musings of the old man 111130

8/3/2019 Musings of the Old Man 111130

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Musings of the Old Man

This is simply intended to be a set of observations and speculations on a variety of topics. Insome cases this is because it is difficult to acquire the facts related to the topic, in other casesthe subject involves problems that are not likely to be resolved, and finally there are some

observations that raise some unpleasant questions about some topics. I thought about callingthis rants instead of musings, but honestly at this point I just feel more sad than angry.What Im going to cover here is probably going to hit a nerve with a lot of people, mostlybecause it is something that they normally dont want to discuss or think about. In fact, by thetime I'm done with this I wouldn't be surprised if one thing or another in this material hit anerve with pretty much everyone.

So, what are you going to do about it?

The title for this section came from a comment that my wife had said to me a number of times

over the past few decades when I was talking about the problems in our society and countrywhich I felt would eventually lead to some kind of major crisis. Each time she said that itwould irritate me at the time because I felt that she was saying that because she didn't wantto seriously consider the issues herself, but there was a valid point to her question. If you arecritical of issues that you think are going to lead to major problems and you aren't going to doanything about them you probably aren't much better than those who don't even think throughthe issues. It is easy to be critical, but it is much more difficult to come up with solutions. Isuppose my short answer to the question is Nothing, at least in regard to solving the largescale problems.

When you first consider the issues and what it would take to correct them you run into the

issue that you would have to change people, and not just a few, but basically the entirepopulation, in order to successfully make the changes. I see two problems with trying tochange the attitudes of a population. One is that most people that have some kind of habit (forlack of a better word) that they would have to give up, they really don't want to give up thathabit, and they are usually quick to come up with some kind of excuse for why they can't giveup the habit or that the habit is somehow acceptable. The other problem is that there wouldbe some people that would actively oppose any change from the way things are currentlybeing done because they have no intention of changing anything, usually because they havea vested interest in keeping things the way they currently are for as long as they can. Even ifthese people only represented a relatively small part of the population they can more easilyinfluence the rest of the population not to change than what you will be able to persuade to

change. Inertia seems to apply to people, individuals and groups, as much as it does to mass.

In order to illustrate this issue I'm going to use the blood for oil concept that I have seenposted a number of times on the internet. Usually the blood for oil argument is that weshouldn't be going to war over oil, and generally the follow-up option that they offer is that wehave our own resources, enough to last a certain number of years. The reasoning is faulty fora number of reasons. The most important reason is that the oil is a finite resource andeventually it will be gone, but before it is completely gone it will become more difficult anddangerous to obtain even if there are no wars over the supply. It appears that the people who


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suggest that we just go using a domestic source for oil are only wanting to buy time so thathopefully they will no longer be around when it finally becomes a major problem. I suppose ifthey have thought much about the issue at all they would have to be thinking like thepoliticians concerning the deficits that the government has run up over many decades they're just hoping that they will no longer be in office when it becomes a crisis. There arealso people who want to drive a big gas guzzler or continue using petroleum in the same way

as we have for decades and they don't seem to care as long as the fuel doesn't cost too muchand they aren't the ones who are going off to war. None of these people seem interested inlooking for a permanent solution in addressing the issue, perhaps because they areconcerned that it may create a situation that is less convenient to them, or they are countingon no longer being around when the current methods can not be continued.

That is just one issue, and the explanation doesn't include the other elements of our economy,society, and politics that would directly and indirectly come into play. I don't see anyone beingable to make the drastic changes necessary to fix all the problems before they come togetheras a major crisis. If you can't change the population you have to change yourself and perhapsinfluence some other individuals so that a least a few will make changes so that they canmore easily adapt to what is likely to happen.

I mentioned in another writing on how we got to this situation and where we were headed. Wecould expect either a sudden or gradual degradation of infrastructure and services. In additionto that I should add that there is a distinct possibility of natural disasters and acts of war orterrorism. This really shouldn't be a surprise because it has happened many times throughhistory and is currently taking place in some countries at the present time. The sad part is thatwhen you've had history classes they are almost invariably focused on names, dates, andpushing whatever the current spin on events the political environment is advocating none ofwhich covers what actually happened and the causes that led to those events. Apparentlyacademics are more interested in an elite few in the course of history than they are in thepopulation masses. You hear about empires and countries that fall and what happened to theleaders, but very little about the masses and how those who survived managed to do so. Howcommon people survived in past calamities is not typically covered in most classes and thatinformation has to be obtained by more indirect methods.

What you can do for yourself

The place to start is your immediate situation. There are things that can happen at thepresent time that you are more likely to experience than something that might happen in the

future. These are things that you hear about frequently or you have already experiencedyourself. These things are what you should prepare for first. They may sound off topic, butthese things do fit into the bigger picture. If someone is not preparing for common problemsthere is not much of a chance that they will be motivated to spend the time and resources toprepare for something that they may not be convinced that they may experience.

Let's start with home fires. They are common and you can prepare for them relatively easilyand inexpensively. The first two things you should do is get yourself one or more smokedetectors and go through your home and reduce or remove existing fire hazards. If you are


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unfamiliar with what things are fire hazards there are multiple local sources that can help,including people from the fire department. The third thing to do is plan how to leave thebuilding if it is on fire and teach your children to do so as well. The same people who caninform you on fire hazards can give information on this topic as well. You should have adesignated place outside the home where everyone can gather so you can make sureeveryone got out safely. Finally there is the subject of fire extinguishers, and it is a more

complicated issue. A small fire extinguisher in the cooking area and in the area of your homeheating unit would probably be a good idea as long as you know how to use a fireextinguisher correctly, have it stored in a convenient location that you would be able to accessin case of a fire, and have enough sense to know to call the fire department and get out of thebuilding if you can not manage the situation yourself.

Now let's look at what you can do about accidental injuries around the home. This is actuallymore likely to happen than fires, but it will require more preparation. Learning enough first aidto know what to do is the most important thing to do, and it is critical to learn the basics beforeyou need to use those skills. Trying to read a manual while someone is bleeding is not goingto be good. Read and practice before you need to do it. After the basics you should considerbeing trained on CPR procedures. Having a few basic items for first aid is more importantthan waiting until you can get a more elaborate kit. If you have the things you need for smallcuts and burns, which are the most common, you can improvise for larger injuries. Cleanfabric can be used for bandages and a variety of things can be used for a splint inemergencies.

It starts getting complicated when you start talking about traveling, and I'm referring to thetype of traveling that we do daily. People in urban areas may use mass transit, while people inrural areas generally have no mass transit available and use personal vehicles.I'm going to cover routine rural travel first since I'm more familiar with it. The first thing to do

is dress for the weather because something may happen and you may need to walk somedistance, and you should have a cell phone if they can be used in your area. Along with thatyou should have a Walk Home Kit, which I need to explain. If you are unable to use yourvehicle to get to your destination and it is not safe to stay with your vehicle you may need towalk to some destination. For myself that destination would be my home in mostcircumstances. The walk home kit is simply enough stuff that in addition to the clothing thatyour are wearing you can walk home. At a minimum this should include whatever clothingarticles that you are not currently wearing that you would need for the current weather, a lightsource (in case you need this at night), and a map of the area. You could upgrade to a fullBug Out Kit, but that is probably excessive unless conditions are such that you may actuallyneed that. Leaving your vehicle and walking in bad weather is usually not the course of actionyou should take unless it is unsafe to stay with your vehicle. Your vehicle would probablyprotect you from most weather, if it is intact and doesn't present a risk because of fire or flood.If your vehicle is immobilized because of a mechanical or weather related problem you canuse a cell phone to call someone for help, if you have a cell phone that you can use, but it isnot advisable to call 911 unless it is actually an emergency. If you are waiting for help it is alsobetter to stay with your vehicle in most circumstances because it is easier to find a vehiclethan it is to find a person, especially if the person isn't on or near the roadway.In addition to your walk home kit your vehicle should have a good spare tire and adequate

tools, including wheel chocks (which are not typically supplied from the manufacturer), tochange a flat. It is a good idea to practice changing a tire so you are certain that you haveeverything you need and know how to use them. In snow areas you probably would want to


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have a small shovel as well. The folding camp type seem to work well for removing snowaround the wheels enough to get moving again. Having extra tools to do repairs is probablynot necessarily a good idea on newer vehicles unless you know how to do the repairs and aregoing to have a quantity of spare parts on hand as well.As final items to go with your travel kit you probably should have water, something to eat,

and a blanket. If you're stuck with you vehicle for a while they should make you more

comfortable. In the winter the blanket would help you conserve heat and during the summer itcan be used to make shade.I can't offer much for those in an urban environment if they are using mass transit. I would

suppose that the walk home kit would apply to them as well. If you're using a personal vehiclemost of the stuff for the rural commuters would probably apply to you as well.

The things I've already listed are pretty minimal things that you can do for yourself. If you areunwilling or unable to do that much it isn't likely that you would do more to help yourself. Itreally wouldn't matter why you aren't doing those things maybe you don't think it's cool (orwhatever the current buzzword is for being fashionable), maybe you spent too much for yourbig screen television and high end electronics (or whatever else you made a priority for yourresources) so you don't think you can afford to put that kind of resources into something else,maybe you don't want to spend the time to actually learn these skills, or maybe you reallycan't pull up the resources to do these things. If you can't or won't do the simple things youwill not do the things that are more difficult.I've already mentioned the basics of fire safety, first aid and traveling, so now we need to

look at other things you need to consider. At this point I'm going to cover a couple of situationsthat may be more difficult to handle. I'm going to leave it to you to work out your own detailsfor a couple of reasons. One reason is that everyone's specific personality, circumstances,and potential problems are different, so what you can and should do are probably differentthan what it would be for someone else. The second reason is that you personally have tothink through all the possibilities of what you may face and need to do, and then decide whatyou are going to do to prepare, if anything.

The first situation that I want to describe is a disruption as a result of utilities being down,bad weather, or civil disorder. Locally when we've had power outages there are peoplearound who leave their homes to stay with friends or relatives that still have power, which isprobably a good thing to do if the situation allows that. Unless you feel your home is at riskyou may be as well off to shelter in place - basically stay at home until the situationnormalizes. You can only do this comfortably if you are prepared for it. You've undoubtedlyhave heard of the 72 hour kit, and this would be one of the situations where it would comeinto play. Usually these disruptions only last three days or less, which is probably where theycame up with the idea for a 72 hour kit. While you are sheltering in place you would be able aaccess equipment and supplies that you normally wouldn't be able to carry around with you.You could have a camp stove to cook food and you could have enough staples (foods likebeans and rice) to last for a couple of weeks fairly easily. Water would be the biggest concernif the disruption goes on for an extended period of time. If you have a 50 gallon water heaterthat should be enough water for five people for ten days if you are frugal with your water.Keep some drinks in individual containers in case you do need to leave your home before thedisruption is over.Camping equipment can be relatively inexpensive and can be very useful for sheltering in

place. If temperatures get below freezing for an extended period of time you should also


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consider a kerosine or propane heater that is designed for indoor use. Kerosine and propaneare both fuels that store easily for an extended period of time and you can get heating,lighting, and cooking appliances for either fuel. Coleman fuel type stoves and lanterns workvery well and the fuel stores well, but I'm not familiar with any Coleman fuel type heaters thatare safe to use in an enclosed space. I would advise that you should have good ventilation ifyou are using kerosine or propane fueled equipment as well.

If you have refrigerated or frozen food you need to plan on how to deal with the possible lossof power. If the power goes out and the temperature outside is below freezing it is a mixedblessing you can put your refrigerated food outside and keep it cold, but you have to heatthe house. Keep in mind that if you put food outside to keep it cold you need to put it in acontainer that will keep out animals. This could be in a vehicle if you're not going to be drivingaround, a camping cooler, a metal trash can, a crate, a barrel, or any of several other types ofcontainers. If it is warm outside you need to try to keep the food as cool as possible for aslong as possible. If you have a chest type freezer make a habit of filling the unused areas ofthe freezer with ice in large containers, like milk jugs. This helps in two ways to keep the foodcooler longer. One is the ice will help keep the food cold just like when you use ice in a cooler.The other is that there is less air space in the freezer for heat exchange by convection. Oneadvantage of a chest type freezer over an upright freezer is that with a chest type freezer youdon't dump out all the cold air every time you open the door. A fully loaded chest type freezermay keep food frozen for more than two days without power, depending on the specificcircumstances. The food in the refrigerator can be transferred to a camping cooler andconsumed before it spoils. The problem with the refrigerator is that each time you open thedoor the cold air will tend to drain out and be replaced by warmer air from the room.If there is a situation in which you can't shelter in place you will have to evacuate, either with

government assistance or on your own. This is where the Bug Out Kit or 72 hour kit comesinto play. The problem with these is that the three gallons of water they suggest you shouldhave adds about 24 pounds to the weight of the pack and there isn't any way to reduce threegallons of water into a smaller volume or weight. In order to minimize the weight and volumetry to use food that isn't in cans and the rest of your items should be as small and lightweightas possible but still practical to use. I'm not going to cover what you should put into your kitbecause there are many other sources that give that information.If you are being evacuated by the government they undoubtedly have a destination to which

you will be sent, and hopefully there are already supplies at that location or on their waythere. If you are heading out on your own you need to have decided upon a destination beforeyou leave. If you are heading to the home of a relative or friend outside of the area they mayalready have supplies on hand or available, but if you are headed to some other location youneed to either have supplies cached at that location or the ability to resupply after you arrive.Anyone who evacuates from a bad situation in one area and goes to a different locationwithout supplies available has only traded one bad situation for a different bad situation.Adverse situations bring out the best and the worst in people. In these situations there are

people who are trying to help others and there are people who will try to take advantage ofothers. There are people who have opened their homes to strangers that been displaced bynatural disasters and there are people who have had their homes or businesses looted inareas that have had natural disasters. Based on post-hurricane events in Florida and the Gulfareas over the past couple of decades it is safe to say that the people who are looters maycome from any income or ethnic group and these are not people who are just looking for foodand water. How you decide to keep yourself from harm or protect your property needs to beconsidered well ahead of time because whatever method you choose will have its ownconsequences.


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The next general category is similar to the previous description of an area-wide disruption,but one that would last much longer, possibly weeks, months, or even years. So far I've onlywritten about adverse situations that are temporary, the mindset of most people under thesecircumstances is that eventually everything will be returned to normal. Even as they sit in the

darkness of their homes, alongside strangers in a community shelter, or in the home of afriend or relative they are thinking that flood waters will recede, power will be restored, homeswill be rebuilt, and life will go back to much the way it was. That is not always how it turns out.Sometimes the power does not come back on, sometimes the displaced people aren'tallowed to return to their homes, and sometimes things don't go back to the way they were.There have been times in history, past and recent, that these things have happened. Thereare examples that exist at the present time of people who live in homes that used to haveelectricity, running water, and working sewers and they have none of those things now, orthey are only available intermittently. There are also people who worked at jobs in localbusinesses for generations and now those jobs are gone, and they quite possibly may begone permanently. The examples that I have in mind are not in the United States, but there isnothing that says that they couldn't happen in the United States.Just because you possess the trinkets of technology doesn't mean that you have the

knowledge or ability to create or maintain that level of technology yourself. That is one of thedubious effects of a consumer economy, and once the support for that technology is takenaway the consumer does not have the knowledge or means to recreate or repair thetechnology. The people in the examples I gave in the previous paragraph were predominatelyunskilled labor, or end users and when those who were responsible for the creation anddistribution of the technology were removed the standard of living plummeted. If you checkout world news or history going back a few decades you can probably figure out whichcountries I was using for examples.Some people think that changing their lifestyle so that is more self-sufficient is the solution.

In some ways that may be correct, but not in the ways that most people seem to think, and itdoesn't solve all the issues. If you are doing this alone or as a small family you would not beable to have a completely self-sufficient lifestyle unless it was a subsistence lifestyle muchlike the indigenous people in many parts of the world. In order to have a higher standard ofliving, whether it is sustainable or not, you need to have enough people that you can havespecialists people to grow food, people to smelt metal, people to turn the metal into usablegoods, people to make clothing, and many more. If you are dependent upon a number ofother people you are not self-sufficient. Ideally the solution would be a sustainable lifestyle,living in a manner that not only you but many generations to come could live without depletingthe resources available.

Back to the Land

At the present time there seems to more interest in going back to the land than there hasbeen since the 1970's. That probably shouldn't be much of a surprise considering the largerconcerns about the world economy, politics, food, and water. Some people see moving intothe country as a way of creating a more stable lifestyle, and that is probably true, but I doubt ifmost people actually see the big picture of what this stable lifestyle may involve.Back in the early 1970's there was a general back to the land movement, which was


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predominately people from an urban or suburban environment moving out into the country fora simpler lifestyle that was more self-sufficient than the way that they had been living. Someof the people who tried the back to the land activity stayed, but many decided that it wasn'twhat they really wanted to do and they went back to their towns. Some of those who hadgone into the country and stayed simply took their suburban lifestyle into the country,andthere were very few who actually made major efforts to try to become more self-sufficient and

continued to live that way. I'm not critical of those who made the effort to try to be more self-sufficient and gave it up at least they tried. Even being moderately more self-sufficient thanthe general population takes additional physical effort and there has to be something thatmotivates you to keep on trying to do what you think needs to be done. There are other oldpeople still around who remember how they lived in the country before electricity and carswere more common common than kerosine lamps and horses. For the most part they livemore comfortably now than they did well over a half century ago, and some of the ones Iknow have commented that they really wouldn't want to go back to living the pre-electriclifestyle.Basically I'm trying to warn off those who want to be part of some kind of back to the land

movement in the 2010's and have no idea what it will involve. It is a lot of physical work thatthe typical couch potato is not going to be used to doing, and if you are wanting to get out inthe country because you expect societal collapse to happen within a matter of weeks are youstill going to be motivated if the collapse doesn't come for another 20 years? I had anticipateda major economic crisis over 20 years ago, and I thought it was imminent, but that really didn'tcome to being anything near a crisis until 2007. I'm out in the country because it was the life Ilearned as I was growing up and I was disappointed in the urban life that I tried to live for afew years. Traditional country and urban lifestyles are different worlds. Most of the youngpeople that I see living in the country live an suburbanite lifestyle, and they depend uponoutside support as much as people who live in the suburbs. When there is some kind ofdifficulty, regardless of whether it is because the power grid is down, the water utility isunsafe, or bad weather they are completely unprepared to deal with it.I can't say with any certainty which people would successfully make a transition to a more

sustainable lifestyle in the country. In my opinion the people who successfully make thetransition from a suburbanite lifestyle would have to have the initiative to make the move; theywould have to have the motivation to continue to work to set up the lifestyle,which issomething that may take years; and they would have to have the intelligence to realize thattheir preconceived notions may be wrong, be willing to learn ways to actually make thingswork, and be willing to continue putting out the physical and mental effort to keep it allworking. If you can't stay on a diet, give up smoking, keep yourself on an exercise regimen, orsome other task you have picked for yourself in the past you will have a difficult time with atask that is going to involve more of your time, effort, and resources.I'm not going to give any details on living in the country because there have been many

books published on the subject, some of which are better than others, but there is one thingthat few of them even mention your relationship with your neighbors. There are manyfamilies that have been living in the country for generations, and most of them are friendlyenough but they are usually protective of their property and what other people do on theirproperty. When I was growing up it was common courtesy to ask before going on someoneelse's property, especially if you were going to be hunting or fishing, and if you got any gameor fish to offer some to the property owner.One of the things that many of the suburbanites seem to bring out to the country is an

attitude that their property lines are important and other people's property lines are notimportant, especially when it comes to using off-road vehicles. This kind of situation often gets


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ugly, sometimes it gets violent, and I've heard of a few cases where it has been lethal. Thesituation can escalate fairly rapidly no trespassing signs are ignored or torn down, barriersare removed, and sometimes it escalates to booby-traps and firearms. I don't have anythingin particular against someone having off-road vehicles as long as they are being used on theirown property or are using them on someone else's property with permission. At one periodwhile my children were growing up they were interested in riding trail bikes. I selected areas

on my property where they could ride and made sure that they wore safety gear. The onlyproblem that came from doing that was that in one area the trail they used was eroding badlyand I had to struggle to keep the area from turning into a large gulley. It took me several yearsto get that area stabilized. I've noticed some of the other people currently living in the areahave built trails for four-wheelers, and these trails seem to have built with heavy equipment a small bulldozer, skid steer loader or something of that sort. I figure that it is their property,and if they had access to heavy equipment it shouldn't be a problem to fix things if their four-wheeler track becomes a problem. There are other problems that are related to the users ofoff-road vehicles addition to the erosion issue. Whether it is all the off-road vehicle users ornot, there are at least some of these people who seem to have no respect for what they do tosomeone else's property. They tend to tear up plants and ground in their play and many ofthem leave trash lying around. If they are caught on the property without permission by theowner these off-road equipment operators seem to have the attitude that they have some kindof right to do this, and this isn't just some hearsay that I've heard from other people I'veconfronted trespassers on my property and have gotten that type of response. It appears thatthe concept that someone that has spent their own money to buy ground and pays the taxeson that ground might take offense if you are tearing up the property with your off-roadequipment doesnt cross their mind. They seem to think that if they bought or built some kindof off-road equipment they should be able to go wherever they want. My personal opinion isthat if you have bought that type of equipment you should have thought about where you aregoing to use it before you bought it. It seems that law enforcement isn't particularly interestedunless someone is seriously injured or killed, and if someone is injured on your property youare quite likely to be held at least financially responsible even if they were on your propertywithout your permission.There are other concerns that a property owner should consider in addition to the off-road

vehicles. If you have a relatively large property, at least large enough you can't see all theproperty without hiking a bit, there is the very real prospect of poachers or someone trying togrow marijuana somewhere. I've encountered evidence of both on my property, and fromwhat I've read and heard it doesn't seem to be uncommon. (I'd be interested in what the anti-gun advocates would suggest about this. The poachers are obviously armed and those whodeal in drugs are quite probably armed, plus both kinds of people are already intentionallyviolating the law, so would the anti-gun advocates suggest that I should be unarmed in case Irun into one or the other on my property?)

200 MPG Carburetor

The 200 MPG carburetor has become a subject of interest every time the cost of fuel makesa major jump in price. There are all kinds of claims, both supporting and dismissing theconcept plus all kinds of conspiracy theories. My take on it is that there is some truth to itand a lot of exaggerations.I had taken an interest in the 200 MPG carburetor in the late 1970's after the fuel prices went


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up from the oil embargo. There was an enterprising individual who put out a book on thesubject, and one of my co-workers ordered it. The booklet was probably worth the askedprice, but I was a little disappointed. It was largely a collection of copies of patents of what arecollectively known as vapor carburetors, and some general information on the results thatvarious people had gotten, but no detail information on how to build one. I looked for moreinformation and discovered that there were dozens of vapor carburetors patented, which were

based on breaking up liquid gasoline totally into a vapor, often by the application of heat fromthe exhaust system or engine coolant. The original 200 mpg carburetor was used in a ModelA with presumably with no decrease in performance, but something that most people may notknow was that the stock carburetor for a Model A did not have an accelerator pump, it lookeda lot like the updraft carburetor on an Allis Chalmers WD. An accelerator pump is typically apiston pump that was built into the carburetor for no other purpose than to give an extra squirtof fuel into the intake manifold when you rapidly press down on the accelerator pedal. Theextra fuel would give a boost in acceleration, at the expense of fuel economy. Once theaccelerator pump was developed it was put in the carburetors on almost all American-madecars, but tractor carburetors did not typically have an accelerator pump.That detail puts the 200 mpg carburetor in perspective. It is quite plausible that vaporizing

the fuel could give a the Model A high fuel economy without a decrease in performance. Italso could give the conspiracy theories some credibility someone would be likely to buy (orsteal) such an item, but when they found out that this new carburetor doesn't give theacceleration that the market has been conditioned to expect it would become a dead project.Even the electronic fuel injection systems had to take that into consideration. The first car thatI ever had with electronic multi-port fuel injection was a 1969 Volkswagen type 3, and thetechnical literature I had on the car indicated that the fuel injection was increased based onsensing the rate at which the accelerator pedal is depressed. I imagine that the throttleposition sensor could be used in a similar manner in the newer cars. Think about the cars andadvertising over the past several decades. When was the last time that you saw any vehiclebeing advertised as not having acceptable acceleration? (crickets chirping) In the same line ofthought, what happened to sales of cars that had a reputation for sluggish acceleration? Afterwe have been exposed to so much consumer marketing, what kind of marketing techniquecould they use to sell economy and efficiency?If you tried to build such a carburetor and put it in a big car with a small block V8 I would

guess that you might get 50 or 60 mpg and I also would guess that you'd have about thesame acceleration as an old farm tractor coming up to speed in road gears. Of course if youreally wanted the economy, and needed a big vehicle like that, you might not mind thesluggish acceleration, but most of our population has been conditioned by advertisements towant certain features in products. Marketing has conditioned our population to think that carsare supposed to give you speed, excitement, prestige, and sex appeal, and trucks aresupposed to offer a display of power, intimidation, and macho despite the wording in thetruck ads that they are supposed to be hauling loads they generally show someone splashingthrough a big mud-hole or some other behavior that would be foolish if you are reallysupposed to be working by hauling a load. Basically for these products and many more youare being sold a fantasy, and it seems to work because many people are spending moneybased on the illusions. I can't even venture to guess how many people have bought big ticketitems of one kind or another based on nothing more than appearances, from the curbappeal of a house to the features and apps available on a phone.Now, for your unasked question of why did I lose interest in the project: After a little

thought the answer is relatively simple. There is a concept that if something is available offthe shelf it is often cheaper in the long run than building it from scratch yourself. If I had


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made such a carburetor for my own vehicle I would also have to service it myself and makeall my own repair parts as well. If I eventually sold the vehicle with this carburetor and itcaught fire and by one means or another caused property damage, injury, or death it is quitepossible that a lawyer would see to it that I would be held liable. I had been working in anindustry that supplied components to automakers, and you would be surprised how oftenwhen there is a fatal accident, major injury, or major property damage that there is a lawsuit

filed against the automobile company and all the companies that made components for thevehicle in question, regardless of whether or not the components were even related to thecause of the accident. If you look at your real transportation needs there are forms oftransportation that are relatively cheap, and if you are commuting relatively short distancesthe options increase fairly quickly. Of course these other modes of transportation may not beas prestigious or offer as much in the lines of creature comforts compared to a big car, butthose are the kinds of things that you need to consider.

What's in a Word?

There are things people do with words to change the effect that they have with the generalpublic. Sometimes it is the choice of words being used and sometimes the meaning of theword is changed. Changing the meaning of a word may be done officially, which is often as aresult of common use, and can be found in a dictionary. Sometimes the meaning is notchanged officially, like Bill Clinton's definition of sex. Personally I have a hard timedetermining where the deception by word definition ends and the outright lies begin theappearance and effects are pretty much the same. Groups often choose words or phrases todepict themselves in a more positive perspective and depict others in more derogatoryphrases.Temperance is one of the words that has changed drastically in the English language. In the

dictionary temperance has two definitions listed. The primary definition is moderation or self-

restraint basically not taking things to an extreme or excess. The second definition is theabstinence of alcohol. Based on the root of the word temperance and the definitions ofseveral of the other words with similar spelling I would venture that the primary definition isthe original. Abstinence of anything is an extreme, not moderation, so the second definitiondoesn't make sense unless the definition was adopted because of common use. I'm guessingthat the abstinence of alcohol definition came into existence during the anti-alcohol movementprior to the enactment of prohibition. The problem with the anti-alcohol movement and therevised definition of temperance is that excessive behavior of other types became sociallyacceptable because of their efforts. They have successfully portrayed the drunkard as a badperson and they have taken the lazy, the glutton, and those with a variety of other vices off thehook.

Usury is an interesting word with all of its definitions related to loaning money. It is also aword that should have some religious connection, but I'll come back to that. In The AmericanHeritage Dictionary of the English Language 1969 there are these definitions for usury: 1.The act or practice of lending money at an exorbitant or illegal rate of interest. 2. Such anexcessive amount of interest. 3. Archaic. The act or practice of lending money at any rate ofinterest. 4. Obsolete. Interest charged or paid on such a loan. Perhaps a newer dictionarymay have a different list of definitions, but that would simply prove the point I'm trying tomake. Even in one dictionary there is evidence that the definition has been changed fromloaning money at interest to loaning money at an exorbitant rate of interest. What is an


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exorbitant rate? Considering that interest rates have gone up and down, does it mean that5% is exorbitant if the regular rate is 4%, or that 18% is exorbitant if the rate had been 4% tenyears earlier? The open definition of the newer definition lets the money lenders pretty muchdo whatever they want, regardless of whether it is the government, a bank, or a loan shark.Remember my comment about a religious connection? The religious connection is as specificas the love of money being the root of all evil. There are specific passages in the Bible that

address usury that would be hard to ignore. In the Old Testament there is a passage that youwill not loan money at interest to your people, and in the New Testament it has a passage thatif you loan money you should do it willingly, and not in the spirit that you will be repaid. (I'mwondering how many know the Bible well enough to know where to find these passages.Perhaps these people should actually read it instead of automatically accepting whatsomeone else says as being the truth.)Unemployed in the dictionary I'm using gives definitions for unemployed as an adjective and

as a noun. As a noun the definition is a person who does not have a job. For many years ourgovernment has given out statistics on the number of people being unemployed being basedsolely on the number of people who were currently filing for unemployment benefits. Peoplewere not counted as unemployed once their unemployment benefits ran out. People onwelfare are also not included in the unemployment statistics, and you will find it very difficult tofind any solid numbers on how many people are collecting welfare. So when the governmentgives a number for how many or what percentage is unemployed you still don't know howmany people are unemployed by dictionary definition. A disturbing trend I observed during therecent economic downturn was the reporting the rate at which new unemployment benefitsapplications were submitted, as opposed to reporting how many were collectingunemployment benefits.Racist in the dictionary gives the definition of someone who believes that their ethnic group

is superior to others. My dictionary must be too old, because the definition seems to havechanged. At the present time it seems that the term racist only applies to the white people,and all the other groups are exempt. Racist also appears to have a second definition of beinganyone who disagrees with a liberal/progressive.Various confrontational groups use different terms to describe themselves and the other

group, and the terms they select for either purpose don't always fit what these groupsrepresent. I'll use the pro-life and pro-choice groups as an example. The pro-life groups andthe pro-choice groups have selected these terms for themselves because the wordingpromotes a more positive view of their position. Based on overall behavior of each side of thecontroversy the most appropriate names would be anti-abortion and pro-abortion. When pro-life advocates resort to violence or killing it would raise a question on where they consider theacceptable boundaries for killing. Likewise, I've considered the pro-choice argument prettyweak considering that unless she's been raped the woman already made at least one choice

although it may not have been a good choice. There is a comment that I heard shortly afterabortion was legalized that might be worth consideration now. I was told that the firstgeneration that grew up with legal abortion will be the first generation that will advocateeuthanasia for the elderly. The reasoning was that when you have been taught to think life ischeap you won't care about someone else's life. The way I see things happening in politicsand healthcare at the present time it has become much more believable that it may happen.


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The Non-Answers

We've all heard them many times in our lives, and you know when you hear them that if youpursue a real answer there will be anger, and quite possibly a fight. When you ask a questionand the reply you get doesn't answer the question it is what I call a non-answer. As often asnot when you ask a question and get a non-answer you have asked a question that makes

someone uncomfortable enough that they want to avoid answering. Sometimes it is becausethey don't know the answer and they have previously been trying to make the impression thatthey are experts on the subject, sometimes you have caught them in a compromisingsituation and are trying to evade the results of their actions, and sometimes they are tired ofdealing with you and are trying to give you a demeaning response in order to discourage you.You may be able to come up with additional reasons for the non-answer, but I've coveredsome of the sources. I've got a few of the common non-answers and some of the situationswhere they are heard.That's different., That's just different, or some other variations. It is always a non-answer,

but sometimes it is just a short answer and another question will give an explanation.Unfortunately in many cases you just exposed the other person's double standard and they

don't want to tell you why that's different.Because. or Because I told you so. I can't even guess how many children have heard this

from a parent. Typically this has been uttered after the parent has been badgered by a childthat wants to do something that the parent doesn't want them to do or the child doesn't wantto do something that the parent does want them to do. Perhaps the parent wants the child totake a bath or go to bed and the child wants to argue about it. It is still a non-answer, but inthis situation the child should comply. There are other circumstances that are not as benign.In these circumstances one person is trying to get another person to do, or not do, somethingand is unable to produce a convincing reason why it should be done, or not done. In thiscircumstance the non-answer is often result of arguing with a fool (something worth lookingup in Proverbs).

I never thought of that. This one is a classic non-answer, often used by politicians, clergy,and others who have a vested interest in not publicly inciting confrontation. Unfortunately ifyou ask the same person about the same topic again much later they supposedly still haven'tthought about it. These people know how to stay in their comfort zone and avoid publiclydoing things that may make them look bad.If you don't know you're just stupid. This is the classic arguing with a fool non-answer

because it successfully combines rage and ridicule. At the best they know the answer butdon't want to tell you. At the worst they don't know the answer, are not willing to admit it, andthey want to insult and ridicule you because you have put them in an awkward situation.Everyone knows that. A non-answer similar to the That's different. because it is always a

non-answer, but sometimes it is just a short answer and another question will give an

explanation.It didn't hurt nothin'. or We were just having a little fun. These non-answers are often usedwhen someone has been caught doing something that they know they shouldn't have beendoing. They didn't answer the question and the phrase is an attempt to play down theimportance of the situation.It's always been done that way. or It's always been done like that. If you are in the

workforce you have undoubtedly heard this in some form or another. Taken out of context itcan be interpreted different ways. If you have made as suggestion to do something a differentway and you have gotten that type of reply it is basically the other person's way of telling you


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that he doesn't like your different idea. Depending on the personalities involved it may or maynot be a good idea to discuss your idea further. Logically your different method may be betteror it may not be better. In practice I've discovered that almost as often as not if you reallythought your idea was good the person who shut you down will present your idea to someoneelse and take credit for it. Having documentation that proves otherwise generally doesn't helpyou unless you are able to get a number of other people that will support you.

It doesn't make any difference. This is sometimes an answer and sometimes a non-answer, depending upon the context of the situation. If you asked someone Do you wantvanilla or chocolate ice cream? it would be an answer, implying that the choice was notcritical. If you had asked someone why they threw trash out of the car window it could be anon-answer unless they really didn't care.The final category is harder to define because what is said depends on the person's

perceived strong suit. I've heard I've got thirty years in the industry! from one person andI've got a MBA! from another. There is a difference between being active in an industry forthirty years and two years experience fifteen times. The education is a similar issue. I'veheard people brag about how they got their degree with a high grade index by underhandedmeans and they will admit they don't remember much from their classes, but they will be thefirst to throw out their education as argument that their point of view is correct. If experience istheir strong suit they will use it, or if education is their strong suit they will use that. If theyactually have the knowledge to support their point of view they can explain, but more often itthe illusion of secret knowledge that helps them hold their position.

Upon What Do You Base Your Values?

The traditional values in the United States were based almost completely on a combinationof the religious and social values that developed in Europe, predominately Englandspecifically. By the mid-twentieth century there was a blending of a number of cultures in the

United States, but it was still predominately Christian and European influenced. In the laterpart of the twentieth century people began to question those values and it appears that manyof the core values were discarded because people felt that they didn't want to follow thosevalues. Being politically correct also meant that you could not use anyone as a good exampleof a bad example because it may offend the individual or group being used as an example.During the 1990's there was some kind of mandate that came down from state level that the

schools should make a point of teaching values to the students. I was a teacher at that timeand a person from the state came to the school and made a presentation to the staff that wewere expected to teach values in our classes to our students, with an implication that theparents and other agencies had largely failed to do so. When he was finished with hispresentation I asked him what we were supposed to use as a basis for the values we were

supposed to teach that wasn't based on religion or a specific ethnic group and was politicallycorrect in all other ways. He didn't have an answer. I'm not sure whether he really hadn'tthought about it before or because he had thought about it and he knew there wasn't ananswer.So it comes back to the original question. Upon what do you base your values? What do you

use to determine whether or not you are a good person? Do you use the same system tojudge others as you do yourself? Would you still be using the same values to judge othersand yourself when you are 80 that you used when you were 20? How would you respond ifother people treated you the way you treated other people?


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The traditional, religion-based values have been ridiculed and largely discarded by many inpractice over the past fifty years. For the most part it appears that people have treated thesevalues like food at a buffet take which items you want and leave the rest. Honesty seems tobe optional, likewise integrity and work ethic are also often left behind.The so-called religious and conservative are supposedly following the general mandates in

the Bible, but in practice they make a big deal about some portions of the Bible and make a

point of ignoring the things that would make them uncomfortable in their lives. The parts aboutthe love of money being the root of all evil, that you should not loan money at interest, that theman who does not provide for his family is worse than an infidel, and the multiple places inthe Bible where the lazy are criticized are generally ignored.The liberals are an interesting group. I have read and I have been told by liberals that they

base their values on their intellectual evaluation. Let me get this straight you're in your earlytwenties and you have learned enough about how individuals and groups behave and howthey influence each other that you can come up with something better than what has beendeveloped over centuries in a variety of cultures. That would be impressive if you couldactually pull it off. Unfortunately what the liberals consider right seems to change drasticallyover a period of a couple of decades. I'll use a couple of well-known liberals as examples Jane Fonda and Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton did the anti-war and anti-government protests back inthe 1960's, and much later became the leader of the same military and government that hehad protested. In case you forgot, Bill got us into military conflict in some nasty placesoverseas. I remember Jane Fonda as doing something during one part of her life and thendoing the opposite later for almost everything for which she is known. During the Vietnam Warshe not only was an anti-war protester she actually went to POW camps in North Vietnam andharassed American prisoners there, but during the first Gulf War she wanted to get in front ofcrowds and wave the American flag. She marched in protest against women being exploitedand she also starred in at least one exploitation film not like she had to, daddy had money.She was down on big business and the ultra-wealthy and then she later married one of thewealthiest men in the country. What kind of values could these people have that would allowthem to do completely opposite things? The only thing that I can guess is that they were doingwhat they thought was cool to do at that point in their lives, and it seems to fit with most ofthe liberals that I have known personally as well. The liberal mindset seems to be that whenyou find something you want to do you rationalize until you come up with something thatwould justify what you want to do, and if you change your mind about what you want to doyou rationalize that is okay also. Oh, something to remember don't even attempt to questiona liberal why they changed their position or why they have some sort of contradictorypositions in their personal life unless you want to start a fight. In that respect the extremeliberals are often more violent than some of the extreme conservatives. Keep in mind that inthis section I'm referring to liberals and conservatives in the political sense instead of theliteral sense.You can say that people can change, but as you get older you will observe that is generally

not the case unless something drastic happens in their life. Sometimes becoming a parent willmake you change, but I've seen just as often that someone doesn't change when theybecome a parent. Something I have observed that often changes people is traumatic injury orlearning that they have a terminal condition, but that may just be desperation.

So, what do you use for the basis of your values? By the time you get past the self esteemand politically correct policies there isn't much left that you are allowed to use to teachyoung people that could pass for values. From what I've seen the warm and fuzzy approachdoesn't work. It seems that those who buy into the warm and fuzzy mindset are routinely


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victimized by others, and there are those who preach that everyone should be warm andfuzzy but in practice they are hypocritical sometimes they are the ones who are victimizingthe people who really did buy into it.How about some of the classic fables and parables? When is the last time you've heard

them being taught to children? Neither The Ant and the Grasshopper or The Little Red Henhave the properties to be politically correct and support self esteem. Parables like The Wise

and Foolish Virgins in addition to the other issues has a connection with religion, whichdefinitely puts it out of public circulation. Even on the rare occasions that it is presented in areligious setting the emphasis is on being prepared for an unknown time of return and theaspects of the wise virgins not sharing with the foolish virgins is avoided.I have my own perspectives on politically correct and self esteem issues. Someone else

may disagree with me, but I would be willing to discuss someone else's views with them.Unfortunately I've been in too many situations where a person is more than willing to questionmy point of view, but if you question their point of view they rapidly deteriorate to anger andname-calling.If politically correct was actually correct they wouldn't have to put the politically modifier

in front of it. It appears that a lot of people in this country prefer deception to hearing anunpleasant truth, or to put it rather bluntly, the truth is not politically correct. So, if politicallycorrect isn't truth, what is being politically correct? At its best, being politically correct is beingdiplomatic, and at its worst it is deception and illusion. Problems can't be solved as long asthe people involved are wrapped up in self-deception or in deceiving others.You really haven't heard much about self esteem in recent years, but several years back it

was the fashionable excuse to explain the poor behavior that some people displayed. Thevarious efforts that were made to improve self esteem for those at risk became sooutlandish that eventually it became parodied so much that it was publicly abandoned. Youstill occasionally hear a few people use the term, although it is usually in a derogatorymanner. In my opinion the best way to get self esteem is to actually do something instead ofhaving someone hand something to you. Unless you are incredibly ignorant or stupid youwould eventually realize that the things given to you don't make you better, but when youhave earned something those things are worth more to you. I've seen this true for evensimple things like tools. I've learned that I could generally tell whether a machinist had boughthis tools or they were given to him by the way he took care of his tools. Those who took careof their tools either had bought them with money they had earned or had been conditioned asthey were growing up to take care of things.

The Bullies

Back in the 1990's Indiana was working on some sort of anti-bullying program to be

implemented in the schools. At the time you could find information on the program on theIndiana Department of Education website. I was a teacher at the time, and as I recall therewas nothing done with the program other than its existence was brought up in a staff meeting.I haven't checked to see if it is still on the website, but I doubt if it is there anymore. I wouldguess that it was like a lot of other programs that were initiated with little or no plans on howto implement them. I honestly doubt that there was any real intention of doing anything aboutthe bullies.I started thinking about the bullying issue again after I ran across a news article about a

student who committed suicide after being bullied, and I remembered some other articles


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about students who were bullied and committed suicide. It seems that all the ones I couldremember happened in the United States or the United Kingdom. I also started going throughmy memories of bullying and similar incidents that I remembered observing as a teacher, aparent, and as a student.Based on what I can remember I would imagine that there are many people who can

remember observing bullying behavior, because in one form or another it seems to be very

prevalent among children and adults. I'm going to throw out some general questions andobservations about bullying characteristics that I've observed and see if I can create someinsight into the how and why this happens.Why are the bullies protected? When they are caught or reported their actions are played

down by the authorities. Perhaps the teachers, administrators, or law enforcement feel thatthey can't do anything or they are simply taking the path of the least resistance. On theother hand, if after extended bullying the bully ends up with retaliation of a similar nature theauthorities seem to be quite willing to pursue action against the retaliating bullying victims.One of the more common statements from the authority in such a circumstance is that theretaliating individuals should have let the authority take care of the situation after theauthority had previously failed to do so. The answer is quite simple really the bullies are partof a privileged group, whether by wealth, family position or status, or by governmententitlement.Why won't the anti-bullying programs work? Another simple answer because the teachers,

administrators, officials, parents, and law enforcement personnel won't do anything about it,sometimes even after serious injury or death. The existing authority figures have alreadycompromised their integrity by supporting the bullies because of pressure from the source ofthe bullies privileged status, and any new authority figures would be put under the same kindof pressure.Unfortunately even revolution or other change in government doesn't guarantee that bullying

won't end after the existing privileged are removed. From what I have seen reported aboutcountries that have had these changes from the mid-twentieth century to the present itappears that the new leaders have often become the core of the new privileged and, basedon news reports from some of those countries, sometimes the top of the hierarchy of a newset of bullies.

Who are the Good Guys, and Why Can't We Find Any of Them inGovernment?

When I was a small child I went with my grandfather into a corn field to check how muchdamage had been done to the crop by animals. I knew what the tracks of cattle looked like,but the tracks I saw were too small for a cow and too pointed for a calf. I asked my

grandfather and he told me that deer had been in the field. He went on to tell me that thetracks were not the only trail left behind, and that cattle would tend to trample more of thecrop as they carelessly wandered the field while deer would try to slip through with a minimumamount of damage. He finished up by saying, You can always tell what kind of animal wentthrough an area by the trail they leave behind, and the same thing is true for people. I didn'tunderstand all of that at the time, but as I got older I understood. I also learned later that thesame thing is written, worded differently, in the Old Testament and the New Testament, plusseveral other cultures have similar sayings. There are also a couple of more contemporarysayings. One is Good people don't do bad things. and the other is Your actions are louder


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than your words.I've already mentioned that different people have different values, which will influence what

they perceive as good or bad. I have issues with people who use double standards for theirvalue set things like it is okay for them to lie to someone else but it is unacceptable forsomeone to lie to them, or use phrases like It's not illegal if you don't get caught. I have littlepatience for those with a double standard and, unfortunately, there seems to be many people

who have a double standard and act accordingly.I've heard the phrase He's not all bad. a number of times over the years in regard to oneindividual or another. Usually the circumstances have been such that it would have beenmore than a little politically incorrect to ask what good the person in question has ever donewhere he personally didn't benefit from it. Many people seem determined to convincethemselves that someone else is different than what their behavior would indicate. Years agowe were visiting friends and it came up in conversation that their daughter was interested in aguy at the same high school who had already gotten six other girls pregnant. The parentswere concerned, but didn't know what to do about it. Rather bluntly, I asked the girl why onearth would she want to be with this guy if he's already gotten these other girls pregnant. Herreply was, But he really loves me! Then I asked her, What do you think he told those othergirls that he hated them? (deer in the headlights look) In another situation there was amotorcycle rider who passed a string of traffic going up a hill on a winding road and went intoa blind turn in the wrong lane and straight into the front of a large SUV. He ended up in theengine compartment and the girl riding with him was bounced off a fender and into brush offthe side of the road. Both died at the scene. The paper quoted the guy's sister in thenewspaper article saying that he was always a safe rider which goes against the descriptionof how the accident took place. There is also the point that there were people who had seenhow he rode his motorcycle around town and the things they had told also would go againstthis guy being a safe rider but we're not supposed to say anything bad about the dead,regardless of how they conducted their lives. If he wants to take risks and get himself killed Ireally don't have a problem with that; I would just prefer that people like that don't take outother people in the process and I really don't need to hear about someone else playing downwhat led to the death. If other people hear that doing stupid things could get you killedperhaps a few might avoid doing those things.So who are the good guys? I may be very opinionated but I think that in order for someone

to be good they would have to have a set of consistent values, which they would use todetermine their behavior and they would expect the same of others. I may not agree withthem, but I could at least respect that much. Unfortunately what I have usually seen is self-indulgent, hypocritical behavior, and double standards, where they will do whatever they wantto do and they would expect better behavior from other people towards them. Ideally therewould be a value system with which everyone would be able to agree, but I wouldn't hold mybreath waiting on that.

Now this will get involved, and it may seem like pointless rambling, but ultimately there is apoint. I want to use small town examples to illustrate what happens on a larger scale. This isfairly long, so bear with me. There are going to be some character sketches of some realpeople.There is an individual who has been a problem for my family for several years. He is a

neighbor to the property that one of my sons purchased. The first time I met him my son and Iwere going around the purchased property and driving in steel T-posts next to the surveymarkers so that they would be easier to find later. He pointed out a pair of additional markersthat he had the surveyors put in that marked out an acre in one corner of the property that we


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had just purchased. The conversation was casual, and he had said something to the effectthat we could come across his property to get to our property, but then he followed thatcomment with but you'll have to walk and stay on the trails that I have made. I remember thespecific words because they were out-of-character from the way that type of conversationnormally runs. It didn't sit well, but I assumed at the time that perhaps he had a paranoidstreak, which would fit with the gate that he had across his driveway. As time went on it was

apparent that he was trying to chase us off the property that we had purchased, and itappeared that he had some influence on at least some of the people working in localgovernment and law enforcement.I had installed a small culvert in a ditch so I could access the south end of the property we

had purchased and almost immediately afterward there was evidence of heavy equipmenttaken onto the culvert and multiple burnouts were done in an apparent attempt to damage theculvert. We suspected the neighbor and eventually caught him doing burnouts on the culvert,but he was off the culvert before we could get a photo. We called the sheriff's office and had adeputy come out to investigate and were told that he couldn't do anything because theneighbor said he didn't do it. I had my son put a parts car on top of the culvert to keep theneighbor off of it and within less than two days the neighbor's wife called in to the sheriff'soffice and had them tow it out as an abandoned vehicle on their property. My son contactedthe sheriff's department to report the car stolen and he was told that the property owner hadcalled and had it removed. It took several hours to convince the sheriff's department that ithad been a false report and had the sheriff's department return the vehicle. After the car wasreturned he installed a silt fence on the outlet end of the culvert. When we later inquired aboutit he first said the electric company, and when we confirmed that was not the case, he said itwas the water utility which had installed the silt fence, which we also confirmed was not thecase. In later documents through his lawyer his story was that he had put the silt fence inplace to keep water and silt from going into his water meter pit, which happened to be uphilland some distance from the culvert. Also after the car was returned by the sheriff'sdepartment the neighbors filed a complaint with the area plan commission about the car beinga junk car, and in violation of an ordinance that had been created just months earlier. As soonas the car was removed to meet the ordinance the burnouts were initiated again. I eventuallyused my tractor to drag a log to place over my culvert and their was even a confrontationduring that effort.I had observed that the neighbor had been developing a trail on my property in the acre that

he had the surveyors mark for him. I informed him I did not want him on my property and hetold me that he would stay off my property, but when I went back later I discovered that hehad removed half a dozen trees in order to improve the trail that he supposedly wasn't goingto be using. I confronted him about it and told him that if he had wanted that acre he couldhave bought it before I bought it. He told me that he wanted the acre, but he didn't want tobuy it and he emphasized the word buy. I knew from that exactly what he had in mind. Ifhe could occupy my property for a long enough period of time he could take ownership of theproperty by adverse possession, and if I couldn't adequately document that I had instructedhim to get off my property he could get away with it. His wife worked in a lawyer's office and Iwas fairly certain that if didn't have the help of a lawyer at that point it would be much moredifficult later. I contacted a lawyer and he suggested that I get a no trespassing court orderand he assured that it would permanently keep the neighbor from taking my property byadverse possession. When the neighbor received the initial paperwork there was anotherconfrontation between us, and I was surprised because it involved his roadway, not the acrewhere he had been building a trail.I did some checking with the previous owners and discovered a very convoluted path that


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had resulted from verbal agreements that had been made by several different people with myneighbor. At the time of my inquiry there were two roadways one was fairly new and onewas the original unimproved county road, which were together until it reached the corner ofmy son's property and were split to separate paths by the time they reached the end of myproperty. There had been a verbal agreement with my neighbor that if the other propertyowners along the road paid for the materials he would use his employer's equipment to put in

a new road which would then be turned over to the county. I had talked to three of the fourother neighbors who had been involved and was told basically the same story. Unfortunatelythe person evaluating the new work determined that the road wasn't up to standard and wouldnot authorize the county to assume responsibility for any part beyond the corner of my son'sproperty. This is a dead end road and my neighbor had put a Private Drive sign at theapproximate location where the county maintenance ended. My neighbor was never given aneasement because in the original arrangement he wouldn't have needed one because itshould have become a county road. Without an easement and without adverse possessionthe neighbor would have to move his driveway about twenty feet west onto the originalroadbed. When confronted about this the neighbor was swore that he had an easement, butshortly afterward had his lawyer attach the previous owners to the no trespassing court orderdemanding that they give him an easement.Eventually the court order was finished and I had the property line on the road side and in-

between the hostile neighbor and I surveyed and marked. I stretched a string between theposts that the surveyors put in and I put additional posts on my side of the string in between.The neighbor came out and raised a fuss and said he was going to pull the posts that I had

just installed he even repeated that while I held a voice recorder up to his face. We calledthe sheriff's department and when the deputies came out they said that they couldn't doanything because the neighbor hadn't done anything yet. The next time that we went out tothe property the posts had been pulled and there were tracks where a skid steer had comefrom the area of the neighbor's house and worked in the area of the posts and returned to thearea of the house. We called out the deputies again; they talked to the neighbor and then toldus that they couldn't do anything because he said he didn't do it. He's still doing annoyingthings, and he's still running equipment a little way across the line in one area, but the mainreason he's been described is because he seems to be the central figure involved in severalinstances of county officials compromising themselves.There are a number of things that I have observed that involved the local sheriff's

department that should raise some questions. Some of the things involved the conflictbetween the hostile neighbor and me and other things were in the local paper. After the issuewith the neighbor had the car towed off my culvert I went to the sheriff's department to get acopy of the run report. The deputy I talked to didn't want to give me a copy until I told him thatthe car belonged to my son and it was towed off my property. I watched him walk to the back,open a file cabinet, pull out a folder, and he was headed back in my direction when anotherdeputy intercepted him and talked to him for a bit. After the other deputy talked to him the firstdeputy put the folder back in the file cabinet and came back to where I was and told me thatthere wasn't any run report. I had been told by a friend who was a deputy in a different countythat they would have been required to make the report, which is why I had gone to get a copy.The fact that the deputies didn't do anything when they were called out after the posts werepulled bothered me. This was the second time they come out on a related issue, and I hadtold them about the voice recording and the machine tracks, but they didn't do much ofanything other than talk to the guy briefly. They also wouldn't do anything about the neighborcontinuing to run on his four-wheeler just about a wheel-width over the property line, aboutlike a pesky child who wants to stick his toe over a line he's told he's not supposed to cross.


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Something that may have been related to the sheriffs department had to do with a tip sent tothe DEA. For some reason the dead end gravel road which the neighbor had installed, whichhad NO OUTLET and Private Drive signs, had a large amount of traffic, much of it fromoutside the area, and I was told by a couple of people with medical background that thehostile neighbors behavior was consistent with long term cocaine use. For some reasonwithin a couple weeks after the tip was sent in the traffic on that road dropped to a small

fraction of what it was previously, and remained that way for several months. It looked likesomeone tipped him off. A couple of the vehicles I saw really stood out as being out of place.One was a low rider that sounded like a power grader dragging in the gravel about a mile inand out. The other was an interesting situation. The hostile neighbor sat in his off-road vehiclein his open gate watching us for an extended period of time, then suddenly drove back to hishouse. A very short while later a white SUV appeared on the road with a white guy and ablack guy in the front seat. They were groomed and dressed conservatively, but if they werebusinessmen they had left the highway, drove a few miles down a narrow paved road, andturned onto a gravel road with a NO OUTLET sign, so it wasnt likely their presence wasunplanned. They drove past the Private Drive sign and a turnaround, and continued untilthey could see the open gate on my neighbors property, and then they turned around on theroad and left.County Assessor's office also disappointed me. The assessed value for our undeveloped

property next to the hostile neighbor was much higher than surrounding properties, includingthe hostile neighbor's property, who was assessed lower than others in the area. I didn't wantto jump to conclusions so I went to the assessor's office for an explanation. When I went intothe assessor's office I laid a voice recorder on the counter and explained that I wanted toknow how they came up with the assessed value for my property, and I was promptly toldthree lies in less than 20 minutes. The first thing she told me is that the assessed value waswhat we paid for it which was completely wrong because we had paid substantially less.Then she said that it was based on the assessed values of the surrounding properties, but Ipointed out that all the surrounding properties were assessed much lower. The property Ihave is ten acres, and when I pointed out an adjacent property of eleven acres she told methat there was a valuation break over ten acres, but when I pointed out the hostile neighbor'sten acre property she told me that if I wanted to contest the assessment I could take it tocourt.You would think that everyone would get the same treatment from the Area Plan

Commission, but that doesn't appear to be the case. When the hostile neighbor filed acomplaint against my son's junk car the person coming out to check had to drive past severalproperties that each had multiple junk cars. We inquired about this and were told by thesecretary that they only respond when someone files a complaint. Were were also told thatthe county ordinances apply to everyone. It turns out that isn't quite the case either theyalso don't always respond to complaints and they also appear to play favorites. We startedfollowing the things happening in the county. In the newspaper there was an article about acomplaint filed against a person with multiple violations of county ordinances. The complaintswere filed against the head of the Area Plan Commission. In a follow up article the personwho file the complaint expressed some regret about filing the complaint, and you didn't haveto read much between the lines to pick up on the idea that someone had put her under somepressure since she filed the complaint. It was also stated in the paper that the secretaryallowed permission for the head of the Area Plan to do those things after the fact. Somethingthat the paper didn't point out is that the permission should have been obtained before the actat an Area Plan Commission meeting and not unilaterally by the secretary. Another item ofcurious interest is that one of the regulations that have been passed in the county is a


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minimum square foot requirement for a house, which is larger than my house was with fourbedrooms and two baths when it was built. Of course you can get permission by requesting avariance, but the question begs how they came up with their required size. I think a cluecomes from something the Area Plan Commission secretary said about wanting to increasethe value of the homes in the county. (Her friend, the head of area plan, to whom she gavespecial permission after a complaint was filed is a realtor.)

The County Commissioners did not do as badly as the others that I've mentioned, but it doesappear to have given in to some influence. I had a number of confrontations with the hostileneighbor in regard to the roadway that he built across the front of my property and he wouldclaim that the road his built was county road or private drive dependent entirely on whichwould be to his advantage at the time so I went to the county commissioners to determinewhere the official county road right of way lay. On the west there was the original roadbed,which is where the neighbor installed a water line after getting an easement to do so from thecommissioners, and on the east there was the road that the neighbor had built that wascentered on the section line and has the neighbors steel gate across it at his property line. Ihad told the commissioners that it really didnt matter to me which one was officially thecounty road, but I wanted it to be determined one to be in one location. It really didnt matterto me because it would be to my advantage either way and it would be to my neighborsdisadvantage either way. If the commissioners declared the original roadbed to still be thecounty road the neighbor would either have to get an easement to drive across my property orgo down the county road and then made a turn past the end of my property to get to the drivehe made at that point. If his road he put in was county road the neighbor would no longer beable to chase me off of it, he couldnt use it as his personal shooting range any more, hewould have to remove his gate from across it, and the neighbor on the west side would beable to use the culvert (which the county had installed) to get to the back part of his propertyon the other side of the ditch although it also meant that the water line was buried on theother neighbor's property without an easement. It took a couple weeks, but thecommissioners declared that the new roadway was the official county road and theyexplained that they selected the new roadway in case they wanted to open up the road againat some point in the future. Less than a year later I heard that the commissioners hadsurrendered the right of way at the neighbors property and they were going to maintain theroad up to the neighbors property line. If they gave up the county road right of way theywould not be able to build a road through there in the future without buying a right of way,which is the same thing they would have had to do if they had declared the old roadbed thecounty road.This is just a set of character snapshots of people in official positions in a rural county, a

small scale version of what has been going on at state and federal levels for many decades.Why these people have done these things doesnt really matter in the big picture. Were they aclique, and just wanted to put down any challenges to their position? Were they directlyinfluenced by the neighbor because he was a friend of theirs, because he intimidated them,because he bribed them, or simply because they felt that giving him his favors was easier forthem because he would stop pestering them? It really doesnt matter, because regardless ofthe reason they have compromised themselves. I was undoubtedly not the first person theyhad dealt with unfairly and I probably wont be the last. These are the types of people that Ihave observed take politically related positions, regardless of what level. They tend tocompromise themselves in order to do favors for others or get things that they want.Personally these people are not a major concern to me because there is a trump card that

will ultimately be played that they can't avoid, but they are incredibly annoying in themeantime. I'll explain a little more about that in Learned From the Other Side.


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You don't only find people who compromise themselves in political positions; you find themin manufacturing, construction, agriculture, medicine, religious organizations, socialorganizations, finance, and retail. (Did I miss some?) I have other local examples.There was a local church leader who colluded with the pastor and the other church leaders

to falsify the results of a congregational vote. I knew this person on a personal basis, and was

extremely upset when I discovered what had taken place. I confronted him with a questionabout it and he gave a defensive non-answer. I knew him well enough that his answerconfirmed what I suspected he had succumbed to pressure from the pastor to announce thevote result that the pastor had wanted.A leader of a local Boy Scout troop basically took steps to make sure that his troop would

win contests, even if he had the change the rules, the contest requirements, or the contestevents after the fact. Without the Boy Scout leader's interference sometimes one troop oranother troop would have, but most of the time the troop that probably would have won wasthe one sponsored by the local LDS church (which is not the one my sons were in, by theway), not the one run by the interfering leader, because the LDS troop would train for thescheduled contests. The opinions I had heard from various scouts themselves is that theydidn't mind if someone else beat them if they actually do better in the contests, but they don'tlike being cheated out of a contest.I could list off many other examples, but you can probably come up with similar examples

from your own community. Larger communities and higher levels of government only magnifythe number of people and the amount of money involved.

Why do we collectively allow this to happen? Are we completely unaware that it ishappening? Are we intimidated by these people? Do we feel like there is nothing we can do?Are we all in our own cliques of people doing favors for each other at the expense of thoseoutside out our group?According to Machiavelli the government of a republic can't become corrupt until the

population is corrupt, and he gave descriptive examples in The Discourses. I havefrequently speculated about whether it could go the other way around, like the chicken or theegg question, but when you think it through it does lean toward corruption in the populationfirst. You might suggest that the government could persuade people to become corrupt, andthat is the basis of why I've speculated about the chicken or the egg issue, but it ultimatelycomes down to people being willing to compromise themselves. If a person was on a strictdiet and something off of the diet was offered to him the person still has to make the choice ofwhether or not to accept what has been offered. If the item appeared attractive enough itwould be more tempting, but still the person has to make the decision. If the person wasforced to take the item it would not be as attractive. That is an oversimplified example, but it isapplicable.

Why don't we have good people in government? The short answer to that is ourselves. Thegeneral population has been voting people into office for decades that they think will do favorsfor us. Campaign promises are famous for their effectiveness in getting people elected andhow well they are (not typically) carried out. Career politicians generally are reelectedbecause they have satisfied the voters' expectations, beat down their competition in somemanner, or some combination of the two. Memories seem to be fairly short, and often faulty inrecollecting what actually happened in the past, so the opinions before elections are largelybased on unreliable memories of just the past few years if someone is bothering to eventhink that much.


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Let's just hypothesize about what would happen if a good person would actually try tomake

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