Been a strange day here

In the local area there have been a series of killings, all unrelated.

In Bonne Terre, a small town of 4000 just Southwest of where I live, there was s Murder Suicide after a young couple decided to break up. The 19 year old woman was attempting to break up with her boyfriend. She had moved in, bring her baby, with her mother and step-father. It began with a chilling 911 call, with a female caller screaming that someone was trying to kick down the door of their duplex. By the time the Chief of Police arrived, a male subject, apparently the boyfriend, was seen running towards a highway. when confronted by other officer responding, the male subject apparently turned the gun on himself. He died at the scene. The 19 year old mother, was gravely wounded, apparently defending her baby, and was pronounced dead at a local hospital. The mother and stepfather died at the scene. Survived was a three year old at the scene and the baby in the car in the driveway where the mother was found. There was also a 10 year old brother of the 19 year old who was at school who also survived.

In another incident, at a funeral of a man in North St. Louis, notorious as gang territory, shots rang out and two people were killed in that incident, with another being left in critical condition in the hospital. The gentleman whose funeral was so rudely interrupted, was the victim of a shooting that at this point remains unsolved. The police escorted the hearse to the cemetery where family members were not permitted to attend.

An Eight Year old boy was shot on the night of the 29th, and was injured but is in the hospital, after the car he was riding in with his father was shot at by unknown assailants. The boy was hit in the back and the father drove to the nearby Juvenile Detention Facility where the boy was then take to a local hospital. Police believe that the father was the target of the shooting due to the fact that he has a long criminal record. The father was also injured, but refused medical treatment.

A man was found shot in the head in Route 66 State Park, a short distance from where I live. A vehicle seen leaving the scene was linked to a standoff at a local comic book store in South St Louis in October where police confronted a man who was being arrested for statutory rape and other charges. The vehicle was last seen leaving the park heading back towards St. Louis.

And last, but not least, on the Illinois side of the river in East St. Louis, a grandmother was strangled in a house where she lived alone. Apparently she surprised an intruder who had broken into her home. There are no suspects.

Everything seems senseless when life is given such value. Petty arguments are settled with firearms. The senselessness of all of this appalls me. This is not a typical day of killing in our area, but is not atypical of any American city. There have been nights of gangland carnage on the Northside, where upwards of ten kids get shot to death in gang turf wars. But this is spread over a large area and affects all demographics and people of color and non-color. A woman defending her child, a senseless argument at a funeral of a man who was gunned down senselessly, a man gunned down for no apparent reason in a place of peace, a young life which was almost taken out and his potential removed from the world and an innocent old woman who was doing nothing more than trying to exist in an apparently insane world. Now I know why one would want to retreat to the mountains to get away from a world of violence.

I am wet.

This from the weather service yesterday:

000
SXUS73 KLSX 250731 CCA
RERSTL

RECORD EVENT REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE ST LOUIS MO
130 AM CST THU NOV 25 2010

...A MAXIMUM DAILY RAINFALL RECORD SET AT ST. LOUIS MO...

A RECORD RAINFALL OF 3.08 INCHES WAS SET AT LAMBERT INTERNATIONAL
AIRPORT IN ST LOUIS MO ON WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 24TH. THE PREVIOUS
RECORD WAS 1.73 INCHES IN 1987.


$$

The Brown "Bailout"

I came across something recently that has troubled me. Knowing something and seeing something are two very different things. There is a new provision in the FAA Authorization Act which will change the way the labor negotiations are conducted for Air Express package companies. Instead of the Federal Railway Labor Act which has been used to govern most airline companies, the provision requires the use of the National Labor Relations Act.

Since Federal Express is primarily a non-union company they have began a campaign to oppose this provision labeling the campaign "Oppose the Brown Bailout." In tiny letters at the bottom of the page, it states that the web page is "brought to you by Fed Ex Express."

UPS is primarily a union company. What Fed Ex apparently objects to is the fact that the bill will according to one article: "language in the House version of the bill that would make it easier for certain FedEx Express workers to form local union bargaining units. It has spent millions on its lobbying effort, as has UPS, which supports the provision." This will benefit not only UPS, but all union based Trucking and shipping companies who use Air Express services.

Fed Ex is using its corporate might to promote what is clearly an anti-union stance which will result in keeping the status quo vis a vie union organization in shipping services. With the new Republican Congress, it is unlikely that the provision will be considered in the lame duck session. Yet, Fed Ex has sponsored a campaign to block this legislation and has apparently been successful.

Another corporation has used its might to cripple union organization and negotiation capacity.

UPS Explains their position here and I have been a little clumsy in explaining it. What I have a problem with is a major corporation campaigning against a provision which allows union organization. Fed Ex functions on a company wide basis as far as union organization is concerned. UPS, since it started as a primarily trucking based company functions as a group of individual Union provisions at each terminal. Fed Ex has none of those limitations.

In the commentary below I can further amplify my opposition to Fed Ex's corporate clout, but it is clear that UPS and Fed Ex are two very different operations.

On the vunerability of Air Cargo

The recent incident about bombs being aboard a UPS cargo plane has brought additional scrutiny to the problem the holes in Air Cargo which might allow a terrorist to get a bomb on a plane. Meanwhile, here in STL, they have been telling us over the boob tube that a Jewish center in Chicago was targeted and was actually sent some cartridges. Apparently they were intercepted in wither England or Dubai. While UPS was featured in the news, a Fed Ex plane was detained in Dubai as well. A couple of UPS planes were detained and searched in the US. Air Cargo has always been a big hole where terrorists can get hold of a plane. There was an incident where a guy shipped himself to DFW on Pilot Air which was a forwarder. I worked in Freight Forwarding for many years and the assumption is that any screening is done by the shipper which has to pass a security check every so often by the TSA. Essentially a forwarder picks up the freight, then transfers it to the best way to get it there at the customers request. that can either be a commercial airline, (like Southwest, American, Delta, Etc) cargo airline (like UPS, Fed Ex, Etc) or through any of a number of Ground companies.

Several years ago, an employee shipped himself in a crate to DFW using Kitty Hawk Airlines which was the major airline we used as a cargo airline. Pilot Air only became suspicious when the guy opened the crate at the destination when he arrived. One only has to remember Fed Ex 705 where a disgruntled Fed Ex Employee flying standby tried to take over his plane by executing the flight crew. (His intention was to crash the aircraft in order to collect on his life insurance so that he would be able to send his kids to college. He was slated to be fired because he had falsified some of his resume when he was hired). It was only recently that all Air Freight slated for shipment on passenger aircraft were subject to the same screening given to luggage. Being out of the industry, I am not sure how this is working out. I know that while we screened our freight well since we shipped for a lot of major companies, it would have been easy to slip something in the freight if one had been a trusted shipper previously shipping with us. I can only hope its much different now.

I worked in Air Cargo for years and while the "trusted shipper" protocol has worked, it has its vulnerabilities. Once one establishes a relationship with a forwarder, one can ship as much as they want without further scrutiny. The onus is on the forwarder to guarantee if the shipment is safe. While it is required that parcels which are on passenger aircraft be screened, the just-in-time nature of forwarding, in which freight arrives sometimes literally just before the plane takes off, allows little time for screening and inspection.

The nature of the packaging leaves little to be desired as well. I have picked up auto shipments where bolts were leaking out of a box that wasn't prepared properly by the forwarder due to a lack of time. I had to wonder if those bolts could have gotten into some vital system on the aircraft, unlikely as it was. This whole system deserves a LOT more scrutiny.

It appears now that this incident is bringing more scrutiny to a recent crash of a UPS 747 in Dubai last month. Before the crash, the pilots, who were the only causalities, reported a fire on board. This may change how the just-in-time screening process is done and may change how freight is handled. It may end up being a boon to the charter industry since many factories cannot abide delays if they can't make a flight due to increased scrutiny.

Cost is going to be the factor that drives this debate. Just to give you an idea, I was asked once to get a bid for a charter flight for a truck frame to California from Louisville to guarantee its arrival. To charter a DC-9 from our contractor that we used the most was $32,000. I had to wonder that every time we were unloading a DC-9 charter for Ford, it was costing them not only the $32,000 they were charged by the Air Charter company, but an additional cost of maybe $3000 to offload and transport the freight to the plant which was on the other side of the airport. How much this will add to the cost of doing business is what will be weighed against the threat to the public. As always with these things, it will probably take a great loss of life before the industry finally hunkers down and allows inspections.

On the vunerability of Air Cargo

The recent incident about bombs being aboard a UPS cargo plane has brought additional scrutiny to the problem the holes in Air Cargo which might allow a terrorist to get a bomb on a plane. Meanwhile, here in STL, they have been telling us over the boob tube that a Jewish center in Chicago was targeted and was actually sent some cartridges. Apparently they were intercepted in wither England or Dubai. While UPS was featured in the news, a Fed Ex plane was detained in Dubai as well. A couple of UPS planes were detained and searched in the US. Air Cargo has always been a big hole where terrorists can get hold of a plane. There was an incident where a guy shipped himself to DFW on Pilot Air which was a forwarder. I worked in Freight Forwarding for many years and the assumption is that any screening is done by the shipper which has to pass a security check every so often by the TSA. Essentially a forwarder picks up the freight, then transfers it to the best way to get it there at the customers request. that can either be a commercial airline, (like Southwest, American, Delta, Etc) cargo airline (like UPS, Fed Ex, Etc) or through any of a number of Ground companies.

Several years ago, an employee shipped himself in a crate to DFW using Kitty Hawk Airlines which was the major airline we used as a cargo airline. Pilot Air only became suspicious when the guy opened the crate at the destination when he arrived. One only has to remember Fed Ex 705 where a disgruntled Fed Ex Employee flying standby tried to take over his plane by executing the flight crew. (His intention was to crash the aircraft in order to collect on his life insurance so that he would be able to send his kids to college. He was slated to be fired because he had falsified some of his resume when he was hired). It was only recently that all Air Freight slated for shipment on passenger aircraft were subject to the same screening given to luggage. Being out of the industry, I am not sure how this is working out. I know that while we screened our freight well since we shipped for a lot of major companies, it would have been easy to slip something in the freight if one had been a trusted shipper previously shipping with us. I can only hope its much different now.

I worked in Air Cargo for years and while the "trusted shipper" protocol has worked, it has its vulnerabilities. Once one establishes a relationship with a forwarder, one can ship as much as they want without further scrutiny. The onus is on the forwarder to guarantee if the shipment is safe. While it is required that parcels which are on passenger aircraft be screened, the just-in-time nature of forwarding, in which freight arrives sometimes literally just before the plane takes off, allows little time for screening and inspection.

The nature of the packaging leaves little to be desired as well. I have picked up auto shipments where bolts were leaking out of a box that wasn't prepared properly by the forwarder due to a lack of time. I had to wonder if those bolts could have gotten into some vital system on the aircraft, unlikely as it was. This whole system deserves a LOT more scrutiny.

It appears now that this incident is bringing more scrutiny to a recent crash of a UPS 747 in Dubai last month. Before the crash, the pilots, who were the only causalities, reported a fire on board. This may change how the just-in-time screening process is done and may change how freight is handled. It may end up being a boon to the charter industry since many factories cannot abide delays if they can't make a flight due to increased scrutiny.

Cost is going to be the factor that drives this debate. Just to give you an idea, I was asked once to get a bid for a charter flight for a truck frame to California from Louisville to guarantee its arrival. To charter a DC-9 from our contractor that we used the most was $32,000. I had to wonder that every time we were unloading a DC-9 charter for Ford, it was costing them not only the $32,000 they were charged by the Air Charter company, but an additional cost of maybe $3000 to offload and transport the freight to the plant which was on the other side of the airport. How much this will add to the cost of doing business is what will be weighed against the threat to the public. As always with these things, it will probably take a great loss of life before the industry finally hunkers down and allows inspections.

Political Ads on my page

I have noticed of late that there has been a number of ads on my Multiply page for political candidates. Among the ones who have appeared are Roy Blunt, Ed Martin, and Christine O'Donnell. I have a feeling that Google keywords these things or since I post that I am from Missouri, they key on the candidates that I am likely to be voting for in the election. Now I detest all these candidates and after having been bombarded with them on my television, I have to have them here too? This isn't right.

Most ads seem to have been sponsored by BIPAC which stands for the Business Industry Political Action Committee which promotes a so-called "prosperity agenda" according to their website. Their board of directors reads like a mid level collection of companies fro lumbering or oil. The VP for "Government Affairs" of Haliburton sits on the board. BIPAC is among the established groups that have benefited from the "Citizens United" ruling which have allowed virtually unlimited monies into the political process, with shadowy groups and individuals contributing large amounts of money to the process without any public disclosure.

Now I commented to Google asking the ad to be removed. I was given several choices so I picked the one I thought appropriate:

This ad contains pornographic, sexual or other adult content.
This ad promotes violence or advocates against an organization, person, or protected group
I don't trust the advertiser to deliver on their claims
This ad appears to violate AdWords policies in other ways

I chose the third one since I don't think any of the advertisers can deliver on any claims.

RIP Paul

Some of you may have been privy to the news concerning Paul the psychic octopus. For the uninitiated, Paul was an ordinary octopus who lived in an aquarium in Germany. He gained international fame and fortune by predicting most of the winners of the World Cup Football (Soccer to those Americans who are quite convinced that game in which a ball thrown in the air is called "football") competition this year. He was a hero of song and story.

Sadly, last night I heard that Paul had finally succumbed to the mortality that will seize us all. Paul passed away last night. Having lived a full life, Paul will best be remembered for his love of the game and his penchant for prediction by eating his dinner.

Rest in Peace, you tentacled prognosticator.