The View From the Outback© 2000 Richard C. Rhodes
A great deal of what we read in newspapers, magazines, and books, and what we see in the movies and on TV is written and produced in New York City or Los Angeles. Much of the "political wisdom" comes from the PR machines of the White House, the Congress, and from the Washington media corps. In short, one might conclude that all knowledge, wisdom, and wit are confined to those who inhabit New York City, Washington DC, or Hollywood. I am now a senior citizen. My experience was gained in many cities in the U.S. and in about 30 foreign countries. That experience has included the U.S. Marines, law school, the ATF, the CIA, Fortune 500 executive, writer, public speaker, educator, editor, and publisher - for openers. For over 20 years, I have written articles off and on for various magazines and newspapers. I've had an enormous number of letters published in major national publications. The Outback is the rural area in Northeast Texas where I have lived for the past 13 years. Every couple of weeks I will attempt to post a new set of musings from the Outback. Some leftover stuff found in a draft file: Click on a Topic to go directly to that topic.
CNN was seeking Soledad O'Brien, of NBC/MSNBC, to come over to the CNN team.
Maybe she has made the jump, I would not know, since I am holding fast to my boycott of any
channel that runs a screen crawl. Soledad has come a long way from when she was a cute and
bubbly host on a computer cable network that morphed into TechTV - out of San Francisco. She
wore black outfits, complete with leather jacket, had short hair, virtually no makeup, and looked
like a biker dike. I wrote her and told her so and suggested that she dress and act like the beautiful
and talented young lady she was. She sure did clean up nicely once somebody with a big
checkbook told her to drop the biker dike image. She was then, and I presume is now, married. So, there was no substance to the dike business, other than her appearance. No wonder Amazon.com was first to offer the Segway balancing scooter to the public. Jeff
Bezos, the boss at Amazon, had about $25 million invested in Segway. It just proves that even
well-educated and successful people make dumb mistakes. Hillary sure got some nice head shots for various publications in connection with her book. I,
who hate her with a passion that is unequaled, downloaded her cover photo on "Der Spiegel," the
German magazine. Acht du liebe! What a sex kitten. It was partly nostalgia. I used to read the ads
in Der Spiegel when I flew on Lufthansa. That was about all the reading of German I could
manage. Ads for cars and soap. My spoken German was passable. An off-duty Lufthansa
stewardess sitting in my aisle, once mistook me for a German, hearing me ask for coffee, etc. in my
nearly perfect accent, "reading" Der Spiegel and all. What an interesting story that turned into. But
... it was all good clean fun. Amazingly, we ended up as passengers and seat mates on several flights. Just an amazing story, which I don't have the inclination to fully share. Other than that she was an incredibly beautiful and educated young lady. Had I not been married, I think the story might have had a different ending. Always the dreamer. First my lady friend died. Now, my dog has died. There is nothing left for me in the Outback.
Desperate to meet someone and get the hell out of the Outback - and this isolation - I joined the
premiere online dating service. I found a photo of one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen.
We had common interests and after a few e-mail exchanges, agreed to meet for lunch in the Dallas
area. The photo she posted online must have been 30 years old - or older. And my guess is that she
also understated her age by nearly 10 years. I had serious trepidation about meeting her, partly
because I had gained some weight. I actually backed out once from arranging a lunch, lest I blow
my one chance at meeting the divine Princess. Has anybody ever sued any of these idiots (and the
online services) for infliction of emotional distress and for fraud? I did not watch the Tony awards, except in between commercials from other shows. Sadly, I
managed to tune in just as the two gay men were kissing each other - on the mouth - on stage and professing
undying love. I got a little sick. They can do what they want behind closed doors, or on the streets
of San Francisco, but that was too much to stomach. Then, Michelle Pawk, accepting an award
said: "Men kissing each other on stage, drag queens, children - it's a perfect world. As it should
be." I'm so proud, I think I'll puke. Now that the Supreme Court has given its blessing to sodomy,
who knows what might take place on the next award show. Quite often I hear someone on the floor of the U.S. House or Senate say that solving a certain
problem will be "a tough road to hoe." It is a "tough row to hoe," as in a row of cotton. The Web site for www.wsu.edu noted that "Out in the cotton patch you have a tough row to hoe. This saying
has nothing to do with road construction." A Google search turned up a lot of wrong uses. On the
Web page for www.herald-dispatch.com for March 17, 2003 was the most humorous misuse.
Headline: "Coal truck bill leaves DOH with tough road to hoe." I tried to "hoe the road" in front of
my house. I will be finished in about Nov., 2006 - and in jail for destroying public property. (See:
www.wsu.edu:8080/~brians/errors/errors.html - many of my favorites are there, including my pet
"hone in.") How can so many supposedly intelligent people in the media incorrectly pronounce Pulitzer, as in
"Pulitzer Prize"? Years ago, as a publisher, I called the Pulitzer division at Columbia and
learned how they answered the phone. It was not "Pew lit zer," or "Pew litz er." It was "Pull it sir." Columbia must have had all they could take. On the Pulitzer Web site (www.pulitzer.org) there is an FAQ. One of the questions is: "How do you pronounce Pulitzer?" Answer: "Pull it sir." Now, you can safely
correct those who insist on calling it the "Pew lit zer Prize." Here is an example of how the media, who have an agenda, rather than simply reporting, can
subtly frame a subject. A headline on an Internet site read: "Master P Arrested For Possession of
Illegal Bullets." Master P was attempting to board an airliner and was caught with six "hollow-
point" bullets, which is a felony. If you consider the headline, you may or might assume that
"hollow-point" bullets are illegal. Loaded cartridges of any kind are illegal to carry on board an
airliner, hollow-point bullet, lead bullet, full-metal jacket bullet, etc. Did many people go into the
local gun store or Wal-Mart and ask: "When did they make hollow-point bullets illegal?" In an earlier Outback, I outlined some steps for doing a full install of Windows XP Home on a
new hard drive. Later, I discovered one large online vendor who offers the "full version" of
Windows XP Home for $93.00, but you have to buy "non-peripheral " hardware to qualify. I
bought a new hard drive and ordered the full version of Win XP Home - for a new computer I am
building. The CD had a sticker on it that said, "With SP1." Finally, I did not have to guess.
Strangely, I got a free 4-pin CD-ROM-to-audio-board cable. They said they had to send the free
cable as part of the agreement with Microsoft to supply the "full" Win XP Home disk. So, I would
presume that you can also order just a CD-ROM or DVD drive and qualify for the full XP Home
Disk. And yes, it installed without interruption on a new hard drive, allowing for on-the-fly
partitioning and formatting of the hard drive during installation. And yes, there were a ton of Win
XP upgrades and security patches at the Windows Upgrade site on the Internet. In a Senate hearing, Rupert Murdoch was defending his potential purchase of the satellite-TV
provider DirecTV. But, several Democrats could not resist getting in their licks about his
FOXNEWS channel and its alleged conservative bias. It was laughable to see a flaming liberal
female Senator from California (Sen. Boxer, I think it was) whining about how one-sided the
coverage is on FOXNEWS. Even if her assertion is true, FOXNEWS is a lone voice in a
cacophony of liberals on ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, NPR, PBS, Washington Post, NY Times, et al.
And talk radio came up in the discussion. Rupert said that if there was an articulate and thoughtful
person of the liberal persuasion, he would be glad to put him on his stations. By the way, for all the
Democratic grousing about the size of Rupert's media "empire," - and foreboding talk about
drowning out opposing views - he noted that he controls only 2.8 % (that's 2 point 8, not 28) of the
media in this country. Recently, I wrote Home Depot inquiring about why my mail-in rebate for $10, which I mailed
in Dec. of 2002, had not arrived. If you have an unresolved complaint with Home Depot, you
might start where I did: Mr. Robert L. Nardelli, CEO I got a letter on May 31st from some peon named Natalie Slade at Home Depot who said they were "in receipt of your letter," and forwarded it to the appropriate department. That department must be "Ignore Idiot Customer Letters Department." Still no rebate check. For ten bucks they are pissing off a pretty good customer. I guess it to too much to think that corporate America will ever say: "We received your letter," instead of "we are in receipt of your letter." I "got" your letter, too - and your number. For a fun and thoughtful article, take a look at: "Confessions of a Nude Beach Bum":
www.home.earthlink.net/~rickhgtx/beachbum.html - on my main Web page. For a long time, I have been noting that the media and the guests on TV talk and news shows
are predominately liberals, mostly from the Eastern seaboard. How conservatism continues to
flourish in such an environment is somewhat of a mystery. In a letter-to-the-editors in the April 24,
2003, issue of the WSJ, Stuart Creque of Moraga, California, put it so well in one sentence: 10. The Cheney heart attack jokes are cruel and tasteless. 9. The lame bit called "Is This Anything?" is perhaps the dumbest in late-night history, but its
inanity is compounded by Letterman's interminable and rambling introduction. Just watch
the girls and shut up - if you absolutely must run the bit. 8. The first two times Stephanie asked the "Survivor" losers: "Did you see or touch any
monkeys?" it was funny. But after about two years, all I can do is wonder where all the
creative talent is in this country? Not working for Dave. 7. We have had about all we can take of Paul Schaffer's dark glasses. 6. I am tired of "Oh, pity me," Dave. About 500,000 people a year have heart bypass surgery,
but you would think he was the only one in history ever to undergo the procedure. And give
it up already about how painful Shingles is. Life's a bitch, then you die. 5. I can take no more of the moronic and cheap shots at President Bush. Does Mr. Letterman
have someone in mind who could have done better in the past couple of years? 4. When was the last time you found any humor in any of the many, many, pathetic bits Dave
does in the "Hello Deli"? The Psychic Sandwich comes to mind. Beat the clock, et al.
Drivel. 3. The "cape thing" with Paul Schaffer is so absurd that I am too embarrassed for all
concerned to watch it. I fast forward it on my equivalent of the TIVO (DishNetwork PVR), as I do a lot of the
interviews with the airheads from Hollywood. 2. Can a man dressed in a Gorilla suit get into a topless bar? Can Spiderman hail a cab in
New York? How many clowns can you get into a coffee shop? And for this people are paid
large salaries? And the show wins awards? Even Dave is amazed about the awards. And the Number One reason NOT to Watch David Letterman: 1. Nadine, the incredibly beautiful blonde "Will It Float?" model, is gone from the show.
Replaced by a black-haired woman with as much charisma as a filing cabinet. Obviously, I have finally heeded my own advice. I quit watching Leno and his group of Hollywood cerebrally-challenged misfits long ago. I find it interesting that Nadine, the blonde model on the Letterman show is gone with no explanation. I wrote one of the producers and suggested that: Nadine and Dave were engaged in hanky-panky and Dave's girlfriend said Nadine had to go; Nadine got a real job; Nadine married an Austrian Prince and moved to Monaco. Surely Nadine is not actually Dave's mysterious live-in girlfriend. Naw, she is way too hot for him. In an earlier Outback, I mentioned how the media so often is wrong when reporting on gun
crime and gun control. Although I missed this gem on CNN (I do not watch CNN, partly because
they run a crawl - but I repeat myself), they came up with the biggest series of lies I have ever
heard of in 30 years of covering the debate - and being part of it as a Federal agent. CNN showed
an AK-47 being fired on semi-auto (one trigger pull for each shot) at cinder blocks. The blocks
were not damaged. Then, the AK47 was switched to full auto and the cinder blocks were destroyed. Two lies.
One, the shooter did not aim at the blocks during the semiauto firing. Two, the discussion was
about continuing the assault weapon ban. The fully-automatic version of the AK47 has nothing to
do with the assault-weapon ban, which relates to semiautomatic weapons. Fully automatic weapons
have been strictly regulated by the Treasury (old BATF) since the days of Al Capone. The lies and misrepresentations were so blatant that CNN was forced to air corrections. Years ago, I got so damn tired of letters-to-the-editor in the
Dallas Morning News that called for the "regulation of fully automatic
weapons that are flooding our streets" that I wrote the editor in charge of letters. I basically chewed
his ass out for continuing to publish such ill-founded letters, especially since I had published
articles in both Dallas papers noting that fully-automatic weapons had been covered by strict laws
since Prohibition days. The editor responded with a promise never to run another letter that called
for the regulation of "automatic weapons." A rare breed, this guy. He actually cared about the truth.
In earlier reports, I noted that during the initial debate on an "assault-weapon ban" (certain
military-style semiautomatic weapons) CBS ran a segment where they showed one of the AK47
type guns that would be regulated. They actually had their stooge fire a fully-automatic version,
which was already covered by Federal law. The idea was to inflame the debate by showing the
"tremendous firepower" of the kinds of weapons to be banned - even though the gun being fired
was already essentially banned under a very old Federal statute. But, the CNN demonstration and
narrative trumps the CBS lie in spades. CNN has set a new bar for lying about gun-control. It
will be hard to top. Is there a "Pull it sir" prize for lying? The "Harvard Heart Letter" had an interesting article about how hard your heart has to work in
hot weather and some tips about keeping cool. (www.health.harvard.edu) On a hot day, your heart beats faster because of a complex rerouting of blood flow. Your heart
may circulate two to four times as much blood each minute as it does on a cool day. Physical
activity causes the muscles to generate 10- to 20 times the heat as resting muscles. The best way to cope with the heat is to be in an air-conditioned environment. Interestingly,
the old idea that a fan will keep you cool is seriously flawed. When the air is the same temperature
as you are (or higher), sitting in front of a fan is about as helpful as sitting in front of a blow
dryer. If there is no air-conditioning available, take a cold shower. Here is the best tip I have ever
seen: put a cold cloth or ice pack under your arm or at your groin. Recently, I was working on
retrieving an air-conditioner filter that got sucked into the lower duct of the unit. I got extremely
overheated. The outside temperature was 98 degrees. I have a couple of flat "refrigerant packs" that
came in a box of cheese or something. I keep them in the freezer and use them to cool a drink
carrier on trips to the store - to transport meat, yogurt, etc. on hot days. I put a thin towel around
one of the ice packs and put it under my armpit and drank a couple of glasses of cold water. In just
a few minutes, I could feel that my body was back to a safe temperature and my heart rate had
dropped considerably. The "refrigerant packs" are sold in sporting goods stores and in places like Wal-Mart. They
are very handy, as pointed out. If you sweat a lot, Gatorade or other electrolyte replenishers can help you maintain the proper
balance of potassium, sodium, and other minerals. Coffee, soft drinks with caffeine (Coke, Dr.
Pepper, Mountain Dew, etc.) and alcohol all contribute to dehydration. Of course, we all know to
drink more water on hot days, but do we do it? Water, water, water on hot days. For decades, we have been told to stay out of the sun from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., to minimize the
risk of sun damage (and possible skin cancer). Here in the Outback, I see many older people
mowing at high noon in 100-degree temperatures. They must have a death wish. These are
probably the same people who smoke. Dark clothing is better at absorbing the harmful UV rays from the sun than light colors. I
always wear a long-sleeve shirt, gloves, a hat, and put sun screen on when I mow. Recently, I
discovered that there is a Chapstick with sun screen. I bought the Chapstick Ultra with an SPF of
30! Once you have had several "pre-cancerous" lesions removed from your arms and face, as I
have, you tend to pay more attention to possible sun damage. Also, one trigger for "cold sores" is
the sun on your lips. I suspect that using the lip balm with an SPF of 30 will help in this area, too.
If you have only about an hour or two of outside work to accomplish, do it early after sunrise
or just before sunset. Your heart will loaf along in comparison to working during the heat of the
day, and you will be exposed to a minimum of damaging rays from the sun. It's a two-fer. If you are a walker, do your walking early or late, or go to an air-conditioned shopping mall or
to Wal-Mart. They welcome you. You might accidently buy something. How did Kirsten manage to stay on the "The Bachelor" until the very end? Her voice would
drive a Screech Owl away - and half of the time I could not understand her. In addition, she
showed her true colors at the end - Bitch. Jen Schefft is great! The best of the reality gals ever.
Please, let this be one of these TV fiascos that actually works out. On the Bachelor website, a poll
indicated that 89.55 % thought Andrew Firestone had found true love with Jen. I hope so. Jen is
moving to San Francisco. The Firestone Winery is in Los Olivos, which is 290 miles away. Unless
Andrew has an office in San Fran, it seems like a bit of bet-hedging for Jen to move to San Fran.
What's up with that? I smell bail out. (I watched about 20 minutes of only the last two episodes
just so I could at least have an opinion. More viewing than that would have been cruel and unusual
punishment.) Am I the only one who notices this? Elsiabeth Rohm, who plays Asst. Dist. Atty. Serena
Southerlyn on NBC's "Law and Order," cannot act. She is horrible. She delivered one line the
other night something like: "Did you put the deposition on the Internet?" All the words had the
same emphasis, or lack of it. At a minimum, she could have said: "Did YOU put the DEPOSITION
on the Internet?" All her lines come out sounding bland and without normal inflections. Even when
she raises her voice to shows anger, there is little inflection - just louder. Cute makes up for a lot in
TV, I guess. Ruben Studdard is the new American Idol. I caught a few songs from each of the three
finalists, just to see what was going on. Ruben looks like he is about one step away from dropping
dead from a heart attack. Clay better stand by in the wings to take over the crown. Clay had his
moments and I would have voted for him, if I had voted. I can't quite figure out what all the hype
is about with Ruben. The black girl, Kimberly Locke, who came in third, is very good. As she
sang "Over the Rainbow," I could see me buying an album of hers if she sang some jazz stuff or
old standards. She may have the best future of the three. She has had no vocal training. Ruben
Studdard studied voice for 3 years or so in college. Watch Kimberly mature when she gets some
training. Watch Ruben sweat. Copies of Windows XP are available on the streets of Karachi, Pakistan for about 70 cents. MS
Office pirated copies sell for about $1.30 for a 3CD set. Microsoft estimates that more than 90
percent of MS software sold in Pakistan is pirated. Two of Microsoft's own people were caught selling software under the counter. And you and I
pay nearly $100 for every copy of XP Home on our computers under the same residential roof. We
are not the problem! Verizon must tell the ID of some downloaders. Until now, the approach has been to pick on
you and me, by threatening to put chips in our computer gear that will make DVDs and some CDs
not playable. Brilliant. This is like the gun-crime approach, which has failed over the decades.
Attack the legitimate gun owners, while it is criminals who use guns who are the problem - and
dealers in illegal guns. Just as we should shut down the illegal peddlers of guns and dope, we
should shut down the wholesale peddlers of copyrighted material. So, forcing Verizon to disclose the name of big downloaders and the industry ads suggesting
that when you download a bunch of songs you also download a list of lawyers is moving in the
right direction. The peer-to-peer geeks are spoiled brats, who were brought up by their permissive
parents to think that the world owed them a living, instead of they owed the world a good day's
work. In the past few months, I unearthed a milk crate full of correspondence in the back of a closet,
and my ex-wife has been sending me documents, certificates, photos, etc. that she has found as she
packed to move. There are a lot of memories in that material. There are letters from a number of famous people, which are all going into the "grandkids
looseleaf binder." There is a "Technical Investigative Aids" diploma from the U.S. Treasury. I actually got a
diploma for attending a school to learn bugging, lock picking, clandestine photography, and covert
opening of envelopes. Our target was the Mafia, which was very strong back then. When I joined
the CIA Technical Services Division, I was told I was only the second guy in the division's history
who had previous experience - and I had a diploma to prove it. A fellow who later became a close
friend, and who was an electrical engineer, signed on and was told that he would be doing
"research." Then one day, somebody asked him how fast he could run and how high could he
jump. That was when they broke the news to him that he would be picking locks and bugging
places. He and I did some amazing lock work throughout Europe, which I think I will pass for now
on describing. If you think you are underpaid, I found a promotion form in which I was promoted as a U.S.
Treasury Criminal Investigator from GS-9 to GS-10. My salary went from $6600 to $6995. No -
not per month. Per year! But, that was back in 1961 when $7000 a year was almost a living wage.
And there was a Meritorious Award from Treasury for an employee suggestion that was adopted. I
got $10! There was a photograph of Manuel Risqeute, a flamenco guitar player who played at a hotel
on the beach north of Barcelona. I convinced him to come to our "casa" one night and he and his
lady dancer gave us a private concert. People were crammed into the living room and standing
outside the open windows. I hung a mike over the ceiling light frame and recorded the affair on a
small German Uher recorder. I still have the tape, but no reel-to-reel recorder on which to listen to
it. I attended a private military school called Breck School for Boys in St. Paul. My report card
was in the mix. My bunkmate (we had upper and lower bunk beds) was Peter Ball, U.S. Sen.
Joseph Ball's son. Joe was eventually beaten by Hubert Humphrey. Peter and I were on the cover
of the Rotogravure section of the St. Paul Sunday paper - in a photo of a fake toboggan spill. I
can't find a copy of that. Rats. You may ponder why anybody with the last name of Ball would
name a son Peter. COPYRIGHT 2000 Richard C. Rhodes You are welcome to quote sections from this page - or the whole page, as long as the source URL is included. Of course, I would be flattered if anyone linked to this page. It is very hard to be the writer, editor, fact checker, copy editor, and publisher of anything. So, I beg your forgiveness for the many mistakes that creep in. Suggested Reading From Past Columns Click Here for Suggested Reading List Archive of Back Issues Media List of Addresses and e-mails Postal Service State Abbreviations, etc. Richard C. Rhodes End |