COLUMBUS DAY 2021

 Today, October 12, there was a bit of chill in the air.  

It was way back on this very same day, in 1492 that  Christopher Columbus and his crew of ninety Spanish fishermen, merchants, shipowners in  three, small wooden vessels  landed on a low-lying verdant Island  called Guanahani in the eastern Bahamian islands less than 400 miles off the coast of present day Florida.  That contact between east and, west was an earth shattering watershed global event that spawned unimaginable change in world economics, politics, agriculture, and had inconceivable  impact on world populations and societies.. 

Columbus and his small fleet  departed the Spanish port of Palos in southern Spain on August 3, 1492 (near modern day Huelva ) . The fleet headed southwest, well off the coast of present day Morocco toward the Canary Islands, Spain’s most westerly possessions. They came to harbor on Gomera a smaller though central island of this chain. 

Columbus’ “shake down” cruise from Palos  to Gomera confirmed his opinion regarding  the advantages of smaller vessels capable of exploring coastal areas.  In fact, his ships were not large.  The Nina and Pinta  were caravels respectively of about 50 feet and 70 feet long from bow to stern.  The Santa Maria, the flagship, was a larger, beamier vessel  with a deeper keel.   Allied a “carrack” or “nap” it was a bulky cargo ship of perhaps 100 feet in length.    But the ocean cruise to Gomera revealed a leak in the Pinta and also  reenforced Columbus’ preference for “square” sails which were better suited for down wind sailing, conditioned that would be encountered on the crossing of the Atlantic.    Columbus’ two caravels were rigged  with triangular, “fore and aft” sails (similar in shape to those of a modern sloop).  These were more suitable for coastal sailing and wind conditions more typical of the Mediterranean.  

These  triangular “lateen” sails were useful where  the wind often came “over the beam” or over the starboard or port sides.  Columbus’ many years of wind and weather observations during his long seafaring career Eich took him as far north as the British Hebrides and south to regions off the coast of Africa had given him unique  insights concerning global wind patterns.   He understood the wind conditions he would encounter on the Atlantic crossing wouldd be persistent “following winds”.  They would require a point of sailing called “downwind sailing”  or sailing “off the wind”.  

Thus in Gomera while repairs were in process on the Pinta,  the rigging of the two smaller ships were altered from the  fore and aft triangular or lateen sails to square sails.  Thus from    “caravella lateena” rigged ships they were altered  to “caravella redonda”.  This latter rig would be more effective with winds that Columbus expected  from the east and southeast on his outward passage and also on his return to Spain. 

According to a summary of Columbus’ ship- log, the “shake down” voyage from Palos in Spain to Gomera in the Canary Islands,  a distance of 800 nautical miles, took the fleet ten days. This leg of the  trip was hindered by poor sail plan on the smaller vessels and a leaky rudder post on the Pinta.  The fleet averaged about 80 nautical miles per day,  or about 3.3 knots (nautical miles per hour).  This author calculated the the average speed of about 3.9  knots made by the fleet  on the Atlantic crossing (Gomera to San Salvador) versus only 3.3 knots on the first leg. The fleet ad a significant  indicate a significant increase in speed of  (0.6 knots /3.3 =0.18 or) 18% a increase in speed of nearly 20%.  . Thu# the re.riggin of his fleet to squaecsails may have been the margin that made the difference between success and failure of the first voyage  ( see below) 

Arriving at Gomera on August 12, 1492, the fleet  languished in port for twenty-five days  waiting for repairs to the Pinta,  re-rigging the sail plan of the two smaller vessels, and arrival and storing of needed food, water and supplies. 

 

When all was completed, the small fleet finally left Gomera on September 6, 1492.   But the fleet, was becalmed off-shore, within sight of Hierra, the the most westerly island in the archipelago, until September 8. On that night strong northwesterly winds arose and allowed the fleet finally to depart Las  Canarias

That night Columbus set his course west-southwest across the Atlantic.  The voyage would  take  33 days days .  Columbus’ route took the fleet southwest from the Canary Islands and then west across the Atlantic for about 3,067 nautical miles.  The wooden sailing ships  averaged about 92 nautical miles per day or a speed of 3.9 knots (almost 4 nautical miles per hour)  a good speed, considering the broad, beamy shape of the ship’s hulls  and of the likely growth of seaweed and barnacle on the wetted surfaces of the hulls over the long period of time they were at sea. 

By October 10,  after more than a month of sailing, the men were restive.  (Columbus, using outdated and erroneous estimates of the length of a degree of longitude and the circumference of the earth, had estimated they would encounter the outer islands of  “Chipangu” or “the Indies” in only a month of sailing).  

By early Octoberafter a month of sailing the crew was understandably fearful of running out of water and food, and also began to have  doubts about the success of the voyage.  They demanded Columbus return home.  In an attempt to to allay their fears and perhaps prevent a mutiny, he struck a deal with his men for a few more days of westward sailing, and sweetened it with the promise a silk doublet and an annuity to anyone who first sighted land. 

On October 10 and 11 the there were sightings of land birds and  observations of a green tree branch as well as a bough of “dog rose”  (Rosa cantina?).  On the morning of October 12, a sailor on the Pinta, Rodrigo de Traina, saw land first.  Columbus himself also had  spotted a light the night before—perhaps that from a campfire—dead ahead over the bow..  At dawn with all hands at the rail straining to see the first land of a new world they finally came close enough to make out the form of a low lying island ( later identified as Guanahani ) one of the most easterly islands of the Bahamian archipelago. 

They soon  made landfall on this “salvation  island” which was inhabited  with friendly natives, covered in  verdant vegetation and many “fruit trees”. Columbus called  this place San Salvador—after Christ the Savior —or the island of their salvation!  After landing and taking possession of the island for Spain, they would go on from here to explore the Bahamas, Cuba, and Hispaniola for the next months before changing weather conditions and some disappointment (at not finding the expected great cities of the Great Kahn of the east) drove them to return to Spain.   

That was what happened on October 12, 1492…..a long time ago. Our lives toaday are very very different,  our ideas,  our sensibilities our technology too. So let us not fall into the trap of attempting to evaluate the actions the motivations and the lives  of other humans who lived under very different circumstances so long ago —with our own very modern ideas and concepts.  Ours  too some day will be looked back upon wth scorn. We too have much to answer for.  Let  us try to see their lives and achievements as they may have been received in their own day. 

 

Columbus’ achievement of sailing  southwest, instead of due west to cross the great “Ocean Sea”, his understanding and use of the global wind circulation patterns, which set the model for all other future sailors,  as well as  his three subsequent voyages of discovery would be acts of exceptional  perseverance, courage, and expertise in any age.  He was an outstanding navigator, leader, visionary, and explorer. If only for these achievements,  he should  remembered and celebrated with his special day.  

Some would claim that the “new world” was already known to native Americans who had crossed the Bering land bridge tens of thousands of years before.  Others would point to the voyages of the Vikings in the far north of the new world.  Perhaps in that age, the “age of discovery” some might add that someone else would have attempted a westward passage to reach the east, had Columbus not been successful.  In fact only 27 years later, in 1519 the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan would lead a fleet that would actually circumnavigate the globe. 

But none of these earlier explorers or immigrants had the impact on the western world of the Colombian discoveries. Columbus (unknowingly) discovered a whole new world.  On his return to Spain the news of a “new world” would have the same impact today, if one of our “touring commercial space ships” would return with reports of an encounter with a new planet with unique life forms and environments completely unknown to us in our world   Imagine that, to get a sense of the Colombian discovery. 

So on this chill October date let us put history and its actual significance into meaningful perspective and remember the extraordinary achievements of one extraordinary explorer.: Christopher Columbus.  

BRIAN IS INNOCENT

  Brian Laundrie is innocent—-(until proven guilty).

The golden thread that runs through English and American jurisprudence as our system’s core foundational premise is: the presumption of innocence. (See: John (1st Viscount)  Sankey,1935, in: Wilmington vs DDP ) 

In our juridical system, we are innocent until proven guilty “beyond a reasonable doubt”. 

In the Gabby Petito disappearance and “homicide” case, the nation has fallen prey to a form of mob rule, where prosecution and conviction takes place  in the press, with judgement based on innuendo supported with few or no facts.  Where only a supposition of guilt, leads to a public “trial” by press release..  What is known, at this time, proves nothing about Laundrie’s guilt or innocence. .

Brian has had a warrant issued for his arrest based on very flimsy charges— his possible use of a credit card that is presumed to be the property of Gabby Petito.   But the card’s  ownership and it’s past usage is unknown. It may have been a joint card shared by the couple.  

This person being chased by the FBI, local police, bounty hunters, who is sniffed out by bloodhounds, and has a bounty placed on his capture, has not been convicted of any crime—- and he is very much still presumed innocent. Attempts at arresting him must take into account that fact. The FBI and local police are not tracking down a fleeing convict, escaped criminal or convicted felon, but a citizen who is wanted for questioning, and the use of a credit card that might be his own. Nothing else. 

 

We are still a nation of laws, that protect us all from hysterical mob rule. If we ignore these our most sacred laws  we are all stripped of their protections and we descend into the jungle of injustice and chaos.

“FAR OUT” BIDEN ECONOMICS

BIDEN VOODOO ECONOMICS 

US Press Secretary Psaki::

“President Biden’s $3.5 trillion dollar plan will NOT cost even a dollar……Ahhhhh….I mean  .. ahh to those American taxpayers making less than $400,000 dollars a year.” ( Jen Psaki , WH Press Secretary. October 2921 ) 

Working Stiff 

“But wait, Jen,  I  don’t make $400K a year, but I do work for a guy who earns that much. He’s a  small business owner.  So if he has to pay more taxes, will he cut back my salary?  Or maybe even eliminate my job…I mean fire me?  (You know how it is Jen…a lot of us salaried guys work for these people. You know small businesses make up more than two thirds of our economy. ) 

Press Secretary

“I just said it.  It won’t cost YOU a dollar!….Just focus on all the Biden benefits you WILL get.”

Working Stiff

“But if I get a big pay cut or lose my job, .or inflation makes food so expensive, how will my kids go to college for free, or get free dental care ?”

Press Secretary 

Jen does not respond. She hurriedly leaves podium 

ORIGIN OF COVID AND SUSPICIOUS COVID 19 FURINE CLEAVAGE SITE

 THE SUSPICIOUS FURINE CLEAVAGE SITE

The French paper Le Figaro posted an interesting article yesterday (October 2,  2021) “ SARS Covid-2 la bizarreris genetiique qui ailments le soupcon.”   by V. Bordenave.   The post concerns the suspicious origin of the Covid pandemic virus.  

We know quite well that this virus had it’s  origin in Wuhan, China,  but not much else.  The Chinese have not been forthcoming and there are those in powerful positions here in the USA  who it seems would like to keep a lid on this subject as well.  Such reticence invites suspicions.  To add to the mystery, our so called “free American press” has  shunned the topic  as well. 

Thankfully, Le Figaro’s Vincent Bordenave was not shut down by his editor in Paris, and was able to post this piece on the “bizarre genetics” of the SARS COVID 2 virus—and why its unusual  genetics “nourishes suspicion”. 

Bordenave points out that there is a tiny morsel of the Covid genome  called the “furine cleavage site” which confers upon this pandemic virus the unique capacity to readily infect human epithelial cells.  Such a characteristic is known to occur in other viruses, such as the common flu or grippe virus.  But Bordenave points out that the scientific literature has not reported any other member of the SARS Covid-2 family of viruses with such a site.   

Thus the “ soupçon” or suspicion he writes about is the possibility that someone altered or genetically manipulated the framework of a bat Corona virus (which does not have such a site) and slipped in a furine cleavage site to create a completely new and extremely infectious novel virus— a so called chimeric virus.   This alteration of the genetic patterning of the virus could have occurred as  perhaps the result of “gain of function” research. 

Others, particularly the  prominent elements of the USA medical establishment and of course the Chinese, favor another less likely —“nature did it” —origin for the SARS Covid-2.  These  folks have close connections to Chinese virology labs, cushy government jobs, big offices,  submissive doting staffs, million dollar contracts and well established reputations and careers to protect.  Weighed down with these benefits they are less likely to assess the facts  and come to a valid conclusion. 

So we must look elsewhere for the answer to just how this tragedy occurred  how could we prevent a reoccurrence? 

See: “The genetic structure of SARS Covid-2 does not rule out a laboratory origin”.   R. Segreto  and Y Deigin.  In: Bioessays,  Wiley Blackwell.  Subtitle“: “SARS Cov-2 chimeric structure and furin cleavage site might be the result of genetic manipulation.”

SALMON DECLINE NOT A SIMPLE CLIMATE CHANGE SOLUTION

SALMON DECLINE AND CLIMATE CHANGE

A MORE COMPLICATED STORY THAN WHAT IT FIRST SEEMS

I read today (10/3/21) in the AP News (See:  “Dwindling Alaska salmon leave Yukon River  tribes in crisis” by N Howard and G. Flaccus) that the  state of Alaska Fish and Game has closed subsistence fishing for chum salmon in the Yukon River and elsewhere.  Salmon is  an anadromous  fish that spawn in rivers, then as fingerlings swim out to sea where they mature.  As adults they return to the same river to mate and lay eggs in the very gravel beds where they hatched.  (Only one in one-hundred live long enough to return to lay their eggs.). Chum salmon are a  mainstay species which Native American fishermen have been harvesting and surviving on for years.  The more commercially valuable King and Chinook salmon have been in decline for many years, due to overfishing,  but the chum salmon have been  a staple and standby fish.  Many upriver natives who depend upon the summer run of this species will have no food in their freezers this winter. 

What is the cause?  If you accept stories in the press….it is of course— the catch-all  cause… ”climate warming”. Yes indeed the climate is warming.  The last glacial epoch  ended about 20 thousand years ago.  Glaciers have been retreating and the Earth and its oceans have been warming ever  since.  

No doubt, humans  have intensified and  sped up the natural end of the glacial epoch and warming process by cutting down vast global forests, plowing up the earth, denuding vegetation, and digging up carbon sources which had been long ago removed from the atmosphere by green plants and buried in rocks  for millions of years.  These fossil sources of carbon were mined by humans to generate energy by burning in the air.  In the process, ancient carbon in the form of CO2, a gas which tends to heat the atmosphere,  was added back into the atmosphere, from whence it had been removed eons ago during a much warmer period of earth history. 

But by focusing only on one cause—-“warming”  we tend to ignore the real culprits.  And many powerful forces with financial or political interests would like to keep it that way.  

In regard to the decline in the salmon fishery in both the Atlantic and Pacific,  there are many culprits other than the overused bugaboo of  “ climate warming”.   No one can prove that the tiny fractional heating of the oceans and the atmosphere, as a result of natural earth heating and human-induced warming in the last century can have as much detrimental affect on fish stocks as:  drastic overfishing, offshore trawl netting of salmon, fish lice parasites, pesticide pollution, and physical barriers such as dams and weirs.

In the best on times a salmon’s life is a hazardous one in which only 1% ever get back to spawn in the river where they were raised.  Only a small change in the perilous journey of a salmon can cause great changes in population.  These human caused and environmental effects  perhaps  minor when examined individually, combine in nature as “additive effects” to have a great impact on populations. 

What are the additive effects? Commercial fishing of salmon has grown exponentially in the last decades .  Netting  salmon before they spawn simply reduces the breeding stock.  Offshore ocean trawlers net  thousands of tons of fish as they seek cod, pollock haddock and halibut and other fish. Salmon are taken in the nets as  “ by catch” that  can not be harvested and are dumped overboard.  This clearly  reduces adult salmon that will spawn. . Sea lice infect “farmed salmon” kept in pens in near-shore or estuarine settings.  These farmed fish are vectors for fish parasites such as fish lice and other disease. Wild salmon are often found infested with sea lice which weaken, reduce vitality or breeding success,  or even kill fish.  

There is no need to explain or elaborate on the effects of dams  weirs , or other barriers that make it often impossible for salmon species to complete their life cycle. All of these above effects combine as additive effects  in nature to reduce the success of salmon breeding.  

Salmon decline does not have one cause—-climate warming.  Even if it did, we can not do much to alter the natural process of a closing and warming glacial epoch.  But humans have imposed their own “additive effects” which we can address to modulate the warming.  The Earth will become a warmer planet whatever we do.  It is a natural outcome of our geology, our drifting continents, and other natural earth cycles.   But we can begin a process of global reforestation, probably the most effective method of climate amelioration. We can begin realistically and reasonably reduce the use of carbon fossil fuels. It is also obvious that we must begin to stabilize and reduce our own burgeoning human populations. 

But as for the salmon,  we can help the salmon most by reducing those impacts to its survival which affect it most directly.  We can address the problems of commercial overfishing, of offshore trawlers and by catch, of fish disease, pesticides, pollution and dams, weirs and other fish barriers erected on spawning rivers. 

But that is the more complex answer.  

 

OBAMA: “BIDEN DOESN’T HAVE IT”

 President Obama: “And you know who does not have it, Joe Biden” 

Half of the nation knew Joe,  and agreed with President Obama  in 2020, but he was elected anyway.  Now after a summer of disasters Obama’s negative evaluation has become patently  manifest.

Joe had nearly eight  months of undeserved, slick, glowing, main-stream media coverage to protect his image and bolster his popularity polls— but then  Afghanistan happened to make the ex-president’s evaluation so prescient. .  

Mountainous, desolate Afghanistan,  the infamous  “graveyard of empires and generals” took a terrible  toll on our oldest President. .  Kabul was Joe Biden’s  “Little Bighorn”,  another closing conflict zone, where  an  overconfident, over optimistic, overrated leader foolishly ignoring protocols  stumbled into a battle unprepared,   where he  met ignominious defeat as he sacrificed the lives of his brave troops. 

The deadly, disastrous and poorly planned Afghanistan retreat, shattered our nation’s reputation and  resulted  in the moral stain of leaving Americans behind in Kabul, but also exposed this president’s  vanity, his stubbornness, his penchant for blaming others, his casual and constant prevarication, and his intellectual shortcomings  for all the world to see,  

Subsequent investigations  have revealed  how President Biden  insisted on retreating from  Afghanistan- ”his way” and in “his time”.  This latter insistence was revealed as a plan to generate  a political  vanity photo opportunity to underscore the idea  “Biden ended a  20 year war”.  His vanity plans did not materialize. He  ignored his military advisor’s warnings of danger, which resulted in the deaths of 13 brave American troops, two hundred Afghans, and an innocent family of aid workers and their seven children killed by a drone strike and who we re falsely  claimed to be terrorists .   

As a result of the sheer horror of published images the Biden media supporters were forced to expose the Kabul fiasco and the crisis for what it was—a disaster.   (These images revealed  the horrific scenes of Afghans falling from taxiing airplanes, resistive  mobs and  uncontrolled crowds surging onto the tarmac , suicide bombers blowing up  hundreds, and American retaliation-drone-strikes killing innocent children and aid workers—not terrorists) ,  This exposure  ended the disgraceful “news blackout” by the propaganda press which so well served Biden during the campaign and the president’s first months in office.  The news blackout  hid or underestimated Biden failures and flubs.  

But the Kabul disaster served too as a revealing  insight into Biden presidential character and  behavior.  As former President Obama so well observed— “Don’t underestimate Joe’s ability to (expletive) things up.” And in a remark on who is capable or not to be president. Obama stated:  “And you know who doesn’t have it, Joe Biden” 

Whether it be the chaos and crisis of Kabul, the Covid pandemic, the “vax” mandate,   the disaster at the  southern US border, ten thousands Haitians camped under the Del Rio bridge, or the looming insanity  of a Biden domestic, “fiscally insane” spending and tax  plan—its Kabul de’ja vu all over again.

In each of the  Biden serial disasters ones sees the same lack of presidential patience, poor planning, poor execution, uneven, or lack of  control over subordinates, poor staffing choice of heads of departments, stubborn insistence on vain plans, no thought of long term consequences, and actions seemingly designed  only to prove some point or right some past slight ( to the ex VP) , or for simple presidential self-aggrandizement. But for whatever cause with Joe, all ends in disaster.  

What’s next? A disastrous fall season?

Perhaps more of us should have listened to Obama.  He knew Joe better than all of us. 

ON BIDEN BLAMING UNVAXED, IGNORING ISRAEL AND UNVETTED IMMIGRANTS

President Biden took to the airways yesterday to address the nation regarding  his “Covid Response” (September 10,  2021) It was another divisive speech pitting one citizen group against another.  Rather than helping to solve the nation’s ills his remarks were an embarrassment to himself, his office and the nation by unfairly casting blame on the unvaccinated for the recent dramatic surge of Covid cases.  

Although Biden claims to “support ‘science’ ” this support is often highly selective.  And in this case, while he pushes for government mandated vaccinations,  he ignores the circumstances of  a nation which has followed these protocols ( Biden is attempting to foist on us) yet even fully vaccinated it has become the world’s hotspot of new Covid infections.  

The pandering MS media all  ignore  the blaring example of Israel’s vaccination and Covid surge in the face of its high vaccination rate.    Israel the most vaccinated nation in the world today is also the nation with the highest Covid infection rate. 

The facts of Israel’s high vaccination rate and it’s high Covid infection rate blows a huge hole in Biden’s  argument for mandated vaccinations.   Israel, is a nation with a superb health care system, with an educated and compliant citizenry and is also the center of modern cutting-edge technology.  Israel has rightly been  touted  as the world’s model for health care and  preparedness during this pandemic. 

Last spring that nation inaugurated an early and inclusive vaccination campaign which was a model of effectiveness.  It became the first nation to achieve the desirable goal of having nearly its entire population vaccinated with two shots. It also had instituted an indoor mask mandate and  a so-called “green pass” for  the vaccinated which permitted holders to enter concerts, bars, restaurants and other indoor or congested venues.  As a further precaution, the Naftali Bennet government even initiated a  booster shot program  (jab #3) in July of this year.    Almost two million booster shots have been administered to date —in a nation of 9 million..  As it’s cases declined early in this year it assumed it had achieved “herd immunity”. 

Yet, this week,  the WHO has reported that Israel—the world’s model on how to “get passed” the pandemic by effective inoculations—has unexpectedly become the world’s worst Covid hotspot  with the  highest level of new Covid cases reported per million population of all nations reporting.   Israel reported the world’s highest number of new cases in a week (@ 1,200 per million population ) becoming the world’s most infected “hot spot” for Covid. The Israeli rate is over two times the infection rate of the UK, and  more than that of the USA.    Remarkably, as of September 6, based on  Israel’s high level of infection Sweden (and Portugal) have closed their borders to Israelis attempting  enter. 

So is it fair for our President to blame  the Covid surge in the USA on  the unvaccinated?   While the Biden team ignores “the science” of the Israeli surge, it also ignores the implications of its chaotic open border policy.  The impact on our nation’s health of a million illegal unvaccinated and unvetted  immigrants surging over our southern border, combined with  hundreds of thousands of unvetted, unvaccinated Afghan refugees ( these latter the results of the Biden Administrations poorly planned and executed  retreat from Afghanistan).  All of these immigrants are potential disease vectors.  The Biden team has scattered these folks over the nation in an unplanned secretive fashion where they can pass on Covid and other communicable diseases to American citizens . These Biden policies have an obvious and detrimental  impact on the nation’s health and Covid infection rate, that may exceed the impact of the unvaccinated  American citizens Biden has smeared in his speech. 

The “science” emanating from the Israeli situation seems to suggest that “vaccines may blunt but not defeat” the Delta variant, and there also seems to be  an unexpected waning of protection of the vaccines with time.  That combined with a natural vaccination hesitancy of certain elements of every population all seem to have  contributed to the  surge  in a very highly vaccinated nation like Israel.  But for the USA the surge we are experiencing is compounded and exacerbated by the Biden Administration immigration polices at our southern border and the chaotic immigration of Afghan refugees.

Our President would like you to ignore this “science” and the travails of those good people  in Israel  as he pursues a policy of division and transfer of blame.  From  the Oval Office President Biden slimes and castigates millions of his own citizenry who will now be branded by their “president

” as “the.cause of a continuing pandemic”. These mostly  God fearing, hardworking, patriotic, people who the Democrats like to smear as  a “basket of ignorant  irredeemables” and troglodytes will be now tarred and feathered as  the cause of all of “their” and the nation’s  problems. 

Don’t let these phony socialist-infected Democrat elites who  can’t seem to get anything right, whether it be fair and valid elections, rampaging inflation, foreign policy debacles, uncontrolled  domestic violence, waves of illegals at our border, reasonable and consistent pandemic directives, or even a safe  orderly retreat from a war torn nation. 

God help us all if we do not get these incompetent radicals out of power.