Heard from a rabid Republican snowbird amigo up near the Delaware coast yesterday that Hurricane Sandy mostly had missed his home on a bay, which vista looks a little like where he lives in the Lower Keys.

===============================

Back in the blackboard jungle, Nick Wright’s letter in  yesterday’s Shame on you, Andy Griffiths – Florida Keys school board candidate post is in The Key West Citizen today:

Incumbent is quick to deflect the blame

A politician doesn’t stay in office 20 years without learning to point the finger of blame. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that the longest tenured politician in Key West was swift in assaulting teacher Mary Maxwell’s opinions. Using the “I’m rubber, you’re glue” defense, the career politician this time decided to:

Blame the teachers! In this letter, the incumbent indicated the teachers are to blame for school finances. After all, the district is broke and those pesky teachers keep demanding that their contract be honored. Clearly, School Board members spend their own money on supplies, and work around the clock to keep the district’s “A” rating while lazy teachers hide in offices all day. But in an election year, with teacher morale as a prime issue, perhaps it would be better to:

Blame the superintendents! In his interview on U.S. 1 Radio, the incumbent indicated that previous superintendents could not be held accountable. While the School Board approves the budget, the incumbent holds no responsibility for embezzlement. Although our School Board member recruited “Carpetbagger” Burke at the Homestead Cracker Barrel, he is not responsible for Burke’s wake of destruction. However, as we have a new superintendent to impress, perhaps it would be better to:

Blame the Recession! In what he describes as “the greatest recession of all time,” the district’s finances have crumbled. State championship teams beg for change and teachers endure unpaid leave. Times are indeed difficult. Although millions were wasted on Marathon Manor, and regulators commandeered his post at Keys Federal, the chairmen of the board can’t be held responsible. … Well surely there is someone else to blame.

Whether he is firing Kathy Reitzel for blowing the whistle, dismissing the Audit and Finance Committee for revealing the truth, hiding from students marching for education or laying off maintenance and cafeteria workers, the School Board’s career politician will be quick to blame your teachers, your neighbors and you! Our children deserve someone who will take responsibility.

Nick Wright

Key West

===============================

Nick wrote to me about what I had attributed to him in yesterday’s Shame on you, Andy Griffiths – Florida Keys school board candidate post:

Thanks for printing my letter this morning Sloan. It was also good to finally speak with you. I would love to fill you in on anything I can of both my saga, and other tidbits accumulated… Fridays are generally the best day for me to meet, as tutoring is slow those days. Not to criticize, but if I might make a few corrections in this morning’s comments… – “this repulsed some of Nick’s students.” – No student ever complained about my teaching methods or content. No student spoke or wrote a negative comment about my teaching during this saga (Possibly the back of some chairs at KWHS share some choice expressions – I was a teacher for nearly a decade). In fact, the only person to speak against my teaching was Ms. Axford – the complainant. – The approval of my firing by the school board was not unanimous. Ron Martin & Robin Smith-Martin voted to allow me to continue teaching. John Dick and Andy Griffiths voted to support Superintendent Burke. Absent from the meeting and listening – occasionally – on the telephone, Duncan Mathewson contradicted his previous statement (that firing was too harsh a punishment) and broke the tie in favor of dismissal. Thanks again Sloan

By the way – I was on the UTM (United Teachers of Monroe) negotiating team up until I was suspended. I was in all meetings with Jara, Kineer, Holly, Leon and Burke when performance pay, race to the top, the state of the budget, etc. were discussed. I was quite clear that the district didn’t have the money to pay for performance pay, and that teachers were going to be labelled greedy for accepting a raise. I raised these issues adamantly in the negotiating sessions, and as acting secretary of UTM, I had minutes written for all meetings on my school computer. Immediately after raising these issues, my computer was seized by Ms. Axford, and the witch-hunt to discredit me began….

=============================

I replied:

Hi, Nick. Very interesting, I did not know you were on the union’s negotiating team, the timing of that with your dismissal also is interesting. Will publish both of yours tomorrow. Apologies to you, and to Robin Smith-Martin and Ron Martin, for writing today that they went along with Burke’s decision to fire you. I was not of the impression any of your students complained in your classes, but at home a few students complained, according to what I recall reading in The Citizen. Please free to add more, if you wish. Sloan =============================

After the school district’s CFO Michael Kinneer told both sides of the contract negotiations that the district didn’t have the money to fund the contract, he did not attend any more bargaining sessions. I wrote a few times before, if the union negotiating team knew the school district didn’t have the money to fund performance pay, why did the union team agree to a contract with performance pay in it? And, I have to ask again, if both sides of the contract negotiations knew the district did not have the money to fund performance pay, why didn’t the school board members know that also? Surely the school board members were hearing how the contract negotiations were going? Surely they were dialed into that drama daily? Apparently not. However, before the school board members ratified the contract, Audit & Finance  Committee member Larry Murray told them that he didn’t see where the money was in the district to fund the contract. There also was the wee matter of the district over-estimating local tax revenues more than a little bit, as the result of the school administration relying on Tallahasse estimates of the school district’s local tax revenues, instead of checking with the county tax collector’s office to see what their estimate of the district’ local tax revenues would be. Larry Murray did check with the local tax collector’s office, like anyone with even 1/10 of a brain would do. The school administration just naturally liked Tallahassee’s higher estimates of the school district’s local tax revenues, because that meant not as much budget-cutting. Ever since, we have been reading all about that multiple financial SNAFU, in which Andy Griffiths was up to his eyeballs despite his campaign rhetoric to the contrary. At candidate forums this year, I heard Andy take full credit for hiring new Superintendent of Schools Mark Porter, but I have yet to hear Andy take full credit for recruiting Joe Burke to replace Randy Acevedo. Joe Burke, whom I heard assured everyone there was enough money to fund the collective bargaining agreement, which time quickly disproved. Thank you, Andy, for talking Joe Burke into being our superintendent of schools.

=============================

In another quadrant of The Asteroid Belt, a person on my email hit list, also a member of Last Stand, wrote to me yesterday:

Sloan, Have not heard your voice lately. You OK? Deb

=============================

My reply:

Hi, Deb Do you mean you have not heard my voice at government meetings? Haven’t attended many lately, other than a couple of school board meetings. I’ve been sounding off at candidate forums, now concluded, although my voice is a bit different and comes and goes after the throat surgery about two months ago to remove most of a benign growth on my vocal left vocal chord. My pen runs off at the mouth daily about this and that, which goes onto the goodmorning websites and you and others receive by email. I suppose after the election next week, the angels will show me where to focus. Meanwhile, I’m scheduled to be on US 1 Radio with Bill Becker this Thursday at 8:55 a.m. I’m going to drive 5 minutes up to the radio station and use a microphone, because there is no telling how my voice will come across in a telephone interview. Maybe I will use yours and mine in tomorrow’s post, to alert other people who have not heard my voice in a while, how they can do that Thursday morning. 5 minutes isn’t much time to cover school district issues, but perhaps a few important points will be made. Hope all okay with you. Sloan

================================

Deb’s reply:

I just wanted to be sure you weren’t ill

================================

My reply:

Well, often I’m in an ill mood, but who wouldn’t be, and ill, too, who stays angel-immersed up to his eyeballs in lovely Keys politics? Yesterday, Naja ze Terribla, according to some, sent me USA’s motion to dismiss in the Federal Court lawsuit filed by Roger Bernstein’s to quiet his company’s title claim to Wisertia Island. Did you see the motion to dismiss yet? If not, here’s the lead-in, which summarizes USA’s position. I wrote back to Naja that it don’t seem USA is rolling over and playing dead.

==========================

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF FLORIDA CASE NO. 12-10072-CIV-MARTINEZ/MCALILEY F.E.B. CORPORATION, Plaintiff, vs. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Defendant. ________________________________________/ DEFENDANT’S MOTION TO DISMISS FOR LACK OF SUBJECT MATTER JURISDICTION

Defendant, United States of America, by and through the undersigned Assistant United States Attorney, hereby moves to dismiss Plaintiff F.E.B. Corporation’s Complaint [D.E. 1] for lack of subject matter jurisdiction pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1); and, in support thereof, states the following:

I. This Action Was Brought Beyond the Quiet Title Act’s 12-Year Statute of Limitations: The Court Lacks Subject Matter Jurisdiction

Plaintiff sues the United States to quiet title to a piece of land located off the coast of Key West, Florida1 pursuant to the Quiet Title Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2409a. Under the Quiet Title Act, the United States waives sovereign immunity to allow a private party to sue only when the party brings the cause of action within twelve years of when the party—or the party’s predecessor in interest—knew or should have known of the claim of the United States.

Where the party  attempts to quiet title after the twelve-year statute of limitations period, the United States has not waived sovereign immunity and the court lacks subject matter jurisdiction over the claim. In the present case, it is undisputed, and the record evidence establishes, that Plaintiff’s predecessors in interest had actual knowledge of the United States’ claim of ownership over the property in question as early as 1951 (and prior to the first purported transfer of ownership). Accordingly, Plaintiff’s claim is well outside the twelve-year statute of limitations, and this Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction over Plaintiff’s purported claim.

1 “The property in dispute constitutes approximately thirty-nine acres of submerged lands, . . . including a spoil island encompassed by the thirty-nine acres of submerged lands known as Wisteria Island or Christmas Island (‘Wisteria Island’), all of which are located northwest of the Island of Key West in Monroe County, Florida.” Complaint [D.E. 1], ¶2 

===========================

If the U.S. District Court rules it does not have jurisdiction, and if that ruling is upheld on appeal, I wonder where Roger Bernstein will be able to try to quiet his title claim to Wisteria Island? If he cannot quiet the title, I don’t see any way he can get Wisteria Island developed. Thus her name, Naja ze Terribla. The angels who kept pushing me to push Naja to keep digging into the history of Wisteria Island’s title probably ought to be called Ze Angels Terribla, for that, and for the way they push me. Sloan

===========================

Deb’s reply: Yup I saw it. Glad you are OK

===========================

OK is relative. I can’t imagine anyone living in my skin feeling OK much of the time. Besides the usual internal commotion, not a day and night pass that the angels don’t do something to turn me upside down and feel the earth is yanked out from under me again. Makes me want to grab beer, run like hell. LOL

Sloan Bashinsky

keysmyhome@hotmail.com

goodmorningfloridakeys.com

goodmorningkeywest.com

Jose Peixoto

is running for

Congress as an

NPA – no party

affiliation -

candidate.

Also on today’s show:

•

Chris Tittel

health dept.

•

Dean Walters,

DOT

•

Charlie Phinizy,

DOT

•

Capt. Al Young,

Coast Guard

•

Wayne Miller,

county judge

•

Roger Hernstadt,

Marathon city manager

•

Bobby Dube,

FWC

•

T. J. Allen,

county clerk candidate

Letter to the editor in The Key West Citizen today:

Union responsible for the district’s legal costs

In response to teachers union officer Mary Maxwell’s call for a clean sweep: The School Board that she wants to sweep has done more for its teachers than any other School Board in Florida. During the greatest recession of all time, this board in five years increased the average teacher salary in Monroe County by $7,023 while the average increase for the rest of Florida during that time was only $427.

To put that another way, we increased teacher pay by 13 percent in five years while the rest of the state went up less than 1 percent. This achieved the School Board’s goal of making our teachers the highest paid in the state, with an average salary of $57,798. We also achieved the highest starting salary, at $41,634.

When the district’s revenues were reduced last year due to the economy, we were forced to impose seven furlough days. This seemed more palatable than simply cutting teacher pay to balance the budget. So our average teacher went from making $305/day to the present $288/day. It is worthy to note that the letter-writer is above the average, and all public employee salaries are public record.

The School Board has made tough decisions in these trying times, but tried to balance the needs of students and employees, while making sure the bottom line remained healthy.

Unfortunately, this School District is spending money on lawyers, but it is important that readers know the reasons. The teachers union filed a grievance demanding their raise with the Public Employee Relations Commission two times, and lost both times, and then went to the 3rd District Court of Appeal and lost a third time. The School Board was required to have legal representation each time, which is funded by taxpayers. The School District wins each time because it is obvious that due to the historic reduction of revenues caused by declining property values, the board could not fund raises this year, and it also had to make reductions like many other districts.

Perhaps that letter-writer is requesting a sweep in the wrong organization.

Andy Griffiths

Monroe County School Board

=======================

My goodness, Andy. You didn’t say you are a school board candidate. And, you didn’t quite tell it the way it went down. The way it went down was the school district’s Chief Financial Officer Michael Kinneer told the district’s negotiating team, in the presence of the teachers union’s negotiating team, at a collective bargaining session, that the district did not have the money to fund the collective bargaining agreement being discussed. Thereafter, Michael attended no more collective bargaining sessions, and Superintendent Joe Burke and his deputy Jesus Jara completed the negotiations of the collective bargaining Kinneer had said the district could not afford, all of which you know, Andy. As do you know, Andy, that when the collective bargaining agreement came before the school board to be approved or rejected, then Audit & Finance Committee member Larry Murray told the school board and Joe Burke that he didn’t see where the money was to fund the collective bargaining agreement. Relying on Joe Burke’s assurance that the money was there, the school board, including you, Andy, ignored Murray and approved the collective bargaining agreement which the school district indeed could not afford, which is what led to the various legal disputes with the teachers union, and to the school district hiring the expensive mainland labor lawyer, and to lots of unhappy teachers. All of which you also know, Andy, but didn’t tell the public in your letter to the editor. And that, Andy, is why I don’t want to see you remain on the school board. I do not trust you to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about the school district, the school board, or yourself as a school board member, who voted to approve a collective bargaining agreement you had been told by a member of the Audit & Finance Committee member the school district could not afford. You, Andy, and the other school board members who voted to approve the collective bargaining agreement, are responsible for the agreement and the school district’s legal costs which sprung from the school district breaching the agreement. You know, Andy, that there is only one way the school board can fix that SNAFU: an increase in school taxes for school district operations. You know, Andy, a tax increase is the only way the school district can honor the collective bargaining agreement you voted to approve. As does every other school board member know it. As does every school board candidate know it, but I am the only candidate in either race who has said it, because I am the only candidate who feels telling the public the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth is more important than trying to get elected.

==============================

In that regard, another letter to the editor in The Citizen today:

Candidate should live in the correct district

Capt. Ed Davidson has never lived in District 3. He just rented an apartment in District 3 so he could run for the School Board seat. As a person who is a resident of District 3, I want to be represented by someone from my district, not by Ed, who lives in another district. Capt. Ed may not be committing fraud, but he is certainly violating the intent of the law. We need integrity on the School Board, not someone who bends the rules for his own benefit.

Johnny McLean

Bay Point

=========================

Darn, do you think McLean is a John Welsh supporter? Of course McLean is a John Welsh supporter. So why didn’t McLean say that? Like local school teacher Mary Maxwell in her letter to the editor yesterday, McLean does not have the class to say who he is supporting in the Dist. 3 school board race, which The Citizen often has reported has not two but three candidates. A write-in candidate, my name is not on the ballot, but there is a write-in space on the ballot under John Welsh and Ed Davidson’s names, where deranged voters can write in my name. Andy, you must have serious pull with The Citizen to get your reply to Mary Maxwell into The Citizen the very next day after her letter ran. That aside, yes, Ed Davidson indeed did rent an apartment in Marathon, which lies inside of Dist. 3, just so he could file to run for that school board seat. I know for a fact that really pissed off Larry Murray, because Larry told me it really pissed him off. I myself wondered just how sincere Ed was, but figured I would not know unless he didn’t win the seat and he continued to keep that apartment,  and live in it, sleep nights in it, which would be the true test of his sincerity. Spoken by a fellow who moved back and forth between Little Torch Key and Key West, and ran for office in both locales. However, when I moved away from Little Torch Key, I gave up the homestead exemption on my home, which cost me about $8,000 in extra ad valoem taxes. I rented an apartment in Key West under a one-year lease, and I lived there three years, until I moved back to Little Torch Key in 2010. When I moved from one location to another, I had no clue I would run for office again. After each race was over, I never wanted to run for office again. I don’t want to be running for office now, but as I have said many times, I run for office because the angels who stay hard on my case tell me to run for office because I say lots of stuff no other candidates say, because they are trying to get elected and I am trying to tell the public the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Far as I know, Bill Becker, News Coordinator of US 1 Radio, has interviewed on the air every school board candidate but the only candidate who will tell Bill’s listeners what they never will hear from the other school board candidates, and what he thinks about the candidates in both school board races, and what he thinks about constitutional amendmendments and candidates for state and national offices, with respect to school issues.

================================

Elsewhere in Keys politics, I recently wrote in a post:

On the local Republican Party front:

Yesterday, Pam Martin, who puts together forums at the Key Largo Civic Center, called me to ask if I would be at her organization’s forum this Sunday evening?, and I said yes. She said the Republica Party is trying to talk Republican candidates out of attending her forum. I said that reminded me of the Jack Bridges article in The Citizen. She said yes, she had seen that article, too. And, she said, the candidates who come to her forum, if their opponents don’t show up, will get their opponents’ time to speak. I told her to hang tough.

===============================

To which State Attorney Dennis Ward replied:

Subject: Fwd: October 28th Key Largo forum From:

dennisward@aol.com Date: Thu, 25 Oct 2012 12:44:00 -0400 To: keysmyhome@hotmail.com

Maybe this would make clearer what Pam was trying to state.
Sent from my iPhone

Begin forwarded message:

From:

Debby Goodman chairman@keysgop.com> Date: October 25, 2012, 11:38:21 AM EDT To: Dennis Ward <dennisward@aol.com> Subject: Fw: October 28th Key Largo forum Reply-To: Debby Goodman <chairman@keysgop.com>

Hey Dennis,

Below is the e.mail I sent the candidates. Phil Schaeffer and I have had two conversations because his folks aren’t revved up about the drive either. Pam won’t reschedule.

Debby

—– Forwarded Message —–

From: Debby Goodman chairman@keysgop.com> To: Stephen Hammond <stephenhammond1@aol.com>; Holly Merrill <hollymariemerrill@hotmail.com>; Barry Gibson <barrygibsonkeywest@gmail.com>; Mark Kohl <markkohl@aol.com>; John Welsh <welshjlsj@mac.com>; Rick Ramsay <rick4sheriff@gmail.com>; Amy Heavilin <amy4clerk@aol.com>; Scott Hopes <scott.hopes@hmd-healthcare.com>; Alina Garcia <alinagarcia@bellsouth.net>; Jillian Gage <jillianlgage@aol.com> Sent: Saturday, October 13, 2012 10:58 AM Subject: October 28th Key Largo forum

Hi Candidates,

I have been asked to send you an e.mail regarding the Key Largo Civic Club and Upper Keys AARP political forum on Sunday, October 28th. There is concern that it may be difficult for those of you in the Lower and Middle Keys – which is a majority of you – to get to Key Largo in a timely fashion unless you leave really early. As you know, it is the day after the Fantasy Fest parade…US 1 will be incredibly backed up. I had to take Phil to the airport in Miami several years ago on that day and it will be one heck of an emergency before I leave home at all on Fantasy Fest “going home” day. You just can’t describe the traffic backups!

I don’t know if you communicate among yourselves – which is why I am sending you this e.mail. You need to be aware of the travel problem and have a plan. (I assume it is too late for the event to be re-scheduled.)

Regards,

Debby

============================

I replied to Dennis:

At the BPW forum, Pam passed something out moving the forum back a half hour. When Pam called me yesterday, she said there was more grumbling and she put the Key Largo races first to give the KW folks even more time to get there. Then there was more grumbling, she said. My impression was she had moved the forum back to the original time, but will let the Key Largo candidates go first, after the constitutional amendments are aired out. Pam said nothing about Phil Shaffer or the Democrats.

============================

I sent Dennis’ and mine to Pam, and asked her to respond. She wrote to me:

============================

Sloan,

There are usually 3 forums in the Upper Keys: the Homeowners Association, which is held on a week night; the BPW forum which cost $40 ahead of time or $45 at the door & is mostly BPW members & the largest forum at the Civic Club which is held on the weekend so more working people & voters can attend. These 3 are usually held on the 2nd, 3rd & the last week in October so the public has a good chance to still see the candidates if they have a problem with one of the dates.

When picking the date for the Upper Keys Civic Club… I ran the date by about 5 candidates (2 from the lower Keys) & no one had a problem with it. This is usually a pretty good indication that the date is OK. I had already checked with the Civic Club which is heavily used & they had Saturday, October 27th open (which I knew was Fantasy Fest & a bad date for the candidates) or Sunday, October 28th.

When I emailed out the applications… no one complained. When I then handed out the invitations in person only 2 people said they could not attend (1 for work reasons, 1 for personal reasons – which is about average.) I then started hearing some grumbling so I pushed back the start of the forum 30 minutes & re-arranged the agenda to put the amendments, local Key Largo races & Congress in the beginning which would give more time for those coming from the Lower Keys to get there & deal with the traffic.

It then seemed that there was a more organized effort to get the candidates not to come & to talk other candidates into doing the same. I talked to the folks at the Civic Club & the Italian Club to give them a heads up & they concurred to go forward as is. Since one of the complaints from candidates is they only get a couple of minutes to talk to folks we are going to give those candidates who attend the time of their challengers if they don’t show up. And that’s where we are now. We still have plenty of candidates coming from Congress on down the ballot!

We will have free pizza, go over the sample ballots, the amendments & the local infrastructure sales tax extension. As a reminder the Civic Club is the voting location for 2 precincts & lots of those voters will be there. I have been organizing this forum for about 16 years & Joel Carmel had done it for years before me so this is a very long running forum.

Running up & down the Keys to attend events is part of the process for candidates & I can’t even gander a guess of how many times I have had to run down to Key West to attend a 1 hour meeting just to turn around & make the trip back up the Keys & get to another meeting in Miami. It’s just part of the process, traffic included. Now it’s up to the candidates to decide if they are going to attend because it’s the voters who will have the final word!

Sincerely,

Pam

==============================

Then, I received from Kay Thacker this general information flyer describing the forum from, which she had received from Pam:

=============================

Roman Gastesi, Monroe County Administrator will talk about the sales tax infrastructure issue at the Key Largo Civic Club Political Forum Sunday, October 28th.

The forum is free and runs from 6:00pm to 8:30pm. The Civic Club is located at 209 Ocean Bay Dr. in Key Largo - (MM100 Oceanside off US#1 across the street from the Lions Club – behind Capitol Bank. The public is welcome and encouraged to attend. This will be the last chance for Upper Keys residents to see the candidates and go over the issues before the November 6th election.

There will be a meet and greet portion from 6pm to 6:30pm than the forum will start. Light refreshments will be on hand during the event. Candidates will have 1 minute to introduce themselves to the audience then they will be asked a prepared question and have 1 minute to answer. The candidates will than have 60 second for an ending statement so candidates can cover more of the issues & their platform.

All local candidates running for office are invited.

Sample ballots will be on hand. The Constitutional Amendments will also be covered.

The Key Largo Civic Club membership has a wide variety of interest and the Civic Club has many different activities throughout the month, everything from Line Dancing to card games and Bingo. The members tend to be in the 50 plus age group as well as active members of the community. Mull Capital Management, LLC, joined The Key Largo Civic Club, Upper Keys Sons & Daughters of Italy, Upper Keys AARP, NOW, The Commission on the Status of Women & Papa John’s Pizza as sponsors of the forum.

This event is usually very well attended with standing room only crowds. The audience will be provided paper to write down their questions for the candidates than those questions will be asked at the end of the forum. This is usually a very lively part of the evening.

The candidates are asked to bring their campaign materials & we will have tables for them to display their information on. We ask that only the Candidates speak. Candidates running for office are asked to stay for the whole event to answer any questions the audience may ask. Candidates will have 30 seconds to answer if we are running short of time, 60 seconds if forum is running on time. We estimate the forum will run from 6:00pm to 8:30pm. We pushed back the starting time for the forum 30 minutes to 6pm to accommodate those driving from the Lower Keys who may have Fantasy Fest traffic to deal with.

Call 305-853-0907 for more information or email:

pmflkeys@aol.com. Candidates are asked to please RSVP’s for the forum if they have not already done so.

Pam Martin – Upper Keys AARP President & event coordinator 305-853-0907 ph 305-853-0908 fax 305-393-4643 cell

==============================

My thoughts:

The problem with all three Key Largo forums is they run every race through their forum, including the Key Largo fire & rescue and wastewater board races. As a result, there is not enough time for any candidate to get really vetted. Candidates get to give only a brief introduction and are given one question to answer. That’s not much incentive for candidates driving up there from Key West and the Lower Keys.

Pam Martin’s forum also includes an early discussion of any constitutional amendments, which makes the agenda even more crowded. However, unlike the other two Key Largo forums, Pam’s forum allows a short closing statement from candidates and takes written questions from the audience to the candidates at the end of the forum, until there are no more questions. Unfortunately by then, some of the candidates and their entourages, and some of the Key Largo residents who had come to the forum, already have left, so it is a thin audience who hear candidates answers questions from the audience. And not all candidates get questions from the audience. I think it’s probably fair to say that everyone who lasts to the end of one of Pam’s forums is totally exhausted. Then, there is the fun drive back down the Keys, or back to the mainland, for most of the candidates.

Pam’s organization put on a similar forum before the August primary. It was on the Sunday evening following the end of mini-lobster season. When I reached Bud ‘n Mary’s at the bottom of upper Matecumbe Key in Islamorada, the US 1 traffic was gridlocked. Using old US 1, I bypassed the traffic and got back onto US 1 just below the old Chesapeake House. Back in the gridlock, I crept over Whale Harbor to Old US 1 on the next key up, and by-passed the gridlock again on the old road, coming back onto US 1 just below Snake Creek Bridge, which is a draw bridge. However, I did not see the draw going up to let boats through. On the other side of Snake Creek, the traffic was moving and I reached the forum maybe ten minutes before the meet and greet started. I probably lost 20 minutes to the gridlock.

I heard grumbling about Pam’s pre-August primary forum being the Sunday after mini-lobster season ended, but I didn’t see any “organized” attempt to get Pam to change the date of the forum. And, I didn’t see any candidates from Key West and the lower Keys not attend the forum. Departing Fantasy Fest traffic might cause similar traffic delays for candidates living below Key Largo, but I doubt it will be any worse than the traffic the Sunday after mini-lobster season.

Candidates can either attend Pam’s forum tomorrow evening, or they can do something else. I don’t see why the Republican or Democratic Parties got involved. It’s none of their business when candidate forums are held. If candidates feel they need their political party’s blessing, or help, attending a forum, they should not be running for office. Elected officials should think for themselves and be immune to outside pressure, including pressure from their political party. If I had my way, every local race in the Keys would be non-partisan, including the State Attorney race.

Sloan Bashinsky

keysmyhome@hotmail.com

goodmorningfloridakeys.com

goodmorningkeywest.com

goodmorningbirmingham.com

From Larry Murray yesterday, who wrote to me the other day that he would have endorsed me for the Dist. 3 school board seat, if I was not a write-in candidate. I felt racially discriminated against.

Yesterday, Pam Martin, who puts together forums at the Key Largo Civic Center, called me to ask if I would be at her organization’s forum this Sunday evening?, and I said yes. She said the Republica Party is trying to talk Republican candidates out of attending her forum. I said that reminded me of the Jack Bridges article in The Citizen. She said yes, she had seen that article, too. And, she said, the candidates who come to her forum, if their opponents don’t show up, will get their opponents’ time to speak. I told her to hang tough.

==========================

In yesterday’s KW Citizen –

Lack of loyalty an issue

BY TIMOTHY O’HARA Citizen Staff

tohara@keysnews.com

Mosquito Control District Commissioner Jack Bridges has been asked to resign from the Executive Committee of the Monroe County chapter of the Republican party because he is supporting a Democrat in the upcoming Mosquito Control District election. Bridges, who resigned Saturday, has not given any money or been active in fellow Commissioner Steve Smith’s campaign, but he has publicly said he supports Smith in his quest for re-election, Bridges confirmed to The Citizen on Tuesday. Smith is facing Republican challenger Stephen Hammond. “I was asked to resign from the Republican Executive Committee because I cannot support the entire Republican ticket,” Bridges said. “Indeed, I have never voted a straight ticket in my entire life. Although I am a Republican, two-thirds of Monroe County is not. While I’m glad there is a Republican majority on the board, I think it is also important to have a well-reasoned non-Republican perspective there, too.” Bridges, who has been on the committee since being elected to office two years ago, has “yet to see the Republican nominee demonstrate a competent grasp of the issues,” he said. “It pains me to go against my own party, but serving in public office is a high honor and handling taxpayer money is serious business,” Bridges said. “If we want to do it right, we need serious people with different perspectives who have taken the time to [examine] the budget and the operation and who can articulate their positions. Stephen Hammond’s a nice man, a good man, but I just don’t think he’s taken the time to prepare himself.” Executive Committee members sign “loyalty oaths” agreeing to publicly support all Republicans who run for office, said Debby Goodman, chair of the Monroe County chapter of the Republican party. “You can still be a member of the club and support anyone you want,” Goodman said. “The Executive Committee is a step above and you sign a loyalty oath.” When Bridges ran for office two years ago, he was a critic of Smith. Bridges criticized Smith and Commissioners Joan Lord-Papy and Charles Langstaff for the amount the district paid its former executive director and for other spending issues. Bridges was also critical of Smith and Lord-Papy for testifying on behalf of former District Superintendent Mike Spoto, who admitted to stealing three company cellphones and giving them to his girlfriend, wife and daughter. Spoto was sentenced to 90 days in jail for the crime. “I don’t agree with everything Steve Smith has done in the past, but I’ve been watching the campaign for nine months and I’ve yet to see the Republican nominee demonstrate a competent grasp of the issues,” Bridges said. “It’s a little disingenuous for Mr. Hammond to level his sword at Mosquito Control and say ‘You’re spending like drunken sailors’ when we’ve just cut a million dollars in spending and balanced the budget, especially when he didn’t even know the millage rate.”

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I gather being a Republican absolutely trumps being qualified to hold the office. Here’s something Steve Smith sent me a few days ago, which I sat on until now. I am publishing it because of what the Republican Party did in that race, and because, if accurate, it bears on Steve Hammond’s credentials. He is welcome to send me a response for publication.

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To: sloanbashinsky@hotmail.com

Subject: Hi Sloan

From: keysgay@aol.com

Date: Fri, 19 Oct 2012 11:34:01 -0400

Sloan:

My opponent for Mosquito Control District 3 wants the citizens the trust him with their tax dollars but the truth is: Hammond’s home foreclosed and sold 6/1/12 Case 2010 CA 433 K Hammond foreclosure KW Golf Club condo on 3/27/12, CASE NO 2010 CA 563 K Lower Florida Keys Hospital: Case 2010 CC 00188 dismissed without prejudice Amended 3 of election finance reports; overspent in violation of FS 106.11 (4) Hammond says “My MBA makes me the best candidate to oversee taxpayers money!” Do you want him to look after your tax dollars?

Regards, Stephen K. Smith

www.votestevesmith2012.com ; *Florida Keys & Key West *Florida Keys Mosquito Control, Board of Commissioners P. O. Box 4538 Key West, Fl 33041 T.305-296-9799 M. 305-924-0288 fax: 305-294-0830

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I told Steve Hammond at the Upper Keys Business and Professional Women candidate forum, that he is up against a candidate with lots of experience on the Mosquito Contol Board, and this race got his, Hammond’s, name before the public and perhaps that set the stage for him running for the city commission in Key West, which position he might like a lot better than the Mosquito Control Board. We talked a while further about that. My impression was Steve liked my suggestion, but his running for the city commission would depend on whether or not his city commissioner, Teri Johnston, wanted to remain in that seat.

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Received word from Mike Mongo yesterday that Key West High School allows Boy Scouts of America to recruit on the Key West High School campus, even though Boy Scouts of America is an anti-Gay outfit. I told Mike to contact school board chairman John Dick about that. I also should have told Mike to contact schools superintendent Mark Porter, as it will be Mark’s job to deal with it.

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On another Republican front, on the November 6 ballot:

NO. 6 CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT ARTICLE I, SECTION 28 Prohibition on Public Funding of Abortions; Construction of Abortion Rights

This proposed amendment provides that public funds may not be expended for any abortion or for health-benefits coverage that includes coverage of abortion. This prohibition does not apply to an expenditure required by federal law, a case in which a woman suffers from a physical disorder, physical injury, or physical illness that would place her in danger of death unless an abortion is performed, or a case of rape or incest. This proposed amendment provides that the State Constitution may not be interpreted to create broader rights to an abortion than those contained in the United States Constitution. With respect to abortion, this proposed amendment overrules court decisions which conclude that the right of privacy under Article I, Section 23 of the State Constitution is broader in scope than that of the United States Constitution. ==============================

In The Key West Citizen today:

Cast your votes for pro-choice candidates

Even those who want to curtail women’s reproductive freedom have been reluctant to make criminals of those who choose not to sustain a fetus to term. Anti-choice propaganda has effectively exploited instinctual love of children in support of irrational views, but not in vilifying unwilling potential mothers. Todd Akin’s comments shed some light on why: Favoring a potential human being over an actual one is based upon antiquated, Taliban-like sexist beliefs and attitudes. Those of us who care about birth control issues recognize them as a Rorschach test on the value of women. Should women be in charge of our own sexuality, or should men control us? Should women decide if and when we have children, or should men decide — even if by rape? Are women of value to our society through our work and thought, or are we only good for producing heirs? Should a woman live if a fetus will die? Granting personhood to embryos has no basis in common law, science or cultural traditions. Historically, a fetus was not a “child” until it could survive outside a woman’s body. Our Constitution grants citizenship to those who are “born.” Roe v. Wade codified that common sense. Technological intervention has, in some cases, rolled the age of potential viability back a few weeks, but with limited success and at extraordinary costs to our medical system. Nonetheless, the basic dependency of a fetus on a woman’s body for development has not changed. Forcing us to bear children when we do not choose to do so — granting a clump of cells that may or may not become a person the right to inhabit our bodies against our will, affecting our health and life paths — diminishes our humanity and violates our fully human rights. If you are focused on the “child,” consider this: Do you believe children should be punishment for engaging in sex? Should a child be a memento of a rape? Should not every child be wanted? Vote NO on amendment No. 6; support candidates who support women’s rights.

P.D. Cummings

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Someone sent this to me yesterday:

Indiana Republican: When life begins from rape, ‘God intended’ it 

By Reuters

Richard Mourdock, the Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate in Indiana, said in a debate on Tuesday that “even when life begins with that horrible situation of rape, that is something that God intended to happen.” The remark drew criticism from his Democratic opponent, congressman Joe Donnelly, as well as from Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s camp – even as Mourdock defended his words. With 13 days until the election, President Obama tried to fortify his support in Ohio and Florida; meanwhile, Mitt Romney made a big push in battleground states such as Nevada and Colorado. NBC’s Peter Alexander reports. During the debate in New Albany, Indiana, Mourdock, Donnelly and Libertarian candidate Andrew Horning were asked about their views on abortion. “The only exception I have to have an abortion is in that case of the life of the mother,” Mourdock said. “I struggled with it myself for a long time, but I came to realize that life is that gift from God and I think even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape that it is something God intended to happen.” Mourdock, the state treasurer who is a favorite of the conservative Tea Party movement, ousted longtime Senator Richard Lugar in the Republican primary earlier this year. He is locked in a tight race with Donnelly ahead of the November 6 election …

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By Mourdock’s logic, everything that happens to a person is God’s will, regardless of what it is. By Mitt Romney’s logic, life begins with inception, so all abortion is murder, but murder is okay if the mother was raped. In fact, neither Mourdock nor Romney have a clue when the soul attaches to a fetus, which is when life begins in God’s eyes. In fact, in most cases, pregnancy termination adversely impacts the mother’s soul regardless of the reason for the pregnancy termination. This is not recognized by pro-choice advocates. In fact, pro-life advocates are imposing their religious views onto women, which, when that rises to government imposition of those views, violates the separation of church and state prohibition of the First Amendment to the US Constitution, which under the 14th Amendment applies to the States. In fact, Amendment 6, if passed, will violate the separation of church and state prohibition of the First Amendment to the US Constitution, which under the 14th Amendment applies to the States. But God only knows how the US Supreme Court would rule on that issue. No woman in her right mind should vote for Amendment 6. However, many women will vote for it because they are brainwashed by their religion and by the Republican Party, both of which are cults in the Jim Jones sense, but more socially acceptable. Not to discriminate, the Democratic Party also is a cult in the Jim Jones sense, but it has different rites. In fact, all political parties are cults. All religions are cults. All political, social and religious movements are cults. The right to life movement is cult. The pro-choice movement is a cult. America is infested with cults. Humanity is infested with cults. Barack Obama is a cult leader with a lot of charisma. Mitt Romney is a cult leader with low charisma. I’m not voting for either of them. Most likely, on that part of the ballot I will write, “None of the above.”

Are we having fun yet?

Ciaosky

keysmyhome@hotmail.com

goodmorningfloridakeys.com

goodmorningkeywest.com

goodmorningbirmingham.com

I created a new Facebook page yesterday:

Sloan Bashinsky

Here is a photo of what cruise ships already are doing to the bottom of Key West’s channel. Imagine what mega-cruise ships will do.

No channel-widening in Key West

click on photo, then click on it again when it comes up, to enlarge and see entire study, which The Key West Citizen so far has refused to publish. If you feel The Citizen should publish the photo, contact ttuell@keysnews.com, Tom Tuell is the Editor of that newspaper, which is published in Key West…

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And I signed a no channel-widening petition, which took me about 30 seconds to download:

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Dear Sloan,

Thanks for signing my petition, “Save Key West! (Stop Proposed Dredging in the National Marine Sanctuary): Tell KW leaders to stop dredging the ocean for mega cruise ships.” Can you help this petition win by asking your friends to sign too? It’s easy to share with your friends on Facebook – just click here to share the petition on Facebook. There’s also a sample email below that you can forward to your friends. Thanks again — together we’re making change happen, Jessica

spreading the word…

Save Key West! (Stop Proposed Dredging in the National Marine Sanctuary): Tell K…W leaders to stop dredging the ocean for mega cruise ships – Sign the Petition!

=================================

And I created a new page at goodmorningkeywest.com:

cruise ship tearing up channel bottom as it leaves Key West The Key West Citizen has refused to publish this photo despite my efforts to get Editor Tom Tuell, Citizen Editorial Board members, and Citizen staff writer John De Santis to publish it. I sent the photo to the city commissioners and mayor, and have used it in many anti-channel-widening posts at goodmorningkeywest.com. This photo could be put on anti-channel-widening campaign posters, with this handwritten on it: “Channel-widening study – already done”

I wondered if all of that was what the nap dream day before yesterday about Bob Kelly wanting me to stay in Key West and work on something with him was about? This morning, The Key West Citizen greeted me with this tombe:

Channel questions linger underneath the surface

BY JOHN DeSANTIS

Citizen Staff

jdesantis@keysnews.com

As partisans on both sides of Key West’s channel-widening controversy prepare to woo voters over the next year, the choice could be seen as a simple one of economic well-being or protection of the area’s fragile ecology. But a deeper examination of the question voters will likely encounter — whether the city should apply to the Army Corps of Engineers for a preliminary feasibility study of the channel-widening proposal — reveals a more complex set of issues. Like the seafloor that some would like to see dredged, so that bigger cruise ships may more safely enter Key West Harbor, many of those issues lie beneath the surface. Experts in environmental policy say people on all sides of the equation need to educate themselves on all sides of the issue, and the consequences that could result. Gosh, John, what a great time for you to slip in the photo showing what a cruise ship today does beneath the surface. “The question is whether members of a community are good consumers of information,” said Chris Stream, director of the Environmental Public Affairs division at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, which assists communities facing crucial decisions impacting their environments.”When we buy a car, we Google cars, and go through things and figure out what kind of car we would buy. But we are willing with decisions like this to ignore that, to go for the single voice that comes in and puts it together for us, often saying they can create one silver bullet. But there is no one silver bullet.” Come to Key West , Chris, and gander what goes on when cruise ships come in and leaves. Come here and kick some tires. Supporters of the channel widening say the study is just that, a study, and that no commitment will inure to Key West beyond that. Detractors say that doing the study opens a Pandora’s box of possibilities, and that the whole issue is best left alone. Yeah, and the check’s in the mail and I won’t come in your mouth. There would be no talk of a channel-widening study, if the talkers did not intend to do everything they can to widen and deepen the channel. Experts in the field of environmental regulations and processes say there are merits to both arguments. Some, however, say a “yes” to the study is likely a “yes” to eventually seeing the channel-widening work done, if not with Key West’s blessings then with those of some other entity, such as the state of Florida. For damn sure, “yes” to the study is likely a“yes” to eventually seeing the channel-widening done. “It is a potential; I am not saying it would happen, but there is certainly a risk,” said Robert Glicksman, the J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Professor of Environmental Law at George Washington University. “The practical reality is that when an agency like the corps pours a lot of money into a project like this, there is some degree of reluctance to abandon a project into which that much money has already been sunk. It may be difficult to move the agency off of its determination to go ahead with the project. Even if they haven’t gotten to a point where there is a firm commitment, the more vested the agency is, the more likely harder it is to convince it that the project should be scrapped.” Amen, thank you Professor Shapiro. Robin Craig, a former Florida State University environmental law professor who now teaches at the University of Utah’s S.J. Quinney College of Law, says putting the question of the study to the people, and its possible approval, because of the intense nature of such a study, could go a long way toward settling important questions once and for all. Yeah, the people can just say NO on the channel-widening referendum ballot, and kill the terrible idea. “It will be a can of worms, but better to have a better idea of what they are talking about. If your concern was, is this just a way of starting the snowball downhill, I would say not necessarily,” Craig said of commissioning the study. “It is a wise move. I do know of places where that has been done with potentially major projects that have obvious environmental impacts on a sanctuary, which is a moneymaker and federally protected, but where there are fairly intense ramifications for commercial businesses. It is not unusual at the federal level for Congress or an agency to commission the National Academy of Sciences or the National Research Council, to look at what we are not thinking about, what we should be thinking about, before you are in any permitting process or legislative process.” Look at the photo of the cruise ship leaving Key West, Craig. It is not just the city, or the state, or the corps that would be acting in a vacuum when such a study is done, Craig said. “Whatever those entities might decide, the number of things triggered on that channel-widening are considerable,” Craig said. “It is going to trigger portions of the Rivers and Harbors Act; it might have to go through Congress. The state of Florida has a federally approved coastal zone management program and Florida is going to have to sign off.” The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and other agencies would likely be involved. Attorneys note that if the channel-widening is seen as feasible once the three-year, $3 million study is done — assuming voters approve commissioning it — there is another level of oversight. Knowing how politics works at the national, state and local levels, the only sure way to stop this rape of the channel, for that is what it is, rape, is for the Key West voters to say NO on the channel-widening referendum. Should Key West and the corps or Florida and the corps decide to move ahead with the channel-widening, a new review process, under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), would occur. That could take three years or more, regulatory experts said, and would involve input from the agencies already mentioned as well as the public. It is also during this process that the potential could arise for litigation, perhaps brought by environmental advocacy groups, attorneys said. Not if the voters just say NO. End of story, no litigation needed. The way Last Stand has behaved for a while now, I don’t see it litigating to stop channel-widening. I see Last Stand’s Executive Committed meeting and wringing their hands and one-human-familying and we all need to get alonging, and I see the general membership doing the same, and I can see them speaking at city commission meetings against channel-widening. Through all of the processes, some experts said, an important question will linger: whether the act of widening the channel would have its desired effect, bolstering the economy of Key West by attracting cruise ships. “If you build it, will they come?” Stream asked rhetorically. Rhetorical means the question answers itself. Of course they will come. Some industry trends, such as cruise companies bringing passengers to private islands they own or have developed, give pause for thought, Stream said. Yep, those monster cruise ships would pretty well colonize Old Town whenever they came to Key West. John Dolan-Heitlinger, spokesman for the Key West Seaport Alliance — a group of business owners who support the channel widening — said he is confident there will be enough cruise business despite those trends to make the study as well as the channel-widening worthwhile. There you are folks, study = channel-widening. “In talking with the folks in the industry, they have lots of things that go into determining where they go, how much do their customers like a place,” Heitlinger said. “Generally they give Key West high marks. They like us. We are convenient with them coming out of Fort Lauderdale and other ports … . In the eight or 10 years it will take, I believe that given the vessels that will be serving the market, we will have more ships. I don’t believe we are going to add a whole lot. They indicate the ships are going to be bigger and if we don’t have this widening, we are going to see a reduction over time in the ships that visit here.” Let’s hope so. A vital tile in the mosaic of arguments is the regulation barring dredging. “It is prohibited in the sanctuary,” said Florida Keys Marine Sanctuary Superintendent Sean Morton. “There has been no dredging other than maintenance dredging. You are taking the seafloor and dropping it. You are widening the channel, but you are still deepening part of the sanctuary.” Morton doesn’t know what kind of coral might live in the place where the dredging would occur. A study would be needed to determine that. He does know what kinds of coral were recovered when the Navy completed its own dredging project, permitted because the rules allow certain military objectives. There is a process for requesting permission to do many things in the sanctuary, outlined in the Code of Federal Regulations. And a “no” from the sanctuary superintendant, according to the rules themselves, could mean an appeal to higher authorities within the sanctuary hierarchy, which is organized under the auspices of the NOAA, itself under the umbrella of the Department of Commerce. It is possible, experts said, that lobbyists could appeal for a change in the regulations or for an approval at higher levels. All of that, regulatory experts note, costs money and takes time. You can count on lobbyists doing that, and you probably can count on them getting their way, since their way already is being greased behind the scenes – otherwise none of this would be happening. The way to stick it to them, chop off the snake’s head, is for the voters to say NO on the referendum. What partisans on both sides of the equation maintain is that the decision to commission or not commission the study will have an indelible effect on the future of Key West and on the view the island takes of itself. That, said University of Nevada’s Stream, is why voters need to start learning everything they can now. “Data has meaning,” Stream said. “So no matter what the study says, it will be one of a kind and become the voice of whatever is decided and it can be a powerful voice … . Is it feasible to do it? Probably. Could it be widened, and if so, does that necessarily create economic strength?”This article has circled around and swallowed itself. The industry or the community could change during the study process, Stream said, or during the NEPA process that might follow. He added that with controversies like this one, even when compromise is reached, the outcomes are not always so good. “The happily ever after rarely happens,” he said.

Amen. I hope, Stream, that you do not get hired by the City, or by the Chamber of Commerce, or by Last Stand to state the obvious.

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Meanwhile, the ever sweetly tenacious Erika Biddle sent this yesterday, about what I imagine Mother Nature might view as the main problem – humans:

============================

Erika

Hello Sloan

I worked the AM shift at the hotel and didn’t get to read your postings yet.I did find the essay about “The End of People” by William Barker I told you about on the phone.

Enjoy XOE

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The End Of People (True Story)

What inspired me to interview Suzy was the following extract in an anarchic magazine:

Suzy takes it out of the pool queue case, unrolls it with some sense of ceremony and holds it as high as her small frame will allow. While others want the end of wars, to feed the world, a change of government or to extirpate wayward bankers, Suzy’s message is as refreshing as it is shocking. Her cotton bed sheet banner ,which she carries at some forty marches a year, simply calls for the end of people.

‘No people, no people. What do I want? No people. When do I want it? Now!’ she cries while she stomps her artificially-starved frame along the streets of a fed-up London. October the 1st, muted chrome clouds above and an earnest wind tumbling paper coffee cups around the finer cobbled streets of Bloomsbury. Suzy skips along the pavement, dressed in baggy orange trousers, baseball pumps and a graffittied t-shirt, her long blonde hair blows not only across her face but anybody else’s who is walking at the same pace. We greet one another with mediterranean air kisses. She picks a two-tabled café and for the sake of readers of ‘Stupid Magazine’ I begin my interview. ‘So according to my records you have a degree in International politics?’

‘Yes, that’s right, for all the good it did me’ She pulls out a harmonica from her rear pocket and starts playing a soft, mournful blues. The waitress grimaces then smiles.

‘And then you worked for a shipping company as an account manager?’ I say raising my voice over her tune.

‘Don’t remind me’ she says with the harmonica in her mouth so her answer is vaguely and comically tuneful. The she laughs and laughs almost drunkenly. I decide to hurry up to the main point.

‘So Suzy when you say you want an end to people do you mean a certain type of heartless greed-driven ignoramus?’

‘No’ she says putting away her harmonica and lovingly arranging her luscious hair. ‘I want all people ended, finished, done, completed, terminated, you see?

‘Yes, I do. It’s just that it would sort of include me…..and  I’ve become rather attached to my existence and anyway, it would also include you’ I gulp on hot sour tea and watch her squint as a shock of surprising sun hits the window and a slight rustle of the London plane trees that line the square wafts in the top window.

‘Oh, and what is wrong with that? What right do we have to existence?’ Her face tightens to almost pure bone and her eyes fix and pale.

‘But you can’t deny someone the right to exist and anyway it’s impossible.’

‘Why impossible?’

‘There is no state you can have where you are deprived of existence.’

‘What about death?’

‘You might experience dying but you cannot experience death’

‘Well, anyway all people must go because they are wrong’

‘Wrong? What do you mean wrong?’

‘Look you know what I’m talking about…people are just wrong.’

‘Well, not really. You want people to somehow experience non-existence’ I  say smarmily, returning to the thrust of my argument ‘you see how crazy that is?’

‘No, Why should it be?’

‘Because there is no such thing as non-existence, don’t you see?’

‘You’re making no sense. What do you mean, Mr. Philosopher?’ She scratched on the section of firm thigh she had exposed through a rip in her skin-tight faded jeans. Her skin was Scandinavian flawless.

‘Put it this way..it is impossible to imagine non-existence. You can imagine nothing but even nothing is the very barest form of something. Non-existence cannot be imagined and it cannot be known and yet you want people to somehow experience it because you don’t like them?’

‘Yes, that’s right and you won’t talk me out of it and by the way, I didn’t say that I didn’t like people’

‘Then why in God’s name are you doing this?’

‘Who knows? It rose in me. Anyway, you are supposed to be into this sort of thing. You are supposed to be alternative’ I was up for absurdity but it and my readers demanded at least a strand of rationale and since I am not interested in self-indulgence or psychotic motivations I decide to terminate the interview. She is clearly a childish fool albeit a beautiful one. I spent the following week chasing up stories about virgin rabbits, real paper aeroplanes and a man who coughs through his ears and when I wasn’t doing that I was walking in the park with my siamese cat, sketching silouhettes of bare trees. Every now and then I would find myself thinking about Suzy and her antics and such is the case when you keep replaying and replaying some idea it seemed to embed itself into my model of reality. By the end of the week I was aching to  her interview her again.

The following Tuesday I tracked her down in a large empty house in Lee, South London.

She opened the door before I knocked.

‘You took your time’ she said smiling. She then grabbed hold of my black wooly jumper and shoved me against the wall, and there and then on that cold wooden floor, under the soft blare of hallway candles, we became lovers.

Over the next few days we recruited several more supporters to our cause and since nobody had a house big enough to contain us all we all moved to a warehouse in Fish Island. Everybody cooked and cleaned and danced and made music. Suzy would recite poetry on the spot while I quietly kept rythym with her on an old banjo. There was a lot of love in a spontaneous group and after a month of cohabiting Mick the butcher from Southend stole a bus; we painted it up in psychedelic colours and toured around the east coast, swimming in the cold sea, preaching in the streets and parks and making bonfires for barbecues. Soon the group got so big that we needed more land so we moved onto a deserted farm in Hampshire. It was a beautiful spot- crumbling building, wild flowers , willow trees by a stream. Pete, the carpenter from Southampton organised little workcamps so that we could cobble together more living areas in the barns and outsheds. People kept coming and coming, pitching their tents in friendly circles; some even  built dens from tree branches. Suzy kept an eye on numbers and controlled the marches but in no less than two months we had over a million people in Britain calling for the end of people. There was so much energy and love in our community and as the movement spread across Britain communities were transformed from anonymous and broken to thriving and caring. By the end of the year our message had reached mainland Europe and in a few weeks it swept right across to Russia, then China, Japan, Australia, and eventually to America. By year two our cause was established as the new world religion and one whole planet was finally united in its attempts to rid the world of people. Realising the stupendous paradox we had created as a planet – that we were all loving one another because we were united in wanting to eliminate our species we (and I do mean the entire population of the planet) sat in a calm void for three days and on day four we all spontaneously took up gardening. We turned the entire land mass of planet Earth into a flower bed and when the blooms came through Earth became one big ball of brilliant oranges, yellows and reds. The colors were so vivid, so overpowering and the fragrance so strong that we stopped eating and drinking as we were able to sustain ourselves on its energy alone. Suzy and I then sprouted wings and spent the next three hundred years just fluttering about the skies.

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Stupendous! Well, Erika. Do you think President Obama and his tribe would go for this? No? Well then, how about Mitt Romney and his tribe? How about the green tribe? How about any tribe? Maybe we need to start a tribe.

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Erika replied:

Obama & Romney are Pepsi & coca cola. Both are corporate hand puppets in my opinion. Not a tribe I would ever want to join…most of my friends always try to go with the “lesser evil”. For me it’s still evil…torture and drones acceptable? No way! My hope is the Transition movement ..check it out if you like Rob Hopkins on TED talks. He explains it in 10 minutes or less..oops it’s already past 1 Am and I have to work tomorrow. Good night XOE

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I googled Rob Hopkins on TED and found:

Rob Hopkins: Resilience leader

Rob Hopkins is the founder of the Transition movement, a radically hopeful and community-driven approach to creating societies independent of fossil fuel.

Why you should listen to him:

Rob Hopkins leads a vibrant new movement of towns and cities that utilize local cooperation and interdependence to shrink their ecological footprints. In the face of climate change he developed the concept of Transition Initiatives — communities that produce their own goods and services, curb the need for transportation and take other measures to prepare for a post-oil future. While Transition shares certain principles with greenness and sustainability, it is a deeper vision concerned with re-imagining our future in a self-sufficient way and building resiliency. Transforming theory to action, Hopkins is also the co-founder and a resident of the first Transition Initiative in the UK, in Totnes, Devon. As he refuses to fly, it is from his home in Totnes that he offers help to hundreds of similar communities that have sprung up around the world, in part through his blog, transitionculture.org. Hopkins, who’s trained in ecological design, wrote the principal work on the subject, Transition Handbook: From Oil Dependency to Local Resilience, a 12-step manual for a postcarbon future. Find notes and slides from his TEDTalk here >>

“Rob Hopkins is the Gentle Giant of the green movement, and his timely and hugely important book reveals a fresh and empowering approach that will help us transition into a materially leaner but inwardly richer human experience.”

Dr Stephan Harding, author of Animate Earth: Science, Intuition and GaiaEmail to a friend »

Quotes by Rob Hopkins

• “By loving and leaving all that oil has done for us … we are able to then begin the creation of a world which is more resilient, more nourishing, and in which we find ourselves fitter, more skilled and more connected to each other.”Watch this talk »
• “In many ways, the idea of resilience is a more useful concept than the idea of sustainability.”Watch this talk »

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I watched/listened to Hopkins talk. Reminds me of back-to-the-land stuff I read frequently in Rodale Press publications and Mother Earth News and other publications in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Hopkins offers no substitute for carbon fuels. Still looks to me the transition has to come through somebody inventing motors, engines, which convert water into hydrogen and oxygen for fuel (hydrogen) and atmosphere replenishment (oxygen). Still looks to me that living in the Florida Keys and claiming to be an environmentalist is an oxymoron. Hopkins refuses to fly in airplanes, but I bet he rides in cars and trucks and on trains and boats. I bet Mother Nature likes the-end-of-people solution a lot better, and bet she can bring it off if she sets her mind to it.

I know for a fact that Mother Nature doesn’t want the channel widened, and I hope Erika puts as much effort into persuading the voters to say NO on the channel-widening referendum, as she spends trying to persuade me that I need to lighten up and start having fun

Sloan Bashinsky

keysmyhome@hotmail.com

goodmorningkeywest.com

goodmornningfloridakeys.com

In response to the teaching to the ACT and SAT part of yesterday’s in search of the lost feminine – American education model, Florida Keys laboratory post, Sue of Key Largo wrote:

I would again like to thank everyone who voted for me in my primary campaign for the School Board.We ran an aggressive campaign calling for change in how the School Board and the School District operates.I assume that that theme resonated with you and that is why you voted for me. In November, you will be faced with a choice between Capt. Ed Davidson and John Welsh.If change in the School Board is what you seek, there is no choice.Capt. Ed Davidson has been a longtime critic of School Board machinations and, if elected, will do his utmost to bring change.Conversely, John Welsh is just another retired principal much like Ron Martin and I do not believe that the School Board should become a retirement community for former school administrators. John Welsh represents a continuation of the status quo. Capt. Ed Davidson represents change and a different future.I strongly urge all of you to cast your ballot for Capt. Ed Davidson.~Larry Murray

Refrain: If you want someone on the school board who truly is about change, I am that man. In just my left little finger I represent more change than Larry Murray, Ed Davidson and John Dick combined ever dreamed

The full passage, which does not even provide the full context --

To be, or not to be: that is the question: 

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer 

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, 

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, 

And by opposing end them? 

To die: to sleep; 

No more; and by a sleep to say we end 

The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks 

That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation 

Devoutly to be wish'd. 

To die, to sleep; 

To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub; 

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come 

When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, 

Must give us pause: there's the respect 

That makes calamity of so long life; 

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, 

The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, 

The pangs of despised love, the law's delay, 

The insolence of office and the spurns 

That patient merit of the unworthy takes, 

When he himself might his quietus make 

With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear, 

To grunt and sweat under a weary life, 

But that the dread of something after death, 

The undiscover'd country from whose bourn 

No traveller returns, puzzles the will 

And makes us rather bear those ills we have 

Than fly to others that we know not of? 

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all; 

And thus the native hue of resolution 

Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought, 

And enterprises of great pith and

moment With this regard their currents turn awry, 

And lose the name of action.

--Soft you now! 

The fair Ophelia! 

Nymph, in thy orisons 

Be all my sins remember'd. 

To what was Shakespeare referring? To death,  ” To die, to sleep; To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub;  For in that sleep of death what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause:  there’s the respect that makes calamity of so long life; ” Shakespeare was referring to procrastination vs. taking action. That was Hamlet’s trial and test, which you spun into God only knows what. On this particular aspect of death, every living, thinking person holds one of these three opinions: 1)  The universe is itself self extant without need of a creator; And we are each the product of natural processes  operated on by natural selection to bring about order from disorder. Therefore, we each are merely a complex  arraignment of molecules and have no meaning or purpose. 2)  The universe is created by a creator for a purpose. 3)  It is impossible to know which, and therefore we must but plod along the best we can merely hoping for the best. While many refinements can be surmised and reasoned for either of the first two, there are no other possibilities than  these three.

I replied: 

I know what soul level means, Jerry, from experiencing it ongoing. I know what ego level means, it was all I used to experience. I have to be ever on guard about going back there, and when I slip up I receive correction from my spirit controllers. I don’t twist arms. Nobody has to read anything I write. People who read what I am told to write are ready for it at the level of soul, even if they are not ready at the level of ego. As I wrote earlier, the angels use me to jostle people, loosen them up, so it’s easier for the angels to work inside of them, try to help them. As long as I stay within my assignments, there is no soul harm to others or to me. Ego ouches are different from soul ouches. If I injure another person’s soul, which could just be by words, but also by physical force, or failure to act when action is called for, that injures their soul and my soul, and the karma is mine to experience. The when and how of the karma might be immediate, delayed, or long-delayed. I might not even connect the dots, unless the angels show the origin of the karma to me. I used to be a terrible procrastinator. It took the angels a while to get me over it. It took the angels while to get me over lots of stuff that was screwing my soul, which I was doing, or not doing, and/or letting other people do.

In the Gospels, Jesus purposefully rattled people’s egos, and it got him crucified. He didn’t really think he would reach their souls, but there were other people watching on and listening, whose souls might be reached, and sometimes were reached. Even so, being reached is just the first step. The ensuing journey is the day-to-day grind, as demonstrated in the Gospels by Jesus and those who followed him before and after he left them in the care of The Holy Spirit. Before he turned the disciples over to The Holy Spirit, Jesus told them that they could blaspheme him and they would be forgiven, but if they blasphemed The Holy Spirit, they would not be forgiven. That was his warning to them that The Holy Spirit was above him in the spiritual pecking order, and if they did to Her what they had done to him, they would seriously regret it. A rabbi, Jesus knew the Spirit of God in the Jewish scriptures was Shekinah, gender feminine. The disciples knew that, too. Alas, Christendom gave The Holy Spirit a sex-change operation, rendering the god of Christendom all male despite Genesis plainly saying human beings were made in God’s image, male and female alike were they made.

Sloan Bashinsky

keysmyhome@hotmail.com

goodmorningfloridakeys.com

goodmorningkeywest.com

goodmorningbirmingham.com