Noem is Out!

I read an article reporting that Trump has fired Department of Homeland Security Kristi Noem.  I support this decision.

Trump also said that she's going to become "Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas," whatever that is.  It sounds like a made-up position, but if it keeps her out of any real position of power I can live with it.

Markwayne Mullin has been selected to take her place.  I don't know anything about the guy, so I don't have any real thoughts on the choice, other than to say it's interesting that Trump would pull anyone from the House or Senate, considering how small their majority is at the moment.  (Mullin is a Republican Senator from Oklahoma.)

Taking Their Ball and Going Home

I'm a life member of a couple of Veteran Service Organizations.  I'm active in one.  Veteran Service Organizations in general are suffering from declining membership.  The old guard is dying off, and the younger generation isn't interested in joining up.

My group has a younger local head honcho who is trying diligently to attract younger people.  The thing is, the old guard doesn't like it.  We had our elections a couple of days ago, to determine who would run things for the next year, and it sucked.  During my time with this group,  we've never had actual elections, because we struggle to get one person to serve in these elected jobs.  This year, the old guard got together and put up a second candidate in an attempt to get the current honcho voted out.  They failed.  Things got heated, and I think a lot of the old guys are going to quit.

I'm disheartened and disappointed.  While I don't see eye to eye with their perspectives, I respected them up to last night.  These guys are my brothers in arms.  If their guy would have won, I would have been disappointed, but I would have respected the outcome of the election.  Unfortunately, it looks like they're taking their ball and going home.  One of the old guys actually asked me to go outside and fight him.  I was dumbfounded!  I hope I never get that old and set in my ways.

Not Quite What I Expected

 When I made the conscious decision to take up my blog again, I said early on that I planned to focus on political stuff.  I was looking for a place where I could share my perspective on the issue of the day without the partisan bickering of Facebook.  This is my little corner of the interwebs, so I can generally say what I want.  Nobody can comment on this blog without my consent, meaning that I don't need to worry about the trolls.  And with a readership of almost zero, that's not an issue anyway.

You may also notice in the earlier post that I expressed the hope I would one day return to mundane blather.  Oddly enough, I'm already sick of the politics and have indeed returned to sharing my thoughts on uneventful occurrences.  I expected this would turn into a virtual version of me screaming, ranting and raging in an empty room.  Instead, it's a virtual version of me spewing a relatively disjointed and unfocused stream of consciousness in an empty room.  I'm good with this, it's just not quite what I expected.

That's My Girl!!

I need to brag on my younger daughter for a bit.

Her hubby's car crapped out yesterday.  It would start, but wouldn't run for Sh!+.  She called me to ask for my engine diagnostic reader, and pulled the codes.

The codes indicated a misfire in cylinder 1.  Research said the most likely culprits were a bad spark plug, a bad ignition coil, a bad fuel injector, or a vacuum leak.  She did the troubleshooting, she did the research, and then she consulted me.  We put our heads together and decided the easiest, cheapest course of action was to replace the spark plug.  After swapping out the plug, she reported that the engine was running a bit better, but was still not quite right.

Before continuing, I need to divert a bit... In my day, there was a single ignition coil.  While consulting with her and doing parallel troubleshooting from my house, I found out that modern engines have a separate coil for each cylinder, and the coil is directly connected to the spark plug.  Having learned this, I then researched how to test an ignition coil.  She beat me to the punch... she swapped out two coils and discovered that the trouble code moved to the next cylinder, showing that the ignition coil was defective.  That's right, my girl troubleshot and addressed the problem all on her own.

There's an itty bitty piece of me that wants to give her husband crap for not being mechanically inclined, but I'm not going to do that.  What he lacks in mechanical knowledge and desire to learn he makes up for by being an active, hands-on father, and by being involved in the day-to-day running of the household.  He shares in cooking, cleaning and childcare.  He's a good man who showers my daughter and my grandson with love and devotion.

But that's beside the point.  The gist of today's post is to brag on my little girl for her willingness and ability to identify and fix a moderately complex mechanical issue with virtually no external assistance, which is a rapidly vanishing skill in today's society.  That's my girl!!

Suicide Drone?

I saw an article yesterday that referred to "suicide drones."  The definition of suicide is the taking of one's own life.  This means, by definition, there is no such thing as a suicide drone for the following reasons:

-The drone is not alive, therefore, there is no life to take.

-The drone is not self-aware, so it did not choose to take its own life.

-The drone is controlled remotely by a human, so the drone did not take its own life.  In fact, if the drone were alive and self-aware, this so-called suicide drone would technically been murdered by the pilot.

U.S. and Israel Attack Iran

I woke up this morning to news that we have attacked Iran.  This is the second country we've invaded in two months.  If you include our oil blockade against Cuba, we are actively working to destabilize a third sovereign entity.

I'd like to remind people that the POTUS who did this is also the same guy who promised to get the U.S. out of "forever wars" ... the same guy who said that he could end the conflict in Ukraine ... the same guy who believes himself worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize... the same guy who promised no new wars.

The article I read said that Israel joined us in our strike, and that we have been planning this strike "for months," meaning the course of action was premeditated, not reactionary.  If any country deserves to be invaded, it's certainly Iran.  But I'm not convinced this is the right course of action at the right time.

I've said it before and I'll say it again.  It's hubris on our part to believe that everyone in the world wants our specific brand of freedom, and it's stupid for us to try to force it on the unwilling.

Run!

I got fired a couple of years ago from my previous job.  I was not fired for cause, though they tried unsuccessfully to dig up dirt on me.

The job started off great.  I was a high performer and was rewarded with a promotion after about a year.  Unfortunately, the CEO retired, and the new guy was radically different than his predecessor.  The old CEO came up through the ranks, personally knew the founder of the company, and fostered a culture that valued the employees.  The new guy was (and still is) the exact opposite.  He's laser focused on maximizing profit at all costs, and has zero tolerance for dissent in the ranks.  He's a know-it-all bully.  I made it about nine months into his tenure before I got the boot.

During that time, he cut staff by about 1/3, and he cut with a hatchet, not a scalpel.  Many of the best and brightest were dismissed, and there was a strong correlation with age and salary.  Those left behind were overworked, underpaid, and inexperienced.  As you can imagine, the environment radically shifted from being a place where people were happy to a culture of fear.

When I left, I was offered an insultingly low severance, which I declined.  A condition of that severance was a non-disparagement clause, meaning that I'd be unable to tell my story.  When they canned me, it was shortly after one of my employees committed suicide.  These bastards used his death to launch an investigation into me, alleging that I engaged in bullying behavior.  I was suspended for two weeks (with pay) while they conducted their "investigation."  When they "interviewed" me, they took something I said completely out of context and tried to say that I was behaving in an inappropriate manner.  Furthermore, this "incident" occurred completely outside of work.  It was an impromptu gathering of my team to celebrate the life of our deceased co-worker.  It was not company-sanctioned in any way, shape or form.

Since investigation did not yield anything that could get me fired for cause, they at-will fired me.  I know they fired me because I was highly compensated, because I stood up for my team, and because I did not quake in fear over C-Suite executives.  From my perspective, part of my job is to speak up if I see something wrong as opposed to cowering in the corner, keeping my head down and my mouth shut.

While I hate what the company has become, and have nothing but contempt for the leadership, I do keep in touch with former co-workers.  I also see a lot of activity on LinkedIn from these people, and from the company.  This evil empire still touts itself as a great place to work, and it's a total lie.  I constantly see people sharing LinkedIn posts saying "I'm happy to announce that I've landed a job at [company]" but to my knowledge, headcount has not grown at all.  This, of course, would indicate high turnover and a culture that remains $h!++y.

When I see these LinkedIn posts -- and I see them weekly -- I feel like I'm watching a horror flick.  I want to scream "run!" but I know they wouldn't listen any more than the characters in the slasher film.

Part of me wants to post my story on LinkedIn or Glassdoor, but I'm going to refrain.  That's a good way to get myself blacklisted, meaning I'd screw myself if I were to go job hunting in the future.  Employers tend to avoid potential employees who would dare speak truth to power.