“As a grim-faced President Obama denounced the “inexcusable” actions of the I.R.S. last week and lawmakers of both parties lined up in Washington on Friday to accuse it of an array of misconduct, everything seemed so clear: the nation’s tax agency had deliberately targeted conservative activists, violating the public trust — and perhaps the law.”

The two major political parties took turns on Friday to blast the IRS policy of discrimination and harassment towards conservative groups. A recent CNN poll indicates:

“Americans appear to be taking all three controversies very seriously, with 55% saying the IRS and Benghazi matters are very important to the nation and 53% saying the same thing about the AP case.

“More Republicans than Democrats or Independents say these three issues are very important to the nation, but even among Democrats, nearly half say the matters are very serious,” Holland adds.”

I feel that once all the facts about the harassment are determined for every  individual who took part in the scandal, the proper punishment should be administered. Of course, the political fallout starts immediately, that’s a given.

The more important point to me is what should the corrective actions be to provide satisfaction to the discriminated groups abused by the IRS?

We all have heard President Obama say that American should be a fair place. A place where no one is denied fairness. He speaks about that subject quite often.

One way President Obama could immediately act and he would not need to wait for Congress to pass new laws to control the IRS. Those changes will certainly happen. But he can use one of his favorite tools, the Executive Order today:

“United States Presidents issue executive orders to help officers and agencies of the executive branch manage the operations within the federal government itself. Executive orders have the full force of law,^[1] since issuances are typically made in pursuance of certain Acts of Congress, some of which specifically delegate to the President some degree of discretionary power (delegated legislation), or are believed to take authority from a power granted directly to the Executive by the Constitution.”

Obama could order that EVERY federal agency is prohibited from discriminating against any group for political reasons. Perhaps he hasn’t thought of this solution yet, but he could do it asap.

However that is not the only step the federal government should take.

Lets look back in our history to see what corrective actions took place in cases of previous discrimination actions. The most visible one to me is the that racial discrimination was handled not only by improving laws against such discrimination, but that an Affirmative Action policy was instituted by the federal government as one way to help minorities get a positive boost in many matters going forward.

Congress should consider passing a law that prohibits every federal agency from discriminating and harassing groups and members of those groups for political reasons. The initial effort of a Remedial Tax Status Affirmative Action law would be to immediately grant the tax-free status of the injured groups discriminated by the IRS. Then for a period of several years, audit the IRS to make sure that tax-free status is maintained without harassment.

That would help resolve the harm committed against those groups by the IRS and make our system of government return to a government by “We The People“; as the Constitution requires.

Update: The Senate Finance Committee sent a letter on May 20, 2013 to the Acting IRS Commissioner asking for more documentation.

It’s a good video and says a lot about my friend.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee conducts a hearing with Foreign Service officers focusing on information turned over to the committee by administration whistle-blowers on the Benghazi terrorist attacks. This session lasted 5 hours and 51 minutes.

This was a very informative hearing. While politics is always present in government presentations, the knowledgeable viewer usually has enough experience to filter out partisan comments to establish the truth.

It is my opinion that every Administration needs to put safety of embassy personnel first and not sacrifice them for political purposes. When we send people to represent American Policy in hostile nations where elements of terrorism are present, then we need to have sufficient force protection in place that consists of American assets. If that cannot be achieved then don’t establish a base of operations there.

Far too many Americans have died in many places due to terrorism and apparently we have yet to learn the lessons of our past losses. Congressional oversight is imperative and obstructing that oversight perpetuates the problems.

Some Americans may be giving up on that perspective. This Los Angeles Times article writes that: Most Americans see terrorist acts as ‘part of life’.

“The share of Americans who see terrorist acts as “part of life” has stayed high since shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. But the figure had declined a bit in recent years, with people younger than 30 notably less likely to expect terrorist acts. Now, in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombings, younger people have joined their elders in saying some terrorist actions can be expected. The shift among the young has pushed the overall percentage who feel that way back to its previous high point.”

It seems to me some Americans won’t take effective action to protect themselves. Sadly, that’s each individual’s choice to give-up rather than fight. But not every American accepts that defeatist view.

I am a firm believer and supporter of Inalienable Rights. Those enumerated rights in the United States Declaration of Independence are not just protections from our government, but also protections from other human beings who would attempt to deprive us of those same rights.

Each person is responsible to themselves for maintaining those inalienable rights using any lawful means necessary. The use of force is not excluded in that maintenance, but must be reasonable to any particular situation where force is used. In the self-protection of one’s life or the lives of others, lethal force may be exercised. No human need sacrifice that right of self-defense to please another’s point of view.

You may notice in American society that inalienable rights are hardly every mentioned when it comes to matters of self-defense. When emergency situations arise to the public in-general, asking that people prepare for self-defense is rarely if ever indicated. That is a huge oversight on the part of the government.

So it remains that each person be vigilant and have a recognition that they themselves understand their inalienable rights of Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That they lawfully exercise the means to remain in that condition.

We planned our trip over several weeks and couldn’t wait to start the celebration. The hotel accommodations were wonderful, the food tasty and well-prepared.

On Saturday night we sat by the fireplace resting our bare feet safely before the flames in our ocean-view suite and talked about our life together. On Sunday we both agreed not only was this our best anniversary (out of so many good ones), but that we felt like this was the first day we were married all over again!

That is the way true love should be! We are fortunate to have friends and relatives married about as long as we and some much longer. We wish all who are together, long lives and deeply felt celebrations.

Some of the pictures we took follow:

Dana Point Harbor

Paddle Boarders

Tide Pool

View from our suite

The fireside chat…

Fancy bathroom sinks and ultra-soft towels.

The spacious jacuzzi

The king-size super-comfortable bed

The House Foreign Affairs Committee heard from Sec. of State John Kerry about his agency’s FY2014 budget. This session lasted 3 hours and 8 minutes.

Although I sometimes disagree with Sec. Kerry policies, I find him a logical and clear-spoken speaker after watching him many times over the years on C-SPAN.

His testimony during this Committee session was clear and honest. I consider him a welcome change from his predecessor who stood in stark contrast to Sec. Kerry. One thing stood out in particular, he is prepared to work with the Congress Oversight Committees to get the important work of the nation accomplished and not give excuses or evasive answers as his predecessor did.

As a corporate employee in a global firm, we were expected to contribute to the company’s goals through our best efforts and offer suggestions and or opinions through our management. If you took your job professionally and proactively, you wrote memos and prepared yourself to explain/defend them to your management.

My company had a culture that was decades in the making and yet evolving at a pace faster than many in management would prefer. It was the nature of the global economy to force changes in global corporations. If you were an astute employee, you paid attention to what you saw coming in the company as a result of external forces on the firm.

The group I belonged to when I wrote these memos were a group of intelligent employees who performed their particular job duties very well. We were a technology support group and we were proud of our positions within the company.

In January 1991 our group was charged by executive management to be the group to consider and recommend the technologies used in the firm. It was not a blessing for many reasons.

As with all large companies, the firm had internal political issues and various departments and regions wanted to own the technology vision regardless of what executive management wanted. I think our group was selected to lead so that the other factions had a prime target to attack instead of granting us any real authority to lead. That realization took me over a year to fully comprehend, by then I had already become a pebble in someone’s shoe.

I can’t say that every one of my or the others in the group ideas were always the absolute correct action to take. My boss had helped me understand how to make better business arguments in my memos and not rely solely on my technical experience to shape corporate technology direction. I tried to do that in these five memos that led to additional discussion with management.

These memos in pdf format hopefully demonstrate five times when I tried to influence the technology direction of the firm at critical times and was ignored. At the time I was very frustrated knowing the group was losing the battle of our technology leadership vision. I have obscured some identifying information because that information has no external bearing on the content itself.

On a few memos, I wrote some handwritten notes years later that reflect my assessment of my memos long after the events I warned about finally arrived…

1. The Shape Of Things To Come – January 1, 1992
2. Schedule of Learning – January 29, 1992.
3. Delineation Of The TSU Vision – February 24, 1992
4. Major Accomplishments for 1992 – December 16, 1992
5. Software Standards and Licensing – March 8, 1993

As the years rolled by I came to realize much of the group ideas were correct when the company spent huge amounts of money for failed global technology infrastructure projects—managed by unqualified technical people who were not familiar with the complex corporate culture in the firm and misunderstood the needs.

In the two decades that followed these memos, I came to know far too many companies failed to recognize the coming rapid changes disrupted by the global economy. I believe many employees in those other companies tried to make course correction changes ahead of time. Some may have actually succeeded, they were fortunate if they did.

I believe those of us in my old group moved on to better fortunes. We took with us our personal and collective experiences and evolved with the changing times. I hope at least some of the content in these five memos helps those of you still in corporate life.

This TED Talk discusses new ways to explore our oceans.

“Graham Hawkes takes us aboard his graceful, winged submarines to the depths of planet Ocean (a.k.a. “Earth”). It’s a deep blue world we landlubbers rarely see in 3D.

A world-renowned engineer and inventor, Graham Hawkes wants to revolutionize the way we experience the oceans. He created the Deep Flight series of winged submersibles, which “fly” to the depths of the oceans with the power and elegance of an airplane.”

This TED Talk is amazing in how one application of science can affect so many areas of modern life.

“In 2007, Paul Rothemund gave TED a short summary of his specialty, DNA folding. Now he lays out in clear, abundant detail the immense promise of this field — to create tiny machines that assemble themselves.

Paul Rothemund folds DNA into shapes and patterns. Which is a simple enough thing to say, but the process he has developed has vast implications for computing and manufacturing — allowing us to create things we can now only dream of.”

This TED Talk is about exploring the Universe from the desktop in 3D.

“For the last 12 years, Carter Emmart has been coordinating the efforts of scientists, artists and programmers to build a complete 3D visualization of our known universe. He demos this stunning tour and explains how it’s being shared with facilities around the world.

Carter Emmart uses astronomy and computational modeling to create scientifically accurate, three-dimensional tours of our universe.”