Category Archives: News

They Deserve Better

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As I have mentioned from time to time on this space, when I graduated High School I enlisted in the U.S. Navy, a life that I was not particularly well suited for and that I left, at their request, in early 1982. I make no bones about it, the military life was not for me and there are particulars about my services that made the situation worse, but I harbor no ill will towards anyone that serves, quite the opposite. I had friends that remained in the Navy for many years including one who became a ‘lifer’; someone who served for twenty years and retired. I have deep wells of respect for those that serve and understand, a little, some of the hardships and sacrifices that they endure in service to our nation, which fuels the enragement burning inside me at the reports of the living conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln.

During my nearly three years in the United States Navy, I was stationed aboard one ship, the USS Belleau Wood, an amphibious assault ship that carried Marines and a Marine airwing for taking beaches in wartime, and aboard the Burning Wood I spent eight months deployed on a cruise of the Western Pacific, so I know something of life at sea in military service.

Over the course of those eight months, we made no less than 9 port calls, 10 if you include Diego Garcia, a tiny atoll in the center of the Indian Ocean with nothing to do but as one classic SF film put it ‘throw rocks at cans, and we gotta bring our own cans.’ The Belleau Wood made some sort of port call pretty much every month of the deployment and those port calls were more than just a chance for the crew to go ashore for liberty and escape the confines of their metal city; they were places to refuel, resupply, reequip, and do vital maintenance that is difficult or impossible to perform while underway. Ships can be resupplied while cruising at sea. Unrep (Underway Replenishment) is a vital element of a ship’s duty while on station and one that was performed under security conditions because the U.S. Navy had mastered techniques that our adversaries had not and we wanted to keep it that way. That said, there are limitations to what and in what quantities of stores that can be delivered to a ship in this manner. Unrep cannot replace a port call, not for any ship.

The USS Lincoln and her battle group were diverted from their usual patrol in November of 2025 and sent to the Gulf in preparation for this administration’s idiotic war. In that time, much of which the crews served under wartime conditions, the ships had precious few port calls. It is quite difficult to keep such a battle group supplied with just the essentials for their operations, much less the ‘niceties’ of life, such as fresh fruit, things for the crew to buy in the ship’s stores, and so during such a prolonged deployment, but such considerations are beyond the concern of this president and his cabinet of yes-men lackeys. Reports from the Lincoln indicated that morale has crashed with possible suicide attempts among the crew. Mind you, we are getting reports principally from the Carrier herself. I have seen nothing from the smaller ships that comprise her escorts, ships with far less ‘generous’ amenities and with far more cramped living conditions. (Not that a Carrier is a hotel. For everyone aboard this is something that will test your endurance and without a clear and understanding of the mission that endurance begins weakened.)

Trump and his SecDef treat these men and women of the military as game pieces on a board moved about to inflate his ego in a vain and futile attempt to fill the deep void at the heart of his soul. The abuse of our troops, ashore and at sea, is a consequence of the voters, who may not have known better, and the spineless cowards in the government who certainly knew better but placed their own status and riches ahead of the nation’s interest and the troops that they so cavalierly abuse.

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My Weekend, My Fears, and Rob Reiner

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I spent the weekend with a mysterious sinus condition that, while principally asymptomatic, left me with loss of appetite, light-headedness, and a touch of vertigo whenever I walked or stood or even sat up straight at my desk. This was nasty enough that I called in sick Monday and lost out on 2 hours of overtime. Luckily, the novel was done and I could coast being a waste in my easy chair while the issue ran its course.

I became aware of Rob Reiner’s death in bits and pieces over the course of a few hours on Sunday. First, tweets from the film side of my Twitter feed started posting RIPs and other acknowledgements of his passing. When they popped up, I noted them. It was sad to lose a talent such as his, but I had no particular reaction of concern—not because I was heartless or opposed him for some political or artistic stand, but because I tend to have no parasocial relationship with celebrities. The people we see on our screens are not who they truly are; it is their public face. Mourning, for me, is for those close to me personally and for the truly tragic.

Then more details began surfacing: Reiner and his wife had been murdered in their home.

Fear crept into my thoughts.

In these terribly heated, hateful, and charged political times, it was not at all beyond the realm of imagination that some demented, disturbed, and misguided individual had taken some form of revenge on perceived enemies. I posted nothing though, because early reports are the least reliable and it was always best to wait for more information.

Fear transmuted into sorrow when news emerged that the couple had been slaughtered by their adult son, whom the authorities then pursued and captured Monday. The murder became a terribly tragic affair that echoed the murder of performer Phil Hartman, also killed by a family member. Naturally, our egotistical and childish president could not resist making such a tragic event about himself, but fortunately he appears to be the exception and not the rule.

I came to Reiner as a director through his debut feature film, This Is Spinal Tap. Despite my indifference to heavy metal, I found the film fantastically funny and accessible. His next feature, The Sure Thing, though under-loved among his catalog, is another of my favorites and one I may watch this week both as tribute and as my holiday film.

Reiner was by far not a perfect director—the faults in The American President are Sorkin’s, not his, and the sexism in Sleepless in Seattle is mild but could have been easily avoided. When we paint traits for people with a wide racial or sex-based brush, it is nearly always an ‘-ism.’ (Hint: a movie that “no man gets” was written, produced, and directed by men.)

I have a number of Reiner films in my library, and in all our collections, he continues to live.

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Celebrity is a Performance

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The Neil Gaiman story which went much wider this week with a long and disturbing account of his alleged sexual assaults and other nasty work has stirred up some very deep feelings of betrayal among his fans in the fantasy and horror communities.

I don’t blame them for feeling betrayed. Gaiman had constructed a nearly perfect public persona that invited respect and admiration. He doled out advice that encouraged artists of all stripes as they struggled with impostor syndrome, his stories celebrated the outsider, and they presented a level of inclusion that welcome many groups of people form whom society has always felt excluding and threatening.

But it his public persona was all for show, and the most vital lesson we need to take away from all this is that all public personas are for show.

Gaiman, Whedon, Cosby are but a few names of men with public faces that made them admired are people who lifted up others and presented what appeared to be images of our better selves. The truth for each of these turned far darker than most expected.

Everyone who is some form of celebrity presents a public face that is not their true self. Some do it to market themselves and their art. Some do it to cover up an inner insecurity that never leaves them. Some do it because their true selves are not readily accepted in wider society. This is particularly true for those in the closet. But some do it to conceal their monstrous nature.

On the outside looking in we cannot not their true selves, we can only know what they project, the image that they create and distribute for their own purposes, some of which are mercenary, some self-protecting, and some nefarious. This is way it is important to never place anyone on that pedestal of admiration.

Praise the art, praise the skill of the artist, but do not believe that simply because of the art that they are good. They may be, there are noble, good, and great people everywhere, but you cannot know them save by their actions and even then, your data set is limited by what they want you to know.

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A Murder in Mid-Town

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Yesterday morning in New York City, the Chief Executive Officer of UnitedHealthcare was slain in what seems to be an obviously preplanned assassination. Leaving his hotel, Brian Thompson was shot multiple times from behind by an assailant who took precautions to mask his identity and fled on foot and on electric bicycle and remains uncaptured.

Following the killing a lot of dark, nasty, and cruel comments began appearing on social media, much of which utilized the for-profit Health Care industries verbiage utilized when denying coverage for medication, procedures, or care.

I know nothing of Brian Thompson as a person or as a CEO. He may have been a man who wanted to bring more care to patients under UHC’s coverage. He may have been the sort of CEO who demanded that every department met ‘quotas’ for rejected claims to protect profits. He may have been a kind and empathetic employer, or he may have been the sort that demands you return to work and leave friends and loved ones stranded. Whatever the case for Thompson as a person murder is murder and the assassin needs to be brought to justice.

The hot and fierce feelings of those people making their online comments is utterly understandable. My job previous to my current one was working for a medical access company. Doctors would send over to us proposed treatments for patients and our company dealt with the byzantine bureaucracy of the for-profit insurers to obtain the approval. UHC was one of the worst to deal with. For some treatments it seemed that every single request was denied forcing us to launch an appeal on the patient & providers behalf. In my opinion that denied knowing that some people wouldn’t know to appeal to avoid that expense for the company. When politicians, nearly always Republicans, scream that you don’t want bureaucrats between you and your doctor it infuriates me. They are there already and making it more expensive and complicated than it needs to be.

Perhaps the murder in mid-town was because someone’s healthcare was delayed or denied and for someone this broke them in a violent manner. It has been reported that shell cases at the scene had the words ‘deny, defend, & depose’ written on them and that support this possible motivation but until the killer is captured, we will not know the truth.

I have not made the biting, cynical, cruel comments that others have but man oh man I understand the hurt and the rage that motivates them.

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