My "O" My!

What a day, what a night, what a Country! Last night was truly something special, and having grown up in the deep South, remembering the "whites only" pools, restrooms and water fountains from my days as a young skipper, it made me proud to see we've come full-circle as a Nation. Whether you wore red or blue yesterday, it's all red-white-and-blue today. My biggest surprise with respect to this election has nothing to do with you or me, our friends, co-workers or fellow Americans. It was world reaction. As Americans, we can sometimes be a bit self-centered, thinking we're better, richer, we're right and everyone else is wrong. But just for a moment, put yourself in the other guy's shoes. That holier-than-thou attitude, coined years ago as the "Ugly American" syndrome, takes a toll on the psyche of everyone outside our borders. Friends, foes, allies, neutral countries, nobody likes being talked down to or treated like 2nd-class citizens of the human community.

These statistics from our allies startled me when I read them this morning: In Spain, only 8% of the people were hoping for a McCain victory. In Germany, 5%. And in France, a mere 1% were McCain supporters while the balance were all Obama. What does that tell you about how we're viewed by our neighbors? Here is a link to the entire article on USAToday, and I think you'll be amazed and saddened by how far we as a Nation have fallen in the eyes of the world:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-11-05-election-worldview_N.htm

This was not so much an election as a birth. You could call it a re-birth, but it's so new I prefer to think of this as its own new direction for the USA. Just like with a new birth, there will be stumbles, diapers to clean and plenty of spit-ups to deal with. But We The People have an opportunity to galvanize and move forward, responding to and re-joining the world community with the prestige and eloquence we've been missing for a long time. Congratulations, President Obama. Now, get to work.

We got a welcome show of humanity from Celebrity Cruise Line this week. The Mercury was on an extended cruise to Hawaii, that was scheduled to come back to Ensenada Mexico, before returning to its home port of San Diego. However, a couple of days out from Hawaii on the return, there were 2 separate passengers with totally unrelated conditions, who fell so ill that it was deemed life-threatening for both. The Captain called back to Hawaii asking for a Coast Guard helicopter to rescue the people, but he was told they were out of range. Celebrity had a decision to make. They could keep going on schedule, and there was a likelihood that one or both of the passengers might not make it back alive. Instead, they chose to turn the ship around, and sail back towards Hawaii until they were within Coast Guard range, losing 2 days of their schedule. Both passengers were airlifted off the next day. However, the Mercury was now hopelessly behind schedule. Cruise ships can crank up the boilers to go faster - a LITTLE faster - but they're still limited on top speed potential. Celebrity realized they could no longer make a call in Ensenada before proceeding to San Diego. They had to go full-speed direct to California, and even then everyone would miss their flights, and the next passengers would arrive at the pier without a ship. Pretty upsetting, but remember WHY they did this. It was a remarkable decision to bypass Ensenada and go directly to San Diego. You're probably thinking "what's so remarkable about skipping a port - it happens?" Theoretically you'd be right. But you're not taking into effect The Jones Act. That's an antiquated statute that still sits on the books, supposedly to protect US shipping companies (of which there are just about none left). The crux of The Jones Act says that any non-US-flagged passenger ship cannot operate solely within US territorial waters, without going to a foreign port before returning to the USA. Probably made a lot of sense decades ago, but now it's just a crummy law that no one has bothered removing from the system. That's why cruise ships in Southern California have to go to Ensenada....it's close, it's Mexico, and it beats The Jones Act. Wouldn't it be nice to take a cruise from LA that stopped in San Francisco for a wine tour, maybe another couple of stops down the coast, Catalina Island and San Diego, back to LA? Or on the East Coast, how about a cruise from New York that hits Baltimore, Virginia Beach, Charleston and Savannah? Can't do it! Gotta go to Bermuda or the Bahamas or the Caribbean, to cover the stinkin' Jones Act. Never mind it's a waste of fuel, taking people hundreds or thousands of miles out of the way form other interesting ports of call, leaving a large number of days at sea. It's the Law. Yeesh. Don't get me started, I've hated The Jones Act for years and will continue to until it's eliminated. You can bet the cruise lines hate it even more!

In this particular case, since the Mercury had gone from San Diego to Hawaii, and come back to San Diego without going to a foreign port, they are going to have to pay massive fines to the government, for a Jones Act violation. All because they wanted to save two peoples' lives. Does that sound fair to anyone out there? I didn't think so.

On a lighter note, the Macomb Michigan Daily newspaper reports there was recently a strong-arm street robbery in Warren, Michigan. That in itself isn't particularly newsworthy, but in this case the events were a little bizarre. The perpetrator was trying to wrestle money away from an unsuspecting "victim". However, the victim turned out to be much stronger than the perp, and he was able to retrieve his money from the would-be mugger. Not only that, when the perp realized he was losing the battle, he tried to flee but as he did $30 of his own money fell out of his jacket pocket. He decided to keep on running. So although the victim was obviously upset with being mugged, he wound up making a tidy profit of $30 for 15 seconds work. I know, I know, you're doing the math in your head. I'll save ya the trouble, Mate. $30 profit for 15 seconds equates to $7,200 an hour, being a mugg-ee instead of a mugger. Nice work, if you can get it...