Congresswoman Renews Death Panel Fears

ELK RIVER, MN (AP) - Less than twenty-four hours before all the provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act take effect, Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann (R-MN) renewed her concerns that death panels would be rung in with the new year on January 1.

A death panel is a political term that originated during the 2009 debate about federal health care legislation to cover the uninsured in the United States. The term was coined in August 2009 by Sarah Palin, the former Republican mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, when she charged that the then-proposed Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act would create a "death panel" of bureaucrats who would decide whether Americans—such as her elderly parents or children with Down's Syndrome were "worthy of medical care."

“Everyone is wishing everyone else a Happy New Year today,” Bachmann said as she peered out from behind a stack of bank deposit slips for the more than $1 million a year she and her Tea Party compatriot husband receive from the US Treasury as various subsidies, “but it’s not going to be a happy new year for millions of my fellow Americans who will be put to death by the provisions of Obamacare.”

Despite being repeatedly debunked by legitimate news agencies and the snopes.com online debunking service, some in the radical right wing of the Tea Bag Anarchy Party persist in spreading fears about the supposed panels.  Their fears are fanned daily by the talking heads on the Fox News Channel.

When asked for a passage in the law that expressly establishes death panels, Bachmann was unable to provide specifics.  “I think you need to talk to Tim Thompson my Chief of Staff about that one. I’ve just been repeating what Roger Ailes and the patriots at the Fox News Channel have been telling us all of us to say.”  Taking a breath from her soliloquy, Bachmann then added, “But real Americans need to pay attention. At midnight tonight Obama is going to start killing people with his death panels.”

Paul “Six Fingers” Anderson, a leader of “Death Panel Watch” an advocacy group of the Tea Bag Party in Lexington, Kentucky, was unable to provide specifics when asked who was on the panels and how often they would meet.

“We really don’t know about that.  You see Obama selects the panels in private with no Congressional oversight.  We all think he does it in cahoots with the Muslim Brotherhood PAC that he heads,” Anderson said.  Yet when asked where in the law the panels are mandated Anderson was vague.  “I can’t be too sure about that but they are there. Are you from the liberal media? Is that why you’re asking all these hard questions?”

The Congressional Research Service, a non-partisan arm of the United States Congress has stated unequivocally that there is no wording in the legislation that establishes or even mentions death panels.  “I don’t know where these crazy bastards came up with this nonsense,” Kitty Carlisle, chief of the Congressional office said. “I have read every word in the 900 page law at least twice and I can assure you death panels do not exist.”

Confronted with reality Bachmann remained steadfast in her warnings.  “The sad thing is that otherwise healthy Americans are going to be put to death starting tomorrow by the orders of the death panels.  What makes it even worse is that the panels are made up of every day citizens like janitors and car repairmen and unless they do what Obama says they are going to be put to death also.”  Bachmann went on to say that her greatest concern about the law is that Obama will appoint only liberals to the panels and they will only select Republicans to be put to death.

Reached for comment while hunting mama grizzly bears inside the confines of Denali National Park, former Wasilla, Alaska mayor Sarah Palin supported Bachmann’s concerns. “I said it in 2009 and I will say it again until I’m blue in the face….well red in the face…the death panels are there and they have generated more campaign contributions for my Tea Bag wing of the former Republic Party than you can imagine.”

More than 2 million people signed up for health insurance coverage under the provisions of the Affordable Care Act since a late October computer glitch slowed down the process.  On January 1 when the law takes effect there will no longer be pre-existing conditions that can stop a person from receiving health insurance.  Children of the insured will be able to remain covered under their parents plans until they are 26 years old, insurance companies can no longer cut insurance coverage if people get sick, and there are no longer upper limits on the amount of money an insurance company has to pay out if an insured person has a catastrophic illness.  The law also mandates that a minimum of 80 cents on every dollar paid for an insurance premium must be allocated for health insurance and the law also calls for an increase in the number of primary care physicians in the United States. 

Republicans insist that this is all bad.

The Cost of a Brazilian Visa

A visa is a document stamped into a passport indicating that the holder of the passport meets the minimum requirements of the host country for entry into that country.  Most of the time a visa is a simple inked stamp that is placed on a passport page and other times it’s a more formal higher tech document with an adhesive back that is placed on a passport page.  Ecuador has taken things a step further and laser prints the visa directly onto a passport page. 

Free visas from places like the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos Islands and the United Kingdom

Visas that are stamped into your passport are generally free to American citizens.  If you have ever stepped off a plane in the Bahamas or Mexico and handed your passport to an immigration officer you’ve seen them stamp your visa into your passport.  Once the immigration officer returns your passport you are at liberty to travel in that country for no more than the number of days indicated.  Most countries provide 30 or 90 day visit visas however some, like Vietnam provide a visa valid for one year in which you can enter the country only one time.  

A single-entry visa to Vietnam cost $100 US in 2006

A growing number of countries, unfortunately, are now requiring travelers to obtain a travel visa before arriving in their country.  Concomitantly for travel to those countries if you do not possess a visa in your passport you are not allowed to board the flight from the United States to travel there.  Airlines can receive hefty fines for allowing a traveler on a plane without the needed visa.

Once while standing in line to obtain a free visa before entering the Sultantate of Oman in the Middle East, a Sri Lankan man standing next to me saw my passport and said out loud, “With an American passport you can travel anywhere in the world and you can do it for free.”

Not any longer.

In the post 9/11 era the United States, under the guise of keeping terrorists out, has begun requiring citizens of more and more countries to obtain a visa before traveling here. Costs associated with a visa to the United States are ridiculously expensive in many cases.  For some time during the Bush Administration there was talk of extending this indignity even to “friendly” countries like the United Kingdom and Canada.  Luckily it never happened.  

When you arrive at the border crossing into Lesotho you pay a $10 US tax to use the highway even if you're walking then the border control person gives you an entry and an exit visa "to save you time."  Travel across the border into Namibia and you also pay a road tax but no visa fee.

In retaliation for treating citizens of their own countries like this, a growing number of countries that never used to require a visa for American travelers now do require one before traveling there.  And in further retaliation those host countries are charging American travelers the same amount of money or more to visit there.  Many times these ridiculous visa costs are marketed as a way to increase the amount of foreign hard currency entering a nation.  That might make sense for a poor country like The Gambia or Mozambique, but when Australia and Brazil are charging extortionate prices for a visa you know more than simple economics is involved.

Crossing the border from Koomatispoort South Africa into Mozambique is an experience you're not likely to forget any time soon

To obtain a visa before traveling to a country requiring one is a simple task if you live in Washington DC or New York or in a city that has a consulate for that nation.   There you simply show up at the visa section during the appointed hours when they receive applications.  Turn in the application form, a photo or two, other required documents, and the dreaded visa application fee, and then leave your much cherished passport with an officer of that nation.  In a few days you can return and retrieve your passport with the visa pasted inside.  If you reside outside of an area where consular offices are available you are reduced to entrusting your passport and the application materials to the US Postal Service or FedEx/UPS and have them deliver the application for you.  A very few countries, Australia immediately comes to mind, allow you to apply for a visa and pay the visa fee electronically thus saving you the time of standing in line or mailing in your application.

Crossing from Israel to Jordan is an experience everyone should have at least once in their life!

Several years ago when I traveled to Israel I decided that I also wanted to visit Jordan while I was in the area.  My original plans for this trip were to spend one day at Wadi Rum in Jordan where I hoped to find a Verreaux’ eagle and get a Jordanian visa in my passport.  These well-intentioned plans came to a halt when I tried crossing the Arava, Israel border for my planned day trip.  I had a rental car reserved at the Aqaba airport, so I set off from Eilat two hours early to allow time for the marathon of going through Israeli departure, getting into Jordan, and finding a taxi to the airport.

The first suggestion that this crossing was going to be eventful was the substantial Israeli departure tax that they did not charge at the Taba crossing to Egypt the day before.  Weighing this, I asked what the cost was in United States dollars for a single-entry visa for Jordan.  Checking her chart the immigration agent told me that American’s pay $85 for a visa at the border crossing, and we pay an additional nine-dollar departure tax to leave Jordan and return to Israel.  Ouch.  It was going to cost well more than $100 to leave Israel, get into Jordan and then back out again for a single day seemed a tad too much.

A Jordanian visa is MUCH cheaper if you obtain it before leaving the United States than it is paying a bribe to a Jordanian border control officer on arrival

I had checked with the Jordanian Embassy in Washington before my departure and asked about getting a visa from them.  The person in the embassy told me that it was a two-week process, it would cost $42, and that it was “much, much cheaper” to get my visa at any Jordanian border crossing.  Apparently the Jordanian Embassy in Washington does not talk often with their border crossing in Aqaba because it was more than twice as expensive to get a border there. 

To pass from Lesotho into South Africa at the Sani Pass border control station all you need to do is step over the puff adders lying in the road, hand your passport to immigration, get a stamp and continue on with your journey

Since that trip in 2001 the cost of a visitor visa in many countries has gone out of sight.  In 2004 I paid $100 US for an electronic visa to Australia and two years ago I was told it would cost $100 US for a visa to step across the border into Zimbabwe and the same amount for a visit to Mozambique.  I paid it for Mozambique but refused to give money to the murderous regime of Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe. There, instead of paying for a visa I simply walked through the Limpopo River with its Nile crocodiles everywhere and plunked myself down illegally in Zimbabwe.

I decided to walk by Nile crocodiles lining the bank of the Limpopo River and enter Zimbabwe illegally than to pay $100 for a visa from the government of Zimbabwe's murderous dictator Robert Mugabe

In preparation for an October 2014 trip to Brazil I checked into the current visa requirements.  The last time I was in Brazil legally was in 2003 when I paid $100 for a multi-entry visa through the Brazilian Embassy in Washington DC.  The new requirements for a Brazilian visa, reprinted below border on harassment.  Why does some civil servant in Brasilia need to see my water bill or my phone bill or my bank statement?

A five-year multi-entry visa to Brazil now costs $180 US plus a processing fee of $89 US

Required Documents

Attention: The Consulate General of Brazil in Miami may require additional documents.

·         Original passport valid for at least 6 (six) months prior to its expiration date. The passportmust have at least 2 (two) blank visa pages. 
Obs: Notice that a passport is considered a valid document only if it is signed by its holder. Therefore, make sure you sign your passport before bringing it to the Consulate General of Brazil.
 

·         One recent individual passport photo, full-frontal, white background;
 

·         One electronic visa application form. Please, make sure to provide full information. When you finish filling out the electronic visa application form, print the application receipt, glue your picture and sign on the appropriate field.
 

·         Letter addressed to the Consulate with detailed information on your trip: tentative dates of arrival and departure, places to visit, contact information, hotel or any other place at which you will be staying. Please, don't forget to sign your letter;
 

·         Yellow Fever International Certificate (when applicable);
 

·         Participants in athletic competitions or performing arts events must present copy of letter from sponsor/organizer with detailed information on the event as well as conditions of attendance (informing clearly that there will be no admission fees neither payment of appearance fee, prize money or any other monetary prize);
 

·         Proof of income from the last 90 days (bank statements, credit card statements showing the available credit line or paystubs). If you cannot provide any of these listed documents, you may have a sponsor who must provide such documents AND an affidavit of support letter assuming full responsibility for your trip. Parents, even if Brazilians, must provide their financial documents to support an application for their children.
 

·          Those applying by mail or third party must present proof of residence within the jurisdiction of this Consulate (Florida, Puerto Rico, US Virgin Island): copy of Driver’s License or any recent utility bill – issued within the past 90 day).
 

·         Those applying by mail must enclose a self-addressed pre-paid U.S. Postal Service Express Mail envelope for the return of original passport. Send your application and paperwork to:

Consulate General of Brazil
80 SW 8th street suite 2600
Miami, FL 33130
 

·           Applicants under 18 years of age must present:
1. Both copy and original of the birth certificate;
2. A Letter of consent signed by the parents or legal guardians: Parents must present original ID document or passport along with the application. If Brazilian citizens, they must submit their original Brazilian ID (Carteira de Identidade) or Brazilian passport along with the application. Remember that a passport must be signed. 
 

·         Brazilian citizens must travel to Brazil on a Brazilian passport. Those who have renounced the Brazilian citizenship must present proof.

 

Fee

The fee has to be paid by US Postal Money Order or receipt provided by the deposit  machine located at the Consulate's main lobby. The machine only accepts cash and charges US$ 1.00 for the service. The US Postal Money Order should be payable to Brazilian Consulate General.

Most annoying of all however is the cost of a Brazilian visa.  Now the embassy fee is $180 US and if you go through a visa broker/expediter they add an $89 charge bringing the total to $269 for a piece of paper with an adhesive back to be placed in my passport. Not surprisingly the cost to a Brazilian wanting to travel to the United States on a visitor visa is also $180 US. What a coincidence.  This cat and mouse diplomatic game has thoroughly soured my desire to ever travel again to Brazil.  Five times in the country already is more than enough for me despite there being 257 species of birds in the country that I have never seen before and most of them occur only in Brazil. 

The right of a country to require someone to have a visa before entering their nation is certainly a valid one.  And if they choose to charge someone for that visa then so be it.  However charging an extortionate amount of money is ridiculous.  I simply cannot believe that the cost to type my name on a piece of adhesive-backed paper and slap it in my passport costs $180 in salary and benefits to the Brazilian civil servant who does the work.  At the same time a GS-7 passport clerk in the US Embassy in Brasilia doesn’t eat up $180 in salary pumping out visas for Brazilians every 15 minutes either. 

A visa for an American to enter Brazil now costs more than a 5-night Caribbean cruise.  We can thank heavy-handed US policy toward the world post 9/11 for this lovely charge.  AND if you pay in cash at a Brazilian consulate the machine accepting the money charges $1.00 for the service. Such bullshit.

To put the $269 fee for a Brazilian visa in perspective consider this.  A season ticket for the minor league Bradenton Marauders baseball team gives you 70 games directly behind home plate for $310.  A ticket from Tampa to San Juan Puerto Rico on Jet Blue Airlines is $226 roundtrip.  An upcoming five-day cruise from Tampa to Grand Cayman and Cozumel Mexico is $224 per person for five night’s accommodation, transportation and all meals.  Yet Brazil wants to charge me $269 to fly there and sweat in the tropical heat for a few days?  I think not.

It is cheaper to purchase a 5-day Caribbean cruise and sail to Jamaica to get this free visa in your passport than it is to obtain a visa to enter Brazil

It’s unfortunate that nations have to engage in these diplomatic pissing matches however in a lot of these cases I can’t really blame the host nation. After all it was the United States that started laying its heavy hand on them first and they can’t be blamed for striking back.

Friendly, smiling, Thailand doesn't charge an arm and leg for a visa to enter it. In fact entry to Thailand is free. I think I'll go back to Phuket...now where is that Thai Airways website?

However as for me - screw you Brazil.  I’ll find another country that does not charge an arm and leg for a visa and go birding there. Visas for Americans traveling to Thailand and Malaysia are free and I have not been in either country since 2006.  Both are looking better every day.

The Ornithologist's Lament

The first day I walked into my dorm room as a freshman at the University of Wisconsin – River Falls (August 1969) I found this poem pinned to the bulletin board above my bed.  I read it once and have never forgotten a word of its eloquence.  It’s reprinted here for your enjoyment. 

The sun was shining brightly and I could hardly wait,

To ponder out my window and gaze at my estate.

A breeze was blowing briskly, it made the flowers sway,

My garden was enchanted on this inspiring day.

My eyes fell upon a little bird with a beautiful yellow bill,

I beckoned him to come and sit upon my sill.

I smiled at him so cheerfully and gave him a crust of bread,

Then quickly closed the window and smashed his fucking head.

Merry Buffettmas Everyone!

After considerable thought and at least three Kalik beers from the Bahamas, mon, I've come up with the solution to the Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays/What Should I Say To Not Offend Anyone non-issue issue. It’s simple and I'm surprised nobody thought of it before. Doesn't matter if you are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, agnostic, or believe in a flock of pink flamingoes....everyone is covered.

December 25 as I may have mentioned before is not only Ernest Hemmingway's birthday but more importantly its Jimmy Buffett's birthday - the holiest day of the year in the Parrothead Nation. Given that reality and the fact that we actually know the exact day Buffett was born on (as opposed to that Middle Eastern socialist who hung out with prostitutes and provided free health care to lepers among others) I suggest that from now on Buffett's Birthday be the December 25 holiday each year! It crosses all religious belief lines, its cross-generational (instead of believing in White Santa showing up in a sleigh driven by 8 tiny reindeer you can wait for Buffett to show up on a bottle-nosed dolphin - and at least with Buffett there is a slim chance he could actually show up) and instead of shopping for Christmas or Hanukah gifts you just buy each other bottles of Landshark Lager (a Bloody Mary can be substituted if Landshark is not available in your area), sit under a palm tree on Buffett's birthday, and drink them (a fake tree can be substituted at higher latitudes).

This solution solves all of the angst, removes the societal pressures, and still gives people an excuse to shop like crazy, eat like a small army at Grandma's house (substituting cheeseburgers and shrimp for turkey and whatever else) and all you need to do is switch out Christmas carols for Buffett CDs and the problem is solved!

So....let me be the first to wish everyone a Happy Buffett's Birthday! (or Merry Buffetmas if you still need to use remnants of the old holiday) and may a giant bottle-nosed dolphin pulling a 20-foot sailboat leave lots of sun tan lotion under your palm tree (fake or real) tonight.

Three Trips Short of Being Jamerican

Tourism commissions exist to paint sexy pictures of whatever piece of real estate they promote.  Travelers to the Bahamas were once told that “It’s Better in the Bahamas,” and they continued to be told that despite nobody ever finding the “it.”  Travelers headed to Puerto Rico were told it was the “Continent of Puerto Rico” and if you continued on a bit further southeast to Dominica you were told it was the “Nature Island of the Caribbean.”

Marketing of multifaceted Mexico has followed many twists and turns.  Sun worshipers see a flood of commercials showing idyllic beaches and people plunging off rocky cliffs into the aquamarine sea.  For Americans on the West Coast, the tourist commission pushed glitzy places like Acapulco and Puerto Vallarta and Cabo.  People on the East Coast are lured with visions of the green Caribbean waters off Cancun and Cozumel.  “Adventure” travelers saw advertisements for trips to rugged Copper Canyon, while those with an interest in archeology and anthropology saw advertisements for the ruins at Monte Alban, Palenque, and Uxmal.  Mexico’s tourist advertisements worked wonderfully, and tourism was soon one of the most important parts of Mexico’s diverse economy. 

Travelers to Jamaica were first lured by pictures of smiling faces and friendly people under the banner of “Make It Jamaica.”  After enough people had tried to make it in Jamaica, and learned that the only smiling happy people were the two in the advertisement pictures, the tourist commission came up with “Make It Jamaica, Again.”  They hoped someone might.

An Air Jamaica (now an extinct airline) Airbus 300 deposited me in Montego Bay on my first trip to the island in May 1990.  Long-time friend and fellow biologist Jon Andrew and I had come to Jamaica for a week of bird watching.  Jamaica has the distinction of being home to 28 species of birds that are endemic to the island.  An endemic is one that exists nowhere else on earth.  That number is the largest number of endemic birds of any island nation in the West Indies.  We were hoping to find them all.

Walking out of the air conditioned comfort of Sangster International Airport into the heavily humid night air of Jamaica we were immediately hit on by hustlers.  One guy wanted to sell me some ganja and another was selling cocaine.  A third said he wanted to sell me his younger sister adding “she’s a virgin,” which after looking at her I found very difficult to believe.  All of these scammers were waiting just outside of the arrivals door and more of them approached us as we walked to our rental car and then stopped nearby to purchase gas.

Jon and I spent a week near Discovery Bay and went on daily forays into the countryside from there searching for birds.  One day we drove to the Blue Mountains above Kingston where, in a flash, I learned that leaving your window down after parking the car was a mistake because someone came by on a motorcycle and stole my tape recorder from the front seat.  Another day we drove into the Cockpit County to look for birds at Windsor Caves National Park. Enroute we passed through the little village of Kinloss.  As we made our way through town we were verbally accosted and told to “get the fuck out of here honky.”  Rocks were thrown at us and knives pulled out from hip holsters and one welcoming man pointed a pistol (I assumed it was loaded) at us as we raced out of town.  Shouted voices behind us were telling us to never come back.

Sugarbelly, the drug-addled manager of Windsor Caves National Park said, after we told him about the experience in Kinloss, “When tourists leave the tourist prisons they find a whole other Jamaica they didn’t know existed.”  The “tourist prisons” Sugarbelly mentioned are the resort hotels that line the beaches on much of Jamaica’s coast.

Our time in Jamaica was well spent and at the end of the week we had seen 27 of the 28 endemic bird species.  I had hoped to find them all so I never had to return to this island but Jamaican Owl remained in hiding and that meant I had to return some day.

The endemic Jamaican owl was the sole reason I returned to Jamaica a second time.  Image downloaded from Wikipedia with no attribution to who took the image

As part of a training program I was in I spent the spring and summer of 1992 on loan to the Florida Keys National Wildlife Refuges where I lived on Big Pine Key.  For some unexplained reason American Airlines and its American Eagle subsidiary had a ridiculously cheap airfare from Marathon and Key West via Miami to Montego Bay over the Memorial Day weekend .  It was one of those airfares that were too cheap to stay home and I still needed to see Jamaican Owl so against my better judgment I went back to Jamaica.

Seeing a Jamaican Owl is simplest at Windsor Caves National Park and to get there I had to pass through Kinloss again.  This time I did so at 4:00 a.m. when everyone was still stoned and asleep and nobody bothered me. Unfortunately they were all awake and lining the streets of Kinloss at 9:00 a.m. when I passed through town again and although I saw no guns or knives a rock bounced off my windshield after someone yelled “You fucking honky. Get out of here!”

I had followed the Jamaican Tourism Commission’s slogan and not only made it Jamaica once I also made it Jamaica again.  Having seen the Jamaican Owl on the second trip I now happily had no other reason to return there.

However in ensuing years I did return there and I did so for various reasons.  Most surprisingly (and refreshingly) each time I have returned to Jamaica I have not experienced any of the anger and hostility that greeted me on my first two visits more than 20 years ago.  Now when I go there people treat me like I am someone they have known for years and they make me feel welcome. 

Twenty-five years ago my arrival in Jamaica was greeted with guns and rocks and offers to buy virgin sisters. Now tourists are greeted with raggae and soca music

In 2006 I flew to Montego Bay to work on my Jamaica bird list and in 2008 I flew to Kingston for a weekend solely to look for shorebirds in the lagoons on that side of the island.  In 2012 I spent a week there drinking beer at Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville Cafes that stretch from Ocho Rios to Negril. Everyone everywhere on the island was happy to see me and made me feel welcomed.  On a hunch I drove through Kinloss one afternoon and was shocked to see little Jamaican kids waving at me as I drove through, many of them saying “Hello, mon” as I passed by.  Not a single knife, gun or rock was in evidence that day.  Just smiling Jamaican faces.  On each of these trips to both Kingston and Montego Bay I was not approached by a single hustler. Nobody wanted to sell me ganja and nobody offered me their virgin sister.  Instead I was asked “Need any help finding your way to the rental car, mon?”

I made two quick trips to Jamaica in 2013; one was a flight to Montego Bay and two weeks later the second trip saw my arrival in Montego Bay on a cruise ship.  On both trips this year I was treated like I was someone who was welcomed by the Jamaicans.  Sailing out of Montego Bay harbor a week ago I actually felt sad that I had to leave the island so soon after arriving.  A taxi driver in Montego Bay asked me how many times I had been to Jamaica and when I told him this was my seventh trip he smiled and said, “Three more trips mon and you’re no longer an American.”   I asked what I would be after 10 trips and he said, “After 10 trips you’re a Jamerican, mon.”  Twenty five years ago I was the enemy and now I’m three trips short of being a Jamaican-American.

I don’t know what has changed in Jamaica but whatever it is it has been for the good.  My second trip there, the one in 1992, I remember talking with a Jamaican man in a bar in Falmouth who, after we each had downed our daily limit of Red Stripe beer, told me that he hated me “because you’re white, mon.”  Hate was a very strong word but that was the word he used.  When I asked why he said “because you were a slave owner, mon.”

I was?  That was news to me.  I told my Jamaican drinking buddy that slavery was abolished in the United States in 1863, a mere 88 years before I was even a glint in my father’s testosterone soaked eye.  I also said that in 1863 my ancestors were 20 years shy of moving from Norway where, at the time, they were mostly interested in figuring out how to catch more cod in the North Atlantic Ocean.

“Doesn’t matter, mon,” my drinking buddy told me.  “You’re white so you’re guilty and that’s all I have to say about it.”

Perhaps it’s a matter of Jamaican’s realizing that their economy is highly dependent on tourism and tourism dollars and if tourists are having rocks thrown at them it’s not really good for the country.  Another thing that I like to think is contributing is the excellent movie Cool Runnings a story about the 1988 Jamaican bobsled team that came within a loose bolt of winning a medal at the Winter Olympics in Calgary.  The movie and the actors portrayal of Jamaicans was so unlike what I had experienced on my first two trips.  Yet after the movie came out who among us couldn’t like Jamaicans?  The entire world had become a fan of the Jamaican bobsled team and in fact I’m still their fan today.

I often wonder how much the excellent movie Cool Runnings has had to do with the tectonic shift in the outlook of Jamaicas toward visitors

I think the movie not only gave Americans the chance to see Jamaican’s for who they really are.  It also gave Jamaicans the chance to see that we tourists aren’t the marauding bastards they had been led to believe by years and years of anger and mistrust.  Even more so it gave Jamaicans a reason to be intensely proud of being Jamaican.  Maybe that had been lacking before.

Its pure speculation about the movie and I have no way of knowing if I’m even close to being correct about its effects on Jamaicans and Americans about each other.  Maybe the change in attitude and outlook has nothing at all to do with it. However its seems more than a tad coincidental that just a few years after Cool Runnings was released, Jamaicans started to make me and other Americans feel welcome.

A tranquil afternoon on tranquil Montego Bay

I became horribly lost along the north coast during my November 2013 trip to Montego Bay and to Falmouth.  Totally befuddled I stopped a Jamaican man at an intersection with the North Coast highway and told him I had no idea how to find my guesthouse in the hills above Falmouth.  “No problem, mon,” he began, “do you have their phone number? I’ll call them for you and tell them I’m bringing you there.”

Handing him the phone number he called, talked to the guesthouse owner and then said, “Follow me mon, I’ll take you there.”  Taking off in the gathering dusk I followed my guide up into the hills and through the winding roads to the entrance of my guesthouse (I would have never found it in the dark).  Stepping from my car and shaking his hand while thanking him profusely, my Jamaican guide said, “No problem, mon.  It was a pleasure you know.  Americans are important to us in Jamaica and we want you safe and happy while you’re here.”

Whatever it is that has changed in Jamaica it’s a good thing and now I can’t wait to get back.  Actually I can’t wait to get back there three more times so I can tell all my friends that I’m now Jamerican.  I wonder what a Jamerican passport looks like?

Where Was the Outrage Then?

Earlier this week at the state funeral for former South African leader Nelson Mandela, US President Barack Obama walked near Cuban President Raul Castro and rather than ignore him, Obama did the polite and humane thing to do.  He greeted the Cuban President and shook his hand.

Within seconds the right wing jihadists were off on their latest witch hunt to prove that Barack hates America.  One mouth-breather said in a Twitter post that "I knew he was a communist Muslim."

He could tell that from a handshake?

In the feeding frenzy of accusations and inuendo and grave predictions for the nation's future that followed, the knuckle-draggers seemed to have forgotten a couple of things in their past.  

For example, where was the outrage when Donald Rumsfeld shook hands with Saddam Hussein a known terrorist (and made up threat to American security)?  Where was the outrage when angry old man and US Senator John McCain (R-AZ) shook hands with  Muammar Gaddafi the deposed and now-dead former leader of Libya?  At one time in the war on terror Libya was listed as one of the top exporter of terror in the world yet McCain could shake the leaders hand?

And what about when Richard "I Am Not a Crook" Nixon shook the hand of the communist leader of China, Mao Tse Tung?  Or what about when Ronald Reagan was palling around with the communist leader of the former Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev?    

What makes these famous handshakes even more ironic is that McCain, Rumsfeld, Nixon and Reagan flew to meet the people whose hands they shook.  All the trips were intentional.  Barack met Raul Castro at a funeral in a neutral country.

And since we're screaming and hollering about American Presidents shaking the hand of the Castro's what about when Richard "I Am Not A Crook" Nixon shook the hand of Raul Castro's big brother Fidel?  Did the airwaves light up with contempt and anger and was Nixon called a "communist Muslim?"  Of course not - the Fox News Channel wasn't on the air then and Rush Limbaugh was busy using a boil on his ass as the basis for a deferrment from military service.

Taking things to a bit more of an extreme, why did we not hear a peep out of the Republic Party when their god, Ronald Reagan met with the leaders of the Taliban and referred to them as "the moral equivalent of America's founding fathers?"   Can you even imagine the outrage that would have happened had Barack Obama said that?

And who could ever forget the time that George W. Bush not only shook hands with but held hands with and even kissed the sheik who is leader of Saudi Arabia?  You remember Saudi Arabia don't you? It was Osama bin Laden's home country. 

What Obama did with Raul Castro was a polite diplomatic gesture from one world leader to another.  With luck it might open the door for eased tensions with Cuba, a neighbor who needs friends just 90 miles from our border.   Maybe its just me but I would much prefer to have my President shake the hand of the President of a communist nation than to embarrass my country like George W. Bush did with his frat boy prank of massaging the shoulders of the German Chancellor at a meeting in Eruope.  What Bush did to Chancellor Merkel would have been considered grounds for a sexual harassment suit had it happened in a Federal office building in the United States.

Where was the outrage then?

Welcome to South Florida Al Jazeera America

Dear Al Jazeera America

For the last couple of years I have hoped that it would be possible to watch Al Jazeera America on a regular basis in my part of south Florida.  I have followed you online and friended you on Facebook and follow you on Twitter and thoroughly enjoyed the fact-based, ratings-aren't-important way that you both view and report the news.  Talk about refreshing!

Not long ago the Brighthouse Network brought Al Jazeera America to its Tampa/St. Petersburg/Sarasota market.  I have been doing backflips from excitement ever since.  How enjoyable it is to turn on the television and see fact-based reporting from the Central African Republic, and to learn about the protests in the Ukraine from unbiased reporters and to discover that there has been widespread violent clashes among people of different views in Bangladesh (and its been going on for a month) that no other news outlet seems to want to discuss.  Hardly any of those issues that affect the world community are reported on the major news outlets in the United States.

I am encouraging my friends to seek out Al Jazeera in their areas and market you to them saying that the way you report the news is like Walter Cronkite did and like Huntley and Brinkley did back in the days when the news was about the news and not about glamor and about ratings.

Thank you for being there. Thank you for being honest and thank you for openly and obviously being interested in educating your viewers with facts - not trying to sway them with partisan bickering (and for your information politically I am about as liberal as is humanly possible)

Keep up the great reporting AJA, and welcome to South Florida.  You are appreciated more than you imagine.

How I Lost My Guinness Virginity

I am writing a chapter on Tory Island off the coast of County Donegal in Ireland for my next book "A Dozen Random Islands."  The following story is the introduction to that chapter.  It tells the funny tale about my almost instantaneous education into the proper way to drink a proper pint of Guinness in a proper Irish pub.  As the story reveals I dont make it to Tory Island on the original time frame I had set for the trip and my tardiness can only be blamed on Arthur Guinness and his wonderful libation that has been brewed in St. James Gate, Dublin for more than 250 years.  Thanks Art!

My first lesson in the proper consumption of beer in Ireland was provided by Allen, a bearded and burly redhead who seemed to be the only person working at the Cavern Pub in Letterkenny.  I had stopped there to break up the trip as I passed from Dublin to the coast of County Donegal and excitement overtook me as I walked to the front door of the pub.  For as long as I could recollect I have heard stories about the Irish and their ability to drink copious volumes of beer and almost all of that beer seemed to be consumed in Irish pubs.  The Cavern Pub, not far off the main road passing through Letterkenny, looked at least from the outside like the quintessential pub in the quintessential Irish small town and I decided on viewing it the first time that the Cavern was where I would lose my Irish beer drinking virginity.

Although my arrival was in early afternoon I was the only person other than Allen in the pub.  He was wiping down the bar with a rag that looked as if it had survived the great potato famine of the late 1840s.  Perhaps it was not quite that old but at first glance it certainly had not seen the inside of a washing machine in several weeks and maybe more.

“I’ll have a pint of Caffrey’s Irish Ale, please,” I said with great authority when Allen asked me what he could get for me.  I had fallen in love with Caffrey’s Irish ale several years earlier when a friend of mine and I tested it in a suburban Washington DC bar over dinner one night.  Its sorted history of brewing was one of the things I liked about Caffrey’s.  The other thing I liked was its taste and its texture.  I used to describe it to people as being like drinking alcohol-soaked silk.  I cannot think of any better way to describe it.

As Allen absorbed my request for a Caffrey’s his head spun around almost like the little girl in the movie The Exorcist.  His eyes widened and his nostrils flared open as he cleared his throat and then bellowed (not said, bellowed) “This is IRELAND.  We drink GUINNESS here!”  I was almost prepared for him to go into cardiac arrest.

I had tasted Guinness only once before and it produced one of my least favorite memories.  A bar in Key West, Florida called Turtle Kraals had a contest in 1992 called “Drink Your Way Around the World.”  Something like 42 different kinds of international beer was available in that bar and if you drank one bottle of each beer you received a t-shirt that read “I Drank My Way Around the World at Turtle Kraals in Key West, Florida.”  Participants carried a small card with them that contained the name of each of the 42 beers and as each new beer was consumed the name of the beer was punched out by a bartender.  It was a long and laborious process but from it I learned about beers such as Stella Artois and San Miguel that I had never tasted previously.  Each trip to Turtle Kraals I would have two new beers and by the end of my time in the Keys, just before my return to Nebraska, I was two beers short of having drunk my way around the world.

One of the missing beers was Tiger from Singapore and its rich bold flavor made swallowing it a pleasure.  The other missing beer was Guinness and it came in a cold bottle.  As the bartender opened the bottle I heard a distinct hiss come from inside as all sorts of gases were released.  Handing it to me I saw globs of yeast floating around in the liquid reminiscent of a “floater” that passes through your field of view in your eye on occasion.  Placing the bottle to my lips I detected a distinctive scent unlike any other I had experienced while drinking beer and as the first drops of Guinness touched my lips I wanted to throw the bottle away and forego my chance for that coveted ticket.  It was, in a word, awful.  However I really wanted that t-shirt and I fought my way through the bottle.  As the bartender handed me my coveted shirt I told myself that under no circumstances would I ever drink another Guinness.  It didn’t matter if I was dying from thirst I would rather die than drink that concoction again.

Allen, the bartender at the Cavern Inn in Letterkenny, Ireland, caused me to view things a tad differently.  It was quickly obvious to me that I had probably insulted not only him but the entirety of the Republic of Ireland when I asked for a beer other than the coveted Guinness.  After all, to the average tourist, what other than the Blarney Stone is more Irish than a pint of Guinness? And where better to drink one than in Ireland where its brewed?  Wikipedia has this to say about the most famous of Irish ales:

Guinness is a popular Irish dry stout that originated in the brewery of Arthur Guinness (1725–1803) at St. James’ Gate, Dublin.  Guinness is one of the most successful beer brands worldwide. It is brewed in almost 60 countries and is available in over 100.  Annual sales total 850 million liters….or 1.8 billion US pints.

A feature of the product is the burnt flavor that is derived from roasted unmalted barley,   although this is a relatively modern development, not becoming part of the grist until the mid-20th century. For many years a portion of aged brew was blended with freshly brewed beer to give a sharp lactic flavor. Although the Guinness palate still features a characteristic "tang", the company has refused to confirm whether this type of blending still occurs. The draught beer’s  thick, creamy head comes from mixing the beer with nitrogen when poured. It is popular with Irish people both in Ireland and abroad, and, in spite of a decline in consumption since 2001, is still the best-selling alcoholic drink in Ireland where Guinness & Co. makes almost €2 billion annually.

Having nearly created an international incident less than six hours after arriving in Ireland I quickly determined that my wisest choice of action was to have a pint of Guinness and have it sooner rather than later.  Allen who at about 30 years old was nearly half my age and at 6 feet 5 inches was about eight inches taller than me (not to mention in much better shape) could easily throw me through the pub’s walls if I annoyed him again.  Discretion being the better part of valor I swallowed my pride and said, “Alright then, Allen, I’ll have a pint of Guinness.  But before I drink it I have to tell you a story about why I don’t like it.”  I then recounted the experience with a bottle of Guinness in Florida with its bad smell and the floating yeast and the altogether forgettable memory it left in my mind.

“Ah, you silly bastard,” Allen exclaimed when I told him the story.  “Didn’t anyone tell you that you never – and I mean never – drink Guinness from a bottle?   Bottled Guinness is for pussies, wankers, and sheep shaggers. Real Irishmen only drink Guinness on draught!”

As he pulled off a proper pint of Guinness for me (and yes there is a correct way and a wrong way to pour Guinness) Allen turned to me, smiled, and said, “Well, you silly bastard. Since you are a Guinness virgin this first pint is on me.” He then added, “And I guarantee you that this will not be your last pint of Guinness.”

Allen’s proclamation turned out to be prophetic because it wasn’t the last Guinness I ever drank. That day, that week, that month or that year.  One taste of Guinness draught and I was hooked.  I had thought that Caffrey’s Irish Ale was like silk but that was before I tasted a draught Guinness for the first time.  It went down smooth. It went down easily.  It went down often and as I saw the bottom of the pint glass rise up to meet me it went down quickly so I could have the pint refilled and not miss out on one scintilla of the wonderful flavor of my newest most favorite beer.

As I slowly made my way through the second pint Allen, now much less uptight, began to talk with me like I was one of the locals.  He had in his pub at least eight beers and ales other than Guinness.  Each was Irish or Scottish and as we discussed them Allen asked if I’d like to taste one.  Switching from Guinness to Bass he told me the story of how it was brewed and how it tasted like it tasted and why that was.  A similar experience in England a few years ago provided me with my first insight into why British beers are so much more tasty than anything produced in the United States.   As I tasted my way through the other’s on tap in the Cavern Pub it was readily apparent to me that none of them came close to Guinness in flavor and certainly none of them had anything at all like the storied history of Arthur Guinness’s libation. 

I stayed at the Cavern Pub a bit longer than expected and tangled with about three more pints of Guinness than I should have attempted.  It wasn’t long before standing up was a challenge and standing straight became an impossibility.  Rather  than let me loose on the Irish highways Allen insisted that I cancel my reservations further west for the night and instead of driving on the wrong side of the road with a belly full of Guinness as my guide, Allen insisted that I stay with him and his family for the evening.  It turned out that Allen and his hospitality were the rule, not the exception, among Irish people as the remainder of my trip to the Emerald Isle would reveal.