Estimated reading time: 2 minutes
In a few days, Winnie and I will be heading out on a vacation trip I’ve wanted to do since about 1979. We’re headed to Peru for a two week tour of this magical South American country.
Charest Family on the Web Posts
Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
This past weekend I had a front-row seat on the latest Elon Musk-driven insanity of screwing with federal workers. It seems that Musk decided, all on his own, to task three million federal workers to report their current work assignments directly to him. On a weekend. With no prior warning.
The good news is, various federal agency heads slapped Musk down. Hard. Which possibly portrays the wheels falling off Musk’s ability to destroy the federal government. And embarrassing Pres*dent Trump in the process. A double win!
No system of ordered liberty can allow the Government to use the carrot of dismissing charges, or the stick of threatening to bring them again, to induce an elected official…
Estimated reading time: 12 minutes
This kayak review is on the Pelican Clipper 100X, a ten-foot one-person sit-in recreational kayak. This kayak is one of a series of recreational kayaks with common features, produced under the Pelican brand.
Estimated reading time: 2 minutes
Way back in Elementary school civics classes, I learned the supposed genius of American government was “checks and balances.” That the separate but equal branches of our government, Legislative, Executive and Judicial, would guard each other against overreach. In theory, if one branch attempted to take actions in violation of our constitution, the other branches would block those actions.
But, recent events have shown that those checks and balances only work if government officials actually take action. So, today, I wrote another letter to my senator asking why he even bothers to come to work.
So today, the 47th president of the United States of America will be sworn in. This should be a day for celebrating our American tradition of a peaceful transfer of political power from one leader to another. Our peaceful transfer of power that has been the foundational principle of our nation for 233 years.
With one exception. That exception was our last presidential transfer in 2001. During that transfer, the outgoing President launched an autocoup to overturn election results and remain in power, against the will of us voters. That president failed to overturn the results. But he was never held accountable for destroying our legacy of peaceful transfer of power, nor of attempting to overturn the will of us voters.
Today, that man is once again taking power as our president. In any other nation, he would be in jail – or executed. That he is now returning to power is our American day of shame for those of us who still believe in Democracy.
Estimated reading time: 3 minutes
Estimated reading time: 3 minutes
I’ve recently added another seemingly popular answer to my Quora account. This time, I had the opportunity to describe one of the very few instances when I was happy to see a police officer. My story also describes when a person received a very direct, and very sudden, Karma response to their actions.
My story is one example of a case when Karma really bites.
Estimated reading time: 2 minutes
Another one of my Quora answers seems to have hit the mark. Given the number of upvotes, and response comments, I thought it was worth sharing on this humble blog.
The question was “Is it true that the longer you stay in the military, especially as an officer, it will be harder to transition to the civilian world when you get out?”
My answer described my difficulties in making my transition from Navy to Civilian life. Spoiler alert: My answer is a resounding “Yes!“
Estimated reading time: 16 minutes
As I get ever closer to retirement, in what sometimes feels like running up a down escalator, I continue to mentally replay career flashbacks both good and bad. Part of replaying these flashbacks is gaming out how I could have changed bad events to come out different. For some events, as often as I’ve replayed them, I’ve never been able to game out how results could have been different.
One of those events was dealing with a client who openly scorned me from the first day we met. Over the ten months I worked for her, I was never able to gain her trust. Nothing I did was ever good enough.
This and That, Mad King Edition
Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
So the days go by, one at a time, as days always do. Here in America each day brings a new atrocity from our mad king trump. Every time we think he’s gone as low as he can go violating our laws, our ethics, and our humanity Americans have long taken for granted, our mad king goes lower. And lower still.
Meanwhile, our mad king’s brown-nosing quislings continue to fall over themselves in their endless quests to kowtow. While us non-trump-fluffing shell-shocked Americans watch our civil liberties melt away and our retirement funds shrink as the price of essentials rockets to the skies. And we watch the nightly news in helpless fury at new horror each day brings.
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