HIKERS BE WARNED - THE COST OF BEING RESCUED - SHOULD YOU GET LOST! [Presenting: Nicolas Cendoya, 19, and Kyndall Jack, 18].

[Edited May 05, 2013, 12:45 PM]

"Life, Liberty and Pursuit of Happiness..." just got a lot more expensive.

The United States of America is broke, and your personal safety has a cost these days. Before you set out hiking you should consider things.

Are you a felon escaping justice? You know, murderer, rapist, kidnapper, thief ? Are you responsible for a massive search involving law enforcement that may cost tax-payers hundreds of thousands of dollars? In general, you don't need to worry. When caught you will be locked up at tax-payer expense and the search for you will also be charged to tax-payers, not to your account. Paying to get you off the streets, is par for the course... it's the way the system works. If you get lost in the badlands, in a vast forest, or on the arctic tundra,  don't sweat it... you won't be charged for your apprehension/recovery. You won't be charged with the search and rescue costs.

But before getting lost consider this:

You're with friends at a beer blast, you wander off and get lost. Search and rescue is called and the cost to find you is in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Chances are, you won't be charged... hey, you got drunk and got lost. It happens.

As a writer I admit I have faults... I have a tendency to write long, involved posts. I know that... am aware people tend to not have time to read long posts, so let me put it as bluntly as I am able.

Your spouse, significant other disappears, last known location - hiking.  Before you dial 911, ask yourself the following question? Were they in possession of "drugs"?

Okay, you might laugh... what difference does it make, in fact, you may not know or even care about the answer to that question.

Or better yet, you  are the one(s) who decide to go hiking... you bring your cellphone, some pot, some peyote or magic mushrooms along. Maybe you leave a little behind in your car - why, well, I'm not sure why, but let's say that you do. Maybe you roll the joint and a seed falls on the floor of your car.

Or let's say, you write a blog, or have a website devoted to "drug legalization". Or you're involved in any of a thousand topics deemed unconventional or questionable by today's post 9/11 standards. Is it any mystery why the terrorists that caused the thousands of deaths on Sept. 11, 2001 chose that date, 911? Stands for: Emergency/rescue! Doh... A Homer Simpson moment!

Since then, we now have the Patriot Act, an act initiated by President George W. Bush to counter terrorism. The Patriot Act does more than protect Americans from future acts of terrorism... it undermines/subjugates the 4TH Amendment to the US Constitution. It makes spying on American citizens legal without much of a warrant. It flies in the face of what our founding fathers explicitly were trying to protect America from... covert actions by a home government into the privacy of it's citizens.

Cut to the chase, or shall we say the 911 search and rescue:

The following story is about two hikers that got lost in a California forest. They dialed 911 from a cellphone. They reported they were lost. They asked for help. After 4 - 5 days and a multi-agency search they were found, barely alive. What was also found, left behind in their car were "drugs". Meth to be exact. But...the key-word here is, "drugs" were found.

Let me back-up and again focus on the facts... the key-word here is not murderer, rapist, bank-robber, serial killer, it's "drugs". I didn't say beer, or coffee, though they're drugs, but we're not talking buzzed or blindly drunk. It doesn't matter what drugs other than legal ones that you may have left behind, or if when you're found two weeks later they make you take a piss test and you test positive for some pot that you may have used at a party weeks earlier.

The fact is, your rescue won't be what you expect. It'll become a criminal investigation and unlike the aforementioned criminal element you'll likely be ordered to foot the bill.

Don't believe me?

Nicolas Cendoya, 19, and Kyndall Jack, 18 went hiking in a California forest awhile back. They got disoriented and got lost for several days, they almost died, all the while they were within about a mile or two from where their car was found. When one of them realized they were lost they called 911 and asked for help. Before the cellphone battery expired law enforcement got a "fix" on their approximate location. Law enforcement found their car. After several days of searching the two hikers were found, nearly dead.

One of the hikers, Kyndall jack reported having hallucinations that she was being attacked by wild animals. She reports she became disoriented. Since the battery for the cell-phone expired, searchers only had an approximate location for the two lost hikers. It took them several days based on what they knew to locate each of them. They survived. The cost of the search and rescue totals approximately $160,000.

When law enforcement searched their car in an effort to determine their plans/location, it allegedly contained a small quantity of methamphetamine.

It is up to a judge now to determine the facts in this case, but suffice it to say the couple has been billed $160,000 for the rescue, as "drugs" were allegedly involved. Law enforcement has determined the couple wasn't hiking, they were out in that forest getting "high". If alcohol were involved they would not be facing the charges they are facing... they could have had a case of whiskey, a keg of beer, which would have been okay... but they had what could have been a marijuana seed in their car and that means they were drug addicts out in that forest getting "high".

Rule of thumb people... alcohol, tobacco are not drugs... leave all you want behind in your car if you go hiking. Getting drunk is far different than getting high... and to ward off the wild animals, you might consider bringing some vitamin B-12.

Honestly... people can do dumb things... like hike on a nice Winter day without any survival gear... and get lost, and who's going to pay to find you when a blizzard happens? I mean stupid is stupid!

But to blame their loss and search and rescue on drug use? Okay, so meth isn't one of my preferred drugs... but what if you had a joint and got lost? My God, you can't carry a compass and a map??? You can't plan ahead and be safe???

I've gotten lost a few times hiking, even without drugs... I have to admit, a time or two I had a little pot, but I always carry a map and a compass, though seriously... to charge these citizens $160,000 simply because meth was found in their car and assume that's the reason the got lost? So now, authorities don't care if or why they got lost, they care that "drugs" were found, which turns this into a drug war investigation. The drugs were left in the car they were driving, like they didn't bring them with? Why would they go hiking to do drugs, only to leave them behind in their car? Seems to me even if the intention was to hike to use drugs they would have brought them along, not left them in their car. Like the drugs couldn't have been planted without their knowledge? I don't know, but seems like a convenient way to pass the buck, that's all I'm saying.

We've lost our humanity. This is where the War on Drugs has brought us. These people were stupid, I grant you that possibility. But the alternative is... if lost and "drugs" are involved, do all of us a favor, don't call 911 - just die? Has society sunk deep enough into a dark hole that we don't care about you anymore because of that? If  you're a murderer, a rapist, a thief, a serial killer then they care, and the taxpayer foots the bill to find them... but if drugs are involved, better that they simply die and spare us the cost of finding them. That's what it comes to. If so much as a seed of cannabis is found, you pay.

So much for the shaman of old who had a bit too much peyote... just let him or her die. Forget the message they may return with to enlighten us all.

Opens up a can of worms in my opinion as in this case the hikers called 911, but what if a loved one or friend had?

The story is here: HIKERS LOST IN CALIFORNIA FOREST.

Stop the Hurt! End the War!

A VIEW FROM BEHIND THE MOP - CHAPTER ONE

A New Series by BobKat... A Fictional Autobiography, more fact than fiction... 

IMPORTANT NOTICE: The following story and the title is copyrighted material by me, the author, alias not withstanding, beginning in 1978, and renewed the latest time in 2013. The title and the following material is owned by me and cannot be reprinted or transferred, in part or whole, for any reason whatsoever, by law. It cannot be printed or reprinted or disseminated in any form without my explicit permission. You may print this, and any subsequent  posts/chapters one time for personal use, but you are not authorized to share or disseminate said printed materials in whole or in part and you are liable if the printed contents are transferred, sold or stolen in part or whole even without your knowledge. The reason for this warning is simple. This is a blog edition of a book I have been working on for the past 37 years. I am providing my story solely to viewers of my blog, for educational and entertainment purposes. Please enjoy and respect my privacy. You are welcome to forwards links to my blog, with the understanding that recipients are subject to the same restrictions to this this story, provided, that you send the link from Chapter One only. Please do not send links to other chapters or parts of chapters. To assist you, here is the link for Chapter one: The Only Authorized Link - "A View From Behind the Mop", Blogger Version 2013, by (alias legally synonymous to the author), BobKat.

NOTE 2: The following story is the story of my life in my early 20's, and holds particular significance to me. It is for that reason I am particularly cognizant of it's contents and sensitive to relevance and it's importance. Some of the names have been changed of people and places to protect the individuals involved, and ensure privacy. The story is true, it is not fiction; however for the same reasons listed above it has been fictionalized and is written as fiction; until such time as the novel has been published, you my fellow bloggers and visitors are the only ones to view the following story. Truth is stranger than fiction, so it should not be a surprise that truth is fiction. Enjoy!

A VIEW FROM BEHIND THE MOP

by 

BobKat

Blog-Chapter One:

I am the oldest child of four, born in 1954. I have a younger sister by a year and a half and two brothers much younger than myself. My parents met in Florida when my mother was a registered nurse, my father was in the Navy stationed there. He met my mother in a hospital in Florida and apparently it was love at first sight. They married soon after, and I arrived into this world just a little over nine months later.

My earliest memories begin around 3 to 4 years old... after my parents moved back to my mother's hometown of Jonsburg NY. We moved into an apartment for a couple of years, where I was told my only friend was a teen-aged male tenant, something I only have vague memories about. After that we moved into our first house, on a quiet street in the small city, where I basically grew up, until we moved again when I was in the 5th grade.

My first friends were my sister and two of her girlfriends. There were others in the neighborhood along with a friendly elderly neighbor named Mr. Philbrick. A tall horse-chestnut tree grew outside of his house on a corner lot and I remember being mesmerized by the large nuts that fell off of the tree and collecting them.

Things that happened when I was around 5 years old all blend together, and I find it hard to separate the memories. It seems now like it was ten years at least that all the things I remember happened, but I know that is not so. Mr. Philbrick must have died when I was around six, as I don't recall seeing him after that. I hung out with my sister then and her two friends which caused a great deal of concern for my mother who was afraid I would grow up gay if I didn't hang out with boys my age.

I was close to my mother as a young child, however when she forbade me to spend time with my sister, and fixed me up with a neighborhood boy friend I felt resentment. I remember the first time I actually crossed the street which must have been around age 4, and it wasn't a busy street by any means. I also remember getting beaten up by the neighborhood bully across from my house on that same street. I remember the fun catching grass-hoppers, and playing hop-scotch, mother-may-I and Simon Says. I remember the first time I fund a grass-hopper infested with worms ...

Overall, my childhood was idyllic, although the grass-hopper infested with worms was disturbing. I remember the dreams too, not uncommon, of demons where I was unable to escape them, and oddly, at such a young age I remember dreams where naked women lined up in a hall for me to make my selection, though what I was to do with my selection wasn't something I knew then as part of my dream. I just knew later in life that was pretty strange.

Back then one day you could cross the street and the next you could roam anywhere, and much of anywhere were forests with magical streams full of frogs, crayfish and salamanders. By age seven I had other friends whom I played baseball with and still along with my sister and my cousin Becky we would walk several miles to play at a park with monkey bars, a refreshment stand, horses, swings and what did they call them - the carousels that went round and round? There was an old public swimming pool too, in a gully that was fed by a stream where when my mother was a child it was full and they all swam. By the time I was old enough to be there the pool was a relic to a past considered a public health threat, and abandoned.

At age 8 my aunt Helen gave me a book for Christmas. I honestly don't remember how old I was when I first became interested in reading, especially science-fiction, but I remember that Christmas and receiving Ray Bradbury's "R IS FOR ROCKET". It was a collection of short stories, one of which was a novella of sorts called, "Frost and Fire". More than anything that has ever happened to me it changed my life, or at least, it planted the seeds for change. Briefly, it was the story of a person who grew up on the planet Mercury, where due to radiation from the Sun, the average lifespan was 7 - 10 days.The original settlers had been from Earth, had crash landed and somehow had found shelter in caves and survived. The average ascendant, many generations later, didn't question their short-term lifespan... but the main character of the story, a boy named Sim did.

The premise of the story was that birth - life -old age became accelerated, which amounted to being the equivalent of age 18 in 3 days, age 40 in 5 days, and age 70 by 7 days. But there was a secret, two secrets in fact. One was that a group of rebels known as scientists lived deep within the caves and that they knew something about the origin of their life and a secret plan that would prolong their lives. The other was that farther up the valley were caves where people lived for 10 days, not just 7. Sim was unconventional enough that he chose to seek the truth against the wishes of his parents and the community standards. On day 3 of his life he sought out the scientists against the wishes of his parents and was mocked because of his choice to pursue a myth and not marry and have children like everyone else did.

Sim found the scientists... and I highly recommend the story to everyone, although perhaps reading the story should be prohibited to those under age 18. The story altered my young mind, only I didn't know it then. It would be another 10 years before the story took form in my mind in a way that provided a strange motivation for me. And much like the experience Sim had, my parents would also condemn my actions and mock me when I too sought out the scientists.

Next time - Blog-Chapter Two... Seeking Science and the Truth About Life...

FACT IS, I'VE BEEN THINKING...

Wow... if I haven't mentioned it previously, I moved to the Boston Area back in 1981, and lived in various communities for the next 8 years. Eventually I moved to New Hampshire.

I attended a couple Boston Marathons... worked in downtown Boston starting at Suffolk University. From there I moved on, to work at other prestigious places. It's tough to share, but I loved Boston, I simply never felt I fit in, although I almost did. A part of me longs to move back there, yet another part of me never would. Maybe it was my initial experiences in Boston, the security guard at Suffolk University that took an instant dislike towards me - or hatred I might say, and threatened to kill me first chance he got if he found me alone. Yeah, a Suffolk University security guard; did I report him? This was 1981... a blue collar employee didn't report such things!

I was only there for less than a year, but I made friends... one was a woman who provided unlimited help with my resume and encouragement, and no I didn't have sex with her, but the view from her 20th story condo was an orgasm by itself. And there were the long lunches I was able to take resting on the Boston Commons. There was the Italian friend/co-worker who clued me into the fact that no Italian wine was a bad buy. And he was correct.

I lived in Malden, MA initially, well, after a couple months in the Back Bay, which was certainly write to home material, and worked for a time at the Boston Shakespeare Theater.

Think this stuff is easy to remember? It's not. It's years ago, and I'm almost 60. I grew up in a small town in NY State...the pace was slooow... the move to Boston was a second chance... my first being Arizona which ended in disaster. A story I'm not going to go into right now.

I moved to Boston with an invitation from a girlfriend... a nutcase, seriously. But she got me settled in Boston and true to the promise she made me she got me out of that small town. Yeah, living with her didn't last long, and before I knew it I was on the top floor living with a total stranger named Roman who was a rock star... who got home at 2AM and proceeded to eat strange foods and I had to buy a pair of eye-shades to sleep - in my sleeping bag at the edge of his one room. He was gay, but never pushed me. But as a matter of fact I met a lot of people who were gay... and the women were especially hostile towards men, which I found difficult to accept, as what made me the enemy just because I was male?

Talk about motivated... I moved quickly to Malden as I mentioned, to a rooming house. I made friends with an 80 year old sea-captain, and the guy 15 years younger than me across the hall. We shared the kitchen and the bathroom. And one day I met the serial killer that I gladly took a ride with apparently to go to a strip club for a good time, only he went through Boston and Boston PD had a web set for him, pulled us over, arrested him for God knows what and they told me to "get the hell away..." and I did, and moved to Allston/Brighten soon after.

What I'm trying to say is Boston was a blast! I made great friends... but it was really, really difficult. I was so alone, so much, but eventually i found myself, I found friends, and I found a life in Boston. But often, friends moved away. Relationships were different - when you live among millions of people you're not so unique, is what I'm saying. Friendship was a special thing, but the pace was such that things changed quickly. Adjusting to change was key to surviving in the Boston Area. Eventually i realized I wasn't cut out for it, though a part of me still longs to move back.

I think about that as I consider what it's like for immigrants moving to Boston. Congress is reconsidering the Immigration Bill since the Boston Marathon bombings took place.

Two people brought the City of Boston and surrounding communities to a halt... for good reason, but to underscore, my underscore, the difficulty of thriving in a big city like Boston... well, the wrong-doings of two people hardly makes a difference to me. I was minutes away from death myself at one point, and I doubt if the killer, the alleged killer, had succeeded, that I'd even have been found, let alone identified. Life in Boston was difficult, yet it was Great! You almost have to be born there to appreciate it, but then so many people aren't.

One morning leaving my driveway in Malden a guy jumped out of the bushes, asked for a ride, which I refused him. Two days later my car was broken into and much was stolen.

All you could do with the police was file a report, but you never heard back from them. In Allston my car was again broken into, the radio was stolen. I filed another police report. Heard nothing. I talked with my neighbor, a guy 10 years younger than myself. Seems he had a party that night, and he knew "the person' who stole my radio... he returned it to me promptly. Neighbors worked together or not at all.

All told, what I'm  trying to say is try not to judge events in Boston too quickly. It's a jungle, not a small town.

HAPPY 420; THE HOLIDAY THAT IS, BUT ISN'T ... A MORE DETAILED HISTORY OF CANNABIS

Today is April 20th, 2013... a celebrated holiday to millions of Americans. What they are celebrating is a plant with amazing and mystifying properties... a healing plant and one that brings enlightenment to it's users. The plant is called cannabis. It's history of use goes back hundreds of thousands of years. It's use includes as a medicine, as a shamanistic purveyor of visions, a recreational means to let go of the stresses of life and to unwind, safely, in the majority of cases.

"Started in 1971 as a codename for San-Rafael high-schoolers on the hunt for an elusive and now mythical marijuana patch, 420 has turned into an annual celebration and over the years April 20 has become some kind of national holiday for marijuana activists." Quote from an anonymous source. But the history is well documented.

"Marijuana"... on the federal level is a Schedule One narcotic, with the alleged dangers for being extremely addictive, without any medical value, and a plant that is so dangerous that since 1971 and passage of Nixon's "Drug Control Act" has cost the American tax-payer trillions of dollars in prohibition efforts and eradication intervention. Today marijuana provides millions of dollars of benefits to law enforcement, prisons, and drug rehabilitation centers. Millions of Americans use what's called marijuana, many on a daily basis, like alcohol or tobacco, which are also drugs, however, marijuana is a drug in a class considered an exception to those drugs that are legal. Despite the deaths and destruction caused by alcohol and tobacco use, marijuana is considered far more dangerous to society, and yet, not one recorded, documented death is due to the use of marijuana.

Despite hundreds of thousands of years of the use of marijuana and no documented, verified harms as a result of it's use, millions of citizens lives has been ruined either through imprisonment or criminal penalties which become a criminal record and that interfere with gainful employment, education or simply, promote  alienation that interferes with individual marijuana users from sharing similar passions.

How can this be?

Normal explanations seem to fail to express the truth or reality; they've been tried so many times in the past by myself and others and those efforts yield blank stares or disbelief by onlookers and those who make the laws.

This disbelief is the result of an exceptionally well thought out, successful and biased propaganda effort begun by the free press, aka newspapers/journalists, what was called yellow journalism back in the early 20th century (early 1900's). This group became an invaluable partner to the federal government when, after the end of alcohol prohibition, after the end of the Great Depression, after the end of the Civil War, passage of the Emancipation Proclamation made Blacks (Negroes) free and equal to all American citizens; something that didn't sit well with many pro-slavery advocates.  There was something else that didn't sit well with many Americans, especially those in the southern states. Just like today, illegal immigration from Mexico was deemed a problem - a big problem, as back then, after the great Depression there were limited jobs as it were for American citizens. The one difference compared to today is that there wasn't a drug war, there wasn't a concern that drugs were being smuggled over the border.

Cannabis, ganja, hemp were all legal. But America had a problem - not all of America, but enough people and enough politicians that there was a problem to solve.

1) How to prevent interracial sex between Black men and White women. As late as 1978 I spoke with a elderly woman quite upset with the still ongoing trend where Black men and white women mingle. She point out your routine blood poster that for a college student shows different types of blood. One type was called normal blood. Another type shown on the poster was labeled, sickle cell. This she said, pointing to the sickle cell blood is "niggers blood". And they are spreading it to Whites. She concluded, "they don't have the same blood as Whites.

I tried to explain to her that sickle cell was a disease, not the blood of Blacks. I said, "we all share the same kind of blood, human blood. She was unconvinced and I left her with her illusion.

2) There happened to be something Mexicans enjoyed a lot. They called it marijuana. It just so happened that Black Americans were hitting the high times with their Jazz music. These Black Jazz artists just happened to have a wild flock of followers - White women.

1 + 2 = 4. Anti-Emancipation groups along with southern states were demanding the federal government do something. At first, there seemed to be nothing they could do. They couldn't interfere in relations between Blacks and Whites, and they were only having limited success preventing Mexican's from crossing the border to find work in the US. Until one unnamed genius in one of the southern states stuck upon the fact that Mexicans enjoyed marijuana.

William Randolph Hearst (Wikipedia Link) is best known for the birth of Yellow Journalism (Wikipedia Link). We have his legacy and empire to thank for the for the most successful sham on the American public and indeed, the world, something unprecedented in it scale and the consequences. Yellow journalist were able to rouse an unconcerned public with the news that Black jazz musicians were doping White women with a powerful new drug supplied my Mexicans. Movies were made, the most famous being Reefer Madness -  1936 (Wikipedia Link). And to add horror to the mix, the drug was allegedly being pushed on unsuspecting children and teenagers.

The dangers of marijuana became a firestorm in Washington, with a newly created department of the federal government, and it's first commissioner, Harry J. Anslinger at the helm. His job, prevent loss of tax revenue due to trafficking of illegal drugs. There was just one problem, ganja wasn't illegal in the US. That's what Mexican's used, only they called it marijuana. Marijuana was a plant, an invaluable plant used in industry and medicine. Harry's job wasn't to bust ganja users in America, it was to control hard drugs and eradicate a loss of tax revenue to the federal government. Yellow journalists saw it differently. Several corporations saw it differently. Mexicans had to go; Blacks had to be put back in place;  marijuana and hemp had to go - hemp fiber used to make rope and fabric was a hindrance to corporations creating new synthetics fibers. Cannabis as medicine, hardly considered - at Congressional hearing in the 1930's only one doctor was interviewed as to his opinion on the dangers of cannabis, and prohibition. He stated it was a medicine and was quite opposed to restrictions. He was of course ignored.

Harry J. Anslinger had only one big problem - there were still insufficient grounds to outlaw a plant. It would be like demanding he outlaw coffee or tobacco. At first he refused. But then he struck on an idea. The solution to machine-gun wielding thugs during prohibition was to charge an enormous tax to own a machine gun. Of course you had to present the machine gun first to pay the tax, which meant you were arrested for possessing a machine gun illegally as you hadn't paid the tax. Those worthy of owning a machine gun like law enforcement or reputable dealers were of course proved with the required tax stamp. So Harry decided to do the same with cannabis, and the birth of the Marihuana Tax Act was born.

No I did not misspell marijuana, Congress did. As I said, in America we knew it by three names, cannabis, ganja and hemp. Mexican's called it marijuana. Congress, or some clerk typed marihuana, and to this day all legal decrees bear the name marihuana.

Not only is it misspelled, prejudicial and the science is wrong about any alleged dangers... but for 75 years people have been hounded and punished for possession and use of a plant that was never a concern to the population in the first place. Whole generations of people have been misled and prohibited fro being equal members of society for choosing a plant instead of synthetics, alcohol or tobacco. Lovers, those seeking can advertise interest in the aforementioned, but risk the law if they share an interest in cannabis.

And after 75 years, all that is about to change - two states, Colorado and Washington have legalized cannabis for personal use and plan to market it as alcohol. More than 15 other states have legalized it for medicinal use, and all this despite the fact the federal government placed cannabis in a federally controlled category of the most dangerous and addictive drugs in the world, as Schedule One, without any medicinal value, and as such, medicinal studies about cannabis are forbidden without a license from the federal government, assuring that any research be biased towards it's dangers not it's benefits. Ironic then the the federal government owns the only patent on cannabis as a medicine, showing proven of it's active ingredient, THC.

Again... Happy 420 - hope everyone had a really great celebration!

About me, celebrating?  I had to replace a fuel-pump in my car that died after the one year warranty expired and I'm drinking beer. I would prefer a joint (cannabis cigarette) but alas, I'm 58 and out of touch with the younger generation that has access to the plant. See, although Congressman Rand Paul might believe cannabis is something you grow out of by age 28, a fade, so to speak - to take up drinking beer and whiskey, or like Vice President Biden hopes we'll all grow up and "buy a shotgun" instead of a handgun, truth is, there are actually many millions of people over age 28 that prefer the handgun as much easier to carry than a shot-gun and the cannabis much safer than the beer and whiskey. That's plain, common-sense reality.

Stop The Hurt! End the War!