JOB FAIR
As we remarked before, the wait sort of resembles that of slaves whose plantation has been sold, and are anxiously awaiting whether they are going to get a "good massa" or whether Simon Lagree is going to show up. (In the absence of an effective labor union in the NPS, there is some validity in the analogy, neighbors!)
In defense of the non-elected NPS superintendent, it might be said that the winning candidate had at least worked in some capacity in the agency for a decade or more and had some idea of how things worked.
On the other hand, at the National level, things are less clear. High ranking members of a winning party are sometimes assigned to a department or agency for which they have no particular affinity or even knowledge but simply because "they have a desire to serve the party."
This is heartwarming, but can lead to problems.
There is sibling rivalry among government departments and agencies and some agencies may feel they didn't get the best deal when the Schedule C political appointees were doled out.
For example, how come the Department of the Interior, one of the largest and most important departments, was assigned to a political nobody from Colorado, while the Environmental Protection Agency, which is not even a department, got the classy Christie Whitman, governor of New Jersey, possible presidential candidate, and a known environmentalist (preserved a million acres in the most densely populated state) and is also pretty bright?
Fortunately, through the miracle of the internet, there is a solution. The President would provide a slate of say, five candidates for each department or agency head. The five candidates might all be Greedhead Republicans or Bullmoose Republicans, or a mix, but they would be the choice of the President. The resumes of each of the candidates would be placed on a website and (with authorization code) the federal employee would vote for the most outstanding candidate (or the lesser of the five evils). Electioneering would not be permitted and the election would be over and the votes tallied electronically in two days.
There are some obvious advantages. The agency would have a stake in the person they elected, and the elected appointee would have some interest in the people who elected him or her. The president would benefit politically as it would increase his patronage base by a factor of five without alienating anyone. (A president who couldn't find five people who thought exactly as himself on issues out of a population of 285 million is either a bit shy or a bit slow).
Should superintendents be elected? Interesting thought, neighbors. I would suspect that most superintendents would think not. However, it does raise an interesting question. How come if you apply for a job you must submit your resume and evaluation to the person you are planning to work for, but for some reason, you can't request the resume and evaluation of your propspective boss? Seems that everyone would benefit from shared knowledge.
ASK WALT
No, we are not referring to the possibility, nay, the probability, that in the foreseeable future, you will be faced with the moral decision on whether to leak some of the more destructive machinations of Secretary of the Interior Norton and her minions to PEER or to the working press.
No, I have no recommendations on this matter as it is between you and your God.
The ethical dilemma we are referring to is whether it is bureaucratically ethical for you to download the electronic edition of THUNDERBEAR on a government computer.
We realize that some of you do not have a home computer and printer. Normally, in the Ben Franklin days of THUNDERBEAR in the familiar hard copy form of paper, this was not a problem. You had paid your $14.00 and, according to the First Amendment, and the US Postal Service, you were entitled to your THUNDERBEAR, no matter what the opinion of the Department of the Interior Solicitor.
However, times have changed. Al Gore invented the Internet, the Information Highway: world wide access to information. What can we do? The answer is, apparently, not much. If its out there, anyone of reasonable intelligence can access it.
One of my neighbors in Wheaton is one of the great computer security mavins of the world. He was approached by representatives of the Chinese government (the Communist one) and asked if he could devise a system that would grant the Chinese people access to the World Wide Web and all its useful information, but would strain out the "filth and perversion" (and dangerous ideas) that might corrupt the Chinese people. He would be handsomely rewarded, indeed money was no object. Bob had to tell the grizzled old fanatics that they were out of luck. For technological reasons, the Land of Marx & Mao could not be kept idea free no matter how many bags of gold were offered.
When you think about it, the World Wide Web is one of the few toys of the 20th century that actually liberates people rather than shackles them. Television, on the other hand is the perfect tool for the totalitarian state. The self captive audience sits passively while the government or corporations doles out the daily ration of electronic swill. Television broadcasting equipment is heavy and expensive and is thus easily controlled by the "authorities" (In most police states, the TV stations are as strongly defended as the Presidential palace to prevent some ambitious colonel from proclaiming himself the New Messiah on prime time). Unlike radio, there is no such thing as clandestine TV; it is centrally located. Now, one might bring up the fact of border jumping satellite TV. Alas! the satellite dishes are easily spotted by those other 20th century toys, the airplane and the helicopter (and is it really useful to be able to access "Seinfeld" or "Ally McBeal" if you are disputing your leader, President Saddam Hussain?)
Indeed, in 1948, in television's infancy, George Orwell spotted television's totalitarian potential and used it as one of the prime villains in his novel "1984".
In addition, the World Wide Web brings a certain democracy to the First Amendment. In the bad old days, in order to publish, it was necessary to make friends with an eccentric millionaire or flog your magazine or newspaper to advertisers; if that fickle group decided your prose and pictures weren't going to help them sell tobacco or cars, well then, no hard feelings, but you aren't going to be able to bring Truth to the Masses.
Nowadays, the net surfer can conjure up THUNDERBEAR nearly as easily as the NEW YORK TIMES or the WASHINGTON POST and for free.
This ease of access brings up the moral dilemma of which we had mentioned.
While First Amendment rights do indeed protect your right to access THUNDERBEAR on your home computer, there is some question to your right of unlimited access to a government owned computer.
This is understandable. While the cost of running a computer is small, the cost of running you is not. The government expects that you are using its equipment for the Mission of the Agency and the welfare of the American People ( I recall one GS-13 in the NPS who did absolutely nothing day in and day out but play the stock market on the government computer. As I am a trusting soul, I can only conclude that the GS-13 was using the bull market to support some of the smaller national monuments. Bravo! Well done!)
Anyways, this is a legitimate question on the part of Management. Does downloading and even printing out THUNDERBEAR add to your job knowledge, and make you a better employee? If so, then THUNDERBEAR is definitely work related and you can access THUNDERBEAR with no ethical or moral qualms.
On the other hand, if THUNDERBEAR amuses you or gives you pleasure, then there may be a problem. You may not be happy on government time. (As a defense for those caught reading THUNDERBEAR on government time and apparently chuckling, I can cite the testimony of former superintendent Ann Belkov, who once solemnly told me that THUNDERBEAR is not funny. If THUNDERBEAR is not funny, then it is a government document, pure and simple, and can be read without harm or censure.)
On the other hand, as an interested party, who am I to make NPS policy? What is clearly needed is clarification from WASO on whether employees can use their government computers to tap out www.workingnet.com/thunderbear and take a look at Thunderbear.
A park by park decision on the part of individual superintendents will not do. We cannot, say, allow the easy-going superintendent of Yellowstone to allow his troops to wallow in THUNDERBEAR, when the more strict superintendent of Zion might prefer a more narrow interpretation of the regs.
Yes, friends we need to ask Walt Dabney. Indeed, I hope it will be among Walt's first official acts as Director of the National Park Service to answer this important question.
GLORY FOR GAIL
However, there are exceptions. We were traveling down to the port city of Vera Cruz from Pueblo, a three hour trip. The driver slapped a movie into the VCR and I held my breath.
I need not have worried.
It was "Glory", the moving and impressively told story of the 54th Massachusetts infantry regiment, one of the first Black regiments in the American Civil War. It was in English with Spanish subtitles.
I had seen the film before, but it was worth seeing again.
I had forgotten how good "Glory" was. Matthew Broderick is excellent as Robert Gould Shaw, the callow, but steadfast and idealistic young colonel of the 54th, Denzil Washington is very believable as the cynical private, ex-slave and troublemaker and Morgan Freeman is rock solid as the indomitable Sergeant Major.
The film is no propaganda paean to Yankee moral superiority. Many of the union officers and enlisted men are depicted as corrupt, venal, and just as prejudiced against Blacks as the Confederates (and this seems to have been the historical case)
There is the sad dignity of the last night of the doomed regiment as they talk about their hopes and beliefs for the future in a kind of religious call and response.
Then there is the forlorn hope assault against the impregnable position and the film is over.
The Mexican bus passengers watched the film with rapt attention, with no conversational asides that are usual in a Mexican film audience. I wondered what they were thinking (Mexico had abolished slavery in 1821 around 44 years before we got around to eliminating "The peculiar institution". Mexico incidentally banned capital punishment by 1940, probably 100 years before we will get around to doing so; there are a number of moral areas where Mexico leads and we follow).
The new leader of the Department of the Interior, Ms Gail Norton had once remarked on "how much we had lost when the South lost the Civil War" (The WASHINGTON POST dryly remarked that Ms Norton had stopped short of endorsing slavery!) What Ms Norton did not know, (or I hope she didn't know) is the response of the Confederate commander to the request of Colonel Shaw's parents for the possible return of their son's body for burial in the family plot. "We buried him between layers of dead niggers and that's all he deserves". was the reply to Mrs Shaw.
Yes, Gail, we lost a lot, when the South lost -- fortunately.
However, as we remarked before, Ms Norton is not a stupid woman, only an ignorant one. There are numerous precedents for a political appointee growing on the job. The position of Secretary of the Interior requires no mental heavy lifting or outstanding moral characteristics (Indeed most of the Secretaries have faded into obscurity after occupying the position) The only thing required to do a better than average job as Secretary of Interior is a willingness to become less ignorant than you were before accepting the position.
One of the best examples of someone who grew in the position was Walter Hickel, Secretary of the Interior under President Nixon. Wally started out in rather modest circumstances as a wrestler and later as a bouncer in one of the tougher nightspots in Anchorage Alaska. Later he became Governor of Alaska, (Jesse Ventura, Governor of Minnesota, could relate to that career plan!).
After his appointment as Secretary of the Interior, Wally arrived in DC with all the usual Greedhead Republican ideas on how he was going to "free up" America's Natural Resources. But Wally was a rather moral, if ignorant, chap and he began to see some moral quandaries that didn't lead themselves to Greedhead decisions. He began to learn and ponder, and grow steadily less ignorant. Now he didn't transmogrify into John Muir, but he began moving toward becoming a Bullmoose Republican. He even wrote a book "Who Owns America?", insinuating, that, gosh, maybe you and I do. Even came out against the Viet Nam War. Never can tell what a lessening of ignorance will do for you! Granted, after he returned to Alaska, he got sort of reactionary again (must be something in the water!) Also, it's hard to hold a grudge against anyone so imaginative as to want to tap into the Northern Lights as an energy source!
Anyways, Wally turned out to be a better than average Secretary of the Interior thanks to his willingness to lessen his ignorance. It is possible that Gail Norton will be able to do the same. We can certainly wait and see. (In the interim, I believe I will send Gail a video copy of "Glory". I'm sure she will find it as educational as I did.)
VOLCANO INSPECTOR
I'm sure this is not due to lack of effort on the part of Mexican mountains as there are some spectacular exceptions.
The exceptions are the great volcanos of the Mexican plateau. There are four of them, Popocatepetl (17,883) Iztaccihuatl, (17,338), La Malinche, (14,595) and Orizaba, (18,695)
The first three volcanos live in my backyard (or at least seem that close) Every morning, when I go outside to turn on the gas water heater, I carefully inspect them to see if they've grown, moved, or otherwise changed during the night.
Iztaccihuatl and La Malinche can be counted upon to behave as they are classified as "dormant" (very few volcanologists want to go out on the potentially embarrassing limb of calling them "extinct".)
Iztaccihuatl is a long, jagged ridge of a volcano, with curves that suggest its translated name of "Sleeping Woman". Iztaccihuatl lies across a saddle from its slightly taller partner Popocatepetl and together they constitute "Parque Nacional Iztaccihuatl-Popocatepetl" (Admittedly quite a mouthful of slamming consonants, but be brave! You learned to pronounced the names of those Hawaiian national historic sites and you can learn these Nahuatl words! Iztaccihuatl is not as bad as you think. It's pronounced "Iss-ta-SEE-wattle". (Can't remember that? Here's a helpful mnemonic: Picture how frustrated you would be if you were a Tom Turkey with an "Itchy Wattle" Not entirely correct, but close enough, and more importantly, I've embedded that image in your psyche forever!) Popocatepetl is even easier, it's Po-po-ka-TEH-petal. Moreover, everyone cheats and calls it "Popo", unless they are referring to it, by its other rather mysterious nickname of "Don Gregorio.
Popo resembles a child's drawing of a volcano: A symmetrical cone with snow (normally) on the top third and smoke coming out a hole on the top.
Naturally, with all this dramatic scenery surrounding them, the local inhabitants had to make up some folktales to account for all the natural wonder. (I am sure that even phlegmatic South Dakotans could come up with some sort of myth to explain such spectacular grandeur, if they had been so blessed).
Anyways, the Aztecs came up with a rather sweet Romeo and Juliet story to explain the existence of Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl. It seems that a low born, but very valorous and effective Aztec Warrior fell in love with the daughter of Aztec nobility and the feeling was mutual. However, the parents of the daughter did not think that a union with the low bred warrior was worthy of their daughter and thus were against it. (Since this is also recurrent theme in American country-Western music, I can only conclude that the great love stories of mankind were essentially written by teenagers)
Anyways, being evil and malicious parents (as all parents are, according to teenagers), the nobleman and his wife did not exactly forbid their daughter to see the young warrior, instead they proposed a test. In order to prove himself worthy of their daughter, he would have to venture into an enemy kingdom where, although outnumbered a hundred to one, he was supposed to slay the enemy chieftain.
(Bible readers will remember a similar program that King David laid out for the inconvenient Uriah the Hittite whose wife, Bathsheba, was coveted by David)
Naturally, as Youth cannot envision Death or defeat for itself, the Young warrior took up the challenge, bid the young maiden the Aztec version of "Hasta la vista" and told his prospective in-laws that he would be back to claim their daughter after slaying the chieftain.
After a suitable interval, the parents, pulling long faces, told their daughter that her warrior friend had died gloriously in combat and it was about time she started seeing some of the eligible suitors they had picked out for her as backup.
The maiden's response to this was very Juliet-like: She took poison that put her into a deep coma. However, her young man had not been killed. Instead he returned home with all the honors and booty of Victory to claim his True Love.
Unable to arouse the sleeping girl, he carried her off to the plateau, vowing to watch over her until she awakened or wait forever, which ever came first. The gods, as they are wont to do in such cases, took him at his word and turned him into a mountain (Popocatepetl) and turned her into another mountain, Iztaccihuatl, or "Sleeping Woman"
Popocatepetl still gives off periodic signs of life to show that he is alert and "on duty" guarding the beloved Iztaccihuatl.
Popo can be very, very alert at times. One day, I was crossing the Zocalo, the wide, beautiful village square of Cholula. I suddenly noticed two things; that the bright, sunny day was getting perceivably darker. I also noticed that I was the only one walking. Everyone else in the square was standing stock still and looking straight up at the sky.
I too, stopped and looked up. It was an incredible sight. There was a vast, roiling, gray white cloud, pink at the edges from
alpine glow of the late afternoon sun. What was so strange about this cloud was not that it filled half the sky, but rather its eerie symmetry. Most of the natural clouds that you and I have seen are somewhat lumpy with jagged edges and bulging towers.
This cloud was an enormous 180 degree half circle, its edges as neatly trimmed as if by God's cookie cutter.
I finally realized that I was looking up at the bottom of the "cap" of a mushroom cloud. Popocatepetl had blown about an hour previously, firing thousands of tons of volcanic ash eight kilometers into the sky. The eerie part was that there was absolute silence, no Hollywood style roar, just the blue sky being slowly erased by this 180 degree arc of ash.
I waited for the ash to start falling. I was somewhat curious. Would it be like a South Dakota blizzard, only with "snow" that wouldn't go away? Would it be difficult to breathe? How deep would the ash get? Would it make a crunching sound when you walked through it? Would it be warm to the touch?
There was no immediate danger. One has to be incredibly lazy or falling down drunk to be buried alive by a fall of volcanic ash (Those unfortunate folks at Pompeii were overcome by apyroclastic cloud.) The main danger would be structural collapse due to the weight of the ash on the roof. The Mexican Civil disaster people did a good job of monitoring Popo and suggesting that everyone have a dust mask, duct tape to seal windows and doors, and a shovel or push broom to clear ash off the roof.
No worry!
When the Spanish conquistador, Hernan Cortes took Cholula, he vowed to build a church on every Aztec sacrificial altar in the city and thus Cholula has more churches than any Mexican town its size. This apparently still cuts some ice with God, as a band of angels (or the jet stream) pushed the cloud of ash back onto the volcano and we were spared an ash fall.
Speaking of Cortes, it seems that Popocatepetl played an important strategic and even tactical role in the conquest of Mexico.
You see, Cortes had some incredibly good luck and the Aztecs some correspondingly bad luck. Unfortunately for the Aztecs, they had a great belief in doomsday prophesies; that a "fair god" who had left them but would later return amongst great tribulations, by incredible coincidence in what was to be the year 1519, the very year that Cortes showed up!
There were other signs and portents: There was unaccustomed cold, The lakes of Mexico City had frozen for the first time in memory, crops had failed, people were starving, necessitating more human sacrifice. Watchers on the coast reported strange "floating temples" on the sea. The normally quiescent Popocatepetl no longer trailed a faint streamer of smoke, but thundered into life with a billowing black cloud by day and lurid red streamers at night.
The Aztecs could be forgiven for thinking something was up. (Lest we become too condescending toward the simple savages, we must remember the hysteria generated by our media a couple of years ago on what would happen when 1999 turned into the year 2000!)
Naturally, when Cortes met the chiefs of the vassal tribes and said "Have I got a deal for you!" they listened. Cortes defeated the Aztecs not so much because he had 13 muskets and 14 cannon,but because he was marching at the head of thousands of ticked off non Aztec Indians (plus that reliable old friend of the Whiteman, Small pox.)
After Cortes and his Indian allies finally defeated the Aztecs in the battle of Tenochtitlan in 1521, the Indian allies thanked Cortes for ending the Aztec threat once and for all, but privately asked each other "Do we really need these guys in tin suits? They look like they eventually might be a problem!"
The Spanish, for their part, had embarrassingly run out of that arbiter of European diplomacy, gunpowder. Cuba and more gunpowder was across the Caribbean. What to do?
No problem if you happen to he Hernan Cortes. "Boys, its true that we're out of ammo and surrounded by thousands of Indians, but there is a solution. There is saltpetre in the various caves in the area and we can get charcoal in the Cholula market. All we need is sulfur. Fortunately, we have this active volcano in our backyard, so our problem is solved. All I need is five volunteers to take all the rope and sacks they can carry, climb that snow capped volcano (Popocatepetl) lower themselves down into the erupting crater, avoid the molten lava, superheated steam, red hot falling rocks, fill the sacks with sulfur, climb back out and return." (or words to that effect)
Cortes did not mention if there would be promotions or a favorable mention in their yearly conquistador evaluation report. Whatever the case, he got his five volunteers.
History books never mention that Hernan Cortes not only conquered Mexico, he also invented mountain climbing. Mountain climbing?
Yup. Our practical European ancestors were never bored. They were too busy trying to eke out a living to wonder what was on top of a mountain. They could see that mountains were capped with snow not gold, and there was no reason to go to the top. Mount Blanc, the highest peak in Western Europe (and considerably lower than Popo) was not climbed until late in the 18th century,when there were a sufficient number of well fed, bored middleclass people around to ask "Well, what do we do next?" Mountaineering did not flourish in the West until the 19th and 20th centuries (Nitpickers will point out to your kindly old editor that Inca priests would tote the odd virgin to the top of20,000 foot peaks in the Andes in order to sacrifice them to the sun god, but we're talking about Western Europeans.)
Anyways, our five volunteers started up the slope of Popo, battling blizzards, snow, ice, and high altitude. (One of our guys had to turn back due to HACE, high altitude cerebral edema, according to symptoms.) However, the other four persevered, inventing mountaineering as they went along. (One could visualize them on the rim of the erupting crater: Pedro saying "Juan, belay me while I rappel down into the crater" and Juan replying "Pedro, what the hell do those words mean?"
Anyways, by what ever means, they got down into the crater, filled the bags with sulfur, climbed back up and back on down the mountain to be greeted by a grateful Cortes.
The local Indians, particularly the folks from Cholula were mightily impressed. In addition to mountain climbing, Cortes provided Mexicans with a novel new toy. Since that day in the16th century, I doubt if there has been a day (or a night) in Cholula without the steady BANG! BANG! of black powder firecrackers and rockets.
The smallest of the four major volcanos is La Malinche (14,595 ft) rises up on the horizon of Cholula. It is an impressive mountain, despite it relatively small size. It is shaped almost exactly like an aztec pyramid with a temple shaped top. It is named for Malinche, one of the more controversial figures in Mexican history. She was an Aztec Indian girl who became the interpreter and lover of Cortez.
Of the three best known Indian women in the history of North America; Melinche, Pocahontas, and Sacajawea, it was Malinche who was by far the most important historically. She furnished invaluable service in providing intelligence about the Aztecs (she was from a well-connected family) as well as a go between and interpreter for Cortez.
Several generations of left wing historians, both Mexican and Gringo, have had a lot of bad things to say about Ms Malinche -- the kindest being that she was sort of a female Benedict Arnold, who had betrayed the Aztecs to the brutal Spaniards. They even coined a word "Malinchismo", which, like "Quisling", was supposed to define treachery forever.
The truth is a bit more ambiguous. It seems that young Malinchewas enjoying the life of a mid level Aztec bureaucrat's daughter. All was going swimmingly until Malinche's father died. Her mother remarried another local ruler and had a son. This changed things. Mom decided that Malinche wasn't needed around any more and proceeded to sell her to some merchants from Southern Mexico, telling the neighbors that poor Malinche had unfortunately died.
The merchants then sold Malinche to some Mayan merchants, who inturn sold her to a lord in the town of Potochan. (Judging from the speed with which Malinche was merchandised, she must have been quite a pistol and hard to handle!)
Sitting around Potochan, Malinche could be forgiven for assuming that Mom and stepdad were anal apertures and the whole system sucked.
It was at Potochan that Cortes appeared, he was handsome, commanding and (relatively speaking) kind. After what she had been through, Cortes must have seemed the answer to a maiden's prayer.
Anyways, they got together for a very cordial and mutually useful relationship. Together they conquered Mexico and together they had a son, the very first Mexican, that blend of Indian and Iberian that American chicano activists refer to as "La Raza" or "The Cosmic Race" to this day.
Anyways, while there are no statues of Malinche in Mexico (and understandably, damn few of Cortes!) she still has her mountain, a prominent feature on the Valley of Mexico skyline. (Malinche may have the last laugh, some Mexican feminists have recanonized her for her plucky spunk and never-say-die determination to wrest a better life for herself in a famously male dominated society.
The last and final of the famous volcanos is just over the horizon from my backyard.
It is Orizaba (Citlaltpetl or "Star Mountain). At 18,695 feet, it is the highest mountain in Mexico and the third highest in North America, after our Mount McKinley and Canada's Mount Logan. It is a spectacular mountain viewed from the Vera Cruz Puebla highway, (yes, the glaciers and snowfields on the summit give the appearance of a star.)
Despite its height and perhaps because of its more remote and solitary location, it has figured less in the legends and history of Mexico than the other three volcanos. Apparently, it was first climbed by some of the carefree lads of General Winfield Scott's ever victorious army who had a couple of days off enroute to Mexico City in the War of American Intervention as the Mexicans understandably refer to the Mexican War.
Now, can you climb these mountains? Sure, why not? The Mexican Tourist Bureau would like you to do so as you will inevitably spend some pesos doing so. They are not technical climbs and if you are sufficiently coordinated to be able to walk and talk at the same time you should have no trouble. (The "walk & talk" part is not entirely an attempt at levity: You should be acclimated at altitude for at least a week and you should be in good shape. If you cannot climb and answer short questions while doing so, and are of a certain age, then you probably should not attempt any of these peaks, except perhaps La Malinche.
At the present time, Popocatepetl is off limits to all climbers due to rather heavy volcanic activity. A few years ago, a party of mountaineers, possibly trying the replicate the feat of the very first mountaineers more than 400 years ago, were incinerated for their trouble. Bad publicity for tourism, hence the closure.
Now have I climbed any of these peaks? Well, I'd like to, but I have a note from my cardiologist permitting me not to try.
However, I believe Don Chase and Butch Farrabee have "done" all of them and will be most willing to assist you with advice and logistics, routes, costs etc. In the interim, I will survey the peaks from my backyard, cold cerveza in hand, waiting for your mirror signals from the summits.
THE YUCATAN
Travel and salt water are hard on lap top computers, so this means that it may be necessary to delay the March issue (# 236) or even combine it into a March-April issue, (still # 236).
Hasta la Vista!
PJ