Mountain Views News          Saturday, September 20, 2014

B4

OPINION

Mountain Views-News Saturday, September 20, 2014 


Mountain 
Views

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PUBLISHER/ EDITOR

Susan Henderson

CITY EDITOR

Dean Lee 

EAST VALLEY EDITOR

Joan Schmidt

BUSINESS EDITOR

LaQuetta Shamblee

PRODUCTION

Richard Garcia

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Patricia Colonello

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John Aveny 

CONTRIBUTORS

CoCo Lasalle

Chris Leclerc

Bob Eklund

Howard Hays

Paul Carpenter

Kim Clymer-Kelley

Christopher Nyerges

Peter Dills 

Dr. Tina Paul

Rich Johnson

Merri Jill Finstrom

Lori Koop

Rev. James Snyder

Tina Paul

Mary Carney

Katie Hopkins

Deanne Davis

Despina Arouzman

Greg Welborn

Renee Quenell

Ben Show

Sean Kayden

Marc Garlett

RICH Johnson

HEAT IS HOT

Closer Than My Cell Phone

 
I don’t want to bore you with tedious scientific research 
and fact finding but I have personally experienced 
over the last several days the hotness of heat. I can say 
relatively confidently that heat is hot. In fact, as of this 
writing (1:49 Tuesday afternoon), it is 106 F degrees 
outside. 

 In my research I discovered the hottest day on record 
in California took place on July 10, 1913 in, of course, 
Death Valley. It hit 134 F. That beat every other state in 
the country. Second was Arizona in 1994. 128 degrees F 
in Lake Havasu City. By the way, there is no place on the planet that was ever 
hotter than Death Valley. Tunisia in Africa hit 131 degrees and Kuwait in the 
middle east hit 128.5 degrees.

 What melts at high heat aside from ice cream and popsicles? Candles can 
melt around 120 degrees. If you see them drooping over you know why. 
Crayons will start to soften at 105 degrees. Especially the ones your kids 
leave in between the seats of your car. Keep an eye on those plastic toys. I’m 
told steering wheels can start to melt. Watch out for your CDs and cases in 
your car. So, use a sunshade protector whenever you park. I’ve had a brain 
meltdown. When that happens the brain never quite comes back. So be 
careful.

 “If you saw a heat wave, would you wave back?” Steven Wright

 “If you can’t stand the heat, don’t go to Cancun in the Summer.” Ben Stein

”A perfect summer day is when the sun is shining, the breeze is blowing, the 
birds are singing, and the lawn mower is broken.” James Dent

 Now, for perspective, the coldest place in California was in a small town 
near Truckee called Boca. In January 20, 1937 it reached -45 degrees F. 
That’s below zero. The coldest day in the United States was January 23, 1971 
in Prospect Creek, Alaska. The temperature hit -80 degrees below zero. 
Honorable mention goes to Montana and Utah who had -70 degrees and -69 
degrees coldest day. Antarctica had -128 degrees below zero and Russia had 
-90 below zero.

 You know, I’m not the only one pondering the hotness of heat. The esteemed 
website, ScienceDirect.com is also taking up these important questions. Look 
what I found on their website:

 “Is heat hot?” Inducing conceptual change by integrating everyday and 
scientific perspectives on thermal phenomena.

 Abstract (which means brief summary)

 An account of conceptual change within the domain of thermal physics 
is described. In particular, the difficulties of inducing an ontological change 
in students’ concept of heat is examined. While the overall goal of this 
research is to document microgenetically the process of conceptual change 
that takes place as students learn thermal physics, this paper describes the 
specific role of metaconceptual teaching. It is argued that metaconceptual 
teaching that addresses the fact that students and scientists may use the same 
terms for different conceptual referents and that scientific conceptions can 
account for everyday ones, helps to effect the targeted ontological changes. 
The pedagogical success of integrating the scientific and the everyday view is 
consistent with young adolescents’ difficulties with a relativistic epistemology 
in which scientific and everyday views are presented as valid alternatives.

 I couldn’t have said it better. In fact I couldn’t have said it at all. But we can 
safely state with even more confidence that heat is hot. -Rich

Dr. James L. Snyder

 Traveling, especially by air, is not my favorite pastime. I know some people 
who just delight in flying from one point to another point. If you would 
count all of those people who do, I would be nowhere on that list.

 Recently I had to travel involving changing planes, which involved 
spending a night at the Orlando airport. I could have come home, which 
is about two hours away, or I could spend the night and catch the plane the 
next day. It would cost me about the same to stay overnight at the airport as 
it would to travel back home and then return to the airport the next day. So, 
after all of my meticulous calculations, I decided to spend the night at the airport.

 I determined while there to get the most of my night’s stay at the airport. The hotel at the airport 
was one of those big international hotels. It had more stories than a politician on the campaign trail. 
As is usually the case, my room was on one of the top stories of the hotel.

 Checking in at the front desk, I then went to my room and settled down for the evening. I was 
not going to waste my time huddled in my hotel room, rather, I was going to look around and 
experience the ”nightlife” at this international Airport.

 Have you ever made a decision, then looking back on it you thought to yourself, ”Self, we are 
never going to do that again.” Such was my case.

 I decided to get some supper around 8 o’clock in the evening. This, I found out, was the time high 
society folk eat. Why they eat so late, I will never know. But, since I was with high society, I decided 
to act and eat like high society.

 The restaurant in this international hotel was one of those highfalutin restaurants where 
you really do not know what is on the menu. The menu was in every language except English. 
Fortunately, they had some pictures and fortunately, my index finger was still in good working 
order. I ordered my supper, set back and observed the high society all around me.

 One thought that stumbled through my brain at the time was, ”I wonder if these people in this 
restaurant know that I am not part of high society?”

 About this time the wine steward, I guess that is what he is called, came by to take my wine order. 
The only wine I know is spelled with an H. When I declined the wine, people began to suspicion I 
was not part of high society. I guess you cannot be part of high society unless you wine a little.

 I finished my supper and decided to wander around in the huge lounge area on this floor. 
Everybody there was talking and so I got an order of coffee, went to a couch, sat down and just 
observed what was going on around me. One thing I noticed was that most people seemed to be on 
their cell phone. What would happen in our society if cell phones suddenly stopped working for 
three minutes? There would be such a panic across our country that nobody would actually survive.

 I decided I should call someone on my cell phone. After all, I am trying to fit in with this high 
society. My dilemma came when I tried to figure out who in the world I should call at 10 o’clock in 
the evening.

 Then it dawned on me. I will call the Gracious Mistress of the Parsonage. I do not know why I did 
not think of this before. So, I pressed the speed dial and the phone started ringing.

 As soon as the phone started ringing, a thought danced in my mind. What in the world am I 
calling her for? What in the world would I talk about?

 Before finishing all of the questions floating around my cranium my wife answered the phone.

 The first words out of her mouth were, ”What did you forget now?”

 It seems that whenever I go on a trip, before I get too far down the road I remember something 
I forgot. When I assured her that I had not forgotten anything, I sensed a slight pause on the other 
end and then she said, ”Did you miss your plane?”

 Within the next few minutes I was bombarded with question after question, all I did was call, and 
at this point, I could not remember why I had called her. It just seemed like the thing to do at the 
time.

 After she settled down a little bit and her panic seizure ceased, I told her I just called to call.

 ”Oh,” she said, not knowing how to answer that.

 I was shocked. It had never happened before. I am going to cherish this memory for as long as 
I live. I actually caught her when she had nothing to say. Needless to say, I relished that moment 
because it will probably never happen again.

 After I hung up, I sat sipping some more coffee when one of my favorite verses came to mind. 
”And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will 
hear” (Isaiah 65:24).

 My comfort rests in the fact that God is closer to me than my cell phone.

 Rev. James L. Snyder is pastor of the Family of God Fellowship, PO Box 831313, Ocala, FL 34483. 
He lives with his wife, Martha, in Silver Springs Shores. Call him at 1-866-552-2543 or e-mail 
jamessnyder2@att.net or website www.jamessnyderministries.com.

 

 LEFT TURN/RIGHT TURN 

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HOWARD Hays As I See It

GREG Welborn


Two Viruses And 

Two Reactions

 “Anytime it’s (sic) starts to tinkering with their bottom line, then they 
act. Now they’re concerned.”

 - Arian Foster, running back for the Houston Texans, on NFL 
sponsor Anheuser-Busch’s statement that “We are not yet satisfied 
with the league’s handling of behaviors that so clearly go against our 
own company culture and moral code.”

 In a tweet a couple minutes later, Foster elaborated, “Domestic 
violence and alcohol damn near synonymous”. (No, they’re not. 
Don’t blame the Bud.)

 It’s not just Anheuser-Busch. McDonald’s. Visa and Campbell Soup have expressed 
their concerns. Radisson Hotels pulled its sponsorship of the Minnesota Vikings. GM 
and FedEx are “monitoring the situation”.

 The IEG consulting firm estimates sponsorship fees, not including advertising and 
promotion, paid to the NFL at $1.07 billion. According to Nielsen ratings, of the 17.4 
million tuning into a regular season NFL game, more than a third (35%) are women.

Procter & Gamble issued a quick response to a fake Covergirl ad that went viral depicting 
a model with a black eye, that it “encouraged the NFL to take swift action . . . to address 
the issue of domestic violence.”

 The corporations are getting it. But for much of the media, the story is on the NFL’s 
attempts at damage control under Commissioner Roger Goodell. (Goodell’s salary 
of nearly $20 million doesn’t factor in bonuses; total compensation for 2012 was $44 
million.)

 There was the initial two-game suspension given Ravens running back Ray Rice after 
video surfaced of him dragging his unconscious girlfriend from an Atlantic City casino 
elevator last February. The State of New Jersey let Rice avoid jail time and clear his record 
by paying a $125 fine and receiving counseling for anger management.

 Goodell rationalized the two-game suspension by explaining that when it was handed 
down last July, there was still ambiguity as to what had happened in that elevator. ESPN 
reports sources say Rice came to Goodell in June and told him exactly what had happened.

 The “indefinite suspension” came with the video on TMZ a couple weeks ago of Rice 
knocking out his girlfriend with a punch inside the elevator. Goodell says he hadn’t seen 
the video until it surfaced on TMZ. The A.P. reports a “law enforcement official” told 
them the NFL has had the tape since April.

 A highlight of the new season was the opening of Levi’s Stadium, new home for the 
49ers. Commissioner Goodell was a no-show. (S.F. defensive lineman Ray McDonald is 
currently under investigation for felony domestic violence.)

 Shifting the focus from Goodell, “Fox and Friends” turned to Rice’s victim, with Brian 
Kilmeade joking, “The message here is, take the stairs”. Steve Doocy added a lesson about 
not getting caught; “The message is when you’re in an elevator, there’s a camera.”

 When Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee sent a letter to Goodell calling 
for “greater transparency” from the NFL, Fox host Eric Bolling called it “convenient”; 
“They love to perpetuate this war on women . . .” Rush Limbaugh accused NFL officials 
and sports media of being “in a race to see who can be the most politically correct, 
feminized guy”, and warned that “if we keep chickifying this game, we’re going to ruin 
it.” (Rush also offered dating advice; “’No’ means ‘yes’ if you know how to spot it.”) Fox 
News’ Elizabeth Hasselbeck tweeted a connection between this NFL controversy and 
Benghazi.

 When the Texans’ Arian Foster observed that “now they’re concerned”, he was referring 
to NFL sponsors and their bottom lines. From Bolling’s comments on Fox, though, it’s 
clear there’s also concern about the upcoming elections, and recognition that when 
Republicans lost seats in Congress two years ago it was because voters saw “this war on 
women” not as something Democrats were trying to “perpetuate”, but as something real. 
(Remember senate candidate Todd Akins’ observation of the unlikelihood of pregnancy 
resulting from “legitimate rape”?)

 While many have been following the NFL controversy, there were other stories in the 
news about men determining what’s best for women. There was state Rep. Paul Wieland 
(R-MO) suing the federal government for the Affordable Care Act’s making contraception 
available to his teenage daughters. Former state Sen. Russell Pearce (R-AZ) resigned as 
his state’s Republican chairman after suggesting mandatory sterilization for women on 
Medicaid.

 This past week, Meredith Vieira used her show to relate her own harrowing experience 
as a victim of domestic violence, and to address the question, “Why didn’t you just leave?”; 
“”I would feel like maybe I contributed somehow to this and they are saying this about 
Ray Rice’s wife, that it takes two to tango.”

 Our new Miss America, Miss New York Kira Kazantsev, has taken the national stage 
to relate her personal experience suffering in an abusive relationship while in college 
and of her work in groups advocating for victims of domestic violence, like Safe Harbor. 
For those on the right, though, Miss America is not to be congratulated but condemned 
– for having interned for three months in support of educational programs at Planned 
Parenthood.

 Domestic violence and the victimization of women have now become prominent 
stories in the media. The NFL’s corporate sponsors have shown their concern – making 
clear their insistence the league deal with the problem openly and decisively. It remains 
unclear whether Republicans in Congress share that concern. While these stories were 
making news, Senate Republicans successfully blocked, for the fourth time, the Paycheck 
Fairness Act. Women comprise half our nation’s workforce, being the primary or co-
breadwinner of two-thirds of our households. Apart from any concern over women who 
are victims of domestic violence, Republicans in this Congress can’t even be concerned 
they get equal pay for their work. 

President Obama’s decision to send 3,000 American soldiers 
to contain and eradicate the Ebola virus before it breaks out is 
the right decision, and Conservatives should support it without 
reservation. Given President Obama’s penchant for moving very 
slowly when committing U.S. troops, he has shown wisdom and 
courage in reacting to the prospects for the world and the U.S. 
should Ebola start to spread rapidly. But the same could be, and should be, said for 
the virus which is Islamic terror, now at least “contained” to one predominant region 
of the world but seeking to spread far and fast. We need the same swiftness of action 
and the same, or greater, commitment of U.S. ground troops to defeat ISIS in Iraq and 
Syria before the two viruses combine and attack the U.S.

 Lethal viruses kill, and the amount of people they kill is determined by the 
combination of how quickly the virus kills and how quickly it spreads. Viruses which 
kill quickly but take longer to spread tend to burn out on their own; too many of 
their victims die before they can contaminate others at a compounding rate. This is 
measured by the “basic reproductive number” – usually shortened to R0. An R0 of 
less than 1 means an outbreak will subside. R0s greater than 1 mean the virus will 
spread. Recent analysis of the current West African epidemic pegs the R0 at greater 
than 1 and further stressed that the virus is mutating. Viruses do that. They try to 
live and reproduce like all organisms. If Ebola continues to grow and mutate to the 
point where it could be transmitted through the air (it cannot now), we would see a 
worldwide epidemic – perhaps even spurred by bio-terrorism. 

 President Obama is right to send U.S. troops – and lots of them. Only the U.S. has 
the personnel, stature and efficiency to put up the necessary facilities, isolate and treat 
those infected and stop this virus. Political dithering would costs lives – thousands of 
live. The President has been told that and reacted appropriately. Whether he did it for 
the right reasons or political reasons is irrelevant. This has to be stopped.

 This brings us to the other virus – Islamic terror, now resident in the form of ISIS. 
It’s not a virus in the medical sense of the world, but it kills with equal dispatch and 
abandon, seeks to replicate itself worldwide and infects too many who ostensibly claim 
to belong to a religion of peace. If Islam in the broader sense is a peaceful religion, then 
it is an appropriate analogy to see the ISIS strain of Islam as a virus infecting that body 
of believers. 

 Like other viruses, ISIS’s strategy is not particularly new. Viruses tend to follow 
predictable paths. While the name is something we hadn’t heard before, ISIS’s 
goals, methods and strategies for dealing with the United States are similar to what 
we’ve faced before. Whether it’s been North Korea, Vietnam, the first Gulf War, Al 
Quada, the Iraq War, Afghanistan or now ISIS, the terrorists practice a similar path of 
asymmetric warfare. They kill to terrorize a population, they refuse to wear uniforms, 
they hide among civilian populations and they strike sporadically as guerrilla’s. They 
also play on the world’s sympathetic media to amplify their claims of a justified cause 
to excuse their wanton cruelty. Like other viruses, they seek the weakest elements 
in the cultures they target to convince the innocent and disaffected to die for their 
advancement. And like all viruses, they seek domination of ever increasing swaths of 
territory.

 Fortunately, the comparisons also apply to how we must deal with them. Ebola 
must be stamped out. It must be met now with an overpowering counter force which 
will contain and then eliminate the threat. You can’t creep up on Ebola; you can’t use 
an incremental strategy. And yes, only the U.S. can supply that overwhelming force. 
It bears repeating; President Obama got it right in his response to Ebola.

 The President must also do the same with ISIS. Before the Obama administration, 
the last time we practiced an incremental approach to warfare was Vietnam. From 
that came a quagmire, but also out of that came the Powell Doctrine. General Collin 
Powell persuasively articulated the need for an overwhelming force when America 
goes to war. From Vietnam until the current administration, that philosophy guided 
our successful engagements in the Gulf War, Iraq and Afghanistan. Because of it, 
we beat back those who would have enslaved nations and whole regions. Obama’s 
premature removal of troops from Iraq, his communication of a withdrawal timetable 
for Afghanistan,his dithering on Syria and Libya, and now his open argument with 
our generals about ground troops have allowed the terrorists to regroup, mutate and 
emerge in many ways more powerful than they were when we first engaged them. 
Historians of the future will accurately record this as the seminal weakness of the 
Obama presidency. Should Ebola mutate to air-borne capabilities and should an 
Islamic terrorist release that strain in an American city, Obama’s weakness will 
become America’s disaster.

 But, there is a chance that future historians will also record a turning point in this 
presidency if Obama, like several Chief Executives before him, learns from his fatal 
mistakes and finishes well. For President Obama and the nation to finish this chapter 
successfully, Obama must immediately and resolutely commit the overwhelming force 
that only boots on the ground can supply to the battle against the virus that is Islamic 
terrorism. 

 

 The author: Gregory J. Welborn is a freelance writer and has spoken to several civic 
and religious organizations on cultural and moral issues. He lives in the Los Angeles 
area with his wife and 3 children and is active in the community. He can be reached at 
gregwelborn2@gmail.com 

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