“Survival of the fittest” was coined by Herbert Spencer, a contemporary of Charles Darwin, as shorthand for Darwin’s 1859 theory of Natural Selection.

A critical feature of Darwin’s theory is that for any species to exist, members of that species must be so well adapted to their environment that they will survive long enough to reach reproductive age and reproduce.

Leaping forward to 1985, Usenet discussion groups created the Darwin Award as a tongue-in-cheek honor to be granted to those who, by exhibiting exceptional stupidity in accidentally killing themselves, assured that their particular genes were not fit to survive and contribute to the gene pool of future generations. 

Today we need a modified version of the Darwin Award, one that does not need to be awarded posthumously. I’ll call this new version the “Carbon Darwin Award”, or CDA. To be eligible for the CDA the recipient must not only be trying to take himself (the vast majority of Darwin Award winners have been men) out of the gene pool, but also children and grandchildren, his, yours, and mine.

Nominees for the CDA are easily identified because they are verbally self-nominating. Their favored mantra is “drill, drill, drill.” 

Oh, I could ask them to consult “Greenhouse effect” on Wikipedia, but what good would that do? The chance that science could have the smallest effect on what their cult leader tells them is slightly above zilch. Unfortunately, the credulous not just killing their own, they are taking yours and mine with them.

This is a difficult problem to explain succinctly, but I must try. Who knows? Maybe a “driller” will be curious enough to investigate.

In a nutshell, since the Industrial Revolution began in the mid-1700s, we have been exponentially taking gazillions of tons of carbon that was safely buried 300 million years ago during the Carboniferous era, and putting it into the air as carbon dioxide, a particularly potent “greenhouse gas” which is superbly effective in trapping heat. The greenhouse effect is our friend, to a point. Without it, Earth would be an ice planet. Problem is: we don’t want too much. Water vapor and a little carbon dioxide provides the warmth we need. Too much carbon dioxide not only works to dangerously increase the average global temperature of Earth, it also acidifies our oceans, being especially detrimental to creatures at the bottom of the food chain. 

If you wish, you can track the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide at NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory in Boulder, CO. Here, NOAA publishes monthly updates from their main CO2 recording station at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii. Measurements started there in 1960, so these charts do not show that CO2 in our atmosphere before the Industrial Revolution was at 280 ppm (parts per million) and at no time in the last 800,000 years had it exceeded 300 ppm. Today it stands at 421 ppm and is increasing by about 2.5 ppm every year.

Some of those who deny that global temperature is rising are like frogs in the cooking pot, where slowly rising temperature of the water is not immediately perceived to be a problem, that is, until it is too late. Some say “I don’t live near the ocean, so rising sea level is not a problem for me.” Others say “I don’t live in an area subject to hurricanes or tornados, so no big deal.”

But there are effects of climate change that affect everyone. It’s just that they’re not immediately obvious. Changing weather patterns are creating drought conditions in many areas where food production once was high. This is one of the reasons why we see so many people from South and Central America migrating north.

It’s not that we must immediately stop drilling; our economy and the world’s is too dependent on fossil fuels for energy needs. It’s that we must transition as fast as we can from dependence on fossil fuels to renewable energy sources like wind, solar, hydroelectric, geothermal, and nuclear.

In sum, boneheads vying for the CDA who keep shouting “drill, drill, drill,” are sending the wrong message. Our grandkids will pay the price. 

Bob Moores retired from Black & Decker/DeWalt in 1999 after 36 years. He was the Director of Cordless Product Development at the time. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Johns Hopkins University

In a surprise attack by Hamas terrorists, thirteen hundred men, women, and children, mostly non-combatants, were slaughtered in Israel on 7 October 2023. The terrorists abducted another 199 to use as bargaining chips, human shields, or reasons known only to them.

One could point to the killing of German and Japanese non-combatants by US strategic bombing in WW2 as an immoral equivalence. One could sympathize with the plight of Palestinians who feel their land was stolen by Jews in the wars of 1948, 1967, and 1973.

Those issues aside because too complicated to here compare, repaying what you perceive to be immoral acts with equally immoral acts is, I think, immoral.

That idea allows me to consider the 7 October attack in isolation, and ask “If our country was attacked in like manner, how would we respond?” This is where perspective arrives. I will make my point by analogy (please remember this is just an analogy).

Suppose agents of the Mexican government, to show their displeasure with US policies and people, were firing rockets at Texas towns every few days. Then they decided to get serious and make a larger-scale attack. 

The US population is 35 times larger than that of Israel, so the 1,300 people murdered in Israel would equate to 45,500 US citizens murdered by agents of Mexico. The 199 men, women, and children abducted by Hamas would equate to 7,000 US citizens/visitors held hostage as bargaining chips. “Don’t hit back at us or we’ll kill these hostages.” Is this not double depravity in the ISIS model? 

I note that The US lost 2,403 souls in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941. In the Korean War of 1950-1953, we lost 36,634 people, mostly military. And we went to war against Al-Qaeda terrorists in Afghanistan upon losing 3,000 American civilians in the 9/11 attack of 2001.

Thus, one should be able to understand Israel’s reaction to the 7 October attack by Hamas killers. Easy for outsiders to urge restraint. But put yourself in their shoes. What would we do?

Bob Moores retired from Black & Decker/DeWalt in 1999 after 36 years. He was the Director of Cordless Product Development at the time. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Johns Hopkins University  

How many times in the last eight years have I said to myself “this is not normal”?

Background.

In July 1959 I enlisted for three years in the US Army. It was not out of patriotism. America was not at war, and lacking both purpose and confidence, I thought it would be an adventure – and maybe in the process I would mature a little.

Being pre-Vietnam, I never saw combat. After basic and advanced training, I was assigned as a truck and jeep driver in the 63rd Transportation Company at Fort Eustis, Virginia. Eighteen months later, the army decided I would make a good personnel clerk, trained me as such, and sent me to the 77th Medical Depot, an army hospital-base in Vitry-le-Francois, France. Our mission, at the height of the Cold War, was to care for the wounded if and when Soviets attacked our troops in West Germany. 

I’ve always admired heroes, especially those who risk their lives in the service of others. That’s one of the reasons why, with my access to Army regulations, I took an interest in studying citations for award of decorations. That way, I could look at a dress uniform and see which medals had been awarded for heroism in combat. Medals for valor are always displayed on the top row of the “fruit salad” of ribbons over the left shirt pocket. 

During my three years in the army I took the opportunity to talk privately with veterans of the Korean War who had been decorated for valor in combat actions. I found a common thread. None were braggards; modesty was the rule. All downplayed their heroism. I had to pry details from them. One who was awarded the Silver Star for defense of his comrades in repelling a “human wave” attack with his M1 Garand rifle told me “I was “just doing my job”.

Moving ahead to July 2015, presidential candidate Donald trump was asked by CBS pollster Frank Luntz what he thought about John McCain’s military service. Trump responded “He’s not a war hero, he’s a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured, okay? I hate to tell you.”

When I saw this exchange on TV I was shocked, dismayed, and angered. John McCain’s A-4E Skyhawk was shot down by a missile over Hanoi in October 1967. Taken prisoner, he endured five-and-a-half years of torture and ill treatment by his captors. He refused their propaganda-driven offer of early release because his fellow prisoners were not offered the same. For Donald Trump to denigrate McCain’s service in this manner was not only a display of abject ignorance (being captured is usually not an individual choice), but an affront to every veteran, living or dead, in our history. This from a man who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, and avoided military service himself. This behavior was decidedly not normal.

Trump, as president, claimed that he hired only the best people. Why then, did his administration display the highest turnover of senior staffers of any administration I had ever seen? Why were most of those people saying he was a self-serving idiot or moron? This was not normal.

Trump has been impeached twice, lost a civil trial for groping a woman, had his university successfully sued for fraud, had his chief financial officer and personal lawyer jailed, and is currently defending against business fraud in New York. Our justice system is trying to figure out a way to schedule four other trials for crimes against the United States for which he has been indicted. Is this normal for any citizen, much less a former president?

Yesterday, Trump’s former Chief of Staff, Marine Corp General John Kelly, said Trump is “a person who admires dictators and murderous autocrats, a person that has no idea what American stands for, and has no idea what America is about.”

Kelly said Trump is “a person who thinks those who defend their country in uniform, or are shot down or seriously wounded in combat or spend years being tortured as POWs are all ‘suckers’ because ‘there’s nothing in it for them’.” Trump supporters, I ask you to think about that statement. Kelly said Trump “rants that our precious heroes who gave their lives in America’s defense are ‘losers’, and wouldn’t visit their graves in France. He said Trump is “a person that did not want to be seen in the presence of military amputees because ‘it doesn’t look good for me’.” Is this normal?

Kelly said Trump is not truthful regarding his position on the protection of unborn life, on women, on minorities, on evangelical Christians, on Jews, on working men and women.”

Trump’s niece, Mary Trump, says her uncle is loyal to only one person, himself. Cassidy Hutchinson, former assistant to Mark Meadows, said in her new book, Enough, that “Donald trump is loyal only to himself.” Yesterday, Trump’s former National Security Advisor, John Bolton, said “the only thing he cares about is himself.” 

General Mark Milley, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, said in his retirement speech last Friday that we in the service “do not take an oath to a king, or a queen, or a tyrant, or a dictator. We do not take an oath to a wannabe dictator.” For these remarks, Trump called for his execution!

Trump supporters. Don’t you get it? He doesn’t care about you. He cares only to the extent that you’ll give him your vote. He’s not loyal to you. With the slightest criticism he’ll drop you like a hot potato. Do you really want him in the White House again?

THIS IS NOT NORMAL!

Bob Moores retired from Black & Decker/DeWalt in 1999 after 36 years. He was the Director of Cordless Product Development at the time. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Johns Hopkins University

It was early Sunday morning in the park. A refreshing breeze wafted from the foggy river as the sun rose above the horizon. Joe was setting up his chess board at his usual bench, hoping to engage someone in a friendly match.

Soon enough, another old-timer comes along and asks Joe if he wants to have a game.

Joe: Sure. What’s your name?

Old-timer: Call me Don. I should warn you, though. I’m the best chess player that’s ever been. The only way I can lose is if you cheat. 

Joe: Well, I’m not sure how one can cheat in this game, but I can’t miss the opportunity to play the best that has ever been. What’s your rating?

Don: 5000.

Joe: Really?! I’ve never heard of a rating for a human player above 2900. 

Don: The international chess community has conspired to ignore me because I make all other players look like amateurs.

Joe (shaking his head): White or black?

Don: I prefer white.

Joe: Have a good game.

Don: Pawn to king four.

Several passersby ask if they can watch the match. No problem.

It’s forty-five minutes later.

Joe: Knight takes bishop, Checkmate. Can’t believe I’ve beaten the best that’s ever been.

Don: You didn’t win.

Joe: Your king is under attack, with no square to move to where he would not be under attack. Game over. How can you say I didn’t win?

Don: You cheated.

Joe: How?

Don: You must have made a couple of moves while I wasn’t looking.

Bystanders 1 and 2: Sir, we were watching the whole time, and we didn’t see him make any extra moves.

Don: You’re friends of his, aren’t you?

Bystanders 1 and 2: No, this is the first time we’ve visited this town.

Don: You took too long to move.

Joe: This was an informal game with no time limit for moves.

Don: I never agreed to that. You rigged the game. 

Joe: Have you ever heard the words “sportsmanship” or “fair play”?

Don: I’ve heard of them. They’re words for losers.

Joe: Good grief! I didn’t know I was playing a nut case.

Don. You all heard that. I’m suing this guy for defamation. Joe, you old bag of bones, I’ll see you in court.

Bob Moores retired from Black & Decker/DeWalt in 1999 after 36 years. He was the Director of Cordless Product Development at the time. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Johns Hopkins University

When the Equal Employment Opportunity Act was passed by Congress in 1972, I was a Senior Development Engineer in Black & Decker Product Development, a department comprised of about sixty designers, fifty-nine of which were white males. We had one black male designer. If I count engineering support people (secretaries, model shop, records, whiteprint), we had one black designer in a department of about 125 whites. I believe that equates to less than one percent.

We had black workers in our cafeteria and maintenance departments, even our mailman and CEO’s chauffeur, but only one black in Engineering.

Was this a problem? No one gave it much thought. It was business as usual, wasn’t it?

Our VP of Product Development called a meeting for folks who were either hiring managers presently or might soon be. I was invited. 

He informed us of the new law, and said that it would do B&D a world of good if we complied with it. To his credit, he appealed to our consciences as much as the legal imperative. He said he was not recommending the hiring of any minority person (black, female, Asian, Hispanic) who was not qualified. I don’t remember his exact words, but the gist of it was “You engineers are smart enough to solve this problem.”

I noticed progress almost immediately, but it was slow. Roughly three years later I attained a position high enough to have final say for new hires in my small group of four people. I should mention that at B&D the interview process in Engineering suggested only two interviews for non-degreed applicants, but typically five for Development Engineer or higher. The title of Development Engineer was the starting position for new college grads. 

It was up to each hiring manager to select his interviewing team, which always included himself. After completion of the hour-long interviews, and getting feedback from all, the hiring manager made the final decision to extend an offer or not.

By the time I retired in late 1999, I believe I held the record for most minority hires by any hiring manager in B&D Product Development history: two black male drafters, two white female drafters, one black male Indian engineer, and one white male Korean engineer. I had also hired four white male engineers. Other managers had hired minorities, but I held an inner pride that I was making more of a difference. Is that too egotistical?

My criteria when considering all interviews was this: Was the interviewee qualified for the job? Was it close to a tie between applicants? If so, the tie went to the minority person. I figured that natural bias should direct a couple of extra points to the minority person (I hadn’t heard the term “affirmative action” at that time). If you think you are among the few unbiased people on earth, I’m extremely skeptical of that assertion.

Why is some measure of affirmative action necessary? While it may be true that Dr. King’s arc of the moral universe bends toward justice, couldn’t that bending use a little assistance?

In her dissent to the latest ruling of our conservatively-biased SCOTUS, Justice Jackson wrote:

“It is no small irony that the judgment the majority hands down today will forestall the end of race-based disparities in this country, making the colorblind world the majority wistfully touts much more difficult to accomplish.”

The conservative justices on the present SCOTUS, following their own ideologies, may be conforming to the strict letter of the law. But I found in my early life that traffic court judges, for example, often exercise compassion and common sense in their decisions. Isn’t that what good judgement is about?

Bob Moores retired from Black & Decker/DeWalt in 1999 after 36 years. He was the Director of Cordless Product Development at the time. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Johns Hopkins University

Why do so many of my fellow citizens like and support Donald Trump? I have worked on this puzzle off and on for the last seven years.

The little I get from MAGA friends is indirect, by inference. That’s because we want to remain friends, and we have agreed to make discussion of Trumpian politics taboo.

But I read articles and listen to Trump supporters on TV. When my Trump pieces are published in The Spy, I save dissenting comments to a Word log that I continue to build – anything that will add another piece to the puzzle.

As an engineer, I have a propensity for analysis, and I know that to understand any difficult problem, especially one involving human views, I must be as objective as I can be. With that in mind, in this piece I take the position of trying to see Trump through the eyes of a MAGA person.

I decided to present my analysis in the form of a top ten list of reasons to like Donald Trump. Note that this list is a compilation of inputs, not all held by every supporter. As with most top-whatever lists, the order will be from least to most important. The order is rather arbitrary, my thinking at this moment. That is, except for Reason #1, which all my data says is deserving of that exalted position. Try to restrain yourself and not skip ahead.

Okay, here goes.

Reason #10 – His physical appearance is attractive. He is tall, large, white, and, though a little overweight, appears physically fit for his age. He is not skinny or obese. He is always well-groomed. He looks good in well-tailored suits. He looks “presidential”, especially beside other world leaders.

Reason #9 – He was good at foreign policy. It was America First, and he called out our NATO partners for not contributing their fair share. He knew how to control authoritarian leaders through a combination of flattery and fear. He admires Vladimir Putin because (a) he is a powerful leader and (b) he helped the right American candidate win in 2016.

Reason #8 – He is an astute communicator. He understands the symbolism of our flag and the Bible. He was quick to grasp the power of Twitter in talking directly to his audience, bypassing the filter of liberal media. Overall, his writing is succinct and not atrocious. It’s never hard to get his meaning. His speech is easy to understand; he doesn’t mumble, slur or stutter.

Reason #7 – He is good for business and our economy. He worked diligently for America. He lowered our personal taxes and excessive taxes on corporations. He was not given enough time to prove that the “trickle down” economics of Reagan and Bush Sr can actually work. He was trying to drain the DC swamp.

Reason #6 – He defends American values and conservative principles. He is a patriot. He wants to return us to a time when America was respected, when certain types of people were less vocal, disruptive, and knew their place. He defends our borders from illegal intruders. He is good at exposing conspiracies against the US (vaccines, deep state rigging of our elections, big pharma, climate change, green energy, and witch-hunters). He agrees with Bobby Kennedy Jr who exposed Dr. Fauci as one who pushed the covid hoax for his own enrichment.

Reason #5 – He is tough, a strongman, an alpha-male with a certain charisma. He is not too nice (think Jimmy Carter). He is a street fighter. If you hit him, he will hit back twice as hard. He knows how to stick it to wokey liberals who play identity politics. He knows how to demean his political opponents by giving them memorable nicknames. Let a criticism go unanswered? Nope. Admit he’s wrong? Never.

Reason #4 – He is sincere. What liberals call lies, he truly believes are not lies. He is not faking it when he says things that seem to have no basis of fact or evidential support. In his mind, these things are true, and I believe that in most cases he is at least partly right. You can trust that he won’t discard you as long as you stay loyal to him.

Reason #3 – He is resolute. He exudes strength of purpose and self-confidence. He is committed to what he believes in. He is not a flip-flopper. He does not equivocate.

Reason #2. He is useful. He works tirelessly to promote long-term conservative principles. He won’t allow liberals to take my guns away. He is pro-life. He appointed dedicated conservative judges. Though he may have a few personal flaws (no one is perfect), the ends justify the means. He is not a liberal, a progressive, or a Democrat.

Reason #1 – He tells me what I want to hear. “Covid will be over by Easter, like a miracle,” and “If re-elected I will end the Ukraine war in 24 hours” are examples.

To explain Reason #1, I am morphing from MAGA avatar back to me. There are two human qualities at work here. The first is that people don’t want to hear bad news, so a potential leader who bears bad tidings will have a hard time getting elected in a democratic society. Al Gore’s “inconvenient truth” of climate change was a good example. The second is “confirmation bias”. People want to believe that which reinforces what they already hold. Thus, MAGA folks are predisposed to believe what Donald trump expounds.

Couple these qualities in a political system where folks are forced to choose (in practical terms) between two less-than-perfect (I’m being kind) candidates, and it helps me understand why so many of my fellow citizens prefer Donald Trump.

Bob Moores retired from Black & Decker/DeWalt in 1999 after 36 years. He was the Director of Cordless Product Development at the time. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Johns Hopkins University

In modern parlance, “witch hunt” has come to mean the unjust ostracism of an innocent victim. During his reign as president, Mister Trump used the term more than 330 times in defense of accusations of wrongdoing.

On September 25, 2019 he called his impending (first) impeachment trial “the greatest witch hunt in American history.” On January 31 of this year, in a deposition over financial fraud in New York, he called the investigation “the greatest witch hunt ever.” And two days ago, he said of the guilty verdict on charges of sexual assault and defamation brought by Ms. Carroll, that it was a “disgrace…a continuation of the greatest witch hunt of all time.” Thank goodness we have reached the greatest of the great witch hunts, as I don’t think there can be something greater than the greatest of all time.

Are complaints by our Grievance President justified? Is he an innocent victim of unjust political, feminine, and societal persecution?

As president, did he accomplish what he set out to do? Did he Make American Great Again? Did he unite our people so we could better accomplish great things under common purpose, or did he divide us as we have never been divided before?

What does MAGA mean? Doesn’t it mean Make America White Again? Doesn’t it represent resistance to the browning of America and all those foreign invaders?

Why is Trump the favorite of American Nazis, the KKK, antisemites, and other “Christian” white supremacist groups?

Why do farmers like him? Is it because he gave them subsidies for loss sales of grain crops to China, a problem he himself initiated by putting tariffs on Chinese goods? Should he be thought a hero for solving a problem he created?

Why do gun buyers/owners like him? At bottom, isn’t it because of the fear and mistrust of “the other” he reinforced in our society?

Why do the most-wealthy like him? The answer is too obvious to state.

Why is it that his administration saw the greatest turnover of any in history? What does this say about his judgment of “the best people” and what they thought of him? And if they were the best people, what does that say about a leader who cannot retain them? Ask any competent manager of people and she will tell you.

If witch hunts are the search for hypothetically evil people, I offer that we have actually found a real one.

Bob Moores retired from Black & Decker/DeWalt in 1999 after 36 years. He was the Director of Cordless Product Development at the time. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Johns Hopkins University

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We Americans are shooting each other so frequently that to keep track we categorize shootings by type, subtype, and number of people shot per incident. Was it a school, restaurant, church, workplace, or home shooting? Was the motivation hate, non-hate, or unknown? If hate, what type of hate, racial, religious, ideological, or domestic? If non-hate, was it insanity, suicide, drug-related or other? Was it a mass shooting (3 or more deaths) or not? 

Is this a problem? What is a problem? A problem is a situation that someone thinks something should be done about. 

I observe almost unanimity of agreement that we have a gun violence problem. The argument is what to do about it. The basic equation looks like this:

Gun plus shooter equals death.

What’s the solution?

Some say the problem is the relatively easy access to the most effective killing devices, either assault rifles or pistols with high-capacity magazines. Only military and law enforcement should have these weapons. Pass laws banning them from civilian use. 

Others say no, it’s mentally-disturbed people, the shooters who are the problem. We already have enough laws regulating these weapons. We need to strengthen and better enforce those laws. And besides, the rulebook says it’s my right to have as many guns as I please.

The thing is, these two camps are equally divided, and we have designed our system such that if this is the case, nothing can be done. In other words, we find ourselves in a paradox, a catch-22 where we have designed the problem to be, at this juncture, insoluble. We are self-paralyzed.

The rulebook says it can be rewritten. But to do that we have to have a supermajority in agreement. We can’t have a 50-50 split of opinions by Americans and our representatives in Congress. Bear in mind that lawmakers, no matter what ill we might think of them, are only doing what we want them to do (I am speaking collectively here, not what you and I individually desire).

So the answer lies in the collective will of the American people. Why aren’t we solving this problem? Three possibilities: Again speaking collectively, we are either insane, stupid, or don’t care. I don’t think we are insane or stupid, so it must be that we don’t care. That is, we don’t care enough. Gun violence is not a priority. We vote for our representatives based on issues we care more about than our kids being murdered in school. 

I have a couple of suggestions, but first let me say something about that tiresome fallback, the Second Amendment. It says:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

What was Madison’s intent? I am not a mind reader but I do understand English grammar. The words say that citizens can possess arms so they can come together as militias in times when the security of their state or country is either threatened from within, say by a tyrannical federal government, or from without, by a foreign entity. The last phrase, then, is dependent on the first. But the first is ignored by those who claim the right to possess any number of weapons of any type for any reason or purpose. Note that the Second Amendment does not preclude a citizen from owning a nuclear weapon! Is that a good idea? If Madison had been sufficiently prescient, would he have approved of arms available to citizens today, or that we would use those arms to murder our own kids?

Thankfully, we have federal and state laws that restrict certain types of weapons citizens can own – machine guns, mortars, and tanks being examples. But even these can be owned if one has the money and patience to adhere to regulations required.

Let’s talk solutions.  

The best solution, as indicated above, is repeal and replacement of the Second Amendment. But considering today’s political climate, that’s not realistic.

What about the shooter part of the equation? To me, this is the most difficult because it involves human psychology and mental well-being, the most complicated and unpredictable forces in the known universe. Trying to predict the next active shooter is virtually impossible. A person who seems perfectly normal today could succumb to depression (or worse) tomorrow. It happened to me, so I figure it could happen to anyone. Fortunately, my depression did not involve harming other than myself. We have more work to do on the shooter; I’m not suggesting otherwise. 

Now to the gun. If you’ll forgive the trite business metaphor, the gun is low-hanging fruit. It’s the easiest part of a complex problem to tackle. I don’t buy the argument that because rapid-fire guns with high-capacity magazines are only one element of the mass-killing equation that we have already done enough to regulate their use. No, we haven’t done enough. We could require more-thorough background checks and longer waiting periods for purchase. We could ban new sales of assault-type rifles. We could make them more expensive by adding federal tax on top of state sales taxes. We could require annual re-registration, close gun show loopholes, and make unregistered private transfers illegal.

We could also call, email, or write our representatives to let them know how serious we are about solving this problem. For my neighbors in District 1, don’t bother contacting Andy Harris. I tried that and found by his form-letter reply that he thinks Maryland already has sufficient gun laws on the books.

Technology to the rescue? 

Here’s an idea I think could work for new gun sales. My car has an electronic door lock which functions only if my key is close the car. We could require all new guns capable of accepting high-capacity magazines to have electronic trigger locks such that if they are within the vicinity of a target-rich environment like a school, restaurant, place of worship, stadium, or any place where crowds gather, the gun cannot fire. RF signals (WIFI?) could communicate with the gun either from the protected location or by satellite using GPS data. Only law enforcement personnel would have weapons in which the electronic lock feature could be cancelled. 

One more element: Yesterday the Tennessee legislature expelled two of its members for violating house decorum in protesting the recent school shooting in Nashville. Of the three protesters, two of which were black men, the other a white lady, only the black men were expelled. In a state with a long history of racial bigotry we should ask why.

Maybe I’m getting desperate. I don’t know about you, but I think having our kids murdered in school is beyond intolerable. We cannot let this remain business-as-usual.

Bob Moores retired from Black & Decker/DeWalt in 1999 after 36 years. He was the Director of Cordless Product Development at the time. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Johns Hopkins University

 

 

One of the problems I see in today’s post-truth era, exacerbated by the double-edged sword of internet and social media, is widespread misinformation (possibly unintentional falsehoods) and disinformation (intentional falsehoods).

I believe this is why many people are either hesitant to take covid vaccines, skeptical that they are effective, or fear that they are part of a conspiracy.

My purpose in this essay is to allay those concerns by presenting a lay-person’s explanation of how a coronavirus vaccine works.

You could rightly ask “what qualifies a mechanical engineer to instruct on such a matter?” The answer is: Both my daughter and her husband have doctorates in cell biology, and from them I can often extract details limited only by time and my ever-diminishing capacity to assimilate.

Here goes.

There are several types of coronavirus vaccines presently in use, but since the end result is the same for all, I will address only the type called “mRNA vaccine” which is created and supplied by Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech.

mRNA is short for messenger ribonucleic acid. Its normal everyday function is to read your DNA, the recipe for building and maintaining your body that resides in almost every cell, and transfer that information to your protein-building machinery called transfer RNA and ribosomes. Proteins are large molecules in thousands of types, each a long chain of much smaller molecules called amino acids, folded up into a variety of compact shapes. Together, proteins comprise the second largest percentage of your body weight, water being the largest.

A virus such as the SARS-cov-2 coronavirus is a parasitic organism that lives and reproduces by attaching itself to a normal healthy cell. By itself the virus can live only a few days. It attaches to a host cell by means of its “spike proteins”, those little cone-shaped thingees that protrude from the outer surface of its body. Without those spikes the virus cannot survive.

mRNA vaccines contain synthetically-manufactured mRNA molecules that instruct your cells to start making the same spike proteins that cover the virus. Those spike proteins circulate in your bloodstream and, while not harmful by themselves, are recognized by your immune system as foreign material “not belonging to you”. Your immune system’s job is to search out and destroy particles in your body that are not supposed to be there. It does this by using its white blood cells to produce antibodies which attack and destroy unwanted, harmful materials, in this case the spike proteins just created by introduction of the vaccine.

Are you old enough to remember the early computer game called “Pac-man”? In this game you used a joystick to guide your little yellow guy through a maze, eating lines of dots while trying not to be caught by four ghosts chasing him. Think of your antibodies as Pac-men circulating through your bloodstream, searching for, and eating, undesirable particles.

The new antibodies destroy the mRNA-created spike proteins, and hang around for a while (a few months) just in case they may find more. Unfortunately for the virus, when it enters your body, these antibodies are poised to kill the spike proteins that cover it. The vaccine gives your immune system a head-start in defeating the virus. Without it, your immune system, especially if already compromised by fighting some other pathogen, could become overwhelmed by the virus before it could make enough antibodies to defeat it. In that case, sickness or death ensues.

The spike-eating antibodies gradually diminish in number. That’s why we need booster shots every six months or so if we want to stay protected. And we will need new formulations of the vaccine to handle new variants of covid and whatever else is coming for us.

I hope this information, available in more detail at Wikipedia.org, helps reduce anxiety and skepticism regarding the vaccines.

One last point. By getting vaccinated for covid and flu you benefit not only yourself but also your neighbors.

Bob Moores retired from Black & Decker/DeWalt in 1999 after 36 years. He was the Director of Cordless Product Development at the time. He holds a mechanical engineering degree from Johns Hopkins University.