The Plumbline

This road warrior is really tired.  A two million-mile flyer on three different airlines, retired after 32 years in the US Military with a top-secret clearance, you’d think somebody would trust me by now.  Au Contraire, Dude!

My freedom of movement hasn’t been so restricted since I was in the prison camps of North Vietnam.  (Well, maybe thats a little over the top.)

I still get zapped and groped and robbed of my lotions and matches and yes, my dignity.  And for what?  A safer flight?  I think not. The motive, I’m convinced of the invasive personal intrusion is a new reality show called “TSA Theater”.  It’s our Big Brother’s way of convincing the world that absolutely no profiling is going on.  So little boys got groped and amputees are harassed while the turban topped and berka clad passengers zip through the scanner with a chuckle and a smirk … and for what?  Certainly not better security. That priority seems way down the list.

And the irony is that we, in our super-sensative state, who don’t want to offend any minority, end up discriminating against the masses we’re trying to protect, and simultaneously diluting any hope for potent security!

I am convinced that if we are going to stop lunatic Muslims extremists from destroying our freedoms, we’re going to have to get real.  And we’re going to have to get tough with the real enemy.  We’re going to have to give up on the “TSA Theater” trying to justify their own existence and come to grips with fighting the terrorists … on our terms, which means forgetting about playing fair.  But it seems we have no stomach for this.

Sometimes I wonder if it will it take a nuclear weapon or biological bomb to convince us of the obvious threat, and stop us from hiding behind the veil of political correctness?  And after the smoke has cleared will our survivors put on our headstones, “I wish I had profiled”?

I’m interested in your thoughts.

Charlie Plumb

I was impressed with the exuberant citizens of Chile when their 33 countrymen were brought out of the jaws of the earth.  What a great nation!  As they sang the Chilean National Anthem and waved their flag, and their president congratulated the mining company, and the brave rescue team, and all his countrymen and, of course himself, I thought, “Why can’t the U.S. be that united? Why don’t we burst out with ‘God Bless America’ once in a while?” “Breathes there the man with soul so dead …?” Can’t we get our act together?

Well here’s a flash:

Did you know the rescue module that brought the 33 Chileans out and saved their lives was designed by a NASA engineer?  (As in NASA from the United States.)

Did you know the drill was made by Schramm Inc., a U.S. company founded by Chris Schramm in the year 1900?  (don’t you just love capitalism?)

Did you know that the drill bit that the miners wrote on with red paint was made in Berlin …  Pennsylvania …  by Center Rock Inc?

And did you know that the drill team was from Denver?   Yep, they were on loan from the U.S. Military. They were dispatched from Afghanistan where they’d been drilling water wells. Their leader, Jeff Hart spent 33 days on his feet operating the drill with surgical precision to hit that small target without hurting anyone in the operation. Did he get a medal?

Seems third world nations are quick to condemn the U.S., our capitalism, and our wealth, and our way of life, until there’s a Tsunami, or an earthquake, or a volcano, or a collapsed mine. And then, after we’ve bailed them out, they sing THEIR national anthem. Well, that’s okay. Maybe that’s what servant leadership’s all about; giving of yourself asking nothing in return.

Makes you want to sing, “God Bless America!”

I

Dismal, dark and dreary, hope must have been waning after 17 days without rescue.  Then the sound of a drill, coming closer and closer. Then, the evidence … the physical evidence of the drill bit, but more importantly, the implication: somebody cares. Similarly, after three years in Communist prison camps, the enemy told us we had been forgotten. We didn’t really believe it, but I must admit our hope for ever going home was running out. Then, late one night, my fellow POW’s and I heard the faint sound of helicopters … jet helicopters. We knew the North Vietnamese had no jet choppers, and they never flew at night. The sounds got louder and the Americans came closer. Were we going to be rescued?   Maybe?  After a wild and tumultuous night, the dawn revealed the Green Berets had raided the wrong camp, and we were going to stay there for another three years. We were disappointed, of course but more importantly we were energized.  That single event was the biggest morale boost of my entire experience. Because, like the drill bit chewing through a cavern wall in a Chilean mine, the sound of the choppers proved that somebody cared. And that was all the information we needed.

How many times in our busy lives do we assume the purpose of communication is the transfer of information, when the lifesaving value of our interactions with others is the simple validation of other human beings.  In this age of phenomenal technology one might argue that the greatest achievement of all time is that we can transfer a packet of data from one iPhone to another, around the world at the speed of light, I’m convinced that the highest value of life is achieved when we are validating others.