Thank you very welcome back and that was Mary Cotland with the Caffe Orchestra and Wild and Free from the album Topaz. And joining me in the studio now I have got Theresa Ryder and Mary Turley-McGrath from the Letrakeny Cathedral Quarters Literary Festival Committee. Ladies you are very welcome. Thanks very much. My dear. And well Mary you are no stranger to Highland and but Theresa this is your first time. It is. So Theresa you're involved in the Cathedral Quarter Literary Festival and give us a wee bit of a background to the to the Literary Festival. Yeah so the festival is actually in its eighth year and it's held in October each year and this year it runs over the weekend of the 20th to the 23rd of October and as usual a range of various locations and events. So very special theme this year the festival is celebrating Behan 100 which is the 100th anniversary of the birth of Brendan Behan. So we're going to bring some diversity, something for everyone, master classes, music, documentary as usual but this festival will honor this great literary talent and his association with Letrakeny. So I've done an anecdote that Brendan Behan had holidayed in Donegal and visited Letrakeny a few times. And when he came to town in 61 which would be like at the height of his his fame or infamy Behan visited the rainbow bar on the main street and his visit was reported in the local paper and it stated that he entertained the patrons with typically outspoken comments and affairs at the moment. So during that visit then he went to the Lescalas Cinema on the Port Road to see a film and he was featured in that film. In the film he sang a song and when that part came on the screen Brendan started singing along from his seat and he claimed afterwards it would be the only time in the history of Letrakeny that a duet was sung by one person. So I came on board with the festival last year and I was invited to read my work alongside Deirdre Hines and James Finnegan those great poets. I read from my work which is a memoir in progress and from my time as a personal assistant to the late author J.P. Dunleavy and of course Brendan Behan looned large in his life so I'm very excited by these Behan connections and I was also given the chance to read the Behan poem Oscar Wilde at Dr Deirdre Hines, McMahon's lecture the next day on the Sunday of the festival and that was a wonderful event with her presentations and poems and a performance of a scene from Borstled Boy by Elusive Theatre. So yeah there's a full-on festival celebrating Behan this year. Fantastic and there's a new departure this year there's a poetry competition that's live at the moment Teresa. So can you give some details maybe about that for us? We're very excited about this Mary and myself have developed this from the start and so yes it's a new venture and hopefully one that will keep going. So what we've done is we've chosen a theme associated with Brendan Behan and that theme is against the odds and in that he delivered such a contribution to the literary world despite the adversity he experienced in life. So we're inviting poets to give us their interpretation of that otherwise the rules are fairly standard we're asked we're asking people to enter up to three poems per entry 30 lines per poem max it's free to enter and thanks to our sponsors we have some great prizes and we'd like to thank Bookmark Leta Kenny and Donegal ETB our main sponsors and we have great support from the Himalayan Cafe Peter Mark Leta Kenny and Universal Books and the details of the competition you can find on our web page which also gives the program of the of the festival itself and this is linked to the Leta Kenny Cathedral Quarter Facebook page or find us with the search the information is up on various platforms including poetry island and writing.ie so all the details of entry are there but we'd welcome we're having lots of lovely entries already and the closing date is September 15th so there's still plenty of time. So when all the poems are read there'll be a few shortest then to take part in the festival. So yeah we're inviting five shortlisted poets to come along and read at a very special reading event during the festival and then we'll announce the winners. Fantastic fantastic and Mary well you are as I say no stranger to Highland and you are a very accomplished poet or poetess whatever might be the politically correct statement to say. So you've been involved a few years part you're participating a number of years and then you've been on the committee as well now. Yes I began with the Cathedral Quarter Literary Festival in 2021 and if you remember that was during the Covid era and festivals were cancelled and readings were cancelled so it was a pretty bleak time. So one day I was going through my papers and I found an old an old program for the festival and Donan Harvey's number was at the bottom of the program so I said maybe maybe this festival will run so I rang Donan and said you know would be interested in having me on the on the program and he said yes so the festival came to pass in 2021. Now the turnouts weren't all that great that year understandably enough but when the festival was over I said to Donan if you wanted any help organizing the festival the following year I would help Mauch. So last year that was 2022 I was involved in the programming of events I was contacting writers took part in the master class and so on so it was a very interesting experience for me so I've continued on with it this year. Fantastic and well you're an accomplished poet now you have four books of poetry published at the moment do you remember back whenever you started off your very first some deference in the competitions that you entered back at the very beginning of your career as a poet Mary? Yeah well probably like everything beginnings are rather shaky you're not really very sure where you're going. Writing is a very solitary occupation whether you're a poet or a novelist or a short story writer you're in a room all on your own with your own thoughts and your own imagination and at one stage you know it was necessary to have as Virginia Woolf said a room of your own nowadays it's quite different you can do your work you know on the bus or on the train or between jobs or caring for your family or whatever but eventually you have to sit down and edit what you have written and after you have it edited and worked through the next question is what to do with the masterpiece so at that stage you can either put it in the drawer and forget all about it and not tell anybody about it or you can send it out to a workshop you can go to a workshop with it or you can bring it to a writers group if you have a writers group alternately you can send it to magazines and last but not least you can send it to a poetry competition and see what happens and what kind of feedback you'll get now the value of a competition it is quite interesting because if you happen to be shortlisted you um it's a social event so you get to meet other writers and you get to listen to their work you talk to people and so on and you get ideas and if you're shortlisted you get a chance to read your own work so it's quite an interactive process and even if you're not shortlisted if you go anyway you'll see you'll see what's going on. Well you've appeared well you've been on Sunday Miscellamy and you have won many awards and been nominated for many awards is there one in particular that meant a lot to you out of all the awards Mary that you've won over the years probably um probably the first one it's like it's like everything else it's great to get a first at some stage so a couple of decades ago I came I won the inaugural Francis Ledwidge competition uh in Dublin and uh one dark october evening I got this phone call to say I won the competition and would I come to Dublin for the presentation of my prize and so on and I said oh yes I will and then uh part of the prize was to read at the National War Memorial Gardens on Ledwidge Day which is the last Sunday in July every year so I did that and subsequently I have read at the National War Memorial Gardens many times on Ledwidge Day so there's an ongoing connection there so there's always the the social and interactive part to being in a competition another competition that I really enjoyed being part of was the Trocora Portrait Ireland award and it was it was great to get first in that and the prize included two weeks in Anna McCarrig in the Tyrone Guthrie Centre which gave me a great opportunity to write and to get away from the usual wear and tear of ordinary life so that in itself was was that it that was a wonderful prize and I came I was runner-up in the same competition two years ago wonderful and from all the experience that you you've had and and all the the things that you've learned is there any advice or any pointers that you might give to anybody who's listening tonight to say oh maybe I'll try and send a poem into the competition well the few pointers I'd say is look at competitions in in in a positive light they're not really look on them as a way of getting your work together of structuring your work of getting your work together and of sending it out there and this is very valuable if you're part of a writing group or if you're not part of a a writing group because you need some validation and you need some feedback so the other thing I would say is people often think well the judge writes in such and such a way maybe they like this particular poem that doesn't necessarily work and what I would say is you know send out your best poem and the one that you've put most work into a poem that's typed clearly edited and well worked over just that that that it is precise and exact I the other thing is of course to read the submission guidelines not to exceed the line length or anything like that just to keep to the guidelines as Theresa said they're they're pretty basic in this particular in this particular competition and two when you are choosing the poems I came across a Greek word recently and it's muraki which means when you do something with soul creativity and love putting a piece of yourself into what you do so if you have a piece of work that contains all those elements send it in quickly thank you very good indeed now although you have four collections of poems yourself you've you've won to read tonight for us but it's it's not one of your own but it's it's about Brendan Behan and who's central to this year's festival yes I have one of Behan's poems he Brendan wrote quite both in Irish and in English and this poem is called Eugnes which is Loneliness and it was published in the Envoy magazine in 1950 and it's just a short poem it reminds me of a of a Haiku and this this is it Eugnes Don Eyre in Aran and the English version loneliness the tang of blackberries wet with rain on the hilltop in the silence of the prison the clear whistle of the train the happy whisperings of lovers to the lonely one lovely lovely indeed and again bilingual and a very talented man Brendan Behan so the the competition is live at the minute at Trisa and the closing date if i'm correct is the 15th of September Friday the 15th September yes and you submit your work in a word document am i right in saying that a word document to our gmail address which is you'll find that on the competition rules and of the guidelines are all on the the website that they're going to find that they're on the website so if you go to the facebook page from let a candy cathedral quarter and get the link there to the web page well ladies thank you so much for taking time out tonight and every every success with the competition and with the festival and no doubt it will be seen just before then and during the week okay thanks very much you thanks for having us on transform your home with a visit to mcgillie's furniture letter


The earliest evidence of fiber technology in Southeast Asia has been found in Tabin Cave, Palawan, Philippines. Stone tools used for thinning fibers were found on these artifacts, suggesting that people living there had developed a method of turning hard plant segments into supple strips suitable as tying material, or to weave baskets, traps, and even boats. This discovery adds to the growing body of evidence that fiber technology was an integral part of late Pleistocene's skill sets. This article was authored by Hermine Zoffler, Sheldon Yagoan, Timothy James Vitales, and others.


Hi everyone. Welcome to Code Pink's What the F is going on in Latin America. This is our weekly webinar of 20 minutes of hot news out of the region, Latin America and the Caribbean. Today, I'm really happy and honored to share the next 20 to 30 minutes with you with Natasha Bannon, who I have had the pleasure of working with through the National Lawyers Guild and through different solidarity projects in Latin America. And let me tell you a little bit about Natasha before we start our conversation. She is Senior Counsel at Latino Justice Pearl Deaf. She focuses on exploitation and discrimination against low-wage Latino immigrant workers. And as she was discussing with me prior, that she likes to describe it as intersectional work between racial justice, immigrant rights, economic rights, and gender-related rights. She also offers legal support in the face of economic and humanitarian crises in Puerto Rico, which is going to be our focus today, and international human rights. And she is also past president of the National Lawyers Guild. So welcome, Natasha. So happy to be in conversation with you this evening. Thank you, Teri. It's great to join you today. So today, we want to talk about, Natasha has a lot of experience in Puerto Rico. And so we've asked her to join us in conversation today, specifically to put an emphasis on the development of our Latin America team here at Code Pink with the understanding that Puerto Rico is part of Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as the citizens of the island being U.S. citizens and how they're treated and made differently than those of us on the mainland in many ways. So it's really important to share that context, that it is Latin America and the Caribbean, but these are U.S. citizens and some of the differences in their life there versus ours on the mainland. So, Natasha, why don't you give us a little background on the history of your work with Puerto Rico? Sure. And actually, first, I really appreciate the opportunity to bring Puerto Rico into the conversation and to situate ourselves geographically, because as you said, Puerto Rico is a part of Latin America. It has a geographic and cultural and linguistic identity that is situated within the Caribbean and within Latin America. And even though we often think about it because the point of reference in the context in the United States is one of a territory. In fact, it really is part of a whole other continent and region. And there's two things that you just said that we often hear that I want to just kind of call attention to, to be really intentional about how we think about the center language, which is one we usually hear. Well, you know, Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens. Therefore, they merit a different kind of treatment or the United States is acting discriminatory towards its own citizens instead of realizing that that's an imposed citizenship. You know, it's a citizenship that was imposed on the evil World War One that was really intended to recruit Puerto Ricans forcefully to go serve in this war and basically be kind of cannon fodder for testing landmines and sending them out before before troops actually went out. So the citizenship isn't what necessarily guarantees human rights or or equal treatment. The other point that I just want to mention is that we also often hear the United States being referred to as the mainland. You know, there's the island and there's the mainland. And what we like to think of it is really Puerto Rico is the mainland. They have their own mainland that this isn't their mainland. They have their own island and their own their own nation and culture. And those are it just really shows how so much of even those of us that do work on behalf of Puerto Rican Liberation and self determination often find ourselves in this co-op. Yeah, and this course myself included that we grow. Yeah, by spending 40 years in and out of Latin America. There are those paradigms that that we learn from a very, very young age. Absolutely. Yeah. No, absolutely. And that discourse has really been co-opted. And we see it often now talked about. And, you know, that the issue around self determination for Puerto Rico is one of civil rights, that is the right to vote or people should be able to vote for the president or, you know, that that's what's going to solve the issue.   And we know that that is not a dignified state that has been not only morally rejected and repudiated by the international community, but legally as well. And for over 60 years, that continues to be the position of international bodies like the United Nations that continue to call upon the United States year after year to initiate a process of decolonization for Puerto Rico and one that leads to self determination so that they can decide what type of political relationship they would like to have with the United States. And that political question, that political crisis is really at the heart of what we often hear talked about in the context of Puerto Rico, which is the economic crisis or what gets called the humanitarian crisis, which is also a human rights crisis and is inherently a political one, too. The lack of people's ability to exercise autonomy over their decision making and deciding and making sure one that they can live, that they have access to water, to food, to safety mechanisms, to schools that won't collapse on them when there's a natural disaster, to energy sources that aren't just focused on non-renewable energy, to be able to govern their ports, their air, their borders, all of that. Those decisions that are taken out of their hands and leaving them extremely vulnerable and in precarious conditions that continue to expose them to not only natural disasters, kind of quote unquote, but really the manmade disasters of disaster capitalism, which is what we're seeing ravish the island right now, particularly in the last decade. Let's talk about disaster capitalism and how that's affecting the population of the island to make autonomous decisions, how they can solve their debt crisis or how they're prohibited from solving their debt crisis and what options can be pursued by them. Yeah, so Puerto Rico has been in the news, I'd say in the last three or four years, for a couple of reasons. The first is what gets called a fiscal or debt crisis and in fact is really kind of an economic depression. And that came to a point, at least in the news cycle, about three years ago or so, three or four years ago where the debt, 72 billion dollars approximately, was declared unpayable by the former governor and that led the US Congress to pass the law, given that Puerto Rico had no other access to any other bankruptcy protections, debt restructuring mechanisms, they tried to pass their own laws and the United States Supreme Court rejected that attempt. They as a colony can't access regional or international financial institutions or banking mechanisms or engage in, you know, types of trade or lending practices with other sovereign nations directly. And so really they were at the will of US Congress to fashion some type of legislative remedy for them. That remedy is known as the law called promeson, the Puerto Rico Oversight Management Economic Stability Act, which does provide a debt restructuring mechanism but comes at a very, very high cost, which is a congressionally appointed delegated fiscal control board. It's a board of about seven members of individuals who serve in their private capacity. They all come from the financial sector, many of them from the very same institutions responsible for indebting the nation and have serious conflicts of interest they meet in private, they meet on Wall Street, they have explicitly said that their primary goal is to make sure that Puerto Rico access the markets and to pay back creditors and they have made that goal. In fact, visible in the policies that they implement, including a fiscal plan that they impose on the elected government and people of Puerto Rico that is based on austerity measures. It's based on the closure of hundreds of public schools of cutting the University of Puerto Rico's the largest higher education institution in the Caribbean slashing their budgets, slashing healthcare and medical needs for an increasingly aging population, forcing migration out of the island. So the Puerto Rico now has the lowest population that it's had in decades, about three million. And, you know, and but I'm I says what we're stuck with and instead of responding to the economic crisis, in fact, it's deepening it. It's really creating, as we talked about this disaster capital, it's after the after Hurricanes and Inma devastated the island two and a half years ago in 2017, the control board really ran through with the compliance, complicity of the Puerto Rican government, long term projects and policies that are going to have devastating consequences on the island for generations. You know, they're they're closing debt deals that are not going to just affect me or or you or anyone was visiting the island or living on the island. It's going to affect family and friends, you know, their children, their grandchildren. These are generational policies that we often see not only in in colonies, explicit colonial situations, but neocolonial situations. I was going to you mentioned austerity measures and we're seeing this throughout Latin America, but really across the globe, attached to IMF and World Bank loans with the objective, ultimately, of privatizing entire economies as we have saw the attempt in Chile, which is erupted finally and and then Honduras being pretty much a Petri dish of full blown privatization of an economy. Do you think that's the objective here in Puerto Rico as well? That's to drive I know that's been the explicit objective and the control board has been very honest about that. One of the members of the control board said that their their goal is to turn Puerto Rico into the Singapore or Hong Kong of the Caribbean, which is what we know is kind of an elite playground for the ultra wealthy and this luxury space kind of an extension of what I think of as Miami Beach, right? So it's a Puerto Rico. That's not for Puerto Ricans. If you're Puerto Rican and live in Puerto Rico, then you're going to be in a service economy serving foreign capital, serving a wealthy class of individuals who are the owners of that land of the resources of the institutions. That is not a model that centers Puerto Ricans and privileges that means their own autonomous decision making that centers the needs of Puerto Ricans and thinking about what a just recovery looks like after the worst natural disasters in a century to hit the island. And this was before the recent earthquakes that have been devastating the southern part, particularly of the island. And it's intended so, you know, the first 60, 70 years of Puerto Rico's colonial existence under the U.S. regime was really about military attention in the region and particularly in making sure that there was a U.S. presence to keep an eye on Cuba and to keep an eye on the Caribbean and parts of Latin America. And that's really shifted to economic interest now. And we see the policies that are being imposed on Puerto Rico directly and directly really serving U.S. capital interests and making sure that even if at some point there's no longer direct colonial rule, that as we've seen in neocolonial context, there will always continue to be control of the economic institutions and the political ones that respond to those economic interests on the island. So that these policies that we see being implemented now, which include and heavily depend on the privatization of public goods, Puerto Rico has a long history of having a robust role of government of government in providing public goods and services and even have some of them explicitly protected in their constitution, which was vehemently fought by the United States to get some of those economic and social protections removed from their constitution. But they have, for example, the right to education. And what we see is the closure of nearly 600 public schools in Puerto Rico is attacked on the higher on the University of Puerto Rico, the the public education system there. And we're seeing privatization of schools, privatization of healthcare, privatization of infrastructure of energy. And the disaster capitalist model heavily depends on that. Not only is it that we're going to ram through these privatization, you know, ventures when nobody's looking because they're literally in the throes of survival and trying to make sure that they're able to sustain themselves and to survive and to remain in Puerto Rico, but that they're going to have they're going to be done in a way that's not transparent because there's no public hearings because there's no public notice because we're not giving opportunity for that because we're resting people who come to the Capitol who try to participate in hearings because we're cramming through votes in 24 hour periods because we're not issuing notices. All of that is happening with with the deep complicity of what I call the colonial government in Puerto Rico that really serves the the interests of a foreign capital. And it's being sold as a model of economic development because but it's not unique to Puerto Rico. We see this replicate throughout Latin America on a constant basis is exactly the same while that's happening in Afro-Columbian communities in Colombia. It's happening in Honduras. It's happening, you know, through throughout the region, throughout the world and certainly throughout the region, which has been since someone wrote doctrine, you know, the place where the United States has has with impunity really implemented this. And it's just that in Puerto Rico because they have colonial cover that they're doing it much more explicitly. So there's a couple things you mentioned. And I guess the first I want to just touch on is you mentioned people being arrested for for trying to figure out what's going on with with the debt servicing. What we are not hearing that at all. Oh, that's yeah. Whenever that's a real nature. Oh, yeah, there's been numerous folks arrested any time they try to attend. You know, what are supposed to be public hearings when in fact there are hearings that are being held at the local legislature and folks try to attend and either they're told that they're closed even though they're being held in the legislature by the legislature, they're inherently public.  And there's a long practice of that by the Puerto Rican Police Department, which is one of the most violent and largest police departments in any U.S. jurisdiction. So second largest after the NYPD that it often receives its training from. And there's very tight and long and historic ties to the FBI and to federal law enforcement. So it's not it's it's by design. It's it's not at all coincidental that those who are trying to disrupt the this process are often targeted. We know that's usually activists. That's also why we see since the summer of twenty nineteen is as we call it. But I don't mean the same way when I think of Puerto Rico really beginning to to initiate the eruption, the Puerto Rican insurrection of people saying, you know, we can't take this anymore. So much of the decisions being made for us are not being made by us and they're made behind our backs in the way people talk about us, the way they're making decisions about us, including their former governor as revealed by the chat, which is the tipping point. There is the it was it was made everything roll over. Yeah, I was really last summer to see so many people in the streets demanding a change and actually at least getting him out of office, the system didn't change. But it was a profound example of public pressure by millions of people exacting a result. And it was very inspiring. It it didn't go much out with with with those of us living, you know, in the United States, but it was a really profound example. And we've seen that since throughout Latin America and throughout the world. It really was, you know, there was the the Arab spring. There was the Puerto Rican summer and and that summer gave gave birthing to and fueled not a movement because in reality, people were already protesting the exact same issues of corruption, of austerity, of neoliberal policies, of being imposed without consent, without transparency, without autonomy, without self-governance in some form or fashion around the world, right? So whether that was, you know, Lebanon or or Turkey or Chile or Haiti or Mexico or Ecuador, what we saw was collective uprising. Yeah, people collectively, you know, rising up and in Puerto Rico, it was a historic moment. You know, a million people in the street, a third of the of the Highlands population at this point who people who had never protested in their lives whose dignity was on the line and who said like, this is it. This is where I draw the line. Like you're making fun of our debt. You're making fun of women. You know, you're denigrating and humiliating us.  And these are the people that were elected to serve our interests, to serve us. And yeah, what we see is deep invasive corruption is the prioritization and privileging of their buddies and granting multimillion dollar contracts with a minimum wage on Puerto Rico's 725 an hour still and was authorized to be reduced to 425 an hour for young people when the average salary is 18,000 a year and more than half of the island lives at the federal poverty line, which we know is already seriously poor. And that's at the line. That was before the hurricane. Now, you know, it's likely much more than that. And so you have these politics of austerity and policies of austerity that are placing the burden of really criminal practices of indebted 73 billion dollars. You don't get to that level of debt without there being criminality. And yet who's being forced to pay for that is the people who have not only no responsibility for that but also the least capacity to bear the financial burdens. And so it's driving them into forced migration. It's driving them out of their homes, away from their families into low precarious labor with the elimination of additional workplace protections that we see come also at the expense of this debt. And as I was saying, like this isn't a new model. It's not just Puerto Rico and it's really important to remember that what is unique about Puerto Rico is that it's accepted. It's accepted as legitimate US interest in US policy that what's happening there is legal. It's fully legal under at least domestic law. It's totally rejected under international law, which we know the United States isn't abide by, but it isn't that we should just have a moral, morally repudiate this and be offended by this. We should be offended because it's our government that does this in our name and does it under the cover of legitimacy. And we need to constantly call that out. We need to call it out as a colonial practice, as an imperial practice, as an illegitimate and criminal practice and to actually begin to hold criminally responsible, those who are responsible for indebting the nation, not just the governor, the various governors in government of Puerto Rico, but also the financial institutions were the same ones that were responsible for the foreclosure crisis that's also targeted black and brown communities. We just see these cycles be repeated globally every decade or so. I keep thinking two things, Greece and the debt and the price that they've had to pay and sacrificing natural resources. Argentina, and as you're describing Haiti for 300 years, you know, you were describing what is happening to Puerto Rican citizens and how they're being forced to leave their homes, to migrate and the reasons. And it's the same. And I agree with you, there was not the attention on it. The same thing under very, very similar reasons that's happening in Central America. And those people and their stories are getting far more media coverage here than what we're hearing from Puerto Rico. And it's a very, very similar story created by the same. Yeah, definitely created by the same actor. They're all policies of violence, but even so really the stories that we don't hear, that we hear about Central Americans, we don't hear their stories until they reach our border. There's really very superficial understanding of the conditions that cause that forced migration and the role of the United States historically in funding, providing the strategy for implementing, planning the political violence that was responsible and continues to bear out, you know, the aftershocks in the region that is promoting that violence, that institutionalized systemic political violence in Central America and sustain in Puerto Rico. Initially there was, you know, the first 80 years of political violence is really now led to deep economic violence that's pushing people out of their homeland because they can't afford to live there. Poor Puerto Ricans can't afford to live in Puerto Rico, but rich Americans can, right? They're being incentivized to go there. They're being incentivized to buy land, to privatize spaces, to not even have to live there, but to invest, which actually doesn't translate to any local wealth, you know, $30 billion is generated in Puerto Rico and profits, but none of that stays there. It's a place, it's a tax haven for rich people to get richer and to transfer their wealth outside of the island, whereas, you know, Puerto Ricans who live there continue to suffer under the economic and political violence that the United States maintains. And we just happen to have an administration in the White House that's very honest for the first time in a very long time about what he and this country and the government feels about Puerto Rico and the burden that it's been ironically when in fact it really is the United States that's responsible directly and indirectly responsible for what we see happening on the island. It isn't just local corruption. Corruption doesn't just sit at one level only. We know that actually it's in Washington where, you know, most of the corruption comes from and gets planned and plotted and seated throughout Latin America. Well, so listen, I've asked you to speak with us for 20 minutes and we're going on 30.  And so I would like to ask, is there anything that we should specifically mention to our viewers that we haven't talked about that you feel we should specifically mention? And I'd also like you to give us a short list of reading resources that are listed. And if you can't do it now, email them to me and I'll share in the comments for our viewers that, you know, some maybe give people something to read in historical context, disaster capitalism and, you know, to reinforce our conversation this afternoon. It'd be great. Sure, well, I'll say a couple of things. One is that we all need to include Puerto Rico in our discourse about Latin America, but also when we are thinking of imperialism and a war which lately and heavily focuses on rhetoric engaged at the Middle East, understandably so, but we have a colony, right? And that colony, we don't talk about it in those terms, we talk about it as a territory, as a US jurisdiction, they're US citizens. And I think that we actually need to challenge that rhetoric and that language to refer to the Puerto Rican nation, to begin to build out a solidarity movement the way that we see and have recognized other nations who also seek their own self-determination processes that have been legitimized, whether it's, you know, Palestinians or Saffatistas or other autonomous nations. And yet ironically in the United States, we don't have many institutions or organizations dedicated to Puerto Rican solidarity that stand in support with Puerto Rican liberation struggles, the way that we see for a lot of other issues, even though the United States, we live in the colonizing nation. And so it is really contingent upon all of us to stand at this critical moment with our Puerto Rican brothers and sisters and not let this be their burden alone, the same way that no matter where we go, you know, we take the causes of self-determination and liberation struggles with us from around the world.  All of that is taking place on Puerto Rican bodies and land. And so we need to really bring that into the United States and to our activist spaces as much as possible and surface it and to demand change policies and a process of decolonization for Puerto Rico. And in terms of ratings, I would suggest for sure, if you're interested in what the disaster capitalist piece looks like post Hurricane Maria, you can definitely read Aftershocks by Professor Jenny Madmonias and Anthology. There's a number of us with pieces in there that really go through this month, our 20, 30 minute conversation and much more depth. There's also a website called Puerto Rico Syllabus. I think it's dot net or dot blog. And it's a curated collection of readings on each one of these issues, much more in depth. And so that's a great place to start. Terrific, thank you so much. You know, we were talking about, you know, making sure that Puerto Rico is included in our solidarity work on the same level and with the same amplification as other nations and people and movements we work with. You know as well as I do, when you travel throughout Latin America very often, you hear the phrase United States and Puerto Rico. And those are the movement people that you and I work with so closely and they clearly understand when they say that what the situation is for Puerto Rico. And I think that that's probably a phrase we should all adopt, United States and Puerto Rico. So that is- Well said. So thank you, Natasha. I'm so pleased to have had this conversation with you. It was really great to talk with you today and to see you again and to work a little bit with you this afternoon. Likewise and thank you all for also carving out a space specifically to talk about Puerto Rico in the context of Latin America. Oh, well, it's really important. Oh, thank you. And thank you for reinforcing that with us. So we'll talk again, I hope. Yes, anytime. Okay. Yeah, Viva Puerto Rico Libre. Yeah, Viva. Thank you so much. Take care. Bye-bye. Bye everyone and be sure to join us next Wednesday at our regular time, 12 p.m. Eastern for our next edition of what the F is going on in Latin America. Thank you again, everyone. Bye-bye. Bye, Natasha.


Hello there everyone and welcome, my name is Melissa Armo and tonight I wanted to talk to you about confidence, specifically your own self-confidence. When you are attempting to trade the market, you have to have a lot of confidence. How do you gain that confidence? Where does it come from? Well, maybe you're just a normal, confident person in anything that you venture to do. If you are, that's great. You're going to need that confidence to trade the market. If you are someone that doesn't normally have a lot of confidence in things that you do, it's something you can work on. You can work on and improve your self-confidence, I truly believe that. But saying that you are someone that doesn't normally have a high level of self-confidence, it doesn't mean that you can't do well trading. What gives people, or successful people, what gives someone like me confidence in the market, the knowledge? It's the knowledge. So when I have my trading room, but I only allow people to join the room after they've taken the golden gap course, and the reason is because that learning the system, learning the information, gives people confidence to trade. It's the knowledge. Once you see something and you understand the thought process is behind it, why you should short this stock, for example. Why you should short this stock here, and put the stop here, look where this is the target, why you would do it. The thinking behind it, the philosophy behind predicting why something's going to drop in price that you would know to short it ahead of time. That knowledge helps you gain confidence in doing it, in actually pressing the button and doing it, and taking the risk. Because you're risking your money when you take a trade, whether it's $50, $100, $1,000. Whenever you take a trade, you're taking risks. There's no way to get around that. You can't just poof, take a trade into thin air, and make money without taking the risk. So you must take risks to trade. It takes confidence to do it. A lot of people do not have confidence. That's one of the reasons why people jump around from thing to thing. Never fully commit themselves to the time and the money and effort to trading. Because they don't have a lot of confidence in their ability. But I'm telling you, once you have the correct knowledge, which you learn in my class, which is why the stock is going to drop, therefore you short it, okay, once you have that knowledge, it helps your confidence to do it. Even if you're not a confident person, if you have the right knowledge, you'll gain confidence in the market and stocks and in taking trades through the knowledge and then the experience of taking live trades and profiting and making money will help you too. And now let me give you an example. If you don't have a lot of confidence, what happens when you lose in a trade? Your confidence level goes down even more. If you have confidence in your ability to trade, to make money in the market, to predict where stocks are going to go. If you have confidence in a system, if you have confidence in the knowledge and your own abilities and the knowledge itself, which you learn in my 26-point rating system, if you have confidence in that and a trade fails, say even two trades fail in a row for you. You can keep going and overcome that two trades or one trade bad day or whatever day you have that you have a bad day without losing it. So many people just get nuts and then they take one bad day and it spirals into a week of bad days. When you understand a system and you have the right knowledge and you have high confidence in it, when you have a trade that does not work, you're not going to blame the market.  You're not going to spiral off on a streak of losing days. You'll accept it that this is part of the system and you'll understand that in the market, not everything works 100%. And you'll just shrug it right off. I call it having amnesia, that's important too. But when you have confidence in yourself and your abilities, you'll better be able to handle hurdles when they come along the way. When problems arise, when you have challenges, when you have hurdles, challenges in your trading or anything you're trying to accomplish, you'll find a way to overcome them. And you won't get so upset and bogged down by any little thing that happens or one bad trade or one bad day. And the problem is that many people carry experiences that are negative and referenced to trading, trades they did, decisions they made, classes they took that they didn't learn anything from. People take all the negativity and they take it into the future instead of using it to their advantage, which is what an intelligent person does, okay? Using the things that happen in the past to their advantage to take it forward into the future and make better choices, make better decisions and understand that not that it can't be done, but that the only way to be successful is having a good system and a high level of confidence. You can build your confidence over time, but you get the confidence from the information and knowledge is what gives you the confidence to do it. When I teach the class, I want people to see it with me. And when they're seeing the gap with me, that helps them take the trade, even though I'm calling it live and they're doing it. It helps them do it too because they see it with me. And that makes a huge difference in your ability to be able to do it. You may not understand what I mean until you take my class. If you're interested, you can certainly email me to find out when the next class date is. What I'm telling you right now, knowledge helps you gain confidence in the market. I apply my knowledge all the time.  I'm a highly confident person. I got this way because I have 10 years plus of knowledge of trading gaps in a system that I created. And that's why I'm so confident to be able to say these things and make the predictions and see them play out, okay? So think about what I said. If you're not confident, you can gain confidence by information and knowledge. And if you are confident, normally as a person, you're still going to need the knowledge to be successful and be confident. You can never have too much confidence. So even if you're a confident person, build on it. Build on it, build on it, build on it, and work it up. You'll make more money over time, the more confidence you are, and you will also make more money, the more knowledge you have about a system that is profitable, which is mine. If you don't have a profitable system, reach out to me. Email me for more information on the Golden Gap course. And you can feel free to call me as well. It's 929-3200 Gap, or email me at Melissa at thestockswish.com. Have a great day, everyone.


So, I would like to thank citizens against nuclear bombers in Vermont, and I would like to thank the Monastic Academy for the preservation of life on Earth for cosponsoring our demonstration for peace. But with those who meditated for the full 24 hours, would you kindly raise your hands and just ask the group to please look out for those folks, share our love for your sacrifice. There were many times in the last 24 hours that I was able to get up and move or do something to meet a physical need of mine. And I watched my friends sit. I think it's hard to imagine just how difficult that is. In Citizens Against Nuclear Bombers in Vermont, I want to extend my gratitude to James Ellers, our campaign director. I would also like to honor the contributions of Ben Cohen, who is one of the co-founders of Ben and Jerry's, who has really been a strong advocate for peace and social justice. And I would like to honor Roseanne Greco, retired Air Force colonel, who has been the brains and the analytical voice and the ethical voice of this movement. And I would also like to thank Jimmy Lees, who has done some outstanding moral and legal writing that has really helped to galvanize many people. I would also like to thank the Senate Government Operations Committee for holding a hearing for our resolution banning the basing of nuclear weapons anywhere in the state of Vermont. HR7 and SR5, please call the Sergeant at Arms Office or stop by and visit their open till about 4.15. And please tell them to give Representative Stevens the message that we would like a House Committee hearing in the House Committee for Housing and Military Affairs. Our voice deserves to be heard. I'm very happy to see all of you here today. It was a beautiful 24 hours of sacrifice and expression of compassion for this beautiful planet and to come out of it to see your faces is truly miraculous. I don't have much of a voice right now. I haven't had anything to drink for two days. But I hope all of you can hear me and all of you appreciate those who did this ceremony for the benefit of life on Earth. One might wonder why would we sit through the hot sun the freezing night without food or water or rest or any breaks, any walking, any leaving for any reason, is that right now we're facing an insanity, an evil, a violence that threatens life on this planet. And we need to find a way in ourselves and in community to face that insanity, that evil, that violence. And so we come here today to meet it with sanity, with honesty, with clarity, to meet it with love and goodness and care, to meet it with truth and peace. So we embody, we commit to embodying peace in order to provide an alternative to war. At this time for many reasons, the most important one being that most people deny it, we're closer to the devastation of life on Earth than ever before. And yet at least now today, we're standing here in peace and love, meeting each other in friendship.  Thank you, Soryu. Now I'd like to invite Richard Ziplinski to speak from Veterans for Peace. Thank you, Jennifer. And thank you all for being here. Just like to say a few words as to why sitting in meditation is so important, maybe add something to what was just said. If we took a poll of all the people on Earth today, or maybe it has been done, and asked the question whether you're for war or for peace, and I think the answer would be quite obvious. No one's really for war. Everybody wants peace. So then the question arises, why isn't there peace? Well, some of the answers can be found through sitting in meditation. I've done it for maybe 25 years, and we find out how our mind operates, what's happening in the mind and what gets in the way of peace, the greed, hatred, delusion, or confusion. We have it in our minds. Things are in our minds and they manifest in the world if we don't recognize them. If we continue to be aware through meditation, we see those things in our mind and we don't spread them out into the world. When we see them in ourselves, it gets replaced with love and wisdom, and we can act effectively, more effectively, in the actions we take in the world. So I want to thank everybody who was involved in this meditation, especially the ones who spent so much time here without moving, eating, or drinking. It is a tremendous demonstration of what we should be doing, looking at our minds and fostering peace that way. With Veterans for Peace, we try to do it out in the world, and I work with our group to foster it in ourselves, too. And if I can put a plug for Veterans for Peace, a week from this Saturday, we're having a meeting at Spirit in Nature in Ripton, Vermont, and we're inviting everyone to a peace picnic and conversations about fostering peace in the world, sort of a gathering of the organizations that work for peace, so we can have a larger force in that direction. So thank you very much, and continue the work. I had one more gratitude to share, and you may have one, but I wanted to say thank you so much to Robin Lloyd for attending today. Because of your long-term peace activism, you have helped to create a foundation for our movement, without which we would not be here. And I just want to thank you for your many indispensable contributions to peace. Thank you, Robin. I would be remiss if someone didn't step to the microphone to offer our gratitude to Jennifer Decker. As long as we have hope, we have breath. As long as we have breath, we have hope. And with people like you out in the world, Jennifer, I have hope. So, as previously mentioned, the doomsday clock that measures the threat of nuclear war and ensuing nuclear annihilation of life on Earth is closer to midnight than ever before. Now, today, we see who has the courage to stand up for peace, to sit up all night for peace. Some would have us believe that the sound of a jet taking off is the sound of freedom, yet freedom depends upon peace. As Roseanne Greco, the retired Air Force Colonel who is calling our attention to the threat we face, has said, In fact, our voices are the real sound of freedom, not the engine noise of a nuclear bomber. The voice of the people is the real sound of freedom. We're here today to use our voices and our practice to say no to nuclear weapons proliferation disguised as jobs and prosperity. We do not support or accept nuclear weapons in our state, our country, or our world. We the people ask our elected leaders to stand for peace, not for endless for-profit wars. Throughout history, states have stood for their rights with regard to housing weapons systems. It's time for Vermont to do the same. We love our congressional delegation, but we cannot allow loyalty to their position to lead us in a foolhardy direction to base a nuclear weapons delivery system in a civilian neighborhood. Like a nuclear arms race, this is madness. We encourage our congressional delegation to set aside this mistaken progress and explore alternate missions such as cyber security that will create a foundation of peace through investment in intelligence and the skills and talents of the younger generation. Cyber war is the real threat to our security. Nuclear weapons have never been a solution, not now and not ever. Vermont youth, many of whom marched down State Street yesterday and provided energizing music for our meditators. It was an extension of the Mind the Music program, I would say. Deserve courageous elders who will stand up for the types of jobs that bring peace and prosperity, not threats of nuclear winter. Today, we stand with many veterans who rightfully question whether this particular project, the F-35, has any value for national security. In fact, it makes us less secure. Hampered by design flaws, the F-35 is a weapon system that is in the hands of one pilot on one bomber plane. This has never happened before. This is completely unprecedented and this is unacceptable to us. There is a new and dangerous arms race accelerating as we speak here today and this is unacceptable. Vermonters want no part in this. We want climate change legislation, not weapons based in civilian neighborhoods that are untested and toxic to our communities when they crash. Do those who serve in the Vermont Air Guard know that these planes have been questioned and rejected by members of the Air Force? If not, why have they not been told?  Do we really want to risk a nuclear war? As a woman who has helped raise Vermont kids for the last 14 years, I want safe working conditions for those who choose a career with the Air Guard. I want them to learn in school our history that the state guard's services are for the state, not for endless foreign wars. I want them to learn and remember that important history. The state guards are for the protection of the state and recent events have eroded this distinction. In whose interest is this erosion of our rights as a state? We believe that we are stewards of the fragile balance of life. Nuclear winter, climate destruction, starvation and mass migration from war is not the direction that we choose. We choose to stand for peace. We choose to stand for a military responsible to the people that hears our voices and knows that our voices are the real sound of freedom. We choose the truth that freedom is free. We honor our veterans and we respect their service. We are veterans. We are civilians. We stand together with the knowledge that in the military we do not go along with orders that are unjust and destructive to our way of life. We ask our military forces to stand with us. We say no to the basing of nuclear weapons delivery vehicles and their inherent risks. Vermont will be a target in nuclear war as well as a place from which nuclear war could be launched if the F-35 rolls into Vermont this fall. Nuclear war will end civilization around the globe. Please support HR7 and SR5, our resolution banning the basing of nuclear weapons everywhere in Vermont. Please call the state house at 828-2228 and ask Representative Stevens to grant us a hearing. Thank you to veterans and service members present here with us and far away. We do not accept any narrative that would divide us from you. Some of the headlines say that we are targeting you. In fact, I am your granddaughter, I am your friend, and I am here to serve and protect you from a mission that does not serve any of us. Hear our voices, the voice of the people.  We stay up all night to honor those who are aware of the cost of the presence of nuclear weapons in our world today. We stand for the protection of our life, liberty, and property guaranteed by the Constitution that will not be taken from us without due process. One representative said to us, this issue is too political, perhaps meaning that he is unsure how it will affect his future electability. I say to him, you will lose more votes when one of these planes crashes or God forget bid mistakenly ignites a global nuclear war. Ending life on the planet and showing a weakness in our democracy from which we would not recover. Please, I say to our legislature, show the courage that is owed to our common humanity in this moment. In the 1980s, Vermont Towns stood for a nuclear freeze. Vermont helped to give rise to the movement that resulted in the end of the Cold War. Vermont can do this again. Stand with citizens against nuclear bombers in Vermont. The beginning of the end of nuclear war is in Vermont. Thank you very much. So as a closing, what I would like to do is to invite anyone who would like to speak a word into the center, a word that comes up for you if you think about this event. I'd like to give everyone a moment to think about what that word might be and offer people in an open manner to voice that when you feel led in this moment to share whatever those words might be. Inspiration. Imagine. Support. Generosity. Care. Solidarity. Generations. Intention. Awakening. Children. Innovation. Love. For James, the owner of the toy, water. Forgiveness. Spirit. Awareness. I invite one or two more shares. Thankfulness. Much gratitude to everyone. If you'd like to come and meditate with us, we have a Sunday sit in Burlington. Every Sunday from five to seven at the Quaker Meeting House on North Prospect. It would be wonderful to spend more time with all of you. You're all welcome and you can also come and visit our retreat center in Lowell, Vermont. Thank you again so much for making this event a success. Thank you. Regardless of the outcome of the resolutions, this doesn't end with those. Just because two planes arrive this fall doesn't mean this ends. So, for those of you that don't have the opportunity to connect with us one-on-one in person, do not lose hope if things don't turn out the way that you would like for them to turn out. Report it on the news or through the rumor mills. This does not end when this legislature goes home. We're just beginning. Thank you. Well done. And don't forget to leave your contact info. Thanks.


Frontier Town, the saga of the Roaring West. Frontier Town, El Paso, Cheyenne, Calgary, Tombstone. Frontier Town, here is the adventurous story of the early West. The tamed and the untamed. From the Pekos to Powder River, Dodge City to Poker Flat. These are the towns they fought to live in and lived to fight for. Teaming crucibles of pioneer freedom. Frontier Town. They say the frontier is pretty tough, but I live smack dab in the middle of the frontier in a rough and ready cow town known as Dos Rios. I don't think it's half as tough as folks say. Who am I? Well, I'm about the only lawyer in the county, and my handle is Chad Remington. Of course, I'm not trying to tell you that we don't have a fair share of trouble and sudden death, but what I am aiming to say is frontier or not the troubles we have, we know how to handle. Well, now, I guess it's up to me to back up what I said by giving you a case in point. It was just a few weeks ago that Cherokee O'Bannon, the ex-medicine man, was with me riding back from El Dorado, the county seat where I'd just tried a case and lost it. Now, I was feeling pretty blue about it, and Cherokee, in his heartiest manner, was trying to buck me up. Had my downcast and Dolores friend, I was to recall to you that famous old motto, but first, you don't succeed, try, try again. Well, I'm sure your advice is well meant, Cherokee, but this is one case I can't try, try again. I'm afraid that the jury was right that my client actually was guilty. Yes, I guess that's the difference between us. Any case I get, I keep working on. You're sure right about that. The cases you get, you work on until there isn't one bottle left. Ah, yes, yes indeed. That's one of the... See, look at that. Looks like the days of 49 with those lumbering big wagons coming down the pass up ahead. Except those aren't Conestogo wagons. From here, they look like freighters. Now, it wouldn't surprise me any if they were hauling supplies up to where they're building the new railroad that's gonna come into El Dorado. Yes, you're probably right about that, Chad. And incidentally, I think it's a rotten shame that they don't make Don Srias' railroad junction point instead of El Dorado. Oh, mister, I can't agree with you there. The first place El Dorado is a larger town. It's a county seat. They do three times the business there compared to what we do in our little one-horse town. Yes, I... Say, Chad, what do you think happened to those wagons? I can't see them now. The road through that pass winds down through the little canyon in Santa Rock and... Billy Blue plays this, Chad. Where are those shots coming from? From the canyon those wagons went into. You see the little puffs of gun smoke? Need I do? Need I do? It's a long haul and we may not get there in time to do any good, but come on, the least we can do is try. By the time we got there, there was nothing to see. That is, there was nothing to see, but signs of what had happened. Born on a ranch and owning a small one, the signs were fairly unmistakable. Cherokee and I just mounted and poked around. Well, Chad, maybe you know what the shooting was all about. I don't. I'm not saying it's as plain as the nose on your face. But it's just about as red. Sir, I resent that, didn't I? No insult intended, Cherokee. Look here, you see these feathers on the ground? If I'm not mistaken, those feathers came out of some Indians' ward dress. You mean to stand there with your eagle eyes squinted up and tell me Indians ambushed those wagons? I mean to tell you that there were Indians here. In judging from the feathers, Comanches. The thing that baffles me, though, is first, apparently the Wagoneers didn't fight back. And second, after the Indians rode off, the wagons apparently proceeded as usual. You know, somehow or other this attack looks like it might have been pre-arranged. And it beats me. Those wagons were freighters hauling railroad supplies. What would Indians want with stuff like that? Well, it beats me too, Cherokee. But since it's coming to sundown, I'm not going to waste any more time standing out here speculating. Nope, I'm climbing back on that broken-down Mustang. I ran it from your livery stable and heading home for Dos Rios. With all I had to do in Dos Rios after a five-day absence, I must admit I didn't give the unexplained wagon attack much more thought. In fact, nobody in Dos Rios was particularly interested because everyone was talking about the new man who'd moved to town, chapped from Kansas, or so he said, by the name of Doc Stonebender. Not only had he moved to Dos Rios, but he'd leased a store building with a large store room and immediately started to option property all over our valley, except for a few pieces that he bought up. Well, I hadn't been back in town more than 24 hours when Doc Stonebender came to call on me. To make a long story short, Remington, if we can get together on a price, I'm prepared to take an option on your ranch and pay you $300 for it. Well, now, Stonebender, this is sheer curiosity on my part, but you must have a mighty good reason for wanting to tie up all the property I've heard you've optioned here in Dos Rios Valley. I sure have. You see, when I operate, I operate big. That's how I've made my money. And that's how I happen to operate on the scale I do. Yeah, I see, but what's your reason? Well, from the wagon loads of that stuff I've seen being unloaded and taken into your store, you've got a heavy investment already in this valley. I'll tell you my reason. I've done a lot of looking around. I've decided Dos Rios Valley is going to boom. If it does, it's going to make me a rich man, a very rich man. However, you haven't given me your answer yet about your own place. Well, I'm afraid the answer is no. Perhaps I'm a little sentimental about it. My father homesteaded the ranch and I was born there. But on the other hand, looking to get married someday, if there's any easy money to be made here, I'd like to make it too. Certainly, a lawyer doesn't have to make his money out of a few acres of land. When the boom comes, you'll make plenty out of your profession. That's right. If the boom comes. Matter of fact, in my opinion, any land boom in these parts ought to hit El Dorado with the railroad coming in there, not Dos Rios. Oh, I think they'll have a quick spurt at El Dorado, but... Well, I'm a busy man, Remington. I'll raise my offer to 500 for the option. If that'll interest you. No thanks, Mr. Stonebender. If you're going to get rich out of Dos Rios, it's all mine. I'm glad you came down here to the stable, Chad. I saw that stranger. What's his name, Stonebender? Booksters, do you're off? Oh, no such luck. He wanted to take an option to buy my ranch. Offered me $500 for the option. Would probably have paid me a fortune for the ranch if he ever bought it. $500 just for an option. That man must be made of money. Which, as I think of it, is a lovely thing to be made of. He may be made of money, but I don't think too much of his brains. My dear young man, any man with the money he must have must have brains to spare. The business act human sticking out of his ears. Why, a man like that doesn't have to drink whiskey. He could drink champagne. Well, if my ranch is ever worth what Doc Stonebender thinks it's going to be, you can have all the champagne you want to drink at my wedding. Which reminds me, Libby and the judge are good enough to invite me for supper at just about time I was getting over there. You lucky young devil having a beautyist damsel like Libby interested in you. Be sure to convey to her and her father my sincerest regards. And if it can, so the date for that wedding party soon. I must admit I'm getting pretty thirsty for champagne.  No, thanks, Judge. I'm afraid your daughter really doesn't approve. Well, I certainly don't. Not so bad when daddy smokes them outside like he's doing tonight, but I'm sick and tired of sweeping up ashes off the parlor rug ten times a day. Young lady, don't forget who paid for that parlor rug. Don't let the judge scare you, Libby, by all that talk about paying for rugs. When I get married, I'm not going to have a rug in the house. Probably can't afford it. Well, that's a fine way to make an impression on your perspective. Excuse me, Libby. I think I see someone coming. If I'm not mistaken, it's Cherokee O'Bannon. Hey, Cherokee, is that you? Yes, it is, Chad. I'm certainly glad you're still in town. Something wrong, Cherokee? Evening, Judge. Evening, Miss Libby. I don't know if something's wrong or if it's just my imagination. But if you'll excuse Chad, I'd like him to come with me. Good night, Cherokee. We just finished supper. Don't you know it's not polite to eat and run? Well, I haven't eaten, and I run all the way here. Because I think I found something that ties right into what happened to those freight wagons the other day on the way home from El Dorado. Freight wagons, Chad? I'll tell you about it later, Judge, but if Cherokee is right, I better be leaving now. Cherokee grabbed me by the arm and practically ran me three blocks back to town. Then, turning down the alley behind his livery stable, walked me another few hundred feet until we were right behind the back door to the storeroom of the big building Doc Stonebender had rented. Two doors away from Dos Rios' biggest and noisiest saloon. Hey, Chad, where'd my strike man? See? See those wheel tracks there in the dirt? Yeah, I can make them out all right. Notice those nail marks? Shoes were fastened onto the wheels? Those aren't the same wheel marks we saw in that canyon the other afternoon. Where you found the Indian brothers, I'll drink a quarter of milk. The very thought reposes me. Cherokee, I'll be dug on if I don't think you're right. Why should those freight wagons we heard being shut up the other day suddenly appear here in the alley behind Stonebender's store? I knew I wouldn't have gone and gotten you. You got any answers? No, not really answers. It's certainly something to think about.  Let's take a walk when I think this over. Well, Chad, got any answers yet? No, we thought those wagons were hauling railroad supplies. But if Stonebender's interested in the railroad over at El Dorado, why should he be optioning all the... Hey, Cherokee, you see that buckboard coming toward us? Look at his split. Yes, I do. Find one thing about horses, that team's running away. Good grief, Cherokee, with the crowd that's in town tonight and all the horses at the hitch-rack, that runaway can start a stampede. Billy Blue blazes, Chad. We've got to stop that buckboard and quack. Come on. Cherokee, there's a man on the seat. Looks like he's fainted. Here, help me turn his head around. What happened, Mr. Are you all right? There's a railroad to get help. Railroad work crew wiped out. Railroad work crew? You mean at El Dorado? Yeah, El Dorado. Indians, hundreds of them wiped us out. Cherokee, this thing's starting to fit together. Look, were the Indians Comanches? Yeah, Comanches. Hundreds of them crazy with liquor and shooting like they were. Chad, is he... is he gone? Yeah, afraid so, Cherokee. He's gone. What he told us is certainly going to cost somebody something. Wouldn't surprise me if it cost that somebody his life. We'll return to the second act of the Valley of Lawless Men, our exciting Frontier Town adventure in just a few minutes. Now, Frontier Town. With that fellow riding in from El Dorado with the news that the Comanches had attacked the railroad work party and wiped them out, not only did Doc Stonebender's part in this mosaic of mystery become more obscure, but with the nearest cavalry post located much too far away to be any help, I roused out the judge, and with Cherokee's help, we soon organized a meeting. With everyone trying to talk at once, no one can say anything. How you know what the facts are, the Indian uprising which wiped out the railroad work party. And we're here to find out what we can do about it. Judge, judge, I got a question I want to ask you. See that this is the time to ask questions. That's what I say. We call this meeting to get some action, not to answer a lot of questions. Yeah, some questions of my own. All right, Molly, in you two, Abe, let's get to the questions and get them over with. With this here and all railroad work party being wiped out, can anybody tell me if the railroad's still going to go ahead with their plans of running their rails into El Dorado? I'd like to know if I want to. And over here, answer a question like that. And besides, what difference does it make with the Commenshes on the warpath again? I'll tell you what difference it can make, Judge. So happens I own a lot of land over here in Dos Rios, and so do some of the other folk here.  Are you all in your right senses?   Chan, fighting is risky. It costs time. It costs money. And I'll be blamed if I want to not only take a chance on gettin' shot, but spend my money when all I'm gonna get out of it is seein' that El Dorado gets a railroad. Your dog gone before he go fight the engines, and up with some money in the bank instead of some men up in Boat Hill. I've never heard the likes of this in all my born days. You know what it says in the Bible about worship and mammon. Now, friends, I just can't believe folks who are as decent as I know you are could even feel this way. You leave your doors open. You'll feed drop-line riders. You'll boast about how neighborly westerners are. And still, on the slim chance of making a dollar for yourselves, you'll let those comanches go on slaughtering decent people without lifting a finger.  Molly was right. What's the cavalry for? Good heavens, by the time the cavalry could get up here, we might all be slaughtered. Remington, I haven't heard anybody here say they wouldn't fight to protect their own homes. So why keep threatening everybody by trying to make it appear that the Indians are right at our own doors? Well, Judge, you've got the gavel. You might as well use it. The only thing we're getting out of this meeting is complete disgust with the human race. This meeting stands adjourned. Just like I always knew when I used to sell my genuine Cherokee and in rattlesnake oil. What's that, Cherokee? The genus, hopo sapiens, is all for every last penny you can make. Think I could have sold any of my oil for two bits if I didn't tell them it was worth $10? No, sir. That's why I always said, you say five dollars is too much. You say you want more for your money? Very well, then. As a special advertising inducement, I'm going to offer this miraculous remedy today for just 25 cents. The suckers? I suppose Cherokee's right, Jed. But if those Comanches ever come over to Dos Rios... No, they wouldn't dare, Judge. They're safe around El Dorado because all the mountains and hills to hide in. This valley's too flat. It certainly would be a... Wait a minute. I think I've got an idea. Idea? What, Jed? And I did. It teach the folks around Dos Rios a lesson. You know Chief Grey Bear, don't you, Judge, the chief of the Honour Wander tribe? Yes. A few years back, I got him out of some trouble. Since I wouldn't take a fee for it, he made me promise that someday I'd let him return in the favor. What have the Honour Wander's got to do with this situation? Nothing right now. But if you'll write out and pay a call on Chief Grey Bear with me, Cherokee, I think we could teach our friends and neighbors a lesson they'll never forget. Now, do you understand, Chief? Do you know what I want you to do? Me understand, Remington.  That doesn't make good Christians out of them, nothing well. We'll do. But today, Comanche have many white men's rifles. Also got plenty of firewater. Firewater? Say, Chad, maybe I could dress up like a Comanche.  Grey Bear, do you know where the Comanche's got that firewater and those rifles? Do not know for sure. But here talk, white men give them whiskey and gun. I had the great horned spoon, Chad. Maybe that's what they stole out of those wagons the other day. Maybe it's what they got out of the wagons, but they never stole them. If they'd stolen them, why would the wagons have driven off before we got there? Oh, sir, I think it was pre-arranged that they stopped those wagons so they'd look good. Chad, I'm starting to think you arrived. What's more, I think your friend Doc Stonebender is the culprit behind it all. Now you're cooking with spring water. I'll bet that's why Stonebender's optioned all that land in Dos Rios, hoping the railroad would build there. If you say, truth, this be plenty bad, white man. Plenty bad, Chief, but we're not going to convince our neighbors that while they still think they can make some money out of it themselves. But a vile commentary on the disgusting weakness of mortal man. You're right. Now, Chief Gravebeer, I have your promise of help, haven't I? Me give word, me do. Good enough. There's a late moon tonight, and if you hit Dos Rios just about ten o'clock, we'll teach those people a lesson they won't forget for the rest of their lives. If nothing else, that visit to Chief Gravebeer and the Honour Wander suddenly showed up big-hearted Doc Stonebender for the miserable sneak and vulture he really was. But knowing he'd still have the town's support, we didn't do a thing until Chief Gravebeer engineered his Comanche attack. Just about ten o'clock when half the town was in bed and the other half in the saloons, the red-skinned tidal wave suddenly swept down the main street. The whole attack didn't take much more than a minute. And with the judge, Cherokee and me trying to help by blocking exits and getting in the way, no one was hurt. That is not physically. But there was a mighty shaken crowd of neighbors gathered in the street when the Indians had finally vanished. Well, I ain't ashamed to admit that I was wrong. Me neither. I mean either I say let's arm up and get after them during Comanche. Now, just a minute, folks. Just a minute. I'm positive those were not Comanches. Oh. And what makes you so positive, Mr. Stonebender? I guess I know a Comanche when I see one. Yeah, I guess you do with that. But from what you told me, you've only been out in this country a short time. How come you're able to identify Comanches better than we are? Why, I... I'll tell you why. Because you've been dealing with the Comanches. Because you're the low-down Maverick who's been furnishing them rifles and feeding them liquor. You got them to attack the railroad work party just to force the railroad to build here and make money for you. Don't listen to him.  I don't like that called a liar, Stonebender. In fact, I don't like it so much. It makes me fightin' mad. Get into the talk, young chap. I use those gold teeth. Anything to oblige a friend. And now... Now, if you all want to see if I was lying, come on. We're busting a lock off Stonebender's storeroom and fighting out just what it is he's got stored in there. Enough rifles for an army. And enough of that cheap red eye to steam up ten tribes of Indians. Know what I think? We ought to smash those liquor barrels and pour them out in the street. Polly Seward for shame. I'm aggrieved that you're wantin' wasteful now. What would you like to do with that firewater, Mr. O'Bannon? Why, what would any thinking man want to do with it? Put out a fire. Well, why should we give it to you? Certainly you don't think you're the hottest man in town. Maybe not. But if you deny me that supply of free libations, there'll be nobody in DOS Rios as burned up as I am. In Teartown, starring Tex Chandler is a Bruce L's production. Story and supervision by Joel Murcott. Direction by Paul Franklin. Music written and played by Ivan Dithmarz. Be sure to be with us again same time next week for another fine action adventure story with your favorite young western star, Tex Chandler. And now this is Bill Foreman telling you that Frontier Town came to you from Hollywood.


Hey everyone, my name is Logan, and I'm a traffic manager in the United States Air Force. I joined the Air Force really for three reasons. The first one was I had a step-brother in the military. He was in the Air Force and he was a an aircraft maintainer. He worked specifically on F-16s. So one, that's like my favorite airframe. And two, he was in Japan for the majority of his 10 year. So getting to hear his stories and everything that he had to say about the Air Force and about what he was doing in Japan for a 14 year old kid, that was like really awesome to me. So I wanted to be a part of that. The second reason, going back a little bit, there was a marine from my hometown, Sergeant Daniel Patron. He graduated from my high school way back when and, you know, his family was well known throughout the community. I looked it up today, it was like in 2011, he was killed in action. He was explosive, ordinance disposal.  I highly encourage it. He's an American hero. Day when, you know, his funeral was coming through the town. They had the casket with the American flag. They had the motorcycles, the Marine Corps flags, the Air Force flags, you know, everything. I was at a gas station and I remember like seeing the sirens, seeing the motorcycles and watching it. And there was something about that that just really got to me and let me know that I need to be doing a little bit more for my country someday. And that was a big reason why I joined. And finally, you know, I thought if I was going to join, the best job in the world for me would be a fighter pilot. I think that there's no, no better or cooler job than that. I want to be Tom Cruise someday, you know. Whereas I know I'm speaking to an audience that's more than likely going to enlist and this whole interview was going to be more about my enlistment and my job as an enlisted airman, but I someday I want to be an Air Force officer. And so why I enlisted, why I joined was for not only the two reasons I mentioned earlier, but to also chase a path to get to the officer side. I've been in just over three years, hit my three year mark a couple months ago. I'm currently a senior airman without the pay grade is E4. So I actually just tested for Staff Sergeant a couple months ago. So wish me the best of luck. I find out results in late August. Hopefully I'll be an E5 Staff Sergeant here soon. But currently, just over three years and senior airman. So my job is traffic management. It's also referred to as TMO or the Traffic Management Office. RAFSE is 2T0XRA1. No, this was not a job that I had in the depth. And as far as I know, everybody who I've met, they never had this job in the depth for whatever reason, the majority of us tend to go in open administrative or open general. And this is what we end up getting. I found out probably like the sixth or seventh week of basic training, definitely near the tail end of things. And I honestly had no idea what it was. I think I had it as like very bottom of my list, but that's why I ended up getting and here I am today as a traffic manager. You know, as I just said, I didn't really have a plan to be a traffic manager. It was definitely nowhere on my radar, you know? I didn't even know anything about the career field until I got to tech school. Someone in basic, like at church on Sunday, they told me like, yeah man, you call people and you move stuff out of their houses. And I was like, what kind of job is that? You know, but got to tech school and found out that there's a whole lot more to it than just that. So I got to tech school and even more when I got into the Air Force and really started doing my job, I ended up really having a passion and a love for it. The one that was like at the top of my list was firefighter. Before I really wanted to be in the military. I really wanted to be a firefighter for some reason. And so I thought like, wow, like if I was in the military and be a firefighter, that's kind of like, you know, two birds in one stone type deal. But really that was the only one I really remember. I was thinking personnel to just because wanting to chase the whole officer thing. I knew I wanted time to go to school, time to chase the different avenues to get to be in an officer. So I knew I didn't want to spend a whole lot of time at work. I know how the bad that sounds, but I didn't really want to have my weekends and my free time taken away. And also I wanted a quick tech school. I think I think tech school was like just over a month. So didn't want to spend six months at Kiesler or in Texas. So, but yeah, so I mean, I just ended up going in open admin of all things and ended up getting this job, probably the sixth or seventh week of basic training. So me, I'm on a four year contract right now. So just being over three years in, technically my data separation is less than a year away. And I'm definitely going to reenlist or extend my contract the, you know, I guess what really attracts people doing the six year contract is getting E3 right off the bat. And for me, I got E3 off the bat either way, whether I did a four year or a six year contract, just because I had experience in junior ROTC. I know that you also get it off the bat if you were an Eagle Scout and the Boy Scouts. And if you reached, I want to say Lieutenant in the Civil Air Patrol, you get E3 right off the bat when enlisting.  So I'm on a four year contract. Tech School for Traffic Management is in Fort Lee in Virginia. It's in Petersburg, Virginia, I want to say, or at least somewhere extremely close to there. I want to say that's like a 30 minute drive from Richmond and probably an hour and a half, two hours away from Washington, D.C. So it's an all right area, but Fort Lee is the Tech School for Traffic Management. Tech School is about a month and a half.  Even maybe before then, you'll have to wait a couple of weeks to start school just because classes are always so filled, but the actual course itself is just over a month. I want to say like a month and a half and you might have a little extra time added onto that. So it's safe to bet that you'll spend probably about two months total at Fort Lee. For me personally, I didn't have the best experience at Fort Lee. I tried to take on a lot. I'll let once to try to become a student leader for whatever reason. I just got way too wrapped up in that, you know, and along with a lot of other factors, I was starting to neglect school a little bit. And so about halfway through the course, I ended up failing a test and I got washed back a couple of weeks. So my month and a half of school ended up turning into a little bit more than that. And I spent like a total about three months at Fort Lee. So I had, you know, a couple, couple really bad days and really long days. I do admit, I did have some fun days and I met some great people who I'm still friends with today. Fort Lee for me wasn't that great, but I know people who had literally the exact opposite. They like going outside of Fort Lee and seeing the historical battlefields and stuff of the Civil War guy I work with now. He actually met his wife at Fort Lee when she was going to the 2T2 Aerial Transportation School. So, I mean, it kind of just depends on what you make of it. You're going to hear that a lot throughout the Air Force career and probably your military career if you don't end up going into the Air Force, but it's what you make of it. Really, we can be stationed at just about anywhere Air Force bases or deployed locations. You can be on joint bases. Literally, we're kind of needed just about everywhere in the world. And I know I say that with like a little bit of cockiness, but it's true. I mean, we're such a big component to the logistics system of the military and Department of Defense. We are needed in some way, shape or form at every single installation, Bob or like Sandbox location. So really, we can go just about anywhere. In a nutshell, traffic management is FedEx for the military. That's the most basic way to put it. I don't know was like putting it that way, but essentially we are there to move whatever the DoD needs us to move. So while we're in the Air Force and we move Air Force property, whether that's cargo, our people or our people stuff, we also have a big hand in helping out our sister services, combat and commands, and really just about every other function of the Department of Defense, where or however you want to interpret that, we move just about everything. And, you know, we have capabilities to move it by multiple modes of transportation, whether that's by commercial air, military air, military sea lift, commercial sea lift, trucks out on the road, highway, you know, so we actually do a lot with logistics. So the best way to relate my job to something that maybe someone's a little bit more familiar with is the FedEx or Amazon for the military. Honestly, I don't work a lot compared to a lot of other AFSCs. You know, we do work on Monday through Friday, 07.30 to 4.30 in the afternoon. We have a pretty simple and easy schedule for the most part. Of course, if you're in deployed locations or if you're at certain bases, you might have to work a little bit more. 12 hours is typically the most you'll ever work in a day in the military regardless. Maybe some people are laughing right now, but that's typically our work week is Monday through Friday, 7.30 to 4.30. Every couple months or so you're going to be probably put on a standby schedule, meaning that all the issues that happen after duty hours, you're basically going to have to go into the shop and deal with it. So that could be anything really. And it could even take away some time on your weekends every once in a while. It doesn't happen a lot, but it is just something to keep in mind. The only type of certificate I can really think of is the hazmat stuff. You can go into the hazmat specialist course. And essentially what that is is that you learn how to certify hazard as cargo through all means of military transportation. There is certain labels and stuff like that you need to be able to mark on your cargo. So that's a valuable skill for us as folks in the military. And then I think all you have to do is take a test or some sort of online course, and then that kind of transfers into a civilian certificate that you can take with you to, you know, that job down the line when you go to work at FedEx or Amazon or UPS. It is very valuable. Really, that's the only type of certificate, certification, qualification I can think of.  Whether you know it or not, just saying that you wore a uniform and everything like that, that's going to move mountains for you in the civilian side. But your experience of dealing with everything that you're going to be dealing within the military, that's something that commercial businesses are looking for. So your experience is going to transfer over very well. And if you're hasn't that certified, that's probably going to move over very well too. Deployment tempos are actually pretty hot in TMO or traffic management. This goes back to kind of what I said earlier is that we're just kind of needed everywhere, a lot of which is deployed locations. For whatever reason, I know it sort of speeds up when you hit a staff sergeant and tech sergeant, just because there's not a whole lot of staffs and techs in the career field. So you might be going out every other year or every year or every six months or so. It is a kind of a fairly high deployment tempo. If you want to deploy, you'll definitely deploy. But it is just something to keep in mind, I guess. Of course, everyone's Air Force story is a little bit different. There are some people in TMO who haven't deployed half their career. And there are some people who deploy almost every year. It all just kind of depends. And a lot of it deals with if you want to or not. I definitely want to make the Air Force a career. I absolutely love the Air Force. This is all I've wanted to do since I was 14, 15 years old. I do want to continue my career though on the officer side. Like I said, it's my absolute dream to be a pilot. So I want to definitely get there someday and then maybe go work in the Pentagon or something. I think that'd be pretty cool. Be a commander. So I definitely want to make a career out of the military, more specifically out of the Air Force. But I don't think I'll be making the career out of TMO. If I was staying enlisted, I probably would. But that's just not me. So yeah, if I was staying enlisted, I would probably remain TMO. I love working in a logistics readiness squadron. I love seeing the value in what I do. It is a job where you do get to see the fruits of your labor in a sense. And I really enjoy it. But for me, that's just not where I want to go. Hypothetically, if I didn't want to stay in TMO and I would stay enlisted and find another job, I would definitely consider Aerial Gunner or Special Missions Aviation. It's something along those lines. Yeah, something along the lines of that. That looks pretty cool. My biggest advice to you, if you're watching this right now, or maybe if you're watching in the future, find out what kind of impacts you make as an airman and as a traffic manager. Everybody in the Air Force, whether you're maintenance or services or TMO or whatever the case may be, putting airplanes in the sky and that is generating combat sorties. And somewhere, somewhere down that line, a pilot is going to put a bomb on target. And that's going to be because of you. You are the reason why planes are flying. You're the reason why lives are being saved. And you're the reason why, you know, America is remaining free and strong. Some people think that's corny, but it's absolutely 100% true. It's very easy to lose sight of that for whatever reason. Some days, you know, you'll just be packing boxes or just kind of waiting around for a customer to show up. And it's very easy to lose sight of, you know, I'm in the military and I'm making an impact. So always strive to find those impacts and see the value in what you do because everything that you do, it literally moves mountains. It's as a traffic manager, you're going to move the world. A lot of our nations and our Air Force and our DOD partners, the success of their mission is going to depend on you. Don't take that lightly and always strive to see that impact. All right, everyone. Well, that's been my interview. I really hope you enjoyed it and I really hope you found it informative. And I hope to someday see you here in the Air Force, whether that's as a traffic manager or not. Fact of the matter is that we need young bright folks like you. And you know, I really hope to see you. I'm going to send Kyle my Instagram name so he can put it in the video. You can follow me on Instagram. Shoot me a message if you ever have any questions, concerns, any things you want to bring to my attention. I'd be more than willing to help you and hopefully find your place in the Air Force. So thanks for watching, guys. Give this video a thumbs up, support Kyle and his channel. To Kyle, it's been a huge honor working with you. So thank you for that and have a good day.