Thanks to everyone for the compliments on the site design. When I found the banner photo on Flickr, I knew I'd found the right picture. It's terrific. It comes compliments of Chris who appears to be one fabulous photographer. And from what I've seen on Flickr from his photos of a recent trip to Greenland, he has quite the enviable lifestyle.
I'd like to extend a huge thanks to Andy for upgrading my site. I designed the new look but he installed all the relevant system upgrades, fixed a few style sheet bugs, and figured out how to delete 38,000 dormant spam comments. And Andy did this all within one hour, I'm guessing. What a guy!
Do my comments work now? Let's see....
I read a heartbreaking and disturbing story this morning on the New York Times site. The salient details of my following argument are this:
When Carrie Beth Walsh and her two toddlers landed at the airport in Seoul, South Korea, last year, there was no sign of her husband, an Army pilot who had been transferred there six weeks earlier.He eventually showed up in a taxi, broke and unprepared for his family's arrival - no rental car for the drive to his base, no apartment, no credit cards in his wallet that were not already up against his loan limits. "He was making more than $60,000 a year," Ms. Walsh said. "But we were always broke."
She soon learned why. Her husband, Warrant Officer Aaron W. Walsh, had pumped more than $20,000 into the Army's own slot machines on bases in South Korea. Last month, his marriage and career shattered, Mr. Walsh, who is 33, resigned from the Army to avoid a court-martial on desertion charges stemming from his gambling habit.
...
Mr. Walsh, the helicopter pilot, was luckier. He was sent to Camp Pendleton for treatment after his wife discovered the program on the Internet. "No one in Korea had ever heard of it," she said.
Like 90 percent of all gambling addicts, Mr. Walsh washed out of his first try at treatment. He drove from the clinic to Las Vegas, overstayed his leave and lost $18,000 before being arrested and sent back to Korea. By then, his wife had returned to her home in Maine to obtain a divorce.
His view is that slot machines should be removed from military bases. The military's explanation that slot machines are a recreational opportunity for the troops is "a bunch of bunk," he said. "It doesn't have anything to do with 'recreational opportunities.' It has everything to do with the money."
After his forced resignation, Mr. Walsh flew home and went directly to Las Vegas. Interviewed on a collect call from a pay phone there, Mr. Walsh said that he has now lost $10,700, the last of his savings. "For nine days I've been sleeping on the streets," he said. "I'm not sure what I'm going to do. Most nights, I think about ending it all."
The story is entitled "Temptation to Gamble Is Near for Troops Overseas." I am dismayed and hurt by much of what is described in the article. What Congress and the Pentagon has chosen to not do regarding the gambling problem of our troops calls into serious question their ability to properly maintain and regulate a gambling business on American bases.
But, for Aaron Walsh, the situation appears highly critical. While in some cases, journalists decide to publicize contact information to assist a person who is highly in need, this situation did not arise this time. I sincerely pray that someone or a missionary in Las Vegas is looking for Aaron Walsh right now. That this man is beyond help and saving, I cannot believe.