texascavers Digest 26 Sep 2008 04:24:48 -0000 Issue 616
Topics (messages 9036 through 9046):
Re: graffiti
9036 by: Diana Tomchick
9039 by: Minton, Mark
TCR is nearly here... And I'd like some help!
9037 by: Stefan Creaser
Not caving related
9038 by: Ron Ralph
9040 by: Geo Crosby
9042 by: Jules Jenkins
Anachronistic graffiti
9041 by: BMorgan994.aol.com
TCMA Garage Sale
9043 by: Linda Palit
Texas Cavers Reunion
9044 by: Allan Cobb
9045 by: Allan Cobb
Dangers of cave tubing in Belize :
9046 by: jerryatkin.aol.com
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--- Begin Message ---
Explain that theory to the National Park System. The Park Ecologist
was very happy to see the photos we provided to him, and to know the
whereabouts of the signatures. In fact, this particular park plans to
have a display in the new visitor's center (currently in the process
of construction) on historic signatures from well-known cave guides. I
would bet that the display will also include the educational info that
nowadays we discourage such graffiti and in fact view it as
defacement. Our cultural values in the 21st century are somewhat
different from those in the past. That does not diminish the
historical value of such signatures and any other debris that was left
behind by previous explorers, including the prehistoric peoples.
Should we also remove the 3,000 year old basket left behind in the
same cave by these explorers, or leave it in place for future
examination? The Park Service has chosen to leave certain artifacts in
situ, if the item is located in an out-of-the way place that will not
be noticed or disturbed by the casual tourist.
By this one-size-fits-all argument, every midden that's discovered on
the surface should be cleaned up and removed, because after all, at
one time it was just an ordinary garbage dump.
Diana
On Sep 25, 2008, at 2:19 PM, Terry Holsinger wrote:
Diana,
That same logic can be applied to "contemporary" signatures.
I believe this is part of the point that Mixon is making, and I
agree with for the most part.
I have been at graffitti cleanups that used the 50 year rule, and
they removed three generations of family signatures leaving only the
oldest (fourth generation) there by reducing the "value" of that one
siganture. That one, and all the others, should have been removed as
well regardless of it's age, as most of it's value was in the
context of the local family visiting this "sacrifice" cave. Graffiti
removal is mostly just an aesthetic reaction to someone else's
aesthetic values. It is a slippery slope when one places ones own
values onto others.
Terry H.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Diana R. Tomchick
Associate Professor
University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center
Department of Biochemistry
5323 Harry Hines Blvd.
Rm. ND10.214B
Dallas, TX 75390-8816, U.S.A.
Email: [email protected]
214-645-6383 (phone)
214-645-6353 (fax)
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
Diana said:
Should we also remove the 3,000 year old basket left behind in the same cave by
these explorers, or leave it in place for future examination? The Park Service
has chosen to leave certain artifacts in situ, if the item is located in an
out-of-the way place that will not be noticed or disturbed by the casual
tourist.
I don't personally care one way or the other whether something like a
basket or pot is left in a commercial cave, but it seems to me that if the
basket is valued, it would be better to remove it. Won't leaving a basket in
the cave lead to its more rapid degradation than removing it to a controlled
environment? And if it is indeed in an out-of-the-way location, wouldn't far
more people benefit from having it in a museum than in an obscure corner of the
cave where few if any people ever go? Who benefits from leaving it where it is
other than the occasional explorer?
Mark Minton
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
Hi All,
The TCR cooks are busy planning for the big feed on Saturday night :-)
During Saturday day we'll be doing the majority of the preparation and
cooking of the actual dishes and would like to get some volunteers to
help with this!
Please can you let me know if you'll be able to help with that, or help
serve, or clean up afterwards. We'll think of some way to reward you!!
I believe we will also be short of 1 cook for 1 dish; if you're willing
to give up your Saturday, and are also able to do a small test-cook
(regular sized portion) at home before hand please contact me and I'll
send you a recipe.
Cheers,
Stefan
----------------------------------------------
Stefan Creaser [email protected]
ARM Inc. Phone: (512)314-1012
Austin, Tx http://www.arm.com
--
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--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
Dear American:
I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a
transfer of funds of great magnitude.
I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had
crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion
dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most
profitable to you.
I am working with Mr. Phil Gramm, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my
replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may
know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the
1990s. This transaction is 100% safe.
This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds
as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names
of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family
lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person
who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.
Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account
numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to
[email protected] so that we may transfer your commission for
this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with
detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the
funds.
Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
Dear Friends:
The financial meltdown the economists of the Austrian School predicted has
arrived.
We are in this crisis because of an excess of artificially created credit at
the hands of the Federal Reserve System. The solution being proposed? More
artificial credit by the Federal Reserve. No liquidation of bad debt and
malinvestment is to be allowed. By doing more of the same, we will only
continue and intensify the distortions in our economy - all the capital
misallocation, all the malinvestment - and prevent the market's attempt to
re-establish rational pricing of houses and other assets.
Last night the president addressed the nation about the financial crisis.
There is no point in going through his remarks line by line, since I'd only
be repeating what I've been saying over and over - not just for the past
several days, but for years and even decades.
Still, at least a few observations are necessary.
The president assures us that his administration "is working with Congress
to address the root cause behind much of the instability in our markets."
Care to take a guess at whether the Federal Reserve and its money creation
spree were even mentioned?
We are told that "low interest rates" led to excessive borrowing, but we are
not told how these low interest rates came about. They were a deliberate
policy of the Federal Reserve. As always, artificially low interest rates
distort the market. Entrepreneurs engage in malinvestments - investments
that do not make sense in light of current resource availability, that occur
in more temporally remote stages of the capital structure than the pattern
of consumer demand can support, and that would not have been made at all if
the interest rate had been permitted to tell the truth instead of being
toyed with by the Fed.
Not a word about any of that, of course, because Americans might then
discover how the great wise men in Washington caused this great debacle.
Better to keep scapegoating the mortgage industry or "wildcat capitalism"
(as if we actually have a pure free market!).
Speaking about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the president said: "Because
these companies were chartered by Congress, many believed they were
guaranteed by the federal government. This allowed them to borrow enormous
sums of money, fuel the market for questionable investments, and put our
financial system at risk."
Doesn't that prove the foolishness of chartering Fannie and Freddie in the
first place? Doesn't that suggest that maybe, just maybe, government may
have contributed to this mess? And of course, by bailing out Fannie and
Freddie, hasn't the federal government shown that the "many" who "believed
they were guaranteed by the federal government" were in fact correct?
Then come the scare tactics. If we don't give dictatorial powers to the
Treasury Secretary "the stock market would drop even more, which would
reduce the value of your retirement account. The value of your home could
plummet." Left unsaid, naturally, is that with the bailout and all the money
and credit that must be produced out of thin air to fund it, the value of
your retirement account will drop anyway, because the value of the dollar
will suffer a precipitous decline. As for home prices, they are obviously
much too high, and supply and demand cannot equilibrate if government
insists on propping them up.
It's the same destructive strategy that government tried during the Great
Depression: prop up prices at all costs. The Depression went on for over a
decade. On the other hand, when liquidation was allowed to occur in the
equally devastating downturn of 1921, the economy recovered within less than
a year.
The president also tells us that Senators McCain and Obama will join him at
the White House today in order to figure out how to get the bipartisan
bailout passed. The two senators would do their country much more good if
they stayed on the campaign trail debating who the bigger celebrity is, or
whatever it is that occupies their attention these days.
F.A. Hayek won the Nobel Prize for showing how central banks' manipulation
of interest rates creates the boom-bust cycle with which we are sadly
familiar. In 1932, in the depths of the Great Depression, he described the
foolish policies being pursued in his day - and which are being proposed,
just as destructively, in our own:
Instead of furthering the inevitable liquidation of the maladjustments
brought about by the boom during the last three years, all conceivable means
have been used to prevent that readjustment from taking place; and one of
these means, which has been repeatedly tried though without success, from
the earliest to the most recent stages of depression, has been this
deliberate policy of credit expansion.
To combat the depression by a forced credit expansion is to attempt to cure
the evil by the very means which brought it about; because we are suffering
from a misdirection of production, we want to create further misdirection -
a procedure that can only lead to a much more severe crisis as soon as the
credit expansion comes to an end... It is probably to this experiment,
together with the attempts to prevent liquidation once the crisis had come,
that we owe the exceptional severity and duration of the depression.
The only thing we learn from history, I am afraid, is that we do not learn
from history.
The very people who have spent the past several years assuring us that the
economy is fundamentally sound, and who themselves foolishly cheered the
extension of all these novel kinds of mortgages, are the ones who now claim
to be the experts who will restore prosperity! Just how spectacularly wrong,
how utterly without a clue, does someone have to be before his expert status
is called into question?
Oh, and did you notice that the bailout is now being called a "rescue plan"?
I guess "bailout" wasn't sitting too well with the American people.
The very people who with somber faces tell us of their deep concern for the
spread of democracy around the world are the ones most insistent on forcing
a bill through Congress that the American people overwhelmingly oppose. The
very fact that some of you seem to think you're supposed to have a voice in
all this actually seems to annoy them.
I continue to urge you to contact your representatives and give them a piece
of your mind. I myself am doing everything I can to promote the correct
point of view on the crisis. Be sure also to educate yourselves on these
subjects - the Campaign for Liberty blog is an excellent place to start.
Read the posts, ask questions in the comment section, and learn.
H.G. Wells once said that civilization was in a race between education and
catastrophe. Let us learn the truth and spread it as far and wide as our
circumstances allow. For the truth is the greatest weapon we have.
In liberty,
Ron Paul
-----Original Message-----
From: Ron Ralph [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Thursday, September 25, 2008 3:38 PM
To: 'Cavers Texas'
Subject: [Texascavers] Not caving related
Dear American:
I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a
transfer of funds of great magnitude.
I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had
crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion
dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most
profitable to you.
I am working with Mr. Phil Gramm, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my
replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may
know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the
1990s. This transaction is 100% safe.
This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds
as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names
of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family
lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person
who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.
Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account
numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to
[email protected] so that we may transfer your commission for
this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with
detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the
funds.
Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
not appropriate for cave tex
--- On Thu, 9/25/08, Ron Ralph <[email protected]> wrote:
From: Ron Ralph <[email protected]>
Subject: [Texascavers] Not caving related
To: "'Cavers Texas'" <[email protected]>
List-Post: [email protected]
Date: Thursday, September 25, 2008, 8:37 PM
Dear American:
I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a
transfer of funds of great magnitude.
I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had
crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion
dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most
profitable to you.
I am working with Mr. Phil Gramm, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement
as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the
leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. This
transaction is 100% safe.
This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as
quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of
our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family
lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who
will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.
Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account
numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to
[email protected] so that we may transfer your commission for this
transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed
information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.
Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
I have no problem whatsoever with graffiti and often find it to be
entertaining, a peculiarity I share with none other than Marion O. Smith! It is
a
basic human urge to memorialize ones fleeting presence in a timeless or remote
place. That urge has been with us at least since the Pleistocene, and shows no
sign of changing soon. It is not just caves, but old trees, mountain tops, and
even buildings that get tagged. I particularly like the writings on men’s
room walls, folk poetry at it’s best!
My only complaint is that it is so rarely well done. Notice that the older
the graffito the better crafted it is likely to be. The best of all are 30,000+
years old. I have seen magnificent ancient inscriptions on cave and cliff
walls in China, and of course in Mexico and Belize. What if some judgmental
jackass in the year 626 had decided that King JaguarPenis’ exploits didn't
deserve to be remembered and rubbed them out. That is the way I feel about
navel
lint picking dweebs who have nothing better to do than to scrub cave walls in
an attempt to obliterate history and bring the exploits of others to their
own level of anonymity.
Now I hate spray paint and beer cans in a cave as much as the next guy,
mostly because it destroys my illusion that I am the first one to get there,
but
the fact is that neither do any harm whatsoever; meanwhile, flowstone never
sleeps and time heals all. Remember that the next time you are stomping on
salamanders while revirginifying the cave walls.
Now, on to the strangest anachronistic graffiti I have ever seen. Quite a
few years ago I was taking a train trip through the Copper canyon and got off
at
San Juanito. The map showed volcanic shelter caves all over the place,
virtually all of which were, or still are, inhabited by the Tarahumara. The
locals
all agreed that the best caves were far away, so I hitched a ride in a
pickup to an Indian settlement and from there hired horses to take me to the
best
cave which was called Las Grutas de Chomachic.
It was a absolutely spectacular series of cliff dwellings, caves, and ruins,
all in a state of almost perfect preservation, and all cut into pink
volcanic tuff in a beautiful pine oak forest. I stayed there three days and
loved it!
There was lots of graffiti everywhere. Some were handprints in the adobe,
some were charcoal drawings, others were hunting scenes with animals scratched
into the rock. Some were obviously very old, but some weren't.
Now it is time to interject a bit of history. The Tarahumara absolutely
hated and feared the Apaches. I met one Tarahumara who vehemently bragged to me
that his great grandfather had killed Victorio.
So it was that I was extremely surprised to see a graffito done in the old
style yet with red paint that depicted an Indian with a rifle in one hand and a
bow in the other. The inscription in Spanish read “El Apache Vitorio” with
a date that was four years in the future! (I was there in 86 and the date was
1990).
Whoever created the Graffito was obviously an Indian, yet a historical
revisionist. I’m just glad I got there before some even more modern historical
revisionist scrubbed it off.
I suppose I’m one too, because just to piss off future archeologists I
completely rebuilt the hearth where I made my campfire. Them danged Injuns
didn't
have clue as to how to build things out of stone! But then I’m the same guy
who has been known to slip his business card into a crack in an unopened Mayan
grave. Can you imagine the look on the looter or archeologist’s face when
they discover my card in an unopened grave?
I have a real problem with those who suppose that history is the exclusive
property of academia, and who utterly destroy sites to squeeze out the juice of
knowledge then leave the ruins in a state of ruin. History is an ongoing
project, and we are all participants.
Sleazeweazel
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
TCR is fast approaching! You have two weekends to find all those items you
want to donate to TCMA for our garage sale! Get rid of that extra cave and
camping gear, or those great collectibles. If you bring an item of
significant value, please tag it with a minimum price. Otherwise you can
put the price tags on items or we will price them at TCR.
If you are willing to spend some time staffing the table for the garage sale
or gathering garage sale items from your grotto or area, Please send Don
Arburn and Linda Palit your name and proceed!
Many thanks,
Linda
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
Howdy Y'all!
The Texas Cavers Reuinion is coming up quickly! It will be the weekend of
October 10-12 at Paradise Canyon near San Antonio. For directions and
information, visit www.oztotl.com/tcr. The website for Paradise Canyon is
http://paradisecanyon.com/. I was out there this afternoon and the water is
at about a normal level. Last year, we had water levels that were just
above normal. The site is looking great and they have more picnic tables
than last year.
This email contains lots of information!
A note about trailers. Yes, we can have trailers. They have some
electricity that trailer can plug into. However, unless you have a small
trailer, you will probably not be close. You need to bring plenty of
extention cords. There will be an extra charge for any trailer that hook up
to electricity to defray the electric cost.
Well behaved dogs are welcome again. If you bring a dog, please be prepared
to pick up after your dog. Paradise Canyon normally does not allow dogs and
they make an exception for us. Please don't abuse this privelage they have
extended to us.
The terms of our contract state that we need to be out of the park by 4 PM
on Thursday.
As always, please pick up any trash you see around the park. Last year,
they were amazed and quite happy that we left the park cleaner than when we
got there. Thanks for picking up!
A new rule for this year is NO FIREWORKS.
Feel free to arrive any time on Friday. If you arrive early in the day,
your help would be apprecited on all the tasks that need doing.
Friday night after about 10 PM I will close the gate to the park. The chain
on the gate will be secured with a carabiner or clip. Please close and
secure the gate behind you. There will be a sign on the gate saying that
the park is closed for a private party. We are that private party, so come
on in! There will also be a sign on the gate for the Texas Cavers Reunion.
There will be an additional camping area on the other side of the road
across from the quiet camping area (at the downstream end of the park).
There will be a gate so you can walk from that area to the quiet camping
area.
Please do not build ground fires except in the designated areas. As always,
be very careful with fire as it is pretty dry.
See y'all there...
Allan
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
The terms of our contract state that we need to be out of the park by 4 PM
on Thursday.
Oops, that should read that we need to be out by 4 PM on Sunday!
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
The Dangers of Cave Tubing in Belize
A 52-year-old woman on a Carnival cruise drowned yesterday while on a shore
excursion in Belize. She was tubing on the Caves Branch River—in what some say
were questionable conditions—when, according to one account, she was swept
under a rock. Reports USA Today: “A local news station in Belize, Channel 7
News, reports that most local tour companies that operate on the Caves Branch
River had canceled their trips Wednesday due to poor conditions.” Obviously,
her trip wasn’t canceled.
Her husband, who was with her at the time, offered a chilling account to the
country’s Channel 5 News. They were screaming for help when they were sucked
under, he said, adding:
“I don’t remember anything because I think we flip upside down. Somebody was
watching my wife and I and it was just second and we keep going down, down,
down and you can tell the water pressure is pushing us inside the cave. I kind
of panicked and I am trying to keep my mouth shut to keep little air, trying to
find my way. I was trying to find where to go. It took maybe twenty seconds,
fifteen seconds and I was like no more air. I said, I am dying right here.”
Carnival says it has suspended the excursion offering and is investigating.
http://www.worldhum.com/weblog/item/the_dangers_of_cave_tubing_in_belize_20080925/
Carnival passenger drowns on Belize cave tubing tour
A Carnival passenger drowned Wednesday in
Belize while on a shore excursion booked through the line.
Carnival has not released the name of the passenger, who had arrived in Belize
on the Carnival Glory, but the line says it was a 52-year-old woman who was
traveling with her husband.
The couple had signed up for a cave tubing tour on Belize's Caves Branch River
-- a popular pasttime for cruisers who visit the country.
"The individual was traveling with her spouse who remained in Belize and is
currently being accompanied and assisted by a shipboard staff member," the line
says in a statement this morning to USA TODAY. "Carnival CareTeam personnel are
scheduled to arrive in Belize today."
Carnival says it has suspended all future sales of its cave tubing excursion in
Belize, and an investigation into the accident is underway.
A local news station in Belize, Channel 7 News, reports that most local tour
companies that operate on the Caves Branch River had canceled their trips
Wednesday due to poor conditions.
"Those who work in the area say the Caves Branch River was too high and that’s
why most tours were cancelled," the news outlet notes. "But one wasn’t and
witnesses say around 10:30 they heard screams."
The station cited the currents on the river. "Those currents swept (the woman)
under a rock where she drowned," the news outlet reported. "They attempted CPR
but she was already dead."
The 2,974-passenger Carnival Glory departed from Port Canaveral, Fla., on Sept.
20 on a seven-day Western Caribbean cruise and=2
0is scheduled to return to Florida on Saturday.
"Carnival extends its deepest sympathy to the victim’s family and loved ones
during this difficult time and will continue to offer our full assistance and
support," the line says in its statement.
http://www.usatoday.com/travel/cruises/item.aspx?type=blog&ak=56115982.blog
--- End Message ---
