Looking back on 2014 and forward into 2015
January 10, 2015 - December 26, 2014
By Kevin E. Dayhoff
Author’s note – I originally wrote this over the Christmas
holiday. I was under the weather with that really-bad cold that has been making
the rounds and trying to keep up with my assignments for the Baltimore Sun
Carroll Eagle: http://www.baltimoresun.com/search/dispatcher.front?Query=Dayhoff&target=adv_article;
Carroll County Times: http://www.carrollcountytimes.com/search/dispatcher.front?Query=Kevin+Dayhoff&target=article
Alas, I got a bit behind and this material below got
orphaned in the computer and left behind. It made me sad. Although the idea that
I was attempting to develop here did survive the cutting room floor and made it
to daylight in an article published on January 7, 2015, “New
year begins with familiar faces missing from county leadership.” New
year begins with familiar faces missing from county leadership And here: “A
love story that began on New Year's Eve, 1945.” http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/carroll/westminster/ph-ce-eagle-archives-jan-20150102-story.html
I’m still running behind as the New Year has begun in
earnest without me; leaving me behind trying desperately to catch-up. I’m
guessing that if I decide to toss my hat in the ring and once again run for
political office after taking ten-years off – chances are that I’ll never
catch-up… - KED, January 10, 2015
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Westminster, Md January 10, 2015 - December 26, 2014 - - For
many the year 2014 could not have come to an end any sooner. It was a strange
year in the bewildering fantasy wilderness that lies beyond the borders of
Carroll County.
In Asia, a very large passenger aircraft literally
disappeared without a trance and CNN could not find it no matter how many hours
it tried.
It was bad year for ginormous too-big-to-manage bureaucracies
like the Veterans Administration and the Internal Revenue Service. It is bad
enough that the IRS lost years of records that Congress wanted to audit; but
the VA took it one-step farther and not only lost records but it also lost
patients for months at a time.
And just when you thought that customer service could not
get any worse – it did. The business of the mega-banks, and especially the
cable and cellphone companies is not to provide you with a service, but to
charge you exorbitant ever-increasing fees every month without providing you
anything in exchange - in order to serve us better. I have tried unsuccessfully
to correct my address with PNC for six-months and as of last week, its mail was
still had the wrong address.
A large number of seemingly sane individuals made videos of
pouring water on top of their heads.
Some pedestrian wandered into the unlocked front door of the
White House. I mean I cannot get my mother past security to get her on an
airplane without her being tossed out of her wheelchair, strip-searched, water
boarded, and interrogated under a swinging lightbulb like she is a criminal,
but some guy strolled into the front door of the most secure building in the
world like he was visiting Starbucks.
Towards the end of the year, it appears that maybe, just maybe,
the world’s economy is showing some signs of recovery despite the clumsy regressive
economic machinations of Washington DC and the European Union.
Looking forward to the year 2015 reveals many momentous
dates in history to ponder, revisit and study. Much of the study of history last
year was centered upon the outbreak of World War I in 1914. Several years ago,
the beginning of the American Civil War in 1861 was the focus of much
attention.
This coming year we can look forward to some discussion over
the significance of Lewis Carroll’s masterpiece, “Alice’s Adventures in
Wonderland” - written 150-years ago, in 1865.
800 years ago, the Magna Carta was initially written by the
Archbishop of Canterbury and issued by the English King John at Runnymede on
June 15, 1215 to essentially establish basic personal freedoms. Although the
Magna Carta itself is a significant event in history; its influence on
political theory, subsequent charters, treatises and governing documents such
as our own American Constitution is immeasurable – to this day.
2015 will also be the 200th anniversary of the
Battle of Waterloo on June 18, 1815, in which allied forces, “the “Seventh
Coalition,” led by the British Field Marshall Arthur Wellesley, the 1st Duke of
Wellington, put an end to Napoleon’s reign of terror in Europe. What followed
was a half-century of peace which enabled the Industrial Revolution, which had
begun in 1760, to flourish unhampered by the economic chaos of war and catch a second
wave from 1820 to 1840.
This year also marks 70-years since the end of World War II.
Although events such as Waterloo and the issuance of the Magna Carta have an
affect on our lives to this day, nothing can more poignant to many of us than
memories of the war years or the recollections of our parents who endured the depravities
of the war, whether they served overseas or stateside.
The Greatest Generation, a term coined by journalist Tom
Brokaw, are the folks who grew-up during the Great Depression only to go on to
fight for our country in WWII. Many of us learned about the war from our
parents or grandparents.
Sadly, to bring history down to a personal level, according
to many sources, including that of The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, “Approximately
every three minutes a memory of World War II – its sights and sounds, its
terrors and triumphs – disappears. Yielding to the unalterable process of
aging, the men and women who fought and won the great conflict are now mostly
in their 90s. They are dying quickly – at the rate of approximately 555 a day,
according to US Veterans Administration figures.”
Kevin Dayhoff is an artist - and a columnist for:
Patuxent Publishing Co., The Carroll Eagle: www.explorecarroll.com: http://www.explorecarroll.com/search/?s=Dayhoff&action=GO
The Tentacle: www.thetentacle.com http://www.thetentacle.com/author.cfm?MyAuthor=41
The Tentacle: www.thetentacle.com http://www.thetentacle.com/author.cfm?MyAuthor=41
Westminster Patch: http://westminster.patch.com/search?keywords=Dayhoff
Soundtrack: http://kevindayhoff.blogspot.com/ = http://www.kevindayhoff.net/
Kevin Dayhoff Art: http://kevindayhoffart.blogspot.com/ or http://kevindayhoffart.com/ = http://www.kevindayhoff.com/
Kevin Dayhoff Westminster: http://kevindayhoffwestgov-net.blogspot.com/ or http://www.westgov.net/ = www.kevindayhoff.org
Kevin Dayhoff Art: http://kevindayhoffart.blogspot.com/ or http://kevindayhoffart.com/ = http://www.kevindayhoff.com/
Kevin Dayhoff Westminster: http://kevindayhoffwestgov-net.blogspot.com/ or http://www.westgov.net/ = www.kevindayhoff.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/kevindayhoffTwitpic: http://twitpic.com/photos/kevindayhoff
Kevin Dayhoff's The New Bedford Herald: http://kbetrue.livejournal.com/ = www.newbedfordherald.net
Tumblr: Kevin Dayhoff Banana Stems www.kevindayhoff.tumblr.com/
Smurfs: http://babylonfluckjudd.blogspot.com/
Google profile: https://profiles.google.com/kevindayhoff/
E-mail: kevindayhoff(at)gmail.com
My http://www.explorecarroll.com/ columns appear in the copy of the Baltimore Sunday Sun that is distributed in Carroll County: https://subscribe.baltsun.com/Circulation/
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Kevin Dayhoff's The New Bedford Herald: http://kbetrue.livejournal.com/ = www.newbedfordherald.net
Tumblr: Kevin Dayhoff Banana Stems www.kevindayhoff.tumblr.com/
Smurfs: http://babylonfluckjudd.blogspot.com/
Google profile: https://profiles.google.com/kevindayhoff/
E-mail: kevindayhoff(at)gmail.com
My http://www.explorecarroll.com/ columns appear in the copy of the Baltimore Sunday Sun that is distributed in Carroll County: https://subscribe.baltsun.com/Circulation/
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