Yet another Republican debate tonight hosted by NBC anchorman Brian Williams, which is showing promise to be a verbal slug-fest between Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney.
The last few weeks, the tone of the race has drifted into nothing less than flat out mudslinging.
Since Ron Paul is sitting out Florida, the subject matter tonight will drift towards Newts checkered past, his resignation from Congress, and numerous ethics violations.
This debate should deliver some fireworks, since the theme of the assault Mitt Romney is directing at the former speaker, is geared around bashing his record and his morals.
Newt Gingrich has certainly made plenty of mistakes over his 30 year career in Washington, but all things considered, his straight-from-the-hip manner comes off as genuine, whereas Mitt Romney spews cookie-cutter rhetoric and parrots the same empty promises American citizens have been force-fed ala Foie gras.
Newt is obviously most comfortable in a more confrontational role, the pit-bull who blurts out all the things no one else in Washington seems willing to say.
Gingrich is coming off a huge come-from-behind win in South Carolina, so the stakes are higher than ever for Mitt Romney, and I think we should look forward to seeing him come out with guns blazing. The problem is that Newt thrives on this brand of debate, and I doubt the Romney camp has come up with any new dirt on Newt.
Regardless of who wins in Florida, the fact that our leaders and party nominees are elected this way is a real farce, and the only loser is the American public.
The Costa Concordia shipwreck disaster has been making daily headlines around the world this month, and with 13 passengers dead and about 20 more passengers and crew still missing, it is indeed a great tragedy that leaves many questions to be answered regarding some of the decisions made by the ship’s captain and crew during the crisis and there are also questions regarding what emergency procedures were in place that either failed or were compromised, or completely ignored.
This important review must be done in order to develop new policies and procedures to be implemented immediately by all cruise ships to prevent disasters of this magnitude from happening in the future.
In this writer’s opinion the tragedy was totally preventable and I strongly believe that for Carnival Cruise Lines, the ship’s owners, to operate their fleet with such little concern for the safety of passengers is morally wrong and I would strongly support criminal charges being filed against the ship’s Captain for manslaughter and I would also support wrongful death charges against the executives of Carnival Cruise Lines because of their gross negligence that failed to ensure the safety of all passengers.
Granted, this is a superficial and very high level overview of the situation, it must still be respected because it is based upon common sense and logic and a mindset that believes an ounce of prevention is always the right answer and that extra precautions are critically important whenever you perform a risk evaluation that acknowledges the loss of life as a potential risk, and further, that the loss of multiple lives is also an obvious risk when there were more than 4,000 passengers on board.
So here are some situations to study and learn from. When a doctor is performing life threatening surgery, is there one doctor or two doctors in the operating room? The answer is there are two doctors in case one doctor falls ill and cannot complete the procedure, and the other reason is because they are performing a life threatening very risky operation which could possibly result in death. Next example, whenever you take commercial fight you will find comfort knowing that there is a pilot and also a co-pilot in the cockpit just in case the pilot is incapacitated for some reason.
There are many other examples to cite where safety precautions are adjusted to match the risks. For example, a driving instructor usually has his own independent gas pedal and brake pedal to be used to avert a disaster just in case the student driver is driving erratically and endangering the lives of other motorists. In a different example, there are corporate governance policies in many Corporations where the Board of Directors must vote on material financial commitments before large scale deals are made. This measure is intended to protect shareholders from bad CEO decisions, and internal corruption, among other potential issues.
So the question to be answered at this time is why was the Captain of the Costa Concordia permitted to veer significantly off course without any corrective measures promptly taken to prevent the shipwreck and prevent the loss the life that followed? The Captain was clearly exercising poor judgement while behaving erratically and with negligence towards passenger safety.
Why wasn’t there an additional crew member in place with the responsibility to monitor the ship’s course in the event of the Captain making very foolish decisions while on duty? Why wasn’t there a control tower with GPS technology given due authority to report the improper navigation of the ship to all crew members and to command that corrective actions be taken before the ensuing disaster. The point is this, why leave it to one man and give him the sole discretion to jeopardize so many lives through lack of common sense or skills and ability?
When you consider that 4,000 passengers were at risk, how can the executives of Carnival Cruise Lines be excused from this tragedy and not be ultimately held responsible for so many deaths? No doubt, the ship’s Captain was at fault and he is guilty of many serious crimes but in this writer’s opinion, Carnival Cruise Lines must pay for damages by court order and they must also learn from this tragedy and recognize the need to take safety much more seriously because of the clear risks, and their obvious failures, and that some significant additional safety measures are more than justified.