Fireballs on the river?

According to Kayak Dude and some from within his extensive network of river watchers, we’ve now got natural gas bubbling up from the bottom of the Susquehanna River. And, yes, you guessed it, there’s an operational drilling rig located nearby. KD said the DEP is conducting tests.

I’m wondering if we’ll need to post “no smoking” signs on the banks of the 444-mile river? I mean, if you’re out there bass fishing and decide to light up a Marlboro, will we be marveled by the enormity of the blast radius the next day?

When those unfortunate souls paddling kayaks or canoes end up good and drowned, it’s usually because they were not wearing personal floatation vests. Personally, I have absolutely no fear when I venture on out on the river. High water events, as well as very low, my personal safety never registers with me except for when that watery entrance to the Knox Mine is in close proximity. But now, now I could be blown to pieces?

Dude, I think we’ll need a fire extinguisher for future trips. Maybe some flame-retardant paddling gear. Perhaps a “this is a non-smoking kayak” placard would be advisable. And we’ll need those Germania Rescue guys to rig up a firefighting boat, just in case. And at RiverFest, we might want to have a medical helicopter on standby if and when we need to transport paddlers to a burn unit.

WILKES-BARRE--After performing autopsies on the deceased, the coroner said the victims were burned over 80% of their bodies, and the deaths were ruled to be 'death by kayak.'

Paddling, anyone?

I’m no militant environmentalist, but there are those days when I wish I was. I’m not an eco-terrorist, but I can see why some would choose to be. When your elected representatives fail to properly represent you, what's left?

Obviously, the lessons of the Anthracite era have been temporarily lost on our legislators as their collective blind leap into the future continues unabated, a leap that takes us along kicking and screaming. And that’s why we need to impeach damn near everybody.

You see, it’s simple. And I do like simplicity: No moratorium, no vote. Tiny bubbles, no vote.

It’s time to ramp up the pressure on the non-committal politicians.

We’ll be voting before you know it, and I’m still going back and forth with this Home Rule question.

I flat-out detest the idea of an appointed county manager. Appointed by whom, I recently asked of Sue Henry? The Democrats in this county outnumber the Republicans by 2 to 1. And if we pull the rug out from under the long-entrenched Democrat machine, they’ll have to react by securing the majority of the 11 council seats so as to be able to pick that appointed county manager.

After I talked to Sue on WILK, somebody affiliated with the charter group called and dismissed that notion. Oh, that could never happen, he said. No, the way it’s set up, they’ll have to recruit the next Donald Trump, or some equally brilliant business mind. Yeah, right!

As I said on WILK, if the Democrats have a huge majority of those seats, they defecate on the Sunshine Laws, and then announce in public that after an exhaustive but unfruitful search, they have been forced to appoint someone from within our ranks.

Enter party apparatchik as chief executive. Pick a name, any recognizable name. And the executive (or whatever the hell they are calling it) does the hiring, right? Enter loyal second cousins with a different surname.

Skeptical? Oh, yeah.

Still though, I opened the newspaper this morning to find the county controller and the county commissioner taking public shots at each other, and I got to thinking that Home Rule in Luzerne County couldn’t possibly be worst than this.

Right?

I can’t vote in this race, but here goes.

I see Chris Carney as little more than Nancy Pelosi’s shiny new hand puppet. With that said, I cannot understand how or why Tom Marino could gain any appreciable traction with the voting public. I guess I don’t get it.

As for the Barletta/Kanjorski scrum, hell, I’d walk 14 miles to vote against Paul Kanjorski. Barefoot and backwards!

I got the biggest kick out of his decision to make Hazleton the focus of this race. I spend a lot of time working in Hazleton and it’s suburbs. And if I had to pick, I’d easily choose to reside there rather than in that shanty town the congressman calls home.

I’ve never been able to get my mind around that one. 26 years and all of this supposed seniority of his, yet Kanjorski has clearly failed to bring the pork home to Nanticoke. In Nanticoke, a new CVS is what passes as progress. In Nanticoke, there are potholes that actually knock my truck out of gear while I’m looking for the street signs that are not there. In Nanticoke, there are no high-paying water-jet technology jobs, despite the millions that were entrusted to the congressman‘s family to create.

No, in Nanticoke, all that I see is Kanjorski’s broken and disheveled throne.

But remember, this is a cleverly crafted referendum on Hazleton.

What a joke.

It’s actually cool outside this morning, and the grand kids are clamoring for some bicycling. So bicycling it is.

Later