"A" wrote in message news:crlad.224750$D%.29909@attbi_s51...
Did you know that the national firefighters union has been stating its
opposition to Bush, and that fire departments have refused (despite
repeated requests) to pose for photo ops with Bush, since 9/11 because
he has CUT the budget for firefighters equipment since 9/11?

Tom Farrell

Forest fire and city (local fire hall) I think are two different groups.

They may be in some areas, they are not in others.

Beyond that, I was speaking of the attitudes of firefighters as a
group... and believe me, firefighters tend to see themselves as part
of a brotherhood of firemen, no matter whether they're full time
professionals or part time volunteers, forest or city. They know that
if there's a major emergency they may be called upon to fly across the
country to cover each other's backs fighting a major forest fire. They
know that any one of them would walk into a burning building to save
someone.

I have an old friend who is a fireman. I've known him since first
grade, and for a long time thought he was something of a flighty
person. When we were finishing high school, he became a volunteer
firefighter, but I figured it was something he was just picking up as
a kind of intense hobby, that he'd drop it in a moment.

In April of 2001, he came to my home to spend the night before we took
a weekend vacation together in New York. He'd stopped along the way to
pick up a piece of equipment, and showed it to me over dinner. It was
a little box that emitted an improbably loud noise, to be worn on the
outside of his uniform. I couldn't quite get the point... until he
explained that it was so that when he's inside a burning house and it
collapses on top of him, his fellow firemen would be able to hear
where he was to dig him out.

I realized then that I'd done my friend wrong for 20 years, not giving
him the respect he was due. Here was a man who would calmly walk into
a burning house, knowing full well it might collapse on top of him, to
help someone in need.

It's also why I'm so upset about Bush cutting funding for
firefighters. These are good people like my friend, getting killed for
lack of equipment. (not my friend, I'm thinking about the 9/11
firefighters.)

About mothers milk haveing fire retardent in it- were does all the retardent
come from? Is it in clothes, bedding, furniture, carpets? How safe are we
with these and other chemicals absorption? Cotton in the 60's and back was
hard to iron, nowadays they put so much stuff into cloth (one so it does not
wrinkle)- what are we wearing besides cloth?

Well, I know the anti-stain clothes that Levis is coming out with use
microfiber polyester mixed with cotton... A lot of other treatments
wash out.

Tom