A special edition of COW, with the theme of LANL: Then versus Now, as portrayed by these two recent comments.Click to enlarge
Then:
The good ol' days. No questions asked back then. We got money by the tanker full, and we didn't have to account for none of it! White male butt-heads and cowboys in charge (as should be). No going-Rogue pussies tolerated in our midst (as should be). The cover of UC to give us an air of academic odeur. Placed on pedestals by everyone who knew better. Legends in our own minds of course. We were truly the best and brightest and damn well knew it! Boy oh boy, those WERE the good ol' days.
Now:
I don't know of a single person under 30 who thinks LANS is a great place to work. As a group, they don't have TCP1, and can carry their 401k anywhere they want to go in the future. They seem to take the collective attitude that if this place doesn't improve, they can just move on down the road without much trouble. Right now, many of them are doing just that along with many other LANS employees. Los Alamos has become a sort of National Laboratory puppy mill.
45 comments:
"Los Alamos has become a sort of National Laboratory puppy mill."
A puppy mill? OK, I think I get it.
Instead of constantly bleating "baa-baa", the new employee chant is to whimper and meekly bark "bow-wow, bow-wow". When scared, we're suppose to pee on the rug. Oh, and please feel free to enjoy sniffing each other's stinky asses, especially that of the LANS "top dog" Mikey. I hear he's "Best of Show" in the Fuzzy Lap Dog category.
I would love to take some body building steroids to "man-up", but I'm afraid it might show up in next month's piss exam.
When I clicked to enlarge that photo, I suddenly realized that the flabby old man is none other than the Governator!
Oh, my goodness! See what all that CA budget stress has done to the man. Frankly, I'd rather have never seen that "Now" photo and been able to keep up my fantasies of the young Terminator. Doug, you're bumming me out, dude.
I hear you, 1:48. Now if you really want to get bummed, go check out your high school yearbook photo...
Those were the old days, these are the new days. Get ready for Plutonium, Plutonium, and MORE Plutonium.
Don't like Plutonium? Want to do real science in a supportive work place? Go somewhere else.
I'm guessing that there have not been many comments gushing about what a wonderful place LANL is to work, how supportive and skilled management is, and how important and fulfilling LANL's new mission (whatever that may be) is.
I'm also guessing that there has not been an outpouring of praise for LANS and for all the improvements in cost and efficiency that their for-profit contract has provided.
I mean, otherwise we would have been reading all of those positive comments here on the blog, right?
2:41 pm: I'm guessing anyone who would be inclined to post favorably about LANL or LANS doesn't bother reading this blog.
A "National Laboratory puppy mill" is a bad thing, right?
Absolutely correct, 2:52. I have it on very good authority that the blog is home to just a few highly vocal malcontents.
Now, where did I hear that?
"Absolutely correct, 2:52. I have it on very good authority that the blog is home to just a few highly vocal malcontents."
The truth...aah such a rarity.
Looks like it might be time for Arnie to let that bathing suit go.
Actually, overall comments seem pretty sparse this week, Maybe we're running out of (or have beaten to death) issues people really care about?
It is interesting to note that when there is a new top post that introduces a new issue, that the few subsequent posts which have substantive content are usually ignored, sometimes for days, until somebody flames somebody else, and then the thread takes off, and within a day, resembles every other thread here. If it ain't about sheeple, Mikey, plutonium, or Bechtel, nobody cares. So yeah, I guess from a percentage standpoint, the malcontents rule. Just sayin'.
Doug sez,
"Absolutely correct, 2:52. I have it on very good authority that the blog is home to just a few highly vocal malcontents.
Now, where did I hear that?"
Doug, you must be getting forgetful in your old age. It was our very own Comical Ali "my lips are moving" Kevin Roark who made that claim about your original LTRS blog, a couple of days before it had received its first million hits.
10/13/09 8:08 PM
Actually, overall comments seem pretty sparse this week, Maybe we're running out of (or have beaten to death) issues people really care about?
No, I know people have sent in some good stuff for posting which has not been posted by the blog-kings. Just wait.
Oh, yeah, it's all coming back to me now, 6:53. Thanks for the reminder.
Whenever the blog hits a temporary lull point, you can usually count on the LANS devotees to start posting their favorite meme: "Doug, why don't you give it up, get a life, and shut down this pathetic blog".
Are you ready to post, Kevin?
This just in from NNSA's Twitter site (really, honest to God!)....
"Pantex Plant safety among agency best"
The National Nuclear Security Administration ranked the Pantex Plant among the agency's "safety leaders" for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30.
Since 2001, contractor B&W Pantex has improved its total recordable case rate by 87 percent and its lost time case rate, also known as "day away case rate," by 93 percent. Both rates are performance measures used to monitor safety issues at weapons plants like Pantex, which assembles and dismantles nuclear warheads outside Amarillo.
"We are proud of the safety record Pantex has established while increasing production at the plant this year," NNSA Administrator Tom D'Agostino said. "At NNSA, we take our commitment to ensure the safety of our workers, our work sites and the communities that host us very seriously."
Only ones that think this is a great place to work, or not work while at work are the NNM locals and families.
Only ones that think this is a great place to work, or not work while at work are the NNM locals and families.
10/14/09 7:39 PM
I guess if you live in Los Alamos you are a "NNM local." Otherwise, see, your comment would be, like, totally racist.
Where else but LANL can a person with little more than a high school education obtain a glorified secretarial position (i.e., the SSMs) and then use it to make over $70k per year, plus get a fantastic pension and great benefits? Many of LANL's support employees are 'living large' off the lab's largess.
All of the Lab's managers are living large as well.
11:22 am: "Where else but LANL can a person with little more than a high school education obtain a glorified secretarial position (i.e., the SSMs) and then use it to make over $70k per year.."
You might want to check your facts. I think you'll find that most SSMs have at least a bachelors and probably a masters in a relevant field. None that I know do anything like secretarial work. I think your TSM arrogance is showing (and I'm a TSM).
All of the Lab's managers are living large as well.
10/15/09 6:27 PM
Really? All the managers? How do you know this? How about the GL I know who is struggling to support two kids and a wife with cancer? How about the DGL I know whose husband just left her with a kid and a mortgage she can't pay? Unfounded generalities are a sign of a lazy mind.
"You might want to check your facts. I think you'll find that most SSMs have at least a bachelors and probably a masters in a relevant field. None that I know do anything like secretarial work. I think your TSM arrogance is showing (and I'm a TSM).
10/15/09 8:12 PM"
What is an SSM? By the way what about the HR people? What are they?
What is an SSM? By the way what about the HR people? What are they?
10/15/09 8:59 PM
What are you? Jeez, if you know nothing about LANL, what the hell are you doing on this blog?
8:17 Odds are good that those managers will not last long with LANS. Once LANS has taken what it wants, there is no longer a need for such people. Those with experience need not apply. Those with integrity need not apply. Those with Bechtel plastered all over their resume - those are the ones that will be rewarded with LANS. Even the lazy can clearly see the trend my friend.
"I think you'll find that most SSMs have at least a bachelors and probably a masters in a relevant field." 10/15/09 8:12 PM
Oh, really? A masters? In what... Microsoft Office usage from the University of Phoenix?
Get real. Most of the people in the SSM category at LANL are paid well above what any sane market outside of the lab would pay. And as far as your being a TSM and all, that doesn't seem to mean very much in terms of required credentials at LANL these days. The credentials bar has been set very low by LANS.
Oh, and the people working over in HR, 8:59... they're mostly SSMs. And "masters" at it, according to 8:12!
Why is LANS letting the Bechtel transplants become fully vested into TCP1 after only 2 years of service at LANL? It seems like Bechtel has a plan to off-load their corporate pension liabilities and dump them into a sinking LANL pension!
9:47 pm: "And as far as your being a TSM and all, that doesn't seem to mean very much in terms of required credentials at LANL these days. The credentials bar has been set very low by LANS."
So can you possibly sound any more arrogant? Are you a member of the uber-TSM cadre? What's the citeria for membership?
I dunno. In that "Now" photo, Arnold looks a bit flabby, but I'd still do him in a flash! Would that be counted as sexual harassment? I mean, he's the Governor and all and I'm just a lowly UC employee. I guess I better go over the special LANS executive "cheat sheets" once again just to be sure.
- Rich ("The King") Marquez
OK, LANS (and esp. Ben Glover), can lab cancer patients now get NM legally sanctioned medical marijuana to deal with their deadly pain? :
++ "Feds to issue new medical marijuana policy" ++
Oct 19, 8:07 AM (ET)
WASHINGTON (AP) - Federal drug agents won't pursue pot-smoking patients or their sanctioned suppliers in states that allow medical marijuana, under new legal guidelines to be issued Monday by the Obama administration.
Two Justice Department officials described the new policy to The Associated Press, saying prosecutors will be told it is not a good use of their time to arrest people who use or provide medical marijuana in strict compliance with state law.
Two things: (1) No Bechtel transplants are in TCP1 (2)DOE/NNSA prohibits marijuana use at LANL, not Ben Glover or any other LANS manager.
Two things: (1) No Bechtel transplants are in TCP1 (2)DOE/NNSA prohibits marijuana use at LANL, not Ben Glover or any other LANS manager.
10/21/09 8:55 AM
Bull-shit on both accounts, 8:55. TCP1 has grown after it was closed off to most new employees. The growth can only be coming from one place... Bechtel. And LANS made it very clear in their memo that the decision they made on pot was *their* decision based on how they currently interpret federal policy guidelines.
Let met guess, you're one of our new Bechtel manager implants (assholes)?
11:50 am: "Bull-shit on both accounts, 8:55. TCP1 has grown after it was closed off to most new employees. The growth can only be coming from one place...Bechtel."
So since you don't know the actual truth, you assume the scenario that most closely fits your preconceived conspiracy theory. You must be a scientist, right? "Data? We don't need no stinkin' data!" By the way, since you seem to believe that parent-company employes can legally be included in TCP1 after the initial transfer period, why couldn't it be additional folks from UC?
11:50 Nope, I am a LANS pension plan specialist( and a member of TCP1). I don't know where you get your numbers, but no one has entered TCP1 since 05/31/2006.
My opinion on marijuana at the Lab is based on the following: Ben Glover said in his Readers Forum respons that: "As a national laboratory, under federal contract with the Department of Energy and National Nuclear Security Administration, we believe it remains appropriate for the Lab to prohibit the use of marijuana by those holding a Lab badge, regardless of whether the marijuana use is permitted under New Mexico law. Consequently, the Laboratory's policy on this issue has not changed."
While this could be construed as saying the Lab instituted policy and the decision to include marijuana in the prohibited illegal drug list , it more accurately says that the LAB agrees that marijuana use at LANL, as a National Laboratory under NNSA, is inappropriate. (Remember UC LANL implemented the Substance Abuse Policy) In actuality, LANL must, by contract/DOE order, comply with 10 CFR which says in section 707.11 "Drugs for which testing is performed:
Where testing is performed under this part, at a minimum, contractors will be required to test for the use of the following drugs or classes of drugs: marijuana; cocaine; opiates; phencyclidine; and amphetamines. However, when conducting reasonable suspicion or occurrence testing, the contractor may test for any drug listed in Schedules I or II of the Controlled Substances Act.
707.14 Action pursuant to a determination of illegal drug use.
top
(a) When an applicant for employment has been tested and determined to have used an illegal drug, processing for employment will be terminated and the applicant will be so notified.
(b)(1) When an employee who is in a testing designated position has been tested and determined to have used an illegal drug, the contractor shall immediately remove that employee from the testing designated position;"
"(2)DOE/NNSA prohibits marijuana use at LANL, not Ben Glover or any other LANS manager."
Well, yes. DOE/NNSA do prohibit marijuana use *at* LANL.
But that's not really the issue here, is it?
Let's be a little more clear. The issue is whether marijuana use by LANL clearance holders, outside of LANL property and not during work hours, will be subject to DOE rules and punishments, if such use is in accordance with NM State law.
My take is that yes, it will be punished because DOE will still see it as a potential fitness for duty issue, and also subject to compromise by foreign intelligence agents, since the drug is legal to use for certain people in NM but illegal to procure on he street.
The DOE reg only says that LANL must test for marijuana. It doesn't say that the lab must fire all employees who test positive but have a legal New Mexico prescription for it, dumbass!
Bullshit, 10/21/09 11:38 PM. The DOE reg says that LANS must test people in certain special access programs for marijuana. The LANL population at large does not have to be tested.
"The LANL population at large does not have to be tested." - 6:47 AM
They do if I say they do. In case people have forgotten, testing everyone at LANL was my brilliant idea. Me... Mikey... I thought it up!
It got me a big, fat bonus from NNSA! Now, shut up and piss in the jar.
- MIKEY
LANL has a fair number of employees who have never been anywhere other than either this lab or at DOE/NNSA HQ. They have no good idea of just how totally screwed up and mis-managed this place has become compared to other labs and agencies. If DOD Sec. Robert Gates is seriously worried about the state of the nuclear weapons research complex, I would suggest that he make use of his Army Rangers and drop in the para-troopers ASAP to take over this place from LANS/Bechtel/NNSA before it is too late. I'm not joking, Mr. Gates. It really has become that bad!
Where are the results from that lab morale survey that LANS promised they would make public? What's the hold-up?
"Where are the results from that lab morale survey that LANS promised they would make public? What's the hold-up?" - 9:25 PM
Uh, we're planning a "do-over". The replacement survey will be directly tied into the job performance scoring system, PerforM. Bad morale reviews of management will result in a lower employee score due to unwanted "behaviors".
- MIKEY
MIKEY
Before your post disappears off the bottom of the list, I jusr want to say that your juvenile anonymous
"MIKEY" postings are really stupid. Get a new gig, dude.
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