It's only right!

Please put what's right ahead of personal entertainment and help make a statement in support of the WGA strike by signing this petition.

It's only right that writers profit from their work, regardless of which distribution method their employers choose to make their profit.

Get the mop out...

This article is about "living poor." At least that's the title. But before the author actually gets into how she "lives poor," (and incidentally, there is very little substance in that thread, despite the fact that her article runs two pages long), she feels obliged to practice some verbal diarrhea by indicting our entire society:

Yet there is another reason I hesitate to call myself poor -- the cultural baggage associated with the word: Poor people are lazy, stupid, immoral, shameless and incapable of making smart decisions. Poor people are losers; our country loves winners. We want poor people to trade their rags for riches. We want them to embody the American dream.

Most of all, we want to believe that poor people are shiftless and depraved and always to blame for their poverty. Otherwise, we'd have to face the possibility that someday we, too, could wind up on the business end of the bread line.

Without resorting to acronyms for expressions I don't use, here are my thoughts on this:

1. ACK.
2. This woman does not know very many nice people. (And I wonder whether she knows any...)
3. This woman must not know any real conservatives.
4. This woman is a liberal class warrior who puts evil words in all of our mouths.
5. This woman sounds as if she thinks she's the only person with internet access who understands poverty or cares about the poor.
6. This woman is smart about her spending.

I know poor people, and I know people who make and spend more money. No one I've met in my LIFE - to the best of my knowledge - thinks that all people who are going through financial hardship are lazy, stupid, etc. On the side of the fake coin that the author uses, though, I do know a few who think poor people are just unlucky. The truth is - as usual - somewhere in-between "they're all just lazy" and "they're all just victims," depending on the individual, and these dishonestly-created divisions are the milk that class warfare thrives on.

Class warfare is destroying our country.

People are individuals, and as individuals, we react differently to the varied situations in which we find ourselves. Some individuals are stupid and have lots of money. Some are stupid and have no money. Many are smart and have little money, and many are smart and have lots of money.

YOUR INCOME IS NOT THE MEASURE OF YOUR PERSON, and despite the author's protests to the contrary, she does hold herself up as noble, by virtue of holding those not in her situation as ignoble.

Here's the one good part of her article:

I might not have selected this scenario for my life. But now that I have it, I'm going to see what I can learn from it. My hope is that it will make me wiser about what I eventually seek.

Hear, hear!

What would be the problem?

A FoxNews blog claims that the military may be (implicitly over-)diagnosing personality disorders - which then lead to discharges - in order to avoid paying for the diagnosed individuals' health care. In the author's words, "it appears that in some way this is being used as a quick way to discharge people that may somehow save the military money."

First, that's a pretty rash thing to say, not that that necessarily makes it wrong. But the blog doesn't even try to substantiate its claim.

Second, when was the last time the military had to try to save money? Oh, back when they had to cut half their contracts (and are threatened again with it now) because our government drastically reduced their budget (or, currently, are requiring a surrender date before they hand over a dime)? Maybe budget cuts on things that keep us alive aren't such a good idea.

Third, so what? Why would we require the military to pay for medical costs for people who can't serve, for whatever (non-wounded-in-service) reason? Pensions and retirement are slightly different issues, since it's continued compensation for completing your commitment. Where do we require people to pay for medical costs of (former) employees who can't work, aside from limited disability payments? How ethical is that??? The military won't pay for your continued insurance if you're discharged for being unfit to serve, because you haven't completed your commitment; it sounds rough to us thoroughly-entitled souls, but especially in the military, your physical and mental well-being are and should be considered almost a "good or service." Contracts are off if the good is defective or the service is not performed. Why should the military be different?

It's that big "but"

Here's a fun headline:

Iran's nuclear program "irreversible": president

Maybe it's "irreversible," but I doubt it's unbreakable.

LOVE Pres. Sarkozy

He's conservative, self-sufficient, intelligent, gutsy, and hey - he even thinks America's not the Great Satan! What a guy! He's France's President Sarkozy, and he's visiting the US right now (in an official capacity; he's vacationed here before). Sure, he's piled onto the "people cause global climate change" bandwagon, but nobody's perfect.

I have to thank the French people, who have shown much more spine (and understanding of reality) than the Spanish in their most recent elections. I love Spain, and their short-sightedness saddens me.

We are in desperate need of allies who have a real grasp of the most serious threats to freedom in the world - and no one would know better than France, who's been fighting a street war against Islamofascist "youths" for years now, as well as having economic issues. I am so glad we have a leader like Pres. Sarkozy to work with!

Vive la France!

Let the kid have it back already

A 3-year-old boy found a woolly mammoth tooth recently. Pretty cool, eh? Except now it's on display at an art gallery. Poor kiddo! Said his grandpa, "When we dropped it down at the art gallery, he was crying. He didn't want to let it go...At first he thought it was just a rock. Now he's all excited." The nearby archaeological center already has one on display. I assume the art gallery will be returning the tooth to little Kaleb after a show, but given that there's already one displayed in the area for people to ogle, I think it should be returned sooner, rather than later.

On a related note, I wonder what the Tooth Fairy left the mammoth for the two-pound chomper?

Happy Harvest - for pedophiles?

In a Newsweek article entitled, "Eye Candy," (at which my eyes almost popped out of their sockets), the author asks whether little girls' costumes are becoming "too sexy."

They've actually been heading down this road for a long time - for instance, two years ago, a co-worker said another co-worker was willing to send her daughter out for Halloween looking like a hooker. That's a nice word for a little girl, isn't it? But what's worse is that she was right!

Forget safety (oh, yes, every pedophile is obeying the "lights-off" rule), health (it gets COLD in some parts of the country), and common sense (oh, she's just little, anyway) - aw, it's so cute, isn't it? Hypothermia, the parentally-sanctioned sexualization of pre-teen bodies, and teaching our most precious children the fine art of double-entendre are really GREAT goals...

If this is the direction society keeps heading, then I raise my sparkling cider to eliminating Halloween celebrations from our culture altogether.

If you can't do anything nice...

...Stick to your last idea & DON'T DO ANYTHING AT ALL.

There's a whole House hearing that will be held to discuss how "global warming" may be affecting the wildfires. *snort*

Most experts (not the political hacks representatives who flap their gums simply to release the hot air building up in their heads) on last week's fires were talking about how it's the dry underbrush - which people been legally prevented from clearing - that's been fueling these "super-fires."

And I hardly think multiple incidents of ARSON qualify as "global warming."

*Update 01 Nov*: No, I'm not saying that "they" (Harry Reid & co.) are saying global warming started the fires...but I seriously doubt that half a degree (or even three-quarters of a degree) would make a whole new set of problems this year and be responsible for "super-fires" that are exploding Ponderosa Pine trees, Nature's asbestos plant...

Finally, a GOOD idea

Congress wants to work less.

Please?!?!?!

On our southern border

Regarding the safety of emigrating to the US - encouraging illegal immigration is a BAD, BAD IDEA. When people come here illegally, they are subject to this sort of torture and other horrors on the journey - just Google the subject to get a huge list of the corrupt, drug-run evils awaiting illegal immigrants. The link I posted was the SECOND story I've seen just this morning in the news!

Not exactly comparable with the terror of waiting in line for your papers...

Considering the illegally-low wages these immigrants are paid, allowing illegal immigration is NOT the "compassionate choice."