This is impossibly inane. Is she mentally competent? Or is this a horrific example of “taken out of context”?

So,why is there a Best Actor and Best Actress? Is there an inherent difference that I don’t know about? Or, today, when everyone is equal, does it just double the “Best” awards?

Another thing I don’t agree with is separating out the “Best Supporting Actor etc”. For instance, this year, the absolutely best performance by anyone was by Christoph Waltz in Inglourious Bastards. His performance as the delightfully sadistic Jew Hunter SS Officer was incredible. By the time the movie was over, you were amazed at the man’s fluency in four languages, his savoir de faire, his joie de vivre, and his pure ruthless efficiency. I actually began to admire the capabilities of the demonic character he portrayed, and I have absolutely no liking for Nazi anti-semitic policy and the atrocities it caused. No one reached outside themselves more and succeeded in creating a better character than he did.

What a bunch of crap. The stupid reported who put that together should be fired for sleeping in 8th grade Civics Class, or fired for just being so fricking eco-freaky that he thinks he can re-write history, one of the favorite pastimes of the New-Age One World Order types. Actually, in the spirit of forgiveness, I think the reporter is just ignorant, and you can thank your local school board for that. Anyone who has any information about the Coast Guard, or the history of our glorious nation knows that the Coast Guard was established by Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury, to stop the smugglers from avoiding their fair share of taxes and revenues. In fact, the Coast Guard was original known as Revenue Marine and the Revenue Cutter Service. It was only in 1915 that it received its current name. In the official site of the Coast Guard Historian
the first mention of environmental protection comes in the 1960’s. This hardly makes it the oldest mission of the Coast Guard.

I recommend that the newspaper, if it wants to retain its reputation, begin hiring reasonably educated reporters who will take 5 minutes to look up things on the Internet.

1. Do our young still have a deep primeval memory or genetic kink that makes them act like primitive tribes everywhere. Tribes that all require music and dance as the prime medium of entertainment, especially in courtship matters that begin at pre-teen ages and run through middle youth. This music and dance also sufficed to transfer religious and social mores down the generations in non-literate groups. One other advantage was that it took some of the competition out of the huts and into the dance arena where harmless competition could wear off animosities, anger, and perhaps, even bloody revenge. Is that still happening today?




2. The second trend that went through my mind is that this musical rebellion against the parental generation is peculiar to the developed countries of the world. It is a statement to the parents that teens are not bound to the mores and customs of their elders; that they are indeed, masters of their universe and do not intend to be mere clones of their parents. Music of the new generations has little or only an adverse relationship to the social mores of the elders.
   
   I remember well one day when I was listening to “The Witch Doctor” which included lyrics such as: “Oo,eee, oo ah ah, oo, ah walla walla bing bang.” My father ridiculed the song as nonsensical and juvenile. Being quick on my mental feet, I challenged him back with, “And what was so smart with ‘abba dabba dabba said the monkey to the chimp’ and “Yes, we have no bananas today”, and “Three iddy biddy fishes in an iddy biddy pool”, and finally, “Mares eat oats and does eat oats and little lambs eat ivy”.
   
   I was fortunate enough to have a teenage club nearby where we would dance every Friday and Saturday night. I was basically a teenager who had been given a gift. My wife, on the other hand, grew up in a community that would have a “sock hop” every three months or so. She was socially denied her generational gift. I enjoyed my music in the 50’s and 60’s but quickly outgrew it in the late 60’s where volume of sound was substituted for quality of musicality. When you look back on each generation, there is a musical shift and dance shift, but still, each generation of young people creates their own distinctive musical niche and this binds them together.




3. Still, it was not so much the quality of the music, what was important was that it was our music and not our parents’ music. It set us apart from society in general and made the statement that our generation was going to be different and the world would be better for this.
   
   The need for the constant stream of music, and by this I mean the constant use of Ipods or MP3 players which have followed the early transistor radios, Walkmans, portable CD players, is a rejection of society as a whole. While listening they don’t have to deal with the millions of daily social contacts that occur in just walking down a street, sitting in a restaurant, or dealing with relatives. The music just shuts society out and insulates them against the stress of social intercourse.
   
   On an even deeper level, it may be the ultimate panacea for thought. For those who think and consider the ramifications of social interaction have much more stress and worry than those who are blessed by no or little interaction. Music forms an important barrier for those unwilling to expose them to this stress. By constantly listening, by being an uninterrupted receptor for loud, rhythmic noise, the brain can be lulled into minor activity excited only by extreme sensory input such as a loud noise or firm touch, or perhaps stepping in a cold puddle. Young escapists can hide behind a bastion of music oblivious to the responsibilities of being a human being in a human world. They have to give nothing, they have to risk nothing, ergo they gain nothing.

Since I’ve matured, my car radio is silent. The CDs I own are rarely played, and I have only five songs on my mobile phone. I may play them once every two weeks. Only when engaged in repetitious chores in the yard or in the house do I allow music as a brain filler. Otherwise, I listen to the world. In the silence I have found a wonderful universe of thought and conjecture. In silence, I have peace.

Tell your friends about this one. I hope to see you at the next DC rally on September 10th and 11th. The last one was the best thing I’ve ever done.

This change in numbers indicates clearly that the ban is not aimed at religious items, but is a backlash against the very rigid Islamic takeover of Europe. And it is a dedicated, determined, and insidious invasion that will succeed as long as the European, and eventually American nations, succumb to the liberal babble about the rights of the minorities and immigrants. As a nation, every state has the right to limit immigration by groups, religion, and mores. Every state has exercised these rights. Few Islamic states allow freedom of religion, or even freedom of national fashion.

When you look at the history of the World, I mean really look at it, only two groups have really risen above the clutter of mud bricks or rock monuments. Europeans and Northern Asians have risen to the pinnacle of technology and economy while the tropical climes have withered and maintained a sub-standard status-quo. To this effect, I assign a primary cause that I feel is very evident. When you live in a cold climate you have two advantages: 1. You have more time in winter to sit around and think about how you can make things better, and 2. The weather is bad enough that to survive you constantly improvise and improve tools, techniques, and social interactions. When you live in a warmer climate, where plants and animals thrive, life is much easier and you don’t have the push to spend a lot of time planning and inventing. The need doesn’t exist.

Now, as in the Dark Ages (let’s hear it for Roland and Vlad Dracule) when the Muslim hoards first invaded Europe, it is time for the Northern peoples to reject a religious society that has rejected their glorious past, that seems set on remaining in the 9th Century, that has no empathy, tolerance, or acceptance of ways that are not Islamic.

We can do this. Laws can be passed. I personally welcome any immigrant that comes to America and becomes an American in dress, habit, and loyalties. Just as all Catholics give up their secular allegiance to Rome when they immigrate here, all others must make America their first loyalty. Those who just want to get American goodies and still not become Americans, can just stay home. They are not wanted and will not be tolerated much longer. There will come a day when the American public will get together and pass the necessary laws.

Comment from my source:

One of the guys I copied on this, XXXXX, was my CC over there. He emailed me back last night that it’s documented that we ‘dusted’ 20,000 prisoners!
I remember being on the platforms as they would come in as part of the search routine prior to processing them into the compounds. So they came to us already dusted, then we dusted them right before we searched them, all in close quarters. I don’t recall any respirators or masks…at most, we tied a piece of cloth around our face, similar to what we did during sandstorms. Not much protection there, and now the thought occurs to me that using that same cloth, without decontaminating it, just held the dust (and other things) and the next time we used it we likely inhaled whatever was lingering there.

I feel OK, but you never know what lurks on the inside. You may remember that I have had a rash on and off. My concern is that I don’t want a lump showing up in my chest or bum and for civilian medical folks to think it is there just because I’m old dude. At least, hopefully, if I am a patient at VA, then someone may raise an eyebrow.

Here’s the video:

If you were in contact with Iraqi POWs during Desert Storm or the current Iraqi war, you may want to contact the VA about filing a claim.

View the related article here.

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Senators: Obama, Reid, Shumer, Clinton, Biden, Dodd, and Baucus.

here’s a source for the video of their remarks: http://www.breitbart.tv/obama-dems-in-2005-51-vote-nuclear-option-is-arrogant-power-grab-against-the-founders-intent/

Check it out for today’s Hypocrisy Prize.

1. Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) today asked the Obama administration to investigate what he called “the greatest scientific scandal of our generation” — the actions of climate scientists revealed by the Climategate Files, and the subsequent admissions by the editors of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report (AR4).
2. Senator Inhofe also called for former Vice President Al Gore to be called back to the Senate to testify.
3. Since the Climategate Files were released, the IPCC has been forced to retract a number of specific conclusions — such as a prediction that Himalayan glaciers would disappear by 2035 — and has been forced to confirm that the report was based in large part on reports from environmental activist groups instead of peer-reviewed scientific literature. Dr. Murari Lal, an editor of the IPCC AR4 report, admitted to the London Daily Mail that he had known the 2035 date was false, but was included in the report anyway “purely to put political pressure on world leaders.”

Wow, good stuff and about time someone started to look at these lying bastards with a view towards prosecution. They have caused world panic and billions of dollars wasted in phoney research and dangerous proselytizing of children and gullible people worldwide.

If Al Gore was half a man, he would return his Nobel Peace Prize and give it to Irena Sendler.

Unfortunately, few elected officials did hear us, and fewer actually listened. None of the news reports actually looked at the totality of the magnitude of the crowd. We filled nearly every seat and standing room on the Metro trains going in to the city that morning. Our buses were parked blocks and miles away from the downtown area because there was no more parking. Airlines were booked with marchers, not vacationers. Normal traffic had a hard time getting around town. Our planned march route was only a few blocks, maybe ten at most. We had to begin the march an hour early because the starting point was filled to overflowing. The march route was crowded with marchers for over three hours. We were a force.

Maybe, we should take a look at how other countries get the attention of their governments.

1. We could all drive in and park our cars wherever we can and thus block streets and bring traffic to a standstill. This is itself would work very effectively. There is no way they could tow 25000 cars or write 35000 tickets, or would the number be 100,000? If they did tow your car, it may cost you a couple of hundred bucks to get it out of the impound yard, but is that too much to pay for your country?
2. We could possibly form a human cordon around the Capitol Hill and everyone could lie down. Ghandi, and probably Martin Luther King, Jr. would have liked that, a little passive resistance. If there are 200,000 of us, how many can they arrest and cart away in day. Where would they put everyone? How would they feed everyone when meal time came. If we all insisted on staying as long as we could, we could bankrupt the law enforcement budgets. What neighboring community would send in its police force to help the DC police and leave their own neighborhoods vulnerable. And what if there were 300,000, or 700,000?
3. What if we made a concerted effort to mass at every outlying Metro stop and filled every train to capacity. How many Federal workers would be able to get to work? How many would be late? And then, we could all wait to go home during rush hour, on the trains and in our cars. How much fun would that be?

You know, this could be a lot of fun. All we need is patience, perseverance, and the will to make our voice heard.

You say it won’t work? Something like this has to work. The only thing left is throwing up barricades.

The good thing is that if he does it, the November elections will be a political bloodbath for incumbents who supported this garbage pile of legalese. The reaction will be so strong that the Democrat party may not recover for years, if not decades. The people are PISSED! Very few want this type of government control over their lives.

Those that go along with it, are saying that they don’t care about the rest of the country, they just want to get their way. They are not serving the nation, its people, or its future. In fact, they are running the nation into bankruptcy and ruination. They need to be taught a lesson. Throw them out of office and make them work for a living. If they are lawyers, they need to be disbarred for complete disregard of our Constitutional freedoms.

The people will speak, and it is now personal. We are coming after Congress with the biggest conservative voting block the US has ever seen. Better start looking for jobs, Congressmen, because one of the things we will do is repeal your lifetime retirement and benefits and put you in the Social Security ranks you so willingly screw every time you raid the SS fund and everytime you refuse a COLA for Social Security and vote yourselves a raise.

Some advice, Vancouver. Find out who shot that Albatross and ship him to Timbuktu for the summer!

Three things really jump out at me at this time, just after the 1500 meter short track skate events.

1. The first thing that went wrong was the interminable opening ceremony which lacked the life, the zest, and the enjoyment that I come to expect from the Canadian friends I know. Each segment of the four describing the parts of Canada were way too long, causing much sighing, going to the bathroom, getting chips, another soda, taking the dogs out etc. The fiddling and dancing were nice but again too long.
2. The final lighting of the cauldron had a major malfunction caused by lack of foresight and no manual override plan. Poor planning, nothing else. I know that some smuck of an engineer will be out looking for work on Monday, but that is really an over-reaction. Because of the malfunction, the opening will be remembered. Lord knows that otherwise it was unremarkable. Funny, how screw-ups are remembered and great shows aren’t? In my memory, the only opening ceremonies that I vaguely remember are just one, those stupid, cheesy stainless steel pickup trucks at the Atlanta Olympics.
3. The highlights of actual events so far are singular. Visualize two superb Korean skaters slamming into the pads while the fourth and fifth skaters finish with silver and bronze. I know, that is the nature and the excitement of the event. Last minute things happen to create the drama. Yet, to me, it takes a very real sporting event and reduces it to a demolition derby. 1500 meters on a short track makes no sense to me. Really, who is the fastest? Or is that not the point?

Another mark of the Albatross was the death of the Georgian Luger. It was a sad event, and one that need not have happened except for the all-sports need for higher speed and greater danger. That drive is one of the tangibles that keeps most of us from even trying the sports that threaten life and limb. I will ski, and I will skate, but not on the slopes or with the speed that the great athletes compete on. Those who do compete have superior skills and unique mindsets that separate them from the rest of us.

All glory to them, and to them, raise your glass in honor. Here’s to you, Nodar! May your spirit live on in the hearts of your countrymen and in the hearts of all free men everywhere.

I say “GOOD RIDDANCE!!” to a family dynasty of flawed characters with delusions of royalty. As far as I know none of them ever really worked for a living, none of them know the weariness of physical labor and hoping for another paycheck the next week. None of them know putting aside hopes and dreams in order to get the car fixed or braces for the kid or to help out a family member in financial trouble. (They do know a lot about helping out family members in legal trouble.)

It always irked me that one family felt it had a right to run my government, that they were in a particularly good position to know what was best for me and what I wanted from my government. We should have a family exclusion law. No member of a family should be able to follow other members of a family into the federal elected government unless one generation was skipped in the process. Even then, I would prefer two generations because it seems that the closer in family ties, the weaker the political notions of the new generation. Sort of like intelligence skipping a generation as we’ve seen before in historical terms. (Don’t ask for examples, it is more a personal observation and a typical Hollywood script line.) Oh, wait. Examples? Look at the Gores, the Bayhs, the Rockefellers, the Daleys, and the many other father-son-cousin-brother examples. Somebody give me a complete list.

Anyway, Good Bye, Patrick, and don’t let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.

One item in this story says that “warmer air carries more moisture.” You might want to tell the inhabitants of the Sahara Desert, The Arabian Peninsula, the Namibian Desert, the Kalahari Desert, the Gobi desert, the US Southwest, and the Nazca Plain that they should protect themselves against the moisture all that warm air contains. In my living experience, it is hotter in the Mojave and in Arizona and New Mexico than it is in Georgia and Florida, yet the humidity is higher in the Southeast. Maybe the scientist should be more circumspect in choosing the words for his statement.

It may seem a bit funny, and over the top, but twenty years ago we would have laughed at the Government owning General Motors and setting salary limits for bankers. We would have been horrified at the thought of the government forcing us to buy health insurance. But look at us now! Many people don’t like what is happening, but not enough are standing up to fight against it.

Time to join your local Tea Party association, it is non-partisan and not for any particular candidate. It stands for: Fiscal Responsibility, Limited Government, and Free Enterprise. Try it, you will do something worthwhile for your country and your children.

After years of trying to get men to be more sensitive and gentle, women succeeded to the point of creating the metro-sexual man and the five day beard man who must have a cheek like coarse sandpaper to remind himself that he is a male animal. Shaved chests and bearded faces? Something wrong here. Women have reach the point of their efforts to emasculate American men where men are no longer men, at least those we see touted by the magazines and TV shows. Let’s hear it for Alan Harper and all those guys on the Life Channel and the Halmark Channel.

Remember Sean Connery as 007? He was clean shaven, carefully dressed, and had a chest of hair and no one, I repeat, no one thought him as anything but manly. It would seem to be time for us to rebel against the feminist purge of our gonads. Time to be a man! Thank you, Sean, for showing us the true path.

More after the game.
Okay, the game is over, and it was a pretty good match with two very good quarterbacks both up against very good defenses. It took a lucky break to make the difference, and that break fell to the Saints, a team that was due, if such a thing is possible.

I take back the remark about being P’ whipped. It indicates that the guys are getting something, but these guys make me believe they aren’t even getting that. Our society over the last 40 years has made a determined effort to break down the normal, natural roles of men and women, roles that evolved over thousands of millenia. The politically correct mob have decreed that men and women both take on the roles naturally adapted by the other sex. That is against nature, and as such, is wrong. When men were men and women were glad of it, things worked much better in our world.

The result will be a timid approach to waging war. Officers will be loath to send their men into combat if they think their efficiency rating will suffer, or that they may get a career ending letter of reprimand.

This recent effort that reprimands leaders for suffering defeats that inevitably come in warfare, especially when support lags for ground troops, is the beginning of the end if it continues. Soldiers are no dummies. When they see that they will be scolded for initiative, for courageous decisions, and for sometimes superior tactics by the enemy, they will stop taking chances, stop taking the war to the enemy, and therefore stop winning the war. Nobody ever won a war by waiting for the enemy to come to them.

I believe in the Right to Bear Arms, as stated in the 2nd Amendment of the US Constitution, the second article of the Bill of Rights, for it is the “maintenance amendment” the one that makes all the others possible. I took an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States when I was a young man. I’ve never forgotten it, and I stand ready to stand behind that oath if it ever becomes necessary. We must stand firm to ensure that our political officials don’t try to take that right away, because if they ever do, you will become unpleasantly acquainted with the national police force in a short hurry.

Check it out: http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/754.html

Thanks, Jackson, for your interest in our page, and the Google search “republicans suck” which brought you here.

Backdoor taxes to hit middle class

Mon Feb 1, 4:09 PM

By Terri Cullen

NEW YORK (Reuters.com) –The Obama administration’s plan to cut more than $1 trillion from the deficit over the next decade relies heavily on so-called backdoor tax increases that will result in a bigger tax bill for middle-class families.

In the 2010 budget tabled by President Barack Obama on Monday, the White House wants to let billions of dollars in tax breaks expire by the end of the year — effectively a tax hike by stealth.

While the administration is focusing its proposal on eliminating tax breaks for individuals who earn $250,000 a year or more, middle-class families will face a slew of these backdoor increases.

The targeted tax provisions were enacted under the Bush administration’s Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001. Among other things, the law lowered individual tax rates, slashed taxes on capital gains and dividends, and steadily scaled back the estate tax to zero in 2010.

If the provisions are allowed to expire on December 31, the top-tier personal income tax rate will rise to 39.6 percent from 35 percent. But lower-income families will pay more as well: the 25 percent tax bracket will revert back to 28 percent; the 28 percent bracket will increase to 31 percent; and the 33 percent bracket will increase to 36 percent. The special 10 percent bracket is eliminated.

Investors will pay more on their earnings next year as well, with the tax on dividends jumping to 39.6 percent from 15 percent and the capital-gains tax increasing to 20 percent from 15 percent. The estate tax is eliminated this year, but it will return in 2011 — though there has been talk about reinstating the death tax sooner.

Millions of middle-class households already may be facing higher taxes in 2010 because Congress has failed to extend tax breaks that expired on January 1, most notably a “patch” that limited the impact of the alternative minimum tax. The AMT, initially designed to prevent the very rich from avoiding income taxes, was never indexed for inflation. Now the tax is affecting millions of middle-income households, but lawmakers have been reluctant to repeal it because it has become a key source of revenue.

Without annual legislation to renew the patch this year, the AMT could affect an estimated 25 million taxpayers with incomes as low as $33,750 (or $45,000 for joint filers). Even if the patch is extended to last year’s levels, the tax will hit American families that can hardly be considered wealthy — the AMT exemption for 2009 was $46,700 for singles and $70,950 for married couples filing jointly.

Middle-class families also will find fewer tax breaks available to them in 2010 if other popular tax provisions are allowed to expire. Among them:

* Taxpayers who itemize will lose the option to deduct state sales-tax payments instead of state and local income taxes;

* The $250 teacher tax credit for classroom supplies;

* The tax deduction for up to $4,000 of college tuition and expenses;

* Individuals who don’t itemize will no longer be able to increase their standard deduction by up to $1,000 for property taxes paid;

* The first $2,400 of unemployment benefits are taxable, in 2009 that amount was tax-free.

URL: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/reuters/100201/us/usreport_us_budget_backdoortaxes

Strange, I don’t ever remember a church complaining about a President’s attendance. Also, his attendance at services serves as a great moral reminder for the rest of the nation. Perhaps he feels the America he represents needs to have Christianity encouraged.

However he feels about the inconvenience, it apparently doesn’t extend to college basketball where he joked with the broadcasting crew while attending a game at the Verizon Center in Washington, DC. He attended that game and didn’t seem to worry about the inconvenience to a much larger crowd than he will ever find a a church. It would appear that he holds sporting events above his religious practices. No surprise there.

Clearly, the middle class is screwed again.

See it here: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100112/ap_en_mo/eu_vatican_avatar

The dreams about my grandfather, who died four years before I was born, are based on my meeting him and we talk about things in general. I’m getting to know him pretty well. I have to admit I’ve always felt cheated by not getting to know him, he was a fascinating man who fought in three wars; the Spanish-American, The Philippine War, and WWI. He married late and raised twelve children and retired after forty years in the Army. So, you see, he had a lot of stories to tell that I never got to hear, and I never got to know first hand what kind of a man he was. The dreams are helping.

My father, who was genius, was a very pragmatic man and didn’t believe in much unless it made sound, logical sense. One night when I was in my thirties, he did tell me about an incident that happened to him in Washington, DC, in the 1920’s. It seems that he had been sent up to the attic on the third floor. The stairs were such that there was a turn, a landing every half-floor. As he was starting back down he put his hand on the banister. He felt a hand close on top of his hand, but he could see nothing. He proceeded to jump down the stairs, landing to landing. End of story. My Dad was not a man to succumb to flights of imagination. This is the only story of this kind he ever told. He usually debunked every movie, TV show, or book that indicated a belief in ghosts or the afterlife. Yet, he believed what he had felt that evening in DC.

My one and only “ghost” experience happened when I was a little child but it is still vivid in my memory. I was at my grandmother’s house in Oregon visiting. I was probably three years old, maybe nearly four (the house was sold and the family moved when I was four). I walked into the living room. There was an old man there with a mustache and tweedy kind of suit and round glasses. He didn’t say anything, but motioned me to the back of the room where is was kind of dark. He reached into the desk and gave me a lollipop. He never spoke a word. And that is that, no more, no less. His image matches his description in his latter years.

So, having laid these things out on this site, I was wondering if anyone else had similar dreams and/or ghost experiences?

I vomited on my keyboard.

Then I searched for my razor blade so I can slit my wrists…not because
the movie depressed me, but because the article did…in so many ways.

I wonder if I could start an internet-thingy like they did where all of
us who are depressed about the article can express our emotions and rue
this horrible planet we live on and hope that the heaven we are so
proactively racing toward is a little like Pandora.

Because, as everyone knows, I was not introduced to literature in
school. I never read Ray Bradbury or Isaac Asimov or Arthur C. Clarke or
Edgar Allen Poe. I never saw a movie about a more beautiful place and
how horrible this place is, because there just aren’t any about
post-destruction society movies or places portrayed in movies that are
more beautiful than ours. Until Avatar, there was no Star Wars, Star
Trek, Twilight Zone, Contact, Battlestar Gallactica, The Time Machine,
Back to the Future, Silent Running, Superman, Amazing Stories, Space
1999, etc. (And that’s just off the top of my head.)

Because Avatar was the first movie EVER to offer a fantasized glimpse
into another world, and the first ever to have a
boy-meets-girl-boy-gets-girl-boy-loses-girl-boy-gets-girl-in-the-end
type of message, and it was also the first movie about redemption I have
ever seen.

It was also the first fantasy/sci-fi/action/adventure movie I have ever
seen, and I am CERTAIN that never before has any movie ever had a direct
or indirect comment on how we are wasting our planet’s resources and/or
forcibly taking someone else’s and I am sure that whatever similarities
exist between Avatar and what happened RIGHT HERE with Native Americans
must be a complete figment of my imagination, or a lie, much like the
Holocaust.

No wonder these kids were moved to depression - it’s because the movie
was so ground breaking story-wise and what it says about all of us and
all of our ideals. It blazed a new trail with the message! And here I
thought it was just nice to look at and, after all, just…

A PRETTY COOL MOVIE!

Silly me. I guess my attitude explains why I can separate fantasy from
reality and why I am moderately successful in the things I pursue. But,
there I go again…sorry…I’m going to stop working now and see if
there are any post-Avatar support groups on the net and/or any Na’vi
groups I can join…

Well said, thank you.
Our youth are not well educated, they are, however, well-indoctrinated, as their response to the movie indicates.

The real problem with these people (both parties) is that they have no regard for the Constitution or the people of these United States. They play fast and loose with laws and regulations and sit fat and happy in their offices sucking up the largess provided by greed, corruption, and lobbyist to whom they are indebted for the money that got them elected.

The solution is for us, all of us, to really look for and find candidates for office that follow a strict Constitutional path and will work for the restoration and guiding authority of the Constitution as envisioned by the Founding Fathers. This means, mostly, that we vote out all incumbents and replace them with new people with old fashioned ideas of government. We need limited government, fiscal discipline, and a market-driven economy. If banks fail, then let them fail. It is the law of the fiscal jungle that should prevail. You provide a rotten product, you should be on the street looking for new career field. And that is what our Congress has done and is doing, providing a rotten product. It is time for a change, a drastic change. Those of us who have sworn to uphold the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, need to get active in recruiting good candidates and for getting out the vote for those candidates.

It is time, people, let’s get to work.

Public and Intergovernmental Affairs

VA Extends “Agent Orange” Benefits to More Veterans
October 13, 2009
Printable Version
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Parkinson’s Disease, Two Other Illnesses Recognized

WASHINGTON – Relying on an independent study by the Institute of Medicine (IOM), Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki decided to establish a service-connection for Vietnam Veterans with three specific illnesses based on the latest evidence of an association with the herbicides referred to Agent Orange.

The illnesses affected by the recent decision are B cell leukemias, such as hairy cell leukemia; Parkinson’s disease; and ischemic heart disease.

Used in Vietnam to defoliate trees and remove concealment for the enemy, Agent Orange left a legacy of suffering and disability that continues to the present. Between January 1965 and April 1970, an estimated 2.6 million military personnel who served in Vietnam were potentially exposed to sprayed Agent Orange.

In practical terms, Veterans who served in Vietnam during the war and who have a “presumed” illness don’t have to prove an association between their illnesses and their military service. This “presumption” simplifies and speeds up the application process for benefits.

The Secretary’s decision brings to 15 the number of presumed illnesses recognized by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

“We must do better reviews of illnesses that may be connected to service, and we will,” Shinseki added. “Veterans who endure health problems deserve timely decisions based on solid evidence.”

Other illnesses previously recognized under VA’s “presumption” rule as being caused by exposure to herbicides during the Vietnam War are:

· Acute and Subacute Transient Peripheral Neuropathy

· Chloracne

· Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia

· Diabetes Mellitus (Type 2)

· Hodgkin’s Disease

· Multiple Myeloma

· Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma

· Porphyria Cutanea Tarda

· Prostate Cancer

· Respiratory Cancers, and

· Soft Tissue Sarcoma (other than Osteosarcoma, Chondrosarcoma, Kaposi’s sarcoma, or Mesothelioma)

Additional information about Agent Orange and VA’s services and programs for Veterans exposed to the chemical are available at www.publichealth.va.gov/exposures/agentorange.

Today, though things were interesting. After sitting on 498 foreign cities for several days, suddenly I got 499–Barbacena, Brazil, and then the big 500 Florianopolis, Brazil, followed by 501 Lubuan, Malaysia. This gives me a total of 11 cities in Brazil and 4 from Malaysia.

Here’s some links to Florianopolis, Brazil:

Nexus Surf Page
Brazil Tourism page
Great Photo Page from Google
Home Page of iFloripa (another name for Florianopolils)

Every page I look at makes me think we have overlooked a great vacation getaway. The photos are beautiful, the surf and sun magnificent, and the young people are, well, very nicely Brazilian.

Congratulations,

Florianopolis, Brazil!

The good news is that like the TITANIC Cameron has put on a visual epic that tickles the mind and engages the intellect. I heard that AVATAR was the new STAR WARS because of the quantum leap in graphic design and visual effects. I think it was much more than that. Almost as soon as the movie starts, the distinction between the real and special effects blurs quickly and you no longer see the difference. You are drawn into the moon-world of Pandora just as quickly as an Indiana Jones movie brings you into Egypt or India, and with the same believability.

With the advantage of sitting in my office and reflecting on the movie, I realize that the graphics and special effects were not quite perfect. Nowhere was the clinker of the uncertain or jerky movement of a character, nowhere was there an obviously flat scene or object, but I now have the feeling that there may have been a bit more real feeling with the Na’Vi people. But, I can tell you, during the movie it never entered my mind. I was sold, hook line and sinker with the story and the visualization of that world in conflict.

Bravo, James Cameron. Please hurry to your next endeavor.

Here’s what the writer said:

What I want to know is, WTF ever happened to real rock and roll -
Someone please identify for me a new band on the scene since 2000 that remotely resembles any of the following:

Aerosmith
Kiss
Van Halen
Rolling Stones
AC/DC
Guns n Roses
Metallica

I’d even settle for someone kind of close to The Who, Def Leppard, Motley Crue, Tesla, Rush, Judas Priest.
Someone please help me!
You want to know why there are more “U’s” on the below list than anything else? (The writer rated the top 100 with “U” being UNKNOWN)

BECAUSE THERE IS NO FRACKIN ROCK AND ROLL ON THE LIST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And that, my friends, largely explains the current decline of western civilization as we know it.

Here’s my reply;

You might want to remember, a lot of R&R was sung, not screamed, and a lot of the harmony was good and you could understand the words. The songs were about the feelings of real people, not druggies, hippies, or other alienated groups that never had a glimpse of reality and a future.

Most important thing, the collapse of the Soviet Union was initiated and built on three things. Ronald Reagan just capitalized on the moldering foundation. So let’s hear for:

1. Levi’s (blue jeans): If you visited the Sov U they counted your blue jeans and you had to exit with the same number of pairs. Jeans made the people identify with the West.
2. Pepsi: It brought a tremendously popular product to the common people and they began to believe they could have more (consumer items).
3. Rock and Roll: It released the young people from a great cloud of economic and political oppression and gave them a joy in life that Communism couldn’t keep down.

Actually, modern music is at an historic low point for quality. Even CW has grown a tedious melody line and musical monotony, much like easy listening has since that Canadian gal sank the Titanic. All of her songs are the same, everyone on Idol sounds the same, and the energetic mind rejects such creative sludge.

I could go on, to me the last great album was Blondie’s Parallel Lines.

In fact, today’s music shows much that is lacking in the American experience. No longer is there optimism, no longer is love a grand and glorious adventure, no longer are heroics really understood. All is show and shallow water. Celebrities take over the news, real events are sidelined while Tiger is caught with a “hobby” other than golf, and millions of dollars are spent on trash magazines and television shows that allow people to identify with the lowest denominators of human emotion. America is soft, weak, and getting more dependent on others every day. It has become a sin to stand tall, alone, and firm on your principles; to face adversity with courage and without complaint; to speak your mind because someone somewhere might be offended. We are being homogenized into puddles of protoplasm with no pride in ourselves, no sense of achievement, and no desire to excel.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/rolling-stones-top-100-and-what-happened-to-rock-and-roll/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/merry-christmas-and-a-better-new-year/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/merry-christmas-and-a-better-new-year/#comments Sat, 26 Dec 2009 03:17:01 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=412 To all my readers, I wish you the very best of the winter holidays, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, and whatever to the rest of you which in my ignorance I skipped.

This year has been a poliltical disaster as far as I am concerned, and I truly hope for a much happier year. Whatever your political persuasion, I encourage you to be active and help shape your future.

To those who wish to overthrow the current world system of prosperity and to dominate the world either through a New World Government or a religious theocracy of any form, may you rot in hell for all eternity.

I’m getting too old to put up with idiots.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/merry-christmas-and-a-better-new-year/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/government-of-whores-lawyers-and-such-scum/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/government-of-whores-lawyers-and-such-scum/#comments Mon, 21 Dec 2009 22:35:54 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=411 Well, Democratic Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska became the last of line of political whores whose vote can be bought by their party or special interests. Along with Louisiana’s Democratic Senator Landrieu have proved beyond a doubt that principles and the feelings of their constituents have no meaning when they vote the national good, only the amount of money it takes to make them toe the party line.

I have long thought that political lawyers should just be called “The Democratic Whore from Nebraska, or Louisiana” or whatever state they come from. They are all, ALL, into self-service, self-aggrandizement, self-perpetuating, and just self-self-self. Why the voters have put up with them for so many years is beyond me. I guess things have just been too good here in America where we have suffered NOTHING for the last 70 years. Even our problems like Viet Nam and Iraq and the financial crisis have been self-involved. The voters just quietly went along while Congress gradually gained more power, voted themselves more money, more perks, and allowed more bastards, crooks, pedophiles, and self-styled kings to keep in office for more years than a decent man goes to church. The Congress has to vote whether or not a convicted felon can be removed from his seat. You can be in federal prison and still be a Senator!

When will we wake up? I sincerely hope it is in the next election. Our only hope of saving our national decency is to vote out all the incumbents, all of them, send a message that politics as usual is not to be tolerated any more! We need new, eager, and honest representatives to serve for short periods of time that will offer up new ideas for the public good based on sound economic and international thought. We need to recall the ones who don’t listen to us, and those who won’t vote for the sovereignty of the United States of America!

Come on, brothers, let’s do it at the polls, before the barricades are necessary.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/government-of-whores-lawyers-and-such-scum/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/global-government-on-the-way/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/global-government-on-the-way/#comments Mon, 21 Dec 2009 22:15:09 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=410 According to those who believe in devils and man-made climate catastrophe and man’s ability to change the weather, global government may be the only solution. They also agree with those who feel that the recent financial meltdown needs global direction for recovery. The International Bank and the International Courts and INTERPOL, and numerous other international agencies would lend an aura of respectability to global government to the casual observer. I know the Leftists and the Environmentalists and the anti-capitalists would love to see the US and EU abrogate their separate powers of sovereignty to a global government run by the UN and financed by the US and EU. It would be the ultimate expression of unity of earth and the brotherhood of humanity.

Well, those idiots better be prepared for a rotten world, screwed up international commerce, rampant crime, and a lower standard of living for those of us having to foot the bill for a bunch of tribal warlords that would rape and pillage at their hearts content. Most of the Third World is still in the Third World due to cultural ineptitude in governance, commerce, and human rights. You don’t let the Alternative Education kids run the school district, much less the school. If you take away the current international situation and leave the world to the UN which is run by representatives of primitive cultures riddled with graft and corruption and tribal animosities, the only safe haven will be the one with the most guns. And buddy, it won’t be those places where gun control has taken over.

That said, there is a well written article on the subject at this URL: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/janetdaley/6845967/Therell-be-nowhere-to-run-from-the-new-world-government.html I suggest you read it.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/global-government-on-the-way/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/when-did-we-lose-control-of-our-children/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/when-did-we-lose-control-of-our-children/#comments Mon, 21 Dec 2009 18:04:52 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=409 When I was young, on a cross-country ride, my son played in the back where the seats were down and he had plenty of room to lay down and stretch out in the trunk if he wanted to. He could also climb up to the front and sit on his knees so he could see out the window. He was allowed to move and play and in general, enjoy the trip.

My son recently returned from up north where he picked up a new car. He flew his six year old son up to enjoy the ride, and by happenstance, the child’s first snowfall and snowman. He mentioned that the ride back had been bad for the boy because he had had to sit in a booster seat for the entire fourteen hour ride. Booster seat? Had to be strapped in? What kind of macabre torture scheme is being foisted on us by our government? Isn’t this just as abusive as a parent spanking a child to keep them from doing something harmful? When did we lose control of how we raise our kids to the politically correct gang that believes no child should ever get hurt? Safety is one thing, but to take it to the extremes is another. Hey, let’s do that for a minute.

Let’s keep our children safe, totally safe from the evil things in their environment. First, no bicycles, skates, wagons, or baseball bats. No golf clubs, no basketballs, in fact, no balls that may bounce back and hurt them. No toys made of wood that may cause splinters, no toys with sharp metal edges, no toys of plastic that the child may chew on. No playing cards that might cause paper cuts, no playmates bigger than themselves, and no groups of more than three can play together because they might form a clique against one of themselves. No running, tumbling, or wrestling, or other contact sports, and no soccer, football, track (gotta watch those hamstrings), or swimming which means pools and drowning or at least swimmer’s ear. Must be careful also, no lone adult supervision, must be as least two at all times, and the child must not be left alone, he might do something like eat a bug and choke on it.

And that is just the beginning. When you finish, you no longer have a human being capable of facing adversity, danger, or failure. They will all be victims of Pre-Traumatic Stress Syndrome and will spend their adult life in therapy dealing with their phobias.

Our society is really beginning to suck.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/when-did-we-lose-control-of-our-children/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/politics/obama-and-an-old-expression/ http://mustangrambles.com/politics/obama-and-an-old-expression/#comments Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:29:32 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=408 There is an old expression in English, “Looking down his nose”, which is used to indicate someone who feels superior and lofty and above the mundane features of your life. It is said that he is “looking down his nose at you.”

Look at Obama when he makes a speech. Look at the current picture of Obama from the Copenhagen speech (Drudge Report has it). Where is he looking? DOWN HIS NOSE!

Watch him. Think how an old expression ever got started. Think about how that expression has survived the test of time and is still used today. What is the truism here?

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/politics/obama-and-an-old-expression/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/movies/invictus-review-of-clint-eastwoods-newest-triumph/ http://mustangrambles.com/movies/invictus-review-of-clint-eastwoods-newest-triumph/#comments Fri, 11 Dec 2009 21:11:46 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=407 Eastwood has done it again. By picking a superb story and gathering a great cast, he has told two great stories. Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon were good picks to keep what could have been a melodramatic movie from getting mired in sentimental mush. Freeman shows a sensitivity to the plight of Nelson Mandela who took over the most unenviable job in the world. Damon played his part with a humbleness that smacked of the great support actors in Hollywood.

One, he has brought the extreme difficulties of post-apartheid South Africa into a narrow focus that shows the need for the human touch in solving human troubles. Too often, leaders of great countries discount the human side for the political, suedo-scientific theories of human interaction. Normally, they fail. This movie shows an insight into true greatness, and how it manifested itself into a solid, country-building effort that would never enter any political calculation. This movie makes you feel the pain, on both sides of the racial divide, in the distance the country had to travel to be welcomed back into the world of civilized nations.

The second story, that of the Springboks, the South African Rugby team that won the World Cup in 1995 is in itself just one more of the genre of underdog teams winning the big championship. This plot is getting old and hackneyed and is not integral to enjoying the film. What is important is for us who know little of Rugby is that we are exposed to perhaps the most brutal team sport in the world. There is a quote in the movie that: “Soccer is a gentleman’s sport played by hooligans, while Rugby is a hooligan’s sport played by gentlemen..” Indeed, the game is a real smasheroo if you are in it. It is brute force against brute force. The scrums are so tough that the sport itself became concerned by the number of neck and back injuries that were producing paralysis. This movie shows you why you don’t see much Rugby, and why I noticed this bumper sticker in St. Louis, Missouri: “RUGBY PLAYERS EAT THEIR DEAD”

I give this movie 4.5 stars out of 5. It is well worth the money to see it. However, it will never get the audience it deserves because it is a sensitive telling of a sensitive time and place, and because there is no violence, no explosions, and no sex. Eastwood is a director that gives you a great movie without these things. He is to be commended and honored. He will be nominated for Best Director numerous times as will Morgan Freeman for Best Actor.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/movies/invictus-review-of-clint-eastwoods-newest-triumph/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/geography/bloomington-in-the-900th-us-city-to-visit-mustangrambles/ http://mustangrambles.com/geography/bloomington-in-the-900th-us-city-to-visit-mustangrambles/#comments Thu, 10 Dec 2009 22:12:43 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=406 Welcome to Bloomington, IN and the unknown person in search of the “Fat Golfer”. I hope you were satisfied with your visit to Mustangrambles and gleaned something useful for your game.

Bloomington is in the southern part of Indiana. I have never been there, although I’ve driven through Indiana several times and visited Indianapolis a couple of times. I do have a good friend who lives there.

Bloomington, IN: The 900th US City to Visit Mustangrambles
Here’s to you, Bloomington, hope you have a mild winter and a terrific summer.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/geography/bloomington-in-the-900th-us-city-to-visit-mustangrambles/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/climategate-the-uncle-no-one-recognizes/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/climategate-the-uncle-no-one-recognizes/#comments Tue, 08 Dec 2009 13:21:06 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=405 In most all large family reunions, there is an uncle or aunt or cousin that no one talks about. This person has disturbed the family karma and is shunned by most of the hierarchy of established relatives.
When they show up, they are ignored and children are kept away from them. Well, this one showed up big time in the political family.

ClimateGate is an unfortunate truth that is being ignored by all the fawning politicos and media darlings who sucked up the fantasy that man has severely impacted the climate and can responsibly mend the horrid rise in temperatures.

Pride and not reason is the main cause for the non-reporting by the media and by the refutations of those in power who have staked their reputations on the inconvenient untruths spouted by charlatans like Al Gore and the leaders at the CRU and UN.

The secondary cause is the possible loss of money and the power that was sought by those whose aim was to increase their control of world governments, financial systems, and the freedoms of the peoples of the world.

Check out this site for several interesting articles on ClimateGate.

http://www.digitaljournal.com/search/?q=climategate

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/climategate-the-uncle-no-one-recognizes/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/football-texas-nebraska-pitt-cincinnati-oregon-ore-state/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/football-texas-nebraska-pitt-cincinnati-oregon-ore-state/#comments Sun, 06 Dec 2009 04:44:01 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=404 I think we have seen the best college football the past three days that we have ever seen.

First, Oregon’s scrappy win against an incredible Oregon State for the Rose Bowl birth. A nail-biter for sure. Oregon State surprised me with good offense and defense, and I feared for my fightin’ Ducks.

Second: Had not much stake in this one except rooting for the Cincinnati team, a perennial also ran when I went to Tulsa U. in the Missouri Valley Conference. My son is dating a girl from Pittsburgh so I was split. A great game though with another great finish.

Third: Alabama crushed Florida. I thought ‘Bama would win, but I was really surprised at how well they dominated the game. They’re my pick in the BCS championship game.

Fourth: Texas at Nebraska. I thought Texas would win handily. Boy, was I wrong! Nebraska dominated the game. Two penalties in the last minute and a half pulled Texas into the win column.
As a Sooner watching Oklahoma lose to the Huskers, I figured Oklahoma managed to lose another one. I didn’t give Nebraska the credit for beating OU. I have to apoligize for that. Nebraska is one heck of team and deserves better recognition for a great team, a great coach, and a great effort.

My prediction for the BCS Championship is: Alabama 35, Texas 17

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/football-texas-nebraska-pitt-cincinnati-oregon-ore-state/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/climate-change-scientists-reveal-themselves/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/climate-change-scientists-reveal-themselves/#comments Tue, 01 Dec 2009 01:44:43 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=403 The recent release of emails and documents related to the CRU (Climate Research Unit) at East Anglia University in Great Britain shows what many of us have said all along. Corrupt Scientists have furthered their own agenda through deceit, withheld data, and manipulated data. Guess the old adage is right, “Follow the Money”. In this case, increased government funds for research and increased prestige in a world circus of Global Warming. Possibly, and even more sinister, is the fomenting of a terrible lie that would result in greater global power for the UN and less power and prestige for the industrialized nations that would suffer great economic damage through the idiotic cap and trade.

Why don’t people understand that once our economy is decimated by these eco-taxes that we will no longer be able to help non-developed countries?

CHECK OUT MY GLOBAL WARMING PAGE FOR NUMEROUS NEW ARTICLES.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/climate-change-scientists-reveal-themselves/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/who-will-pick-up-tab-for-surge/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/who-will-pick-up-tab-for-surge/#comments Tue, 01 Dec 2009 01:06:47 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=402 This is a guest blog.

That’s the title of an article in today’s Politico, a newspaper following issues and those in them here in DC. It’s on the third page, in three columns. It discusses who is going to pay for the surge in Afghanistan, to include the premise that those families making more than $150K will do so in taxes, thus being penalized for being successful to support something they probably morally don’t. POTUS is laying out this plan tomorrow night at the Academy, of all places. Then it offers differing quotes from a variety of talking heads.

However, the article does not answer the real question. The real question is not one of money. The cost for the surge will be paid by our service members and their families. The claim is that the number of troops in country will rise from 68,000 to 100,000. There have been 928 US fatalities there so far.

It just bothers me sometimes when people overlook the real cost of war. I work in the cost, and I’ve seen it, so maybe I’m little biased.

Whatever happened to not wanting to fight a war?

But, in any event, dammit, it’s not about the money. Surely we are not the only ones who get that.

The writer works with disabled veterans.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/who-will-pick-up-tab-for-surge/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/politics/politico-7-stories-barack-obama-doesnt-want-told/ http://mustangrambles.com/politics/politico-7-stories-barack-obama-doesnt-want-told/#comments Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:27:22 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=401 POLITICO has a great article that everyone should read. Please view it. It seems to be a fair look at some of Obama’s problems.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1109/29993_Page4.html

It is a quick read, concise and incisive.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/politics/politico-7-stories-barack-obama-doesnt-want-told/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/tiger-woods-above-the-law/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/tiger-woods-above-the-law/#comments Sun, 29 Nov 2009 17:00:15 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=399 If I had been in a wreck that destroyed public property at 2:25 A.M. on Friday Morning, the police would have insisted on a full statement, probably on site and at the time of the accident, or if I had been seriously injured, they might have waited until Friday morning around 9 A.M. to get my statement. There is no way they would not have insisted on a statement that day.

If by some miracle they were busy and couldn’t get to me that day, they surely would have come to my house on Saturday to get the statements. If my wife had gone to the door and told them that I was sleeping and that they should come back the next (3rd) day, they would have told her to wake me up and get my ass down stairs to talk to them.

However, I am just one of the millions of regular people, not those who are above the law by reason of stardom or wealth or power.

It must be nice to be Tiger Woods.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/tiger-woods-above-the-law/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/politics/obama-bows-again-and-the-chinese-guy-is-not-even-royalty/ http://mustangrambles.com/politics/obama-bows-again-and-the-chinese-guy-is-not-even-royalty/#comments Wed, 25 Nov 2009 03:47:44 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=398 Well, that’s three inappropriate bows that Obama has made to foreign dignitaries. The first two might, I’m very skeptical on the “might”, be excused because the King Of Saudi Arabia and the Emperor of Japan are “royalty”. Bowing to the Premier of China is inexcusable in any book of etiquette issued by the State Department.

He has show us to be weak and in a subservient mode. The Far East, and the Middle East do not look favorably on weak public actions. Obama is making himself a fool, and by extension, us too.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/politics/obama-bows-again-and-the-chinese-guy-is-not-even-royalty/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness-part-3/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness-part-3/#comments Sat, 21 Nov 2009 13:24:51 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=396 The PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS: Part 3.

Thomas Jefferson carefully worded this phrase for the Declaration of Independence. He realized that if worded, Life, Liberty and Happiness that he would be opening major problems for his new country. Unfortunately, the last 75 years have brought those problems into the American mainstream with the natural results we see today.

The phrase “Pursuit of Happiness” indicates that we all will have the op[portunity to try to be happy. We will be able to do those things that may bring us happiness. We will be FREE to choose our path through this life, FREE to try to obtain those goals, jobs, and money that will make us happy. It does not guarantee us that we will “choose wisely”. It does not guarantee that we will achieve our goals, get that job, or earn that kind of money we think we need. It merely recognizes that the opportunity is there. It does not say that society owes everyone a living. The grasshopper should not suck up the ant’s hard earned wages. As any farmer knows, too many grasshoppers can ruin the crop, just as too many people on the public dole can ruin the society. The ant who freely chose to work hard and save up for winter should be allowed to keep his earnings. He pursued his happiness and “chose wisely”.

Nobody, anywhere, can guarantee you happiness. Normal life events will always cause you some grief, some setback, some disaster from which it seems you will never recover. Some do never recover do to a lack of determination, patience, courage, will power, or physical strength. Mostly, we don’t recover because we don’t expect to ever be challenged by life, we don’t have the emotional reserves built up by having faced and survived tough times as children. Today’s modern American Society wallows in safety and good feelings. We try to never challenge our children’s self-esteem. In child sports we give everyone “Participation Trophies”. We try not to keep score so the little tykes won’t know they lost and suffer the agonies of defeat. We try to seal them off from hunger and disease so they will never suffer the flu. We make them wear helmets to bicycle and knee pads to skate. Consequently, because of these things, our children cannot cope with adversity.

They become devastated when things don’t go their way. Their first failure in life, say, getting fired from a fast food joint, can be cause for years of depression. By the way, in sports, the kids know the score. They know if they win or lose, you can’t hide it from them, Parents, so don’t try. Our teachers keep telling them how wonderful they are, how good their ideas are, how pretty the pictures. Teachers are told not to use a red pencil when correcting papers because it will hurt the pupils feelings and make them think they didn’t do well. Well, hell, they didn’t do well and they need to know it! They need to know that they aren’t making the grade and need to work harder.

As to disease and safety, many of our kids are so protected in infancy and early childhood that they do not develop the immune systems they need to protect them later in life. They are so wrapped up in Mommy’s little antiseptic cocoon that a mere cold will lay them low, cuts become infected, and the flu will devastate them. In the area of safety, with all the safe equipment, kids don’t get to know the agony of carelessly skinned knees, bumps on the noggin, bloody noses, and the occasional broken arm. There is no “mental callous” built up during childhood that will protect them later in life.

Children are protected from images of violence and death. Of course, gratuitous violence and death in the movies is not particularly good for anyone, but the normal images of a run-over dog or cat, the shooting and field-dressing of a deer, the killing of varmints, and the death of family members should not be hidden from children but addressed as normal life events. Many young people today are not prepared for the violence of our society or of our world. History classes in school do not dwell on the wars with their attendant death and destruction so when our young go to war, they are not prepared for the scenes they see or will participate in. They are not psychologically prepared to cause death or to endure the dangers and duration of war. A great part of this is the political meddling in war that causes a soldier to be afraid to shoot because he will be judged in court by non-soldiers if his shots go astray. It is the fallacy to training soldiers to kill, and then threatening them with punishment if they do kill when under fire by the enemy. This may be why we have such a surge in Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in our military returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Considering the length of time we’ve been there, and the number of military there, it is one of the safest wars our soldiers have fought in, ever. Yet, our suicide rates are rising, and more stressed individuals are returning in greater percentages than in any other war. In short, we’re raising weak generation because of our fear of allowing our children to experience life.

In our society today, thanks to 75 years of welfare allotments, payments to people who don’t work, won’t work, and teach their children not to work, we have non-participating members of our economy whose main goal is to suck as many free dollars from our taxes as they can. These elected representatives, then grant large sums of money to the non-working class of welfare people so that the welfare people will vote for these socialist dollar-sucking scumbags.

We need to vote them all, Republicans and Democrats, out of office at the first opportunity.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness-part-3/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness-part-2/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness-part-2/#comments Thu, 19 Nov 2009 22:40:24 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=395 Part 2 of Life, LIBERTY, and the Pursuit of Happiness.

Liberty, perhaps the very basic instinct of true Americans, has been with us since the days our fathers and mothers came to this land. Many fled religious persecution and many fled political persecution, and many fled economic conditions that reflected flawed leadership of their countries. All came here with the dream of liberty, the ability to live life without coercion from outside influences. All dreamed of being able to work, live, play, and raise a family in the way they felt was best for their family. None of them came here because the governmental yoke would direct them, harass them, pander to them, and be instrumental in the major decisions of their lives. Our ancestors and those that fought to throw off government oppression were making a statement that governments should exist because they were constructed and run by citizens that were of the common citizenry–not some aristocratic group of family nobleness; governments exists in support of the people–the people were the ultimate object to be sustained, not the government; and because the people realized that individually they could not sustain their freedom and needed a larger organization to provide defense and trade conditions that would lead to a fruitful and happy existence.

Our country became great because for the first 150 years (the slavery question can be dealt with separately) our federal form of government passed few laws to constrain commerce and no laws to dictate social structure or form. Today, our great country sees its currency falling woefully, laws being passed to restrict individual freedoms, social laws are being passed that are creating a new class of non-productive citizens that naturally vote for more largess from the government, and a leadership bereft of any of those values that underpin our history.

It is time to pass a new law, one that will restrict the vote to those of us who work and provide the engine of success for our economy. Those on the public dole should be disenfranchised because their only function in society is to vote for the party that gives them more money for doing nothing. Because they contribute nothing, and because they drain the public coffers, much like leeches from a pond, they should not be allowed to participate in the decisions on how this country is run.

Liberty is not free. Liberty is bought by the blood of those who defend it. Liberty is sustained by the sweat and toil of those who believe in it.

]]> http://mustangrambles.com/society/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness-part-2/feed/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness-in-three-parts/ http://mustangrambles.com/society/life-liberty-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness-in-three-parts/#comments Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:22:33 +0000 http://mustangrambles.com/?p=394 I woke up thinking that a brief discussion on these three “inalienable rights” might be in order. So, today, Part one, LIFE.

When we broke away from a greedy and corrupt parliament led by a so-so King, life was a tenuous thing at best. Medical science was in its infancy. Cleanliness and safety were little understood. Man’s life expectancy was short. Man’s life was filled with dangers from bad food to savage Indians to government’s quick race to the noose for minor and major offenses. Just as then, Americans look to their federal government for protection of their lives through maintaining a sufficient defense force to deter invaders and insurrection. Much as we rely on our local police forces for protection against criminals, in a larger sense we rely on our federal government for our armed forces for protection against those who would do use harm. More recently, that protection is focused on prevention of terrorism against us.

We do not expect that the federal government would set itself up to determine which of us to protect and which not to protect based on some variance in “worth”. Which one of us is not worthy to continue living, and which of us is worthy. Who contributes to the welfare of the nation, and who does not. If you set up national health care with its restricted budgets and conservative logistical goals, somewhere, someone, some group, will decided how much of what is to be available to the general public. Because of this, someone will go without what is needed and needed expeditiously and will die. Perhaps, many will die, probably the elderly will suffer the brunt of this (lack of) effort.

Those who support national health care may argue that more people will get health care than get it now. That’s sort of like saying more people will have cars than now, even if most are forbidden to buy new cars, but must make do with cars that are nearly antiques. Many people, especially the young, do not feel the need for health care insurance. They are probably right. Most won’t get some horrifying disease (despite TV’s adoration of hospital drama). Most will sail into middle life in good shape until time, reason, and higher wage levels move them into some health insurance plan that they or their employer will choose for them. Those that do get desperately ill will find that hospitals won’t throw them out on the streets, they will get care of some sort, even if the bills cause bankruptcy, once healed they can begin again, much like many divorced men do every year.

LIFE is a natural occurrence and is by definition uncertain in length and comfort. Our federal government should protect against forceful curtailment of life (except by due process in criminal law). LIFE is ours to do with what we shall. The federal government has no place in how we live LIFE.

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