There are hundreds (if not thousands) of recaps, reviews, etc of this weekends events at the NYC Hilton.  I don’t need to tell you that there were thousands (I think) of women and a maybe a couple of dozen men sprinkled in, all with different goals underscored by the commonality of blogging.  But even if you weren’t there, chances are if you are reading this, you know what it was all about.  So, I will not rehash what really requires no rehashing.

Instead, I will share what I learned, because obviously being in the minority at this event, my perceptions and what I took away, particularly from the keynote speeches will be markedly different than those of the majority.  In particular I took a lot away from the closing keynote, because while it was geared and spoke directly to the women of the crowd, the underlying theme is one that we all know but sometimes forget (or toss aside because of political use… but that is another story)… and that message is… “Yes, I can make a difference!”

Ever so often I tend to start shying away from posting here when I get too caught up in one of my phases.  In particularly one of my ranting phases.  ”Who wants to hear this?”  I ask myself.  ”Who cares?” and “What difference is it going to make?”  During the Keynote it was asked if the sponsors were there “because they like us?  No!”  And it very true.  We as consumers have a lot of power.  We as voices on the Internet have even more power.  We have the power to not only vote with our wallets, but to spread the word, not to mention the ability to do what PR people fear most… spread the word.

And oddly enough, just today, I saw on Twitter, a post that described this sentiment exactly:

@StephanieWDC: The era of effective consumer boycotts is over. Companies don’t change behavior, they just get better at PR.

And this helped gel my new affirmation I had pledged to myself.  This is NOT true unless we allow it to be true.  There are victories (albeit small at times) that are being won all over the place if you take the time to look.  More and more milk companies are asking farmers to take “No bovine hormone” pledges and offering milk that is no longer tainted with this.  Why?  Because consumers demanded it.  In many of the consumer products that dotted the exhibit all you were seeing the effects of the demands of consumers, items made with fresh ingredients, items that were now organic, or made with greener packaging.  No, it is not every company, and some of the companies are being sneaky (but I will address that tomorrow) with their ingredients, but the effects are clear, they are real and they are tangible.  And they are there because, “Yes… We CAN!”  (please again, put aside your political ideology, because that is not what this is about)

You will see “experts” that will say bloggers are a bunch of egotistical beings that like to hear themselves talk (so to speak), and to some extent, there is probably a modicum of truth to that.  I didn’t start blogging because of money, it is not my “job” it is a passion, and one I take pride in doing.  So, yes if that is egotistical of me… so be it.  But that doesn’t make my voice, my feelings, my opinions any less worthy.  It doesn’t mean that if I want to help effect change by supporting the removal of rBGH from milk, or warning others of the dangers of High Fructose Corn Syrup that my sharing that information is just as valid as any other persons.

There is a great line in the movie, “National Treasure” where Benjamin Gates (Nicholas Cage) paraphrases something from the Declaration of Independence:

“If there’s something wrong, those who have the ability to take action have the responsibility to take action.”

If you liked nothing else about this movie, this is a great line, and one that is an excellent take away for every person.  We as bloggers, whether the cause be big or small, whether we are trying to right injustices all over the world, or just in our own back yard, we have the tools… and I don’t mean the Web Server, or WordPress, etc.  I mean we have a voice, we have a platform, we have the ability to affect change, whether it be fixing problems with food, seeking parity between men and women in elected offices, ensuring our children get the educations they deserve, or finding the best knitting needles to make a scarf, whatever it is you strive to do, to say, to acquire the knowledge to learn, you have the ability.  Now it is up to you to go out and do it. say it.  be it.  Because, Yes… We Can!

I ranted a bit on Twitter back during the Olympics about the Proctor & Gamble “Thanks Mom” campaign.  I can sum up my those dozen or so Tweets and my feelings on the matter in a few simple words… “Screw You P&G.”

So, why am I going on about this again *now*?  Well, two reasons.  The first is because they have once again been pushing through with some bloggers on additional “Thank You Mom” posts, but the second is much more personal.  I have gone on (and on and on) about LatteGirl and her Ice Skating, here, on Twitter, IRL and anywhere else I can, and I know some of you at least are probably tired of hearing about it by now.  This week however, while LatteGirl is up in Boston competing at the ISI World Team Championships 2010, I am back at home, and it is this that is currently making me (despite my tag line), just a bit bitter.

As many already know, I take a very active interest in her skating.  I attend every competition I possibly can, I cheer her on as much as anybody can, heck I started taking ice skating lessons just to be able to have a better understanding of terms, and be able to spend some time with her in her element.  But just as important (I believe), I fund all of this.  So, no I am not in Boston right now, not because I don’t want to be there, but because we cannot afford for me to be there.  Besides the additional expense of me actually taking the trip, then we would have to board the dogs, and I would have to sacrifice income… Income that we need for her to be able to be able to participate in these events.

Tell me the truth, isn’t that worth a little appreciation for what Dad does?  No, I am not there, but that doesn’t make me any less of a supporter in her interests.  The title of this is a bit off, but I don’t know another way to put it.  I am not necessarily looking for a pat on the back, nor do I think most mothers do it for that reason.  They do it for the benefit of their kids as I do.  But, I guess it seems that marketers these days are falling all over themselves nowadays to ensure they are pitching to Mom, that Dad sort of gets forgotten in his role.  Don’t forget Dad, he cares too.

This weekend is Memorial Day in the U.S. as most (if not all) of you know.  When I was a kid, this was (next to Xmas) one of my favorite holidays.  I helped my dad several times build floats for the Memorial Day Parade, I went with him on the Sunday two weeks  before to help raise money for Disabled American Veterans, and on the Sunday before to decorate the graves of fallen soldiers with American Flags.  I’d help sell (well at least I thought I was helping) Poppies.   I’d run and collect .30-06 shells from the rifles used for the 21 gun salute and several times I got to march with him and his War Veterans Post in the Memorial Day Parade.

But I must admit, it has been a long time since I have really enjoyed the holiday.  People talk about Xmas losing its “meaning” (don’t get me started on that one), but I don’t know if any holiday has lost more of its true meaning than Memorial Day.

What is Memorial Day?  Memorial Day (originally Decoration Day) is a day set aside to Honor and commemorate those that lost their lives defending this country in a time of war.

Now I am not saying that people need to sit around and mourn or be solemn on this day.  I actually think and like the traditions of Barbecues and festivities that often take place.  Think of it as a giant Irish Wake to celebrate the lives of these brave men and women that have given their lives.

What Memorial Day ISN’T.

It isn’t JUST the “unofficial start of summer.”  While you are enjoying those burgers and cold drinks, don’t forget to remember those people that gave their lives so that you could enjoy those things.

Just as importantly (though some may not realize they are doing this), Memorial Day is most definitely NOT a day to use the military as your political pawn.  It is not a day to try and tell people how much more patriotic you are than somebody else.

It is not a day to make a statement about policies you would like to see enacted (or repealed).

Using these brave souls as a tool on this day is a disgrace to their memories… but yes, you do have a right to do it if you want, thanks at least in part to their sacrifices.

Remember those that have died in defending our country.

Celebrate in their honor.

Thank those living that continue to carry on those missions.

Leave the rhetoric until Tuesday… don’t worry, it isn’t going anywhere.

I know that seems like an odd combination, but please try and bear with me.  I had initially planned on writing about my experiences with attempting to put together a trampoline, but that will have to wait as I have a thorn in my paw.

It was really a fairly innocuous tweet from Lucretia M Pruitt (@LucretiaPruitt on Twitter), that really got me started again… but I really guess I should start with a little back story first, so insert the wavy screen filter and dreamy music as I bring you back a couple of years ago.

Here we are, circa 2007 or so.  My daughter whining about wanting a cell phone.  After all, “all her friends had them,” and she wanted one too.  It was also a time when you couldn’t open a newspaper without hearing stories about kids texting in class, and schools banning cell phone, and other such stuff.  I was honestly confused at the time.  Why were parents buying kids cell phones at such young ages?  I wasn’t indignant about it (more on that in a minute), but just couldn’t see the rationality of it.  Then slowly people started giving some rally valid points.  Kids in more than one place at more than one activity, was one of the first that really resonated with me.  But surely I didn’t have that issue since I only had one to worry about.  Some pointed out the GPS feature in case of a child being abducted, but that to me was more about marketing attempting to scare folks into buying a phone, because more than likely that phone would get tossed by the abductor.

Fast forward to 2009, and my daughter would be finishing her ice skating camp approximately 1/2 before anybody could get there to pick her up.  Now there was plenty of things to do and to keep her occupied for that half hour.  But there was something missing.  Something that didn’t fit in with our “in case of emergency plan” of making sure she had change to call one of us should the need arise.  That problem… there was no pay phone.  Look around.  There aren’t many left, and even fewer that actually function.

We thought about it… not for very long, and I went out and picked her up a Pre-paid mobile phone.  I sat down with my princess and explained the rules to her.  I explained the charges, and what limits she had to abide by.  A year later, she has followed those rules quite well… and it has worked out that we feel quite comforted that she can get in contact with us at any time in case of emergency. (Quick Pimp… This is what lead me to review the new Kin Phones from Microsoft, which I have done on my new Review Blog)

So now, we are considering the next step, and that is giving her a better phone.  Back in 2007, I was dead set against this, but in reality, it was trying to keep her little, and not acknowledging that times are different.  Markedly so.  There isn’t a pay phone everywhere.  And (provided you set down the rules and they listen to them), it teaches responsibility as an added bonus.  So really, it really is a great thing all the way around.

Now, I am a rather opinionated fellow (hey… I heard that).  Of this I do not and cannot argue (oddly enough).  Certainly, Lucretia and I have disagreed on things before (aha… you thought I forgot that I had mentioned her earlier didn’t you?).  But disagree doesn’t mean anything but the fact that we have varying view points at times.  What got me started on this was her Tweet that went:

You can curse me all you like. We got the kidlet her own cell for emergencies. Tired of loaning her my ‘droid

Curse you?  For giving a kid a cell for emergencies?  WTF.  And as is not uncommon, somebody else stated (better than I ever could) what was on my mind (in this case it was BusyMom)

@LucretiaPruitt Ya know? A phone is just a tool, not sure when it became some sign of parenting superiority. Don’t even start me…

There it was, something that has been bugging the ever living hell out of me lately.  Snooty, who the hell they think they are people with some sort of superiority complex.  There are some places, that it is just as equally inappropriate, but more expected, like in political conversations… but in parenting?? If you are a parent presently… then guess what… you are still going through on the job training, and that job isn’t done yet.  You haven’t graduated.  You do not have a “proven method” regardless of how well Muffy and Chad are doing at the Academy of Really big Important Sounding Name School that I use to show how great my kids are and rattle off to get adoration and hear sounds of jealousy from others.  You not not done.  So please, stop and think for a minute before you open your mouth.  Consider for a second that somebody else’s situation may be different than yours.  Consider the oh so slim possibility, that you may not be correct.  Shocking, I know.  But it is possible.  So just climb down off that high horse.  This doesn’t just apply to cell phones, or any one particular issue, but your overbearing, unwanted “edict” of trying to rein down your superior knowledge.  If you are still parent… your job is not done yet… and that means, you still do not have all the answers.  You have opinions.  Nothing wrong with sharing them.  But before you are going to start lecturing somebody else about their parenting.  Stop, sit down, and shut up, until that feeling passes.  Then try talking to somebody as an equal, share your opinions (if they are wanted), and don’t forget to listen as well… because you just might learn something.

Recently, I’ve learned that it is not always what I say, but how I say it that makes a big difference.  Tell me, what have you learned that you didn’t know before.

I am sure that some people have felt this for some time already.  Others may not have quite caught on yet.  But Facebook, the Social Networking powerhouse is broken.  No the site isn’t down.  But rather than continuing to try and sneak features by people that they eventually catch on to and turn off in their privacy settings, Facebook has now upped the ante and essentially crippled features unless you make your information public for all the world to see.

It apparently starting rolling out last week, but it finally hit my profile today.  A popup notifying me that it now links things in my profile.  My hometown, my likes, my previous employer information, etc.  OK, on the surface, it is not a horrible or particularly evil feature, I could link and find other people that went to my same high school, or worked at some of the same previous employers.  Except, all of that information is public to the world once I do that.  Not than any of this information is “top secret” stuff, but still, I would rather have some sort of filters against what I make easy for Phishers and other scam artists to cull, or at least make them work for it, and not provide everything a would be thief needs for identity theft to be served up to them for free.

OK, fine, so I will need to pick and choose what I am going to allow Facebook to link to, this way only what I don’t mind being public is out there.  Right?  Nope!  That doesn’t work either, and this is why I say Facebook is broken.  If you are not willing to make the information public… then Facebook will no longer allow you to have it as part of your profile… period.  They won’t just leave it unlinked… no, after you go through this process, anything you don’t allow it to link IS REMOVED FROM YOUR PROFILE!

I don’t mind ads, and I realize targeted information makes for better advertising dollars, and since Facebook is FREE (despite what all those stupid groups “warning” about Facebook starting to charge May 1, May 15, July 10th and August 33rd, prices from $4.95 to eleventy billion dollars a month are saying) and I don’t mind Facebook making money, they have simply gone from bad to downright evil in their attempts to coax people into making information public.

Now please don’t tell me something stupid like I could go back to using Friendster or MySpace.  Let us be honest for a second, MySpace is for bands and people that want to decorate their pages like a 12 year old with a poster fetish, and does ANYBODY use Friendster anymore?  Didn’t think so.

Yes, I know and am well aware of the privacy settings, and will turn off what I don’t want to be public.  But that prevents me from sharing things that I wish to with my friends and family.  Worse, now I also feel like I need to start a help group for those that may not be as tech savvy or are unaware of what the implication are of these moves.  Incidentally, if you feel unsure about what is being made public by any of these new changes, feel free to e-mail or leave a comment and I will be happy to help.

For those old enough to remember Hill Street Blues, at the beginning of every episode the Seargeant would warn them, “Let’s be careful out there.”  That now definitely applies to Facebook.  Be careful, be aware, and beware of what you may be exposing to the world.  Facebook is now broken.  Pass it on.

I’m sure some will see me as harsh, and even suggest things like “look at it from her perspective” or “she is just a kid” but in all honesty, right now I don’t care.  Destiny Hope… excuse me… Miley Ray, I think forgot who put her where she is today, and gave her what she has.  The young teen and tween fans (well really… us, the parents of those fans), the one’s she is now discarding because she “knows who she is” according to her latest write up in Parade Magazine.

’ My job first is to entertain and do what I love, and if you don’t like it, then change the channel. I’m not forcing you to watch me. I’m not forcing you to talk about me. I would do that pole dance a thousand times again, because it was right for the song and that performance. But, dude, if you think dancing on top of an ice-cream cart with a pole is bad, then go check what 90% of the high schoolers are really up to. It’s funny. I don’t know if a lot of parents remember what they were like as kids. But I’m like, ‘Dude, as if you were an angel!’”

She sighs. “I’ve learned I can’t live for what people are going to say. People are so judgmental—especially parents.

That is right Miley, we are judgemental. We are the ones that decide what concerts our children go to see, and what music they buy, and we decide what they watch because we are concerned parents.  And, if you don’t like that… then fine, I am taking my child AND my wallet and going home.

Yes, it is true that you are just a kid (despite what you probably think right now, being a rich, snot nosed teen), and of course you are going to make mistakes.  But, treat the people that spent the Billions of Dollars on you… and make no mistake about this… because Disney packaged you and sold you perfectly, those people are not going to be there after you keep up the “I don’t care about you attitude.”

Now, some of my anger is probably not Miley’s fault really.  I remember sitting with my little girl, excited that a new episode of Hannah Montana was coming on.  The songs didn’t make my ears melt (like Jonas does now), the acting wasn’t awful (unlike That’s so Raven) and I actually liked and felt I understood Billy Ray’s caring and worrying about his little girl.  I was on some level able to connect with the show almost as much as my daughter.  And having those times together is something I will always cherish.

But time does move on.  My daughter outgrew the show… I guess.  Either that or she (like I) realized that the show now stunk and was no longer entertaining.  Of course, I had  placed most of the blame on the writer’s strike thinking it took the show out of its rhythm.  Little did I know, it was thanks to the fact that you had turned into a prima donna that “hated” being a popular actress in a hit television show, because you didn’t like the outfits you had to wear.  It is called acting.  Not all your roles (assuming you get any more), are not going to “allow you to be who you are.”  I had a point.. oh yeah… time moves on, and it was time for the show to say good-bye.  And I will fondly remember the 1st two seasons, and the time I spent with my daughter watching Hannah Montana.  For that I say Thank You, and Hannah… you will be missed.

But Miley, you are now the pompous ass people have been saying you are turning into.  Something I refused to believe originally, when people were comparing some of your indiscretions into the same sort of self-implosion that  marred Britney Spears.  I fought and defended you, certain that your parents would be able to help you navigate your way through and avoid the big headed pompous attitude that ruins so many people that get fame too fast and too early.  But apparently, you know better since your parents “aren’t stoked” about your choices, but you don’t care.

I hope, for your sake I am wrong, but if you are paying attention, you are already starting to fade.  Disney is going to get whatever last bit of juice they can squeeze out of you with this stint as a “mentor” on American Idol.  I know you “don’t care” what people think, but you just might want to take a peek at the Entertainment magazines and just find out how much of a joke the general public and entertainment experts think of this idea.  But Disney might get a quick boost of viewers for Idol like they did with Dancing with the Stars when they milked your fandom multiple times with you, your dad and Cody Linly.

In one of those conversation you have with you dad, you just might want to ask him how fleeting stardom is.  Without Disney, you would just be the best singer at the Tennesee State Fair, and if you don’t mind you business and fans a bit better, that is where you might be again.  Good Riddance Miley… not that you care.

I sat and pondered this for a day, deciding whether I dared to write it.  I mean, first of all the few people that still may actually read this are not the people I am talking about.  (Unless by some chance this gets spread to a few of the “wrong” people… then it may very well become an example of what I am talking about).

After all, I am certainly not an “authority” on blogging, I am not a “social media expert” or any of the other titles that float around so freely these days.  I’m just a guy that blogs (and for the past year or so barely that).  But then again… my *brand* is “extra large, extra strong … without being bitter.”  I am an openly (and probably too loudly) opinionated blogger.  So, if I am going to own my brand… I need to stay loyal to it.

But it also puts me in a bit of a quandary.  I signed up to attend BlogHer this year, for a couple of reasons.  One… for the entertainment factor (I can’t wait to see what this years drama and controversy will be).  Two, to finally get a chance to meet and socialize with some people that are so spectacular in personality in their blogs, I just had to sieze the opportunity to finally get to put a live face to the words (I would love to do that with everybody that I read… maybe someday when I am rich and powerful, but in the mean time  this is at least an opportunity to meet several at one time).  And third, is to learn a bit more about what I am missing is the blogging world.  The “brand building” that I have heard so many people talk, blog, tweet, about in past events.  I want to learn a bit more… at least I think I do.

I say “think” because, I don’t know if it was the pithy title that set the mob over the edge, but the New York Times article “Honey Don’t Bother Mommy.  I’m too busy building my brand.” certainly got a section of the MommyBloggers circling their wagons.  The funny part is, for the most part, the article describes quite well, how MommyBloggers HAVE in fact built their brand… how as a collective they have become a force to be reckoned with (more on that shortly).

But instead, some clearly skimmed the article, others picked it apart selecting passages, others put words in that didn’t exist, and made a story about MommyBlogging to mean no woman can be taken seriously as a writer, and one or two I don’t think read it at all, rather took their cue from others and just wrote based on what they heard was a “wronging” and went from there.

Now, sure I am certain somebody would say, “but you are a guy, you have no idea about being a woman and the struggles it entails.”  And physically yes that is true, but I also know I pay a lot more attention to those details and am more aware of them than I suspect most would think, because I do worry what barriers of entry my daughter will face in the years ahead of her.  I also read a lot more mommyblogs that about anything else (well… except for tech blogs… but you get the idea).

My question becomes to these people is… are you trying to build a brand?  Have you attended panels on how to do this… or have you spoken at them?  Then why are you so offended by somebody pointing out that this is what you are doing?  Yes, I will admit the headline was corny… but really, building a brand is what you are doing… own it.

Now maybe I am starting to get a little annoyed because over the past 4 or 5 years, I have watched a certain amount of devolving going on, and it is disappointing.  Two items in the recent past still stick like a thorn in my pad… The first was the Bullshit “TSA kidnapped my baby” debacle.  If you dared question this Mommyblogger because her story did not sound right… you were ridiculed for it, how dare somebody question a Mommy Blogger.  How date the TSA do this!!  Except none of it was true.  No apologies to the beast just moved on looking for its next meal.

The other was the absolutely insane #nikonhatesbabies hashtag party that took place because “how dare Nikon not allow a mother to take an infant to a party… at night… at a bar?”  These are the same people that try to claim that Bloggy Boot Camp, and BlogHer are “no different” than any other technology conference.  Really?  On one side of the coin, I read demands of “if you are going to throw a BlogHer party as a vendor, you should know your crowd, and provide for children at the events.”  And then, out of the very same mouths comes “this is no different than SXSW or any other tech conference, and shouldn’t be viewed any differently just because it is a conference for women.”  Make up your minds ladies… Which one is it?

And… once again, one or two twitter messages went out from a couple of people about how sorry they were about the #nikonhatesbabies thing… but for the most part, the beast moved on to its next feeding ground.

Perhaps the arguement several years back at BlogHer was correct, and there needs to be a better definition of what is a “MommyBlogger.”  Just because you write, and you happen to be a mom, doesn’t necessarily make you a “MommyBlogger.”  At the same time, just because you are a mom and happen to have a blog, doesn’t make you a MommyBlogger either, nor does it give you an automatic right to ask for things.  I have now started unfollowing people that have put up tweets such as “I can’t afford to go to BlogHer, what airline wants to sponsor me and send me?”  and I would think anybody that wants “MommyBloggers” to be taken seriously to spend as much time beating down a person like that as they do when they feel slighted by some corporation, because it reflects poorly on all MommyBloggers.  Maybe if this can be broken up, then the pieces can each get the recognition they deserve, and each can have their own battle lines drawn, because right now, it looks like MommyBlogging has become the beast with an appetite for destruction that is just insatiable.

(Quick Reminder… Comment Approval is turned on because of spammers… but all non spam comments will be approved)

Embarrassingly, yesterday the New Jersey Senate voted down the Same Sex Marriage Act, because with an incoming, proud bigot coming in as Governor, it became OK to hate “teh gays” again I guess.

State Senator Sean Kean (R), who lives in what he calls “the gayest district in New Jersey” voted “No” on gay marriage.  I guess, voting in a way that represents the people of your district isn’t important in his and others eyes in the Senate.

I just want to make sure I have it on record, the 20 people that voted no, the 20 people that think that being bigoted is OK, that think “all men are created equal… except those faggots.”  This way, when election time rolls around again, and they say they want to represent the people of New Jersey, we can return the favor and say “NO” to them.

The Republicans that Voted NO:

Bateman, Branchburg
Beck, Red Bank
Bucco, Denville
Cardinale, Demarest
Connors, Surf City
Doherty, Washington Township, Warren County
Haines, Springfield
S. Kean, Wall
T. Kean, Westfield
Kyrillos, Middletown
Oroho, Franklin Borough
O’Toole, Cedar Grove
Pennacchio, Montville
Singer, Lakewood.

The Democrats that added to the embarrasement by voting no

Girgenti, Hawthorne
Madden, Washington Township, Gloucester County
Rice, Newark
Sacco, North Bergen
Turner, Trenton
Van Drew, Dennis

I’m really tired of some of this bullshit. I ran across a poll on Facebook last night. The one asking “Should Gay Marriage be legalized?” Now, I must admit… my initial response was “No.”

Why? Well, heterosexual marriage doesn’t need to be “legalized,” interracial marriages, which was like the last generation’s version of this issue doesn’t (and didn’t) need to be “legalized.” And along that same lines, I don’t see why “Gay” marriage needs to be legalized.

Now, for all you religious freaks that are quick to judge others (despite supposedly following the teachings of a book that says, “Judge Not, Lest you be judged.” Nobody says your faith MUST recognize or perform ceremonies that you do not believe in. My guess would be that any homosexual couple that wanted to get married would rather not be associated with a bunch of closed minded bigots like yourselves anyway.

So why is it that you can’t just let it go? Nobody is asking you to “like” or even “approve” of something you do not. I know several Jewish people that have been considered the “black sheep” of the family for marrying outside of their faith. I have a cousin that endures a lot of flack from people because she married an African-American man. Some people are tolerant, and others continue to have their beliefs of what is right and “wrong” but there is nothing that actually prevents them from doing this.

So why are people struggling so hard to make it “illegal” for two people who love each other to show their commitment, simply becuase they are the same gender? It is just so wrong… or as the homophobes would say… It is so gay.

OK, awkward segue, I admit, but while I am on this topic, I love the new PSA commercials from ThinkB4youspeak.com. I remember (but can’t find) a story recently where a student was suspended for saying somebody was “so gay” because she (and her parents) couldn’t understand what was so wrong with what she said. Unfortunately if you look at some of the “replies” and “comments” on YouTube to the campaign, and it seems that the only people (so far) who “get it” are the people that already know it is wrong. Others continue their homophobic tirades, or just show their ignorance is supporting “free speech.” Still, I am hopeful that maybe it will reach at least some people that picked up the phrase without actually understanding what they are saying.

Finally, I missed this initially, but apparently identifying yourself as a Lesbian gets you banned from Xbox Live, because others find it “offensive.” I realize Microsoft is a big corporation and that within their ranks there are some people that are probably not the brightest bulbs on the planet within their employ… but I am completely confounded by a corporation founded by what could be considered the original “nerd squad” (see not funny if you are a nerd) allowing a policy of intolerance. I don’t own an Xbox, thus I don’t participate in Xbox Live. But until this policy changes, Microsoft can be damn sure, they will not get a dollar from me until that changes.

It just continues to boggle my mind.  I keep hoping that someday soon, this whole silliness can be put to bed, so we can all have a a yabbadabba-doo time,  A dabba-doo time, We’ll have a gay old time.

It is that time of year.  That post where I get berated for being inclusive instead of exclusive.  I hear how offensive it is to wish someone to be well, and to have a Happy Holiday.  Yes, once again, more people are joining in on the faux War on Christmas.  This game, started (as far as I know) by Bill O’Reilly, a man so whacked, that even the top brass at Fox News don’t like him, has now been carried on by others, including this year, a particularly idiotic piece by Michael Reagan.

I find it “particularly idiotic” because he is clearly transparent in his attack.  He blames “a handful of secular progressives who loathe Christianity and any celebration associated with it.”  Apparently, it would never pierce his thin skin to realize that a Jewish person may not want to be wished a “Merry Christmas” any more than he would like to be wished a “Happy Kwanzaa.”  He doesn’t want to appear quite this crass, so he tries to bury the whole thing as people out to “destroy Christmas.”  While I do not doubt or deny there may be a few nuts out there that have this thought, most simply would like to be recognized for their beliefs even if they aren’t Christian.  Recognition that while a majority of people may in fact be Christian, we are not a theology, and that their rights and beliefs are not any better or worse.  

For all his claims to the otherwise, nobody is actually attempting to stop anybody from having a Merry Christmas, or for Christians to celebrate and recognize Christmas as the high holy holiday that it is for them.  They just don’t want to participate (and perhaps that is the problem for single minded morons like this).

He forgets, while claiming that it is “a birthday not a holiday” that the holiday has been around much longer.  I won’t go into the details about previous silliness or the historical moving of  Jesus’ birthday to coincide with the holiday, I have documented that previously, and most rational folks already know this.  But apparently he doesn’t see the irony in his own statements:

My fellow Christians should join me in pledging never again to shop in any commercial establishment where the clerks greet us with that “Happy Holiday” greeting as an insult to our religious beliefs, just as we must defend the exhibition of the menorah or other Jewish symbols at Hanukkah.

Just what Jewish symbols is he supposedly defending by demanding that it is “Merry Christmas” or nothing? And am I the only one that finds it humorous that he complains that about people being “forced” into saying “Happy Holidays” but now he wants to blackmail commercial establishments by threatening to not shop their unless he is greeted as he expects. And he goes on to say, “Have a Merry Christmas. And don’t be afraid to say that loud and clear to everyone.”  That’s right.  Don’t give a damn about who you may offend, because you are a Christian, and as such have a right to offend whomever you wish, at least according to Reagan.

So why is this?  Why is it that being inclusive to spread love to everyone so darn “offensive” to some Christians?  Does “Peace on Earth and goodwill toward man” only apply to a select few?  As the old saying goes, “Can’t we all just get along?”  Do you really need to have a crusade?

Whether it is Happy Hannukah, Merry Christmas, Blessed Yule, Happy Kwanzaa, I wish you and yours the best for a happy and healthy Holiday Season.

It is a race to see who falls out of the spotlight faster now that their “15 minutes” is up.

So who will disappear quicker?  Joe Wurzelbacher or Joe Lieberman

Honestly I don’t care as long as they both go away.

This will mark the end of politics on this blog (your welcome).

Those that may from time to time want to see the political talk, I will be starting another blog just for that purpose, The Daft Dem.  Because I don’t believe yesterday was the end… it was only the beginning.

But I will be happy to bring this blog back to a more cheerful and stop be “sooooo serious”  (see Liz, I’m trying)

Next Week will mark the Return of TechParent Tuesday.

Look, there is virtually nobody I can sway at this point.  If you are of the mind to vote for John McCain at this point, what can I possibly say?  You are either party loyal to a fault, are a lemming, or have latched onto a lie.  There is nothing I can do about it.  At least not number 1 or 2.  But with regards to number 3… If you are going to vote for McCain, so be it… but please don’t if these are one of your reasons.

1.  He is a Muslim.  No, he is not.  No matter how many times Sean Hannity swears it to be true.  No matter how many times somebody slowly stretches out HUUUUUUUU SSSSSAAAAAIIINnnnnn to try and draw some sort of mental image in your head to connect him with Saddam Hussein.  It is a flat out LIE.

2.  He is black.  Well, I can’t argue this, he is.  But that is not a reason to not vote for him.  C’mon man, it is 2008, are you still a racist?  Put the frickin’ KKK robes away, take a slug of moonshine and realize that, “that thar colored fellow” is a whole lot smarter (and probabaly better educated) than you.

3.  He is gonna raise my taxes.  I am going to go out on the limb on this one a bit, and say blankly… No he isn’t.  If you are making $250K or more a year, you are not sitting around reading blogs.  You might have a blog, but you probabaly have somebody write it for you (or at least type it).  Somebody explain to me please, how all these people that are actually going to get a tax cut under Obama’s plans are screaming about socialism, and fearing spreading the wealth around?  Let me tell you something sparky, your one of the people he is spreading it to… because like I said, if you were making $250K +, you would have better things to do with your time than to stand around an be a “Joe the Plumber” clone.  You remember Joe, he is the self important twit that exibits my point so clearly.  He isn’t in the same city as the ballpark of making $250K, but goes to rallies and likes to pretend he does, and gets indignant about spreading the wealth, when his dumb ass would be the one that benefits.

I could go on, but you were going to get the point, you would have done so by now.  Both sides have stretched the truth, as politicians running for office often do.  But one side has done nothing but smear and flat out lie.  And if you are going to not vote for Barack Obama, at least do it for something better than being caught up in the lies.  Prove you have a brain and think for yourself.  No matter which way you end up voting.

And regardless of how you vote, it should (but doesn’t) go without saying.  Be sure to vote.  Be sure to encourage others to do the same.  It is not a right, it is a responsibility of being a citizen.

I’ll see you on the other side of what will probably be 24 hours of hell and fail whales as we await the outcome.

Look, I am not any big fan of bailing out a bunch of Investment Bankers and banks.  Fine, I am not a fan of the idea at all.  And I am not going to spend too much time on the negatives, the golden parachutes, idiotic CEO pay scales, and the like.  These have all been well documented and hammered home on virtually every blog and Tweet on the subject.

However, in all the negativity on the subject, something has gotten lost, and I don’t think (well I know, but I didn’t want to overstate it) many quite understand the gravity of the situation, and why it wasn’t just an “easy” decision for lawmakers to just tell these companies to, “go ahead and fail,” or  ”you made your your own bed.”  It just isn’t, as much as we would like to think it is, to untie these situations from the rest of the economy because of the scale of it all.

A car dealer not far from my home, Bigelow Motors, had been in business for 66 years.  It had weathered upturns and downturns many times over the years, but they were basically forced to close their doors this past week.  The reason?  They lost their line of credit.

In my own business, there are times that I need credit to cover the time between when I secure the supplies I need and the time my client pays me.  Without that line of credit, I am seriously hampered in what I can do and what orders I can complete.  

This is a common way of doing business for companies big and small (only the size of the line of credit changes).  From small corner delis that need to cover stock to mega corporation deals, there is very little that is done “in cash” because income and outlay do not always line up nice and neatly.

Obviously, the impact on business also affects employment as well.  Everybody at that car dealership I mentioned earlier is out looking for a job now.  Unemployment is up all over the place, and would only get worse as businesses need to either cut back or shut down because they are not able to conduct business as usual.

So, just understand, it was not a “no-brainer” to just vote this bill down. (Well, it was in that crazy first draft sent over from President Bush, but that was pretty much obvious to everybody except I guess President Bush and Treasury Secretary Pauson).  Is it ideal?  No.  Did it have to be as quickly as it was?  Unfortunately, Yes.

While people joke around now about how it hasn’t fixed everything already, this plan it going to take time to actually start having an effect, so even now we are still in crisis, but everyday that it waited is more time until implementation takes effect, and the more business that are apt to fail if this wasn’t passed in some form.

What I think a lot of people are shocked with, it that they got a good look at how Washington works.  The sort of wheeling and dealing (and pork additions) that happened here goes on constantly.  It is “how things work” and while this is no secret, it was clearly (and expensively) on display here.

I guess what I am trying to say here is, that I am not saying you shouldn’t be angry about what is going on.  I sure am.  But be angry at the right people, for the right reasons.  Look to former Texas Senator Phil Gramm and his slipping in of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act (CFMA) that enabled things like the Enron collapse, and the bundling of “derivatives” that helped make this mortgage crisis possible.  Be angry that this same Phill Gramm is on John McCain’s short list to be Treasurer of the United States.  Be angry at those that politicized this process and demanded pork for their vote.  But don’t take a “yes” vote in and of itself to be the whole reason.  This really wasn’t an easy situation for anyone to swallow, and there are valid reasons to have voted for the bailout.  The damage has long since been done, and now it needed to be fixed to keep the situation from getting worse.

It is probably enough to have Milton Hershey rolling over in his grave.  Last year a number of chocolate manufacturer’s lobbied to attempt to get the definition of chocolate changed so that they could substitute cheap fats in place of cocoa butter when making chocolate.  This would have allowed them make the product cheaper, and to profit more by selling the cocoa butter at much higher profits to the cosmetics industry for use in lotions, soaps, etc.  This however failed, and the FDA re-iterated that ”Cacao fat, as one of the signature characteristics of the product, will remain a principal component of standardized chocolate” according to the update.

The part that was most galling (to me anyway) was a statement by Kirk Saville, a Hershey’s spokesman, who said (emphasis added by me):

There are high-quality oils available which are equal to or better than cocoa butter in taste, nutrition, texture and function, and are preferred by consumers.

Preferred by consumers?  Preferred? I don’t think so, Kirk.   Oh, yeah take out the Cocoa Butter which actually has some nutritional benefit, and lets replace it with hydrogenated corn oil instead.  Screw the fact that we take chocolate and actually make it unhealthy… it is healthy for profits.  What this really means is, I think we can get away with it, and nobody will notice.

In the Biography of Milton Hershey that can be found at hersheypa.com

He took great pride in the growth of the school, the town, and his business. For the rest of his life, he always placed the quality of his product and the well-being of his workers ahead of profits.

Well, obviously Milton is no longer in charge of the Heshey’s chocolate company.  Hershey has done an end run around the issue.  So, they can’t call their imitation chocolate “chocolate” but that didn’t stop them from making the change in a number of their products.  According the the post on CandyBlog, a number of Hershey’s products are no longer milk chocolate, but instead are now “chocolate flavored candy.”

Look at the list of ingredients from a package of the original “Milk Chocolate” Kissables.

Milk chocolate (sugar, cocoa butter, chocolate, nonfat milk, milk fat, lactose, soy lecithin, PGPR & artificial flavors), sugar, red 40, yellow 5, yellow 6, blue 1 & carnauba wax.

Now look at the “Chocolate Candy” Kissables:

Sugar, vegetable oil (palm, shea, sunflower and/or safflower oil), chocolate, nonfat milk, whey, cocoa butter, milk fat, gum arabic, soy lecithin, artificial colors (red 40, yellow 5, blue 2, blue 1, yellow 6), corn syrup, resinous glaze, salt, carnauba wax, pgpr and vanillin.

See anything missing? Yup, that is right, no Milk Chocolate in it any longer. The same is true for Whatchamacallits, Milk Duds, Mr. Goodbar and Krackle.  Why hasn’t anybody noticed?  Because Hershey went to great lengths to make it so that it is difficult to notice.  (And in part, thanks to a slight change in labeling law on what has to be called “imitation” ).  Products that once bore the words “Milk Chocolate” now instead are listed as “chocolate candy,” “made with chocolate” or “chocolatey.”

Actually, it seems in once case apparently it did get noticed, where Almond Joy was returned to Milk Chocolate after comsumers complained.

Fortunately (so far) Hershey Bars, Kisses, and Reese’s Peanut butter cups remain unaffected and are still Milk Chocolate products. Tell Hershey what you think of their faux chocolate, because messing with our chocolate is just plain wrong.

Like many, when Sarah Palin was picked for a running partner, I said, “Sarah Who?”  At first blush, I thought this was just an ill conceived move in desperation to try and grab, “disgruntled Hillary Voters” and women in general. (As I suspect many others have done as well).I held off commenting on this situation at first because there was little I was going to say that hadn’t been said far more eloquently by somebody else.  But as I watch this from the sidelines, I am quickly starting to understand.  This was no “fluke.”  Sarah Palin fits perfectly into the Karl Rove built world of politics.  I was both thrilled and disappointed when I read about the hackers that had gotten into Palin’s Yahoo! e-mail account.  Thrilled of course that now there was obvious proof that she was in fact doing what she was being accused of doing.  She was circumventing public records Acts and using alternative methods to send e-mail so as to cover her tracks.I was disappointed that this was done, because it obviously gives Palin and her supporters the cover they need in this situation.  They cry foul (which in all fairness it was), and can of course now claim that it was all a hack and that none of the e-mails were “real.”  They would be lying through their teeth in doing so, but Palin (and John McCain) have both shown that even when caught, they will go right on lying. It is so bad that even Time Magazine admits,

 The situation has gotten so intense that we in the media have slipped our normal rules as well. Usually when a candidate tells something less than the truth, we mince words. We use euphemisms like mendacity andinaccuracy … or, as the Associated Press put it, “McCain’s claims skirt facts.” But increasing numbers of otherwise sober observers, even such august institutions as the New York Times editorial board, are calling John McCain a liar.  

I mean, how bad is it when Karl Rove is questioning your practices? No, Sarah Palin was no “accident.”  

The Times reports that using webmail for official business was Standard Operating Proceedure in Alaska:

While Ms. Palin took office promising a more open government, her administration has battled to keep information secret. Her inner circle discussed the benefit of using private e-mail addresses. An assistant told her it appeared that such e-mail messages sent to a private address on a “personal device” like a BlackBerry “would be confidential and not subject to subpoena.”Ms. Palin and aides use their private e-mail addresses for state business. A campaign spokesman said the governor copied e-mail messages to her state account “when there was significant state business.”On Feb. 7, Frank Bailey, a high-level aide, wrote to Ms. Palin’s state e-mail address to discuss appointments. Another aide fired back: “Frank, this is not the governor’s personal account.”Mr. Bailey responded: “Whoops~!”

She has shown herself to be willing to make up her facts as she goes along quite nicely.  Whether it is her claim that Alaska provides 20% of the nations energy (Alaska provides about 3.5%), or flat out lying when she says she told Congress “Thanks but no thanks” for funding the bridge to nowhere.  After all when she was running for Governor she said during an Interview:

Yes. I would like to see Alaska’s infrastructure projects built sooner rather than later. The window is now – while our congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist.  

 Oh she eventually threw the project under the bus, but not until it had been all but killed in Congress, and had become the poster project for pork barrel spending.She has also shown the same cut-throat expectation of loyalty and will fire anybody that does not give her 100% support, that we have come to know during the Bush years. In other words, refuse to give Sarah the right answer when asked if you would ban books from the library that Sarah Palin doesn’t like and you are gone.  When I first saw Sarah Palin, I likened her to Geraldine Ferarro, a poor choice done out of desperation.  I was so wrong.  While Ferarro was a poor choice, and her inept run probably hurt the cause of women in politics more than anything, Sarah Palin is far more dangerous than that.   

Trade shows for the year are done, as are (hopefully) business trips.  So other than a new podcast we (“we” being myself along with the unflappable BusyMom) are trying to launch (but more on that soon), life should allow me to get back to blogging on a regular basis again.  I hope.   I don’t know if it is because I haven’t had much opportunity to blog lately or not, but I have been storing up one rant or another, and it seems like all my topics are leaning this way.  I hoped to start out a bit more mild mannered, but decided, if I did that I might not ever get back to it… so my apologies, but here we go with rant one in the series.Over at Career and Kids, there was an interesting little bit on Does Your Husband “Baby-Sit”?  This is one of those things that is a sore subject for me… from a variety of angles.  On one hand, sometimes I think this gets a bit overblown. Even in the comments, several women complained that men should not refer to it a “baby-sitting” when it comes to their own kids.  Really more than anything,  it is just a difference in choice of words.   Blame it on sexist games or “being manly men” or whatever, I know dads that while every bit as happy to be with their kids as anybody else, but when they are talking to their “buddies” use phrases like “being stuck baby-sitting.”  It has nothing to do with “expectations of their wife” or how they feel about their kids.  Turn it around, and even if they would really prefer to be out shopping with their friends, but he is on a business trip, she would NEVER say she was “stuck baby-sitting” to her friends (even if this is how she felt), because of appearances.  After all “what kind of mother would say that?”Yes, there are exceptions to all of these scenarios. There are fathers that treat their wives like they are slaves, and the kids are nothing but critters under foot that the wife is supposed to deal with, and keep in their place because he had a hard day at work.  But they are exceptions, these are outdated 1950′s versions of cavemen (or Republicans).  And these clods wouldn’t “baby-sit” anyway (at least not without a fight), so really the complaint is about bad wording.  On the other side of this coin, do you ever wonder why some of these issues continue to come up?  Look around, read some blogs and really pay attention to what is being said.  Look at advertising, and even (I may have mentioned this once before), look at medias portrayals of men as parents.  Take a look at any “parenting” magazine.  Count how many ads you see that aren’t specifically targeted towards women (you won’t need more than one hand, and will probabaly have a finger or three to spare).  The argument will most likely be, “but men don’t read these magazine.”  And that is probably true, but why?  The articles are writen to, for and about women.  The ads are selling directly to (and exclusively to) women.  So why would a man read it?Take in a sermon (or speech) from to biggest (or at least loudest) voices of the “moral majority” and you head how men are not men any more.  How women are supposed to stay home to take care of the children.  While they treat this more like the previously mentioned silly outdated theories of the men “make the money,” the other not talked about side of it, is that obviously these people don’t think (and in some cases they may be right) that these men are fully capable to be a full time parent. Read a few Mommy Blogs long enough and you will see how women are “amazed” at how well things went when she went on a trip, or how she doesn’t trust him to check their homework, or get them to soccer practice, and so on.  They love their husbands (I presume), but yet they trust them with nothing, allow them to do nothing, in many cases don’t bother to tell them anything, but then don’t understand why he is disconnected with “everything going on.”My final (and admittedly a bit silly, but it is worth the point I hope to make) complaint is how father’s are portrayed in movies, media, etc.  Funny, how so many women complain and hate “pricess” things because of all the supposed negative stereotypes (that is a whole other rant for another day), but let us look for a second at the dads.  Cinderella’s father couldn’t raise his daughter alone, so he chose to marry (granted poorly) so that his daughter would have a proper mother.  Staying in Cinderella you have the crazy king, insistent on getting his son married.  ”Crazy Old” Maurice trying to raise Belle.  Bambi basically learned it all on his own out in the wild because his mother died.  While he eventually catches on, the humor in Mr. Mom is how inept Jack is at taking care of his kids when his wife goes off to work.  Daddy Daycare also shows that men have “no clue” how hard it is to raise children.I am a parent too.  I care just as much, and do just as much for my daughter as my wife.  And do so happily.  If you don’t like the wording on how I describe it, change the stereotypes.  Don’t make me look either “whipped” or “freaky” for wanting to do so.  But until that changes, don’t harp on me for how I choose to describe it either*.(*Disclaimer: I haven’t ever used the phrase “baby-sitting” to describe spending time with my daughter… but I am trying to make a point). 

I can tell I was really wrapped up lately in prepping for my trade show, since I somehow missed this earlier on.   I mean how I missed the fact that every picture on Flickr was offered up for sale from July 3rd – 5th is simply amazing to me.  It wasn’t until I spotted it on the This Week in Photography Blog that I really took notice.

What has upset me more though is Flickr‘s response, or more correctly their lack of response.   After all, this wasn’t a common, grab a picture and use it sort of thing (which, btw it amazes me how many big corporation have been caught doing this).  This was a company using Flickr’s own API, to download images and sell them.  I expected some sort of response, even if they didn’t plan to make changes to the API, at least to clarify that this company did things wrong and didn’t use the API correctly.  Instead… silence.

Now, I love Flickr.  I have a pro account, I have bought pro accoutns for other people as gifts.  But I am uncomfortable with them right now.  I am certainly not, until they do or say something, going to upload any high res. photos to their site, and I am debating on what I should do with the photos that are already there.  Do, I pull them down?  Take the time to make low res. versions of all of them and replace what is there?  What about you?  Have you changed how you have used Flickr?

For the most part, falling only perhaps to Liz, I am as pro-New Jersey person as you will find.  Despite what a lot of people and comedians may lead you to believe there is a lot to like.  I am not going to go into a long list here (your welcome).  But one of those things that I am typically happy about is that (perhaps thanks to northern logistics), it is a place that race does not usually play a big part in the way people thing.

Perhaps that is why then I am utterly shocked and amazed when something like this comes along.  It seems that Pemberton Republican Club in New Jersey thought it would be cute to try and link Barack Obama and OJ Simpson with the slogan, “Obama loves America like O.J. loved Nicole.”

The club’s Web master, Ed Kuck, didn’t respond to a message left at his home but told The Philadelphia Inquirer that he saw the slogan on an Internet site and copied it onto the club’s Web page as a joke.

“I just want to apologize to anybody who was offended, because that wasn’t our intention at all,” Kuck told the newspaper.

Racism, is apparently still “funny” to some people.   While this fact does not shock me, and I fully expect to see more pathetic attempts to inject racism into the race, I never expected it to come from here.  Just goes to show, narrow minded people live everywhere.

I have had it.  People just stay away, because the only conclusion left is that I cause cancer.   How else do I look at it.  It is not region, the only common factor in this “cluster” of cases is… me.

I honestly didn’t think about it a couple of years ago, when my father passed away.  I was too concerned with mother dealing with Islet Cell Carcinoma (which she is battling quite well so far) to have started putting the correlations together as my Sister-In-Law whipped Breast Cancer into submission.  However, a sneaky suspicion started when my step-father-in-law passed away 8 or so months ago.

My string of “victims” continued when my uncle finally gave up, his body riddled with cancer.

Perhaps I should find myself a nice lead lined Panic Room, and stash myself in there.  Before somebody else contracts cancer.

That could be a phrase you see less often around the blogosphere.  In a truely bone headed move, the Associated Press has shown that they are not much different than the MPAA and RIAA, where they try to hold old media standards to the web, because they don’t think they are getting paid enough by everybody.

According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation:

Last week, the Associated Press sent the Drudge Retort seven DMCA takedown notices, demanding that the site remove excerpts of AP articles ranging from 33 to 79 words that were linked through to authorized copies of the AP stories.

See what I did there?  I quoted another source, attributed it to them, and linked to the full article, providing potentially more traffic to them.  I did not steal their story, I followed what has been considered Fair Use, even before the days of the Internet.  Before you would have a Reference Page, Foot Notes, etc.  You needed to ensure your credited and cited your sources, but it has always been fair use to quote another source.

Not so according to the AP.  They want you to link to them, AND NOTHING ELSE.  After the inital lashback against their tactics, the A.P. backed off (sort of) according to the New York Times.

 After that, however, the news association convened a meeting of its executives at which it decided to suspend its efforts to challenge blogs until it creates a more thoughtful standard.

“We don’t want to cast a pall over the blogosphere by being heavy-handed, so we have to figure out a better and more positive way to do this,” Mr. Kennedy said.

Mr. Kennedy said the company was going to meet with representatives of the Media Bloggers Association, a trade group, and others. He said he hopes that these discussions can all occur this week so that guidelines can be released soon.

Now, reading this at first, it sounds like maybe they learned their lesson, but in “hopes that these discussions can all occur this week so guidelines can be released soon” tells me that they are only trying to find a new tactic, because after all there are already guidelines in place as I said earlier.  It is known as Fair Use and it is already codified by the U.S. Copyright Office.

On a bit of a side note, I would love to know who decided that the Media Bloggers Association should have the right to negotiate this.  I mean, no offense to Mr. Cox and those that are already members, but I don’t know you.  You stopped accepting memberships, because you don’t even have a clear set of policies (by your own admission), and while you may very well have the best interest of bloggers in general, I do not find this to be an acceptable situation.  Suffice it to say, as an independent blogger, and not a member of your organization, I do not find that I will feel obligated to follow any guidelines set forth by this meeting and your “agreements” with the Associated Press.

It is also probably germane to point out that the Associated Press is owned by its 1,500 daily newspaper members… those very same people that have not yet been able to find a way to use the web properly and continue to bleed red ink (while blaming the Internet in general and Bloggers specifically for their eroding fortunes).  These same people that fight and attempt to keep bloggers from getting credentials because they are not part of the media.  Seems to me, they want to have their cake and eat it too.

There has been “chatter” particularly from those trying to find some way to salvage anything that might look like a legacy for President Bush that are desperately trying to cling to the notion that they U.S. economy is in or headed towards a recession.

They point to things like the old outdated definition that a “recession” is 2 or more quarters of decline in the country’s Gross Domestic Product.  Most economists however do no like this definition since it does not take into consideration unemployment rates or consumer confidence.  There are of course a couple of problems with this.

First and foremost is the fact that “domestic” companies no longer directly reflect on how strong the economy locally is since so much production has been moved overseas or “outsourced.” So while Mattel can can reap huge profits selling us lead paint based products, the benefits are not seen in the domestic job market since all these toxic products are made in China where they can pay slave wages and not worry about silly little things like safety standards which only “erode profits.”

Finally, any attempts by workers here to try and unionize and earn a fair wage are thwarted by union busting activites. Wal-Mart is well known for hiring consultants that threaten workers trying to unionize, and even (as much as it pains me to say it), Starbucks has seemed to taken to firing employees that are active in unionizing efforts there. Wal-Mart doesn’t surprise me since they tend to be ruthless with everybody, vendors and employees alike. Starbucks on the other hand makes a big deal over their “fair trade coffee.” So essentially, they are concerned with workers getting a “fair wage” in some third world country for picking the beans, but here at home, well that is a different story all together.

I am getting a bit off topic, but really the point is, I am not surprised that the “well to do” (and those that blindly follow them regardless of their own reality) do not see a recession. They look at their stock portfolio, and as long as Mr CEO is turning in 15% and up growth in the stock, they couldn’t care less how it is done. Unions have garnered a bad reputation (some of it admittedly it deserved), but are really there to even the playing field to give the workers some bargaining strength against these large corporations that couldn’t care less about workers. Workers here are viewed, not as assets, but as “expenses” and that is just wrong. And of course, if you are not struggling to make ends meet, you don’t care that your meal dollar isn’t stretching because food companies are making products smaller while keeping the prices the same, because as long as those stocks are profitable, well you will just buy more food.

By these definitions, there will never be a “recession” again. Idiots will continue to tell us how we are doing “well” but just don’t know it. There used to a joke that went something like, a recession is when your neighbor loses his job, a depression is when you lose yours. It is overly simplistic, but I think explains the chasm in opinions quite well.

Maybe the government should have just let Bear Stearns fail and go insolvent. Maybe then some of these people would have gotten a clue that there is a problem. As a parent this lack of vision scares the hell out of me. Not only for me, but for the children of tomorrow. As we become a “service” society, we are heading towards a two tier model. There will be those that “have” (the bosses, CEOs and other executive types) and those that serve them (wait staff, valets, security guards, etc) and nothing in between. The middle class will be wiped out, outsourced overseas and be told that it didn’t happen.

In talking about Amazon.com earlier, I mentioned how Twitter has not exactly had the best record of being up and running lately.  Of course, most people know by now that predominatly the cause is that the site is simply “too popular” and the site was simply not built to scale to the size needed for the number of users.

Rafe Needleman of Webware.com came up with a solution… Shut the site down.  His reasoning.  The site is too unreliable, and hence “nobody” is using it any more anyway.

Now, I as an “uneducated non media type” could get away with this sort of logic (or lack thereof), because well… I am not a member of the media.  I am not an expert.  Right?  He is supposed to be the respected authority, yet to me (the unenlightened) this makes absolutely no sense.

There used to be a stupid old saying that goes something like, “Nobody goes to that restaurant any more because it is too crowded.”  It was a joke, and (most) people seem to readily get the irony of it, but apparently for Rafe, this sort of “logic” can be applied to a website on the Internet.  I guess things work differently in the Web 2.0 world.

My question is, how do I find a way to make idiotic statements like this (lord knows I am good at making them), and still find somebody to actually pay me to make them.  Inquiring minds want to know.

CNN is reporting, White House ‘puzzled’ by ex-spokesman’s book bashing Bush. I found this hysterical. Why? Because, anything that resembles the truth always seems to puzzle Bush.

According to White House Press Secretary Dana Perino:

“Scott, we now know, is disgruntled about his experience at the White House,” Perino said. “For those of us who fully supported him, before, during and after he was press secretary, we are puzzled. It is sad. This is not the Scott we knew.”

Then White House counselor Dan Bartlett:

“We’re hearing from a completely different person we didn’t have any insight into,” he said.

Now, first of all, when McClellan was thrown overboard in favor of Tony Snow, the President spoke in rather glowing terms if I remember correctly:

One of these days he and I are going to be rocking on chairs in Texas, talking about the good old days and his time as the Press Secretary. And I can assure you I will feel the same way then that I feel now, that I can say to Scott, job well done.

So, it is going to be interesting to watch these desperate attempts to try and discredit him, and still have Bush maintain an invitation to that rocking chair.

It seems to me that what is “puzzling” them is that they thought they had this guy gagged, and are trying to figure out how he slipped out with a proper brainwashing.  I guess they expect complete loyalty to even those that they have thrown overboard.

What is going to be even more entertaining, is to watch as this is just another former official stating how the White House played fast and loose with anything that looked like the truth.  Just how many of these people can be discarded as “disgruntled” liars before even the Faux News Channel has to admit that there simply must be some truth to it?

I, like many people have battled weight issues a good part of my life. Despite what many “skinny” people will claim, it is not a “choice.” Is it something I can do something about? In my case, yes. At least I have managed to do it before, and with weight loss of almost 16 pounds since April 17th, I am making some progress again.

But this isn’t really about that fight. No, this is something that has been simmering since my Step-Father-In-Law passed away from Lung Cancer last year. It bothered me at the time, but I wasn’t completely sure why, but there was a gnawing at me about this. Mostly, I guess because I felt it was so unfair that by the time it was “discovered” he was given six-to-nine months and didn’t last that long, that I dismissed what was bothering me as just the sort of bitterness you have when you lose a loved one to illness.

Well, a couple of weeks ago, my uncle was diagnosed with Lung cancer. Fortunately, in his case, it is currently considered early enough that while the long term prognosis is not good (can it ever be?), there actually IS so far, a long term prognosis. Something, that my Step-Father-In-Law never “enjoyed.” I started rethinking it, and using “the Google” to seek some others information and similar type of incidents and stories. I probably shouldn’t be shocked in this day and age to actually find a Blog dedicated to the topic of fat prejudice in health care. This is exactly what was bothering me all this time, and a couple of delicately placed questions to my mother-in-law confirmed this.

He had complained of shortness-of-breath and several other symptoms for quite some time before his diagnosis. Every time his Primary Care Physicians “diagnosis” was that he needed to lose weight, and that then it would no longer be an issue. Symptoms overlooked, simply because, well if you are fat… that is the problem and the end of the effort by the physician (in these cases).

I would love to think that this is infrequent and isolated with a few “bad seeds,” but when you see things like, UNC-Chapel Hill: Obesity May Keep Some Women from Getting Screened for Breast, Cervical Cancer it seems clear that this is not the case, and Kate Harding has a excellent breakdown of this story and how (and why) this issue exists. (On a side note, Kate’s Shapely Prose blog is an excellent read.)  There are even studies published on the Stigma and Discrimination in Weight Mangement and Obesity.

Of course, the media is not much help in this regard either.  Yes, there are some articles that point properly at some causes and issues, but doing so is “too politcally correct” for some writers, and just a lifestyle choice for others.  Of course even some governments get involved as well when they do something like tell a person that they are ‘too fat to adopt.’

It is like continuing to get picked on by the school yard bully for being overweight.  Only the sonsequences to your health could be far more severe.

I’ve been stewing on this one a while, and while I have made mention of it before, it was always just more of an afterthought; but after encountering it yet again this past weekend, I think I have finally had enough.  By now I am sure most of you (well all three of you), are saying “get to the point” so I will.  Why is it that “everybody” (especially it seems older people, and for some reason very religious people) seem to have this particularly invasive idea that they have the right (or almost responsibility) to inquire about your reproductive plans?  Oh, and if that isn’t enough, then they are going to judge you on it based on what they have determined is the “right” thing.

When TheWife and I were first married, it was the constant (and somewhat typical) question of “when are you going to start a family?”  The fact that we waited 6 years was almost unconscionable to some people and family members.  I won’t even get into what my poor sister has to go through since she and her husband have opted to not have children.  For these people, can I just point out that people actually get married for reasons other than to start pushing out children.

Of course, fortunately the reason that we did not have a child right away was because of choice.  I know (both in real life, and many others that I have come to know through blogging) that haven’t because of medical problem.  This of course serves to act as a big slap in the face, and can (and usually does) open some painful emotions in people struggling to have a child, when these reproductive nazis…er… well intended individuals, come along and decide to poke their noses in and demanding answers.

Lately, the new question has come up about when are we going to have another child (now with the extra bonus of them reminding me that I am not getting any younger). The incredulous looks and shocked to downright snarky replies we get when we say we are done with one is a sight to behold.  You would think that I had just put an end to the chances of the human race’s chance of survival.  Then they begin the prodding, because they all need to know the “real” reason.  Is it physical problems?  Is there something wrong with LatteGirl that makes of afraid of another child?  Is it money? (because apparently when you have enough kids, you can live on love) Wouldn’t it be easier to have more if TheWife didn’t work?  (That one of course is insulting on assorted levels and goes into other issues I am not going to touch now)  They just cannot accept that this was the choice we made.  I had somewhat jokingly come up with the response of “We can only afford to raise and spoil one properly” just to try and head off the amount of time I would have to deal with their probing questions.   But to be honest, I am tired of using it as an answer, because I see no reason that I should feel compelled to answer.

The answer is “Just Because” and I am done with it.  LatteGirl is quite well adjusted thank you, and I know plenty of other only children at various stages of life to know that being an only child does not guarantee that they will not know how function in society as you seem to like to claim.  While I like to use the term, somewhat loosely “spoiled” she certainly isn’t.  She knows and has boundaries, she can play well with others, and is able to wait her turn, and doesn’t expect to always be first, just because that is “what she has always known” without competition from siblings.  I don’t question your choice to have more than one child, even if it means going beyond your financial means  (well, except for you Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar!!  17 kids?  WTF is wrong with you people?) .

While I am busy annoying people today, let us take a side rant here.  Why is it that people are against the use of condoms, or birth control because it “messes up” some divine plan, and that if “god” (or your personal choice of term) sees fit to bless you with a child, you should not “interfere” with this plan… but yet these same people seem to have absolutely no problem with fertility clinics and drugs that attempt to help in difficult situations (just to be clear, I do not have a problem with EITHER situation, I just don’t understand why messing with “the plan” is OK when you want to have a child, but not when you don’t).  Simiarly confusing to me is why there is nobody protesting, bombing or trying to shame men that go to a place that offers a vasectomy.  Doesn’t that mess with “the plan” as well?

What does this little side rant have to do with anything?  Well, it really all ties up quite nicely in the end… Stay the hell out of our choices.  My wife and I will choose what is best for us.  And the only reason I will give from now on is “Just Because!”

Despite what some people may think, I am not all about government intrusion in our lives, but the government is supposed to be there to protect the people, especially from the likes of monolithic corporate giants that have nobody’s interest at heart but their own.

Why isn’t that the case any longer?  Why do special interest groups always get their way?  (Yes, I know it is all about the money and re-election funds… it was a rhetorical question.  Just follow… OK?)  An excellent example is the recent first in the country RFID laws passed in Washington State.

In case you haven’t been paying attention, RFID chips are being put into and used in “everything” now, or at least they will be very soon.  That “touch-less” Gas-N-Go card you have from the Station?  RFID,  Those new “intelligent” passports that are coming?  RFID, the new digital Drivers Licenses that are being rolled out?  RFID.  Even some of those frequent shoppers cards.  You have a lot of information that is now accessible, just by walking past an RFID reader set to grab that information.

Now rightly, there is cause for concern, and the laws they were pushing in Washington made sense.  There were basically two parts; the first is making it illegal for anybody to attempt to access your information for fraudulent purposes.  Rather obvious, and somewhat redundant, since fraud is already illegal, but I guess this would be another tacked on charge, or perhaps you can simply be arrested for “attempted” fraud.  Whatever, I don’t have a problem with that.  If somebody is “skimming” my information, then sure he should get in trouble for it without me having to be an actual fraud victim.  But then there is the second part of the law, or more correctly, the original bill… because it never made it into the law.

That part, required retailers and other businesses to only gather information about you on an opt-in basis.  As is always the case… it seems, the retailers and their lobbyist fought this part of the law, and eventually got it pulled out.  So, now skimming is only illegal for an individual; corporations that are skimming are free to gather information about you, how long you shopped in their stores, where in the store you went, how much time you spent in each section, just by strategically placing some RFID scanners, and you will be none the wiser as they gather this information.

But don’t worry, I am sure some company will come out with some sort of RFID blocking wallet, that will be ugly, cumbersome and expensive, but will “protect” you from the “snoops.”  Yup that is right, to have the privacy you should expect by default… you will have it.  As long as you pay for it.  (Maybe!)

Abigail Taylor died Thursday from injuries sustained last June when when she sat on a wading pool drain; the suction so strong that it suck out part of her intestines. It is always a tragedy when a child dies, and always there is some knee-jerk reactions, some good and sometimes even some not so go. But when it happens for something incredibly stupid, it is all that much more infuriating.

On the heels of this incident, in December Congress approved legislation to “ban the manufacture, sale or distribution of drain covers that don’t meet anti-entrapment safety standards.” It was called the Virginia Graeme Baker Pool and Spa Safety Act [pdf], the named for the granddaughter of former Secretary of State James A. Baker, III, who was killed when she was trapped by the suction of a drain in 2002!

Now, I don’t understand why this wasn’t already a law, because it seems so brain-dead obvious to me as a parent, but can somebody explain to me, even after the first incident, and when people started lobbying for this law in 2002, it took 5 freakin’ years to get this written into law?  Now, I am willing to bet if I left it at that, I would have somebody come along and say “there’s a war on and Congress had ‘more important’ things to contend with.”  But if that is the case, then can somebody explain to me why Abigail Taylor had to die when over those same five years Congress sat back,  played IM games with Pages, stuffed freezers full of cash, taking bribes, and making medical diagnosis via videotape.  They had “the time” to do it, but it seems unless there is enough dead children for them to stop taking donations from corporations that are too cheap to manufacture these things safely, they just allow it to go on.

It has been long known that the U.S. Military (along with many others, this is not a American phenomenon), uses propaganda in times of war. Planes littering villages with leaflets, buying of air time and ads in newspapers in a sort of psychological warfare. But tactics like these are (or were) supposed to be strictly controlled; as a matter of fact by trying to be more coy about it, the United States came under fire when they admitted they were planting stories in Iraq newspapers as “news articles.”

But it certainly seems that those days of propaganda planting being kept out of our news streams is history. Oh sure, it has been blatantly obvious for some time that the Faux News Channel is little more than “right wing mouthpiece” and tries to twist things to fit that image, but certain talk shows hosts aside (*cough* Hannity, O’Reilly *cough*) the data is usually twisted but not typically made up. Not so in this recent false article planted in Time Magazine. Glenn Greenwald over at Salon.com has done a nice job of comparing the unsubstantiated (false) claims in the Time article piece, with something that the author of the Time article couldn’t be bothered with, facts and numbers.

It is really sad, that you now have to be critical about everything you read.  It is at a point where I trust very few sources of information outside my blogroll.  I may not agree with all of you all the time, but at least there, I know if people don’t know, they don’t know, they don’t just make up the facts as they go along.

It really is a sad place we are in right now.

Not all of them of course, but as we push forward into an era of “zero tolerance” policies, it seems that school officials use this as an excuse to not use their heads in far too many situations. The latest one of these seemingly over the top punishments was a kid that was suspended from school for a day, barred from attending an honors dinner, and stripped of his position on the student council, because he… what? Threatened another student? No. Made unwanted sexual advances towards another student or teacher? Na Uh. No, this kid received this punishment because, he bought a bag a Skittles from another student.

Superintendent Reginald Mayo said Wednesday that the principal was just trying to keep students safe, but that he would review the decision to suspend Michael.

Yes, of course, we must keep our kids safe… from Skittles.  Are you kidding me?  The punishment has now been rescinded (he will have his record cleared, and given his position on the student council returned, but of course he now missed the honors dinner he was qualified to attend), I suspect that the school did this about face while staring down the business end of a lawsuit by the parents.

Look, I am all for the schools not selling candy and soda in the schools, but what the hell are these people thinking?

It has been a while since I have mentioned it, but when Michael Eisner left Disney I had hoped that the days of the Disney Channel killing off their shows after 65 episodes or 3 seasons was a thing of the past.  The thought that would wrap up Hannah Montana after 3 years, never even entered my mind.  That ended when I ran across Miley Manic.

First I found the post about the Hannah Montana movie. When I saw that, it clicked.  They were planning on ending Hannah Montana.  It is just the way Disney does it (Well, except for Phil of the Future, which they quite abruptly ended with a single episode at the end of Season 2).  The Lizzie Maguire Movie, The Proud Family Movie, The Even Stevens Movie, and even Kim Possible: So The Drama (though fans managed to wrangle an extra season out of that).

Of course, if I had just gone back a few more posts first, I would have found this post.  Now  there was a  rumor  flying around lately (I wouldn’t be surprised if they were started by PerezHilton, which seems to have it out for Miley) that Hannah Montana was already canceled.  That was patently false.  The show is still going on… at least until that movie is aired.  Even the premise as reported, that the Stewarts were going back to Tennessee, sounds like the type of storyline that would end the show.

Now I realize that many of you (and I certain “should be”) are a bit tired of Hannah Montana, and her seeming overexposure, but if Hannah is to survive the end of season three, it is time to start now thinking about writing a letter or giving a call to Disney and tell them that they have got to stop arbitrarily axing shows after  3 seasons.

I am totally not telling LatteGirl until the show has completely ended, and I guess hope that she is “over” Hannah by then.  I don’t want it to break her achy breaky heart.  (aww, c’mon, you knew I had to do it sooner or later)

Do you have an adorable pet? Do you think others would think so to? Enter a photo of you pet in the Bissel MVP (Most Valuable Pet) Pet Photo Contest. The winning pet’s picture will be put on the new Bissell Pet Hair Eraser vacuum , and donation of $10,000 will be made to the charity of the winner’s (well winner’s owner) choice. Plus the top vote getter each week will win one of the Pet Hair Eraser vacuums, and the top 5 vote getters (getters?) will move into the finalist group. Grab your camera, snap a picture of your pet and send it in.  (Contest ends 04/30/08)

Why I hate people from Alaska – You remember Sen. Stevens (R-Alaska), of “The Internet is a series of tubes” fame?  Well, he is at it again, along with apparently equally dimwitted Senator Bill Nelson (D-Florida) and Senator Olympia Snow (R-Washington), who have introduced a bill to outlaw the already illegal practice of phishing.  Sounds a bit like yet another Bridge to Nowhere.  Of course I can’t but wonder, if it doesn’t pass if Stevens will throw another one of his hissy fits and threaten to quit the Senate.  Of course, I can always dream.

Your rights trampled in the name of profits – It seems Monsanto is on a tear again, pushing for lawmakers to get rid of your right to select milk not tainted with synthetic growth hormones.  Whether or not you believe or care about the rBST/rBGH controvery or not, you should care about your rights, as this is not the only product that is being targeted by large companies to get labeling stripped to keep the consumer in the dark.  Contact your representatives, and tell them, you have a right to know.

Emeril going green – Emeril is coming to the Discovery Channel with a new eco-friendly food show.  The show reportedly will be set in Whole Foods Markets and will feature organic, free range and natural foods.

And how about now? – Yes, I know I can understand if you are tired of me mentioning TheMeatrix, and Sustainable Table, and other food “activist” type things, because how could farms possibly be as bad as it is show in that little animated movie… right?  Well what about this video?  That is not fiction!  That is not “a demonstration” or even a theoretical re-enactment.   No cute little animation here.  This is the actual goings on that lead to the single largest recall of beef (to date) in the United States. [Via Sustainable Table Blog]

What is it going to take to stop people from packing a supermarket the day before a snowstorm, and shopping like they are going to be homebound until spring?  Does everybody just happen to need bread and milk the day before a storm?

Look if you happen to live in one of those places where the “corner store” is “follow this road five miles, make a left where old man Fogarty’s barn used to be, and head down the mountain,”  well then maybe you have some justification.  Or, of course if you are say advanced in years, where the thought walking on snow and/or ice instills visions of broken hips and nursing homes, well maybe you should prepare to be inside a bit longer.  I even understand everybody running to Blockbuster, because of the potential of kids at home for a snow day, and needed something to keep them occupied.

Other than that, honestly people, what are you thinking?  That the horse drawn carriage isn’t going to be able to get Bessie’s milk to the market? That old Mrs. Pumpernickel won’t be able to find enough fire wood to bake some bread?   Just why is it that this insane habit continues today?

OK, so unless you don’t read or watch the news, like ever, you know that there is a “dead” spy satellite that is coming down to earth.  You probably have even heard that the U.S. Government is planning on shooting it down.  But that is not the end of the story apparently.

First of all, can we talk about money for a second?  It is reportedly going to cost between $40 – $60 million dollars to shoot down this satellite!  Many people joke about the conversion rate of the U.S. Dollar to the Yen or the Peso, but it seems that we are quickly approaching a similar status, where the value of the U.S. Dollar is a joke.    Any undertaking, seems to now require millions and sometimes billions of dollars.

And speaking of a joke, thanks to the “Wild West President” that we currently have in office, other nations, most notably Russia and China are not happy about this.  Russia is claiming that these manuevers are part of a space arms race program, and China while not actually insinuating that this is a cover, has warned the U.S. against the plan to use the missle.  We could really do without another cold war right now, don’t you think?

Yesterday the U.S. Senate voted on a measure that would have stripped out immunity for the telcos that illegally assisted the government in spying on United States citizens.  It seems that in today’s day and age, you can break the law all you want, so long as you own enough politicians, becuase then they can say you do not have to face any penalties for commiting those crimes. 

The White House’s argument has been that the 40 some odd law suits currently pending in the courts could cause finanacial hardship for the telcos.  Well gee, how does the old saying go?  Don’t do the crime if you can’t pay the fine?  (yea I know, I am paraphrasing).  Perhaps they should have thought of this before they went ahead and broke the law.

So what Senators do the telcos own?  (And if your Senator is on this list, you may wish to contact him/her and ask Why they are supporting and providing immunity for criminals!)

Alexander (R-TN)
Allard (R-CO)
Barrasso (R-WY)
Bayh (D-IN)
Bennett (R-UT)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Carper (D-DE)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Coleman (R-MN)
Collins (R-ME)
Conrad (D-ND)
Corker (R-TN)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Craig (R-ID)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Dole (R-NC)
Domenici (R-NM)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Grassley (R-IA)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hagel (R-NE)
Hatch (R-UT)
Hutchison (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Inouye (D-HI)
Isakson (R-GA)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kohl (D-WI)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lieberman (ID-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McCain (R-AZ)
McCaskill (D-MO)
McConnell (R-KY)
Mikulski (D-MD)

P.S.  Regardless of what your political leaning are… YES!  The Telcos are criminals.  If they weren’t, they would not need the cover of being given immunity.

Of course there is a lot being said after yesterday’s Super Bowl and the “shocking” victory of the Giants over the heavily favored Patriots.  Allow me to put my own spin on it with things you won’t (probably) read from those “experts” today.

After this year, I have personally given up on the Superbowl being “the” day for the best commercials.  Sure there were a few cute ones.  But nothing along the lines of the great days of the past.  The Bud Light series was cute for about one commercial, but the ongoing gag became tiresome real quick.  I liked the one of the horse training for the Budweiser Clydesdale Team.  But the fact that I can remember the E*Trade spots with the “baby” stock trader, goes to show how low the creativity has come.  Oh, and am I the only one that misses the “I goin’ to Disney World” commercial?

Now… about the game itself, the pundits, talk show hosts, and so called “experts”

To Tiki Barber – Former Giants Running Back and now big mouth that mocked Manning saying that it was “comical” that he was “trying to” be a leader.  hmmm… what do you think now Mr.  Barber?  (He has been Maybe Eli was having a problem being a leader with a mouthy malcontent veteran running back! 

For all those experts that questioned Eli Manning all season, and laid the blame for Giant losses squarely at his feet, despite the fact that the Giants had the most dropped passes of any team in the NFL all year.  Do you still think it was Manning that was the problem?  Can you stop comparing him to Peyton now?  He did in 4 years what took his brother 6 years to do (and with a more talented cast around him). 

Is anybody going to call Bill Bellichick, the “geneius” on his performance, both on and off the field?  First of all, has there ever been a less gracious coach that lost the SuperBowl?  I mean would it have broken him to give some credit to the Giants?  Of course you are disappointed Bill, everybody knows that.  But how about giving the Giants some credit for picking your team apart.   And could you possibly stay on the field until the end of the game?  Sure, I realize you were like a deer in the headlights, as I am sure you could still not believe that you lost, but the NFL should fine Bellicick for leaving the sidelines.  “Innocent” mistake or not, it was bad sportsmanship. 

Of course, he should be bitter in some respects.  His arrogance is at least in part, some of the reason his team couldn’t put the Giants away.  If he goes for the field goal in a low scoring contest rather than going for it on 4th down, the Giants touchdown only ties the game.  But Bill was so worried (or so it seemed), about his defenses performance on the first drive, he was too busy making adjustments there, to realize Tom Brady was gettin his head handed to him all day long.  Bill just assumed that they would eventually break out for 30 points, and figured even if they didn’t get that score with the field goal, they would just march right down again and score again.  Whoops.  The geneius got caught without an answer for the defensive display, and hurting the Giants defense put on his team.  Granted, despite him making zero adjustments, it was still almost enough to pull out a victory.  But of course, the keyword is… almost.

Is anybody going to mention the pundits who agreed with Tom Brady, lauging at Plaxico Burris’ prediction of a 23-17 final?  I mean, sure the prediction was a bit off, but the part that was so “insulting” to Brady and laughable by the writers was, wondering how Burris could possibly think that the Patriots were “only” going to score 17 points.  Turns out, they didn’t score that many.   They were quick to knock him… anybody gonna be as quick to give him props now?  I wouldn’t hold my breath.

Just, in case you think this is coming from a Sore Winner Giants fan.  That is simply not the case.  As embarassed as I am to say it after the season they had, I have always been a Miami Dolphins fan.  I started keeping track on the Giants when LatteGirl was about 18 months old, and was cheering for the Giants (though at the time, she really had no idea who she was cheering for, she just knew that people around her were cheering when the Giants scored, since I am a Dolphins fan in a family of Giants fans, and married into a family of Giants fans as well).  I have just never been a big fan of some teams that come across as arrogant (think St. Louis Rams right up until they lost to the Patriots, or the Dallas Cowboys during the Jimmy Johnson era).  I guess it comes down to disliking arroagant coaches.  And Bellichick, certain fits that description.  Though perhaps a bit less so today.

If you know the song the title is from, like me you probably have a young one with a Hannah Montana obsession. Now, I have so far been very accommodating, and have proved myself a worthy sucker for Disney’s marketing machine. I used to wonder how they made money on their shows and movies on the Disney Channel without the benefit of advertising (although I have noticed the “proud sponsor” spots sneaking in much like they now do on PBS shows, but that is a different rant for another day). Now I know where they make the money.

We have clothes, dolls, I was one of the fortunate parents that was able to get tickets (at face value) for the concert, and  Santa Claus even came across with the Digital Blue 718 Disney Mix Stick Hannah Montan Mp3 Player (a compromise between me wanting her to have her own music player, and TheWife thinking she was too young for a “real” MP3 player).

Now of course, since our TV rarely leaves the Disney Channel, I of course knew that the Hannah Montana 3D movie was coming.  I was somewhat hoping (fine I was in denial) that since she went to the actual concert, she would not be interested in going to see the movie.  Of course this was NOT the case.  But fine I thought, it is just a movie.

What I didn’t anticipate (and did not see in the commercials until this past week) is that this movie is being release for “1 week only.”  Which in many of the theaters (at least around here) means they are only showing it 1 or 2 days.   Then TheWife informs me that tickets are $15!!!  $15 for a movie that is barely over an hour long!  But things don’t stop there.  No, since there are only a total of 6 shows over two days, the closest theater to us that is showing the movie is SOLD OUT!  TheWife was actually considering (before I found tickets at another theater) trying to buy tickets through a ticket broker.  Can you imagine this?  Scalping tickets to a movie?

Fortunately as I said, I was able to find tickets at another theater, because there was no way I was “paying up” for tickets to the movie.  So, TheWife and LatteGirl will get to see Hannah in 3D (Noooo, I’m not going… not at $15 per).  And I am left to ponder, is Disney out of their freakin’ minds?  Or am I?

Since more than 50% of people are against animal cloning according to a study done by the International Food Information Council, I am confident that I am not alone when I say how disappointed I am at the FDA approving cloned animals to be used in our food supply. What bothers me more than that, is that the companies that lobbied the FDA to get this through, are aware (as I am sure the FDA is as well) at the negative response, and because of this have gone through the effort to hide it by refusing to require food derived from cloned animals to be marked as such. Sort of a Don’t Ask Don’t Tell for Clones.

This of course leads to the potential for labels from those that do not use cloned animals to mark their products as such. But let us look for a second at an issue that I have mentioned here before, the use of synthetic hormones in milk. Dairies that have chosen to not use Monsanto’s rBGH/rBST should under the same theory be “free” to let consumers know that they produce a product that does not use these hormones, giving consumers that would rather not use them a choice. Simple enough, right? Wrong! Monsanto tried the court route, with mixed results, certainly not good enough for them. Suddenly now there appears to be a genuine campaign to get these labels removed, so that consumers will not be allowed to chose for themselves.

Is this what the FDA means by “free to label or mark their products?”  The simple fact is, that they assume an uneducated consumer is the best consumer, because that means more profits at the expense of your health… not that you would know it, because the FDA… who is supposed to be watching out for the best interest of the people, are all too quickly giving in to pressure from politics and big business.

It is coming to a point, where regardless of how careful you are or try to be with what you feed your family, these corporations have the money to take away your right to know what it is that you are eating.  If this all sounds “anti-business” it isn’t.  It is about anti-corrupt-businesses.  Businesses like Monsanto that have no ethics and cheat and lie to the public and try to buy off politicians.  Heck, I have all the respect in the world for companies like Burger King.  Are they selling products that are, well questionable in nutritional value and awful in regards to fat?  Of course.  And they make no bones about it.  They tell you simply the way it is.  We cater to fat people with big appetites.  Sure, a bacon cheeseburger is loaded with fat.  But if you are a big person, with a big appetite, and want something that has 5 layers of cheese, burger and bacon, and want to consume all that fat in one sitting, then we are happy to serve you.  It is not healthy.  It is not smart.  But they aren’t trying to get lawmakers to ban health food stores for “misleading customers by claiming that their tofu is a better choice” as their defense.  It is disgusting… but it is honest.   You want to eat that… you know what you are getting and are making a choice.

Unfortunately, when it comes to cloning (and unless we can stop it soon milk as well), you can’t make such a choice.

I head off today for a little ski weekend away.   And I will tell you, that no little break or vacation has come at a better time than this one.  I just want to stop reading the news for a couple of days, because it is just getting me so… so… angry.

No, not the politics.  There is nothing really new there.  While I get frustrated with things like the Faux News Channel pretending to be fair or balanced, or Chris Matthews of MSNBC, who can’t seem to find a nice word to say about any female politician, and seems to take great joy in finding new ways to insult Hillary (for the record, I am not a Hillary supporter, but Matthews is way out of line).  No those things are just part and parcel for politics today.

What has gotten to me, is once again, we are starting to see a rash of stories, on parents that just are… broken.  The woman that confessed to suffocating her autistic child,  The mother that was found in the house with the decomposing remains of her 4 daughters, whom she claimed were ‘possesed’ when she was arrested on murder charges, the search continues for 4 children allegedly thrown off a bridge by their father/step-father after he has a fight with his wife.

On top of these, today I read the story about a woman, that was out on $10,000 bail for child endangerment (she left her 9 month old alone and unattended in a car), has now been charged with murdering that same child.

I just can’t take these “parents” any longer.  I’m so glad I’m on vacation.

Well, it is not like it is an uncommon thing for me to do. And in reality it has been some since I did it last, probably because I opted to stay on the sidelines after BlogHer fed this fire a bit earlier this year. To be certain, I really don’t want to annoy or anger anybody, and for the most part, this has had little effect on me, as most of the sites I read are good enough for full disclosure, or don’t bother with things like PayPerPost.

Since, my most recent faux pas of antagonizing a poor PayPerPoster brought up the same old points, and questions, I thought it was worth the time once again to cover these issues.

PayPerPost sounds good… on paper. Companies pay people to write reviews and commentary on their products and services, and hope to generate some sort of “buzz” out of it. Sounds good. And I have seen a couple of people actually use the product in this way. (Maybe 2 of them) But by and far this is simply not the case. It seems that what most people do is look to see what is the highest revenue product they are eligible to write for, and write about that. Regardless of what experience they have …often none, other than maybe… MAYBE taking a peek at the website before they write up a post on the subject.

What, really however gets my goat about this whole scheme, are the people that try to mask this in their regular posts. Now in theory, I guess PayPerPost originally sort of encouraged this sort of misleading practice because the whole “point” was to create buzz, and to appear less like advertising. There is no telltale affiliate code in the link, you just directly link to the website in your post. I have heard that PayPerPost is going to change this policy, in an effort to clean up their image (presumably at least in part to the backlash that they saw at BlogHer, and presumably other events), and start requiring people to disclose this. I think it is a step in the right direction. But I am biased. Because where I seem to most often put my foot in my mouth is when I have called bloggers on a post being a PayPerPost posting. Those that don’t currently disclose, are more often the same ones that get quite indignant about being called on their practices.

I have seen and heard things like, “You have GoogleAds and Affiliate Link.” Yes. Yes, I do. And everything about them is above board. Every single product or company I link to via an affiliate code, is because I believe in or like the product, service and/or Company. (I also have a Policy and Disclosure Page, explaining just that). There is nothing here that I promote, without it being something I believe in. If you happen to pick up a DVD from Amazon, based on my recommendation of it, then I think I have earned the few cents I make on an affiliate link. I am putting my opinons and my credibility on the line in doing so. If I tell you about a bunch of films you don’t like, well then you are not likely to buy them, and I am not going to get paid for them. If you can’t tell the difference between that, and writing a quick couple of paragraphs about Fly-By-Night.com (Not saying that all PayPerPost website are Fly by Night, but…) because that is the one that will pay you the most money to sell your credibility this week, well then there really is no reason to carry on the conversation any longer.

But please. Don’t stand there defiantly, and get all high and mighty. You are right, I am free to go my own way and not read it. That is true. And on many many blogs that is simply the case. I will just click next and move on. If I have commented to you on it. One. You are hiding your true intentions. And (more importantly in this case), you have sold your credibility and disappointed me in the process, because you had some credibility in my eyes. I thought you were worth reading. I thought your opinion was worth something, I thought it mattered. But since your credibility was worth $2.5o (or whatever you got for that post), I guess I felt bad that I had so misjudged you in this regard.

Blogging has for the most part moved past the days of having “donation buttons” and “wish lists” and for that I am sad. Heck, I would donate something to a blog I like (and have). I have used the wish list. I don’t begrudge anybody for trying to make a dollar. I applaud you if you can find a way to make a career out of this. When the day is done however, in the written world like this, all you have is your credibility. Think twice before you pawn it off for such measly sums.

Corrections:  I was corrected by the people at Wirefly.com for an incorrect view of the company.  Wirefly is not an affiliate front as I believed it to be at first pass, and I apologize for this misunderstanding.  The incorrect information has be removed from this post.  I will be taking them up on their request to take a closer look, and will (without PayPerPost compensation) be reviewing them properly when I get an opportunity.

Seems, all the world over supporters of our rogue President are dropping almost as fast as his approval ratings. There is no doubt, that being viewed as Bush’s lap dog was at the root of Tony Blair exiting Downing Street back in June. As Prime Minister for 10 years, his term will be known as exceptionally good economic times in Great Britain, but will be forever marred as well with the unpopular (and unnecessary) Iraq war.

Bush’s buddy and “supporter” President Gen. Musharraf is only still in power, via a declaration of Marshall Law, and he has now gone from President to Dictator, thus leaving the U.S. looking bad to the people of Pakistan.

And now, Bush’s second vocal ally, Australia’s Conservative Prime Minister John Howard was handed a stunning defeat in Australia. What turned voters to the Labor Party (Liberal) and against Howard? Promises to remove troops form Iraq, and the promise to sign on to the Kyoto Protocol. Something Howard and President Bush were both staunchly against.

So it seems while we in this country somehow continue to elect boneheads that are denying global warming or still lying about the war in Iraq, it seems that the rest of the world has caught on. I only hope when the elections roll around next year, we don’t continue to show our ignorance to the world, and get somebody into office that is willing to stop the insanity.

Kristen from Motherhood Uncensored was looking for feedback, on kids and computer/video games. This started out as a comment, but when my comment started developing into paragraphs, I thought perhaps it would be better addressed here. (nobody has ever accused me of being short winded)

First of all, she asks the question(s),”Is your tot a gamer yet? Ever? Never?” and in there is I think some of the problem. Commenters also played along and went with the same language and theory. However, “gamer” certainly draws a certain connotation to it (whether you believe that connotation is good or bad is wholly dependant on your POV) that I don’t think applies to kids. They play a game. In the case of some games like V.Smile or Leapster, they even LEARN while they are “playing” (not “gaming”).

I think the fear that every kid that knows how to use a computer is going to turn into some sort of computer zombie slayer is quite overblown. If anything, my bet would be that the exact opposite would often play out to be the truth.  Much the same way that kids that are completely denied sugar are the ones that often hit the candy racks the hardest when they are able to do so, the kid that is denied the opportunity to use computers, whether purely for learning, or even for some amount of entertainment, would be the ones that I would be on to become gaming addicts later as they attempt to make up for lost time.   Not to mention the fact that in this day and age, you are putting your child at a distinct disadvantage if you do not introduce them to technology in a society that whether you like it or not is technology driven.

Of course, like everything else, there needs to be limits.  Limits on the amount of time spent on the computer.  Limits to what they are allowed to play or use, and other common sense rules apply here as well as with anything else.  The fact of the matter is, if you keep it age appropriate, at a young age, whether they realize it or not, while they are playing these games they are learning something… colors, numbers, associations… there is learning going on there, interactive, touch and work with it learning.  Even Seasame Street can’t compete with that, let alone anything else that they might happen to watch on the “idiot box.”

Of course, TV has been outed for the most part as not necessarily the best baby sitter in the world, but most parents do employ it as least once in a while in an effort to get something done, or to find a couple of minutes to get in the shower, maybe get dinner ready without somebody hanging at your heels crying “I booooored.”  And to be honest, again if you keep it smart, and within limits I don’t thing there is anything wrong with that.  And “computer time” could simply be used as another way to not only teach but entertain.  Given a choice, I would rather my daughter grab her Reader Rabbit game, or log on to Playhouse Disney and play some games that teach her something that to give in to another hour or even half hour in front of the TV.

In the second grade, this has already paid off dividends for me and LatteGirl.  She had a science project last week (Don’t get me started on already having week long projects in the second grade), where she needed to look up different types of animals and find out facts about them.  With no help (but WITH supervision), she logged into Encarta, pulled up facts on each animal, and even copy and pasted the URL for each animal and pasted it into notepad so she could print out her bibliography.  I don’t know if I tasked TheWife with this project, if she could have completed the reseach any better or any faster than our seven year old.  That is not a knock on TheWife, but it is a telling scenario of just how proficient LatteGirl has gotten at using her PC.

Sure, when we were in school, we had to walk uphill both ways in the snow, get permission from Mrs. Shushman to go and dust off a seventy pound Encycolpedia to do our research.  But those days are gone.  Your not protecting anybody by keeping technology out of your kids hands.  If anything, you may be hurting them.  If they are going to turn into a gamer (not that there is anything wrong with that), they are going to do it whether or not you let them play an interactive game when they are young.  Our society is to technologically advanced to sit back and try and deny it is there.

New Jersey is getting set to vote on abolishing the death penalty. It is a charged subject that many people have very strong opinions on. I am not one of them. The whole issue has left me rather cold and unsure. On one side of the coin, I have seen enough cases of people that have had long standing convictions overturned on DNA evidence that wasn’t available at the time of their convictions, to know that the system is clearly flawed, and that despite the best intentions we simply have not held up the notion that it is better to set 10 guilty men free than that one innocent suffer (English jurist William Blackstone).

On the other hand, when I look at an animal like Jack Fuller, a “family acquaintance” that murdered Brittney Gregory, and he only got 30 years in prison my blood begins to boil. Here is a case where this guy admitted in court that he punched the girl at least twice in the face and head because she tried to stop him from smoking crack while he gave her a ride to her boyfriend’s house in July 2004. Her unclothed body was found in a shallow grave some two weeks later. In 30 years he will walk out of prison a free man. Brittney on the other hand will still be dead. I can’t even imagine what it must be like for her parents to know that he will one day be free again.

But, I am getting away from the point a bit, because here in New Jersey, the death penalty has been nothing short of a joke. It was reinstated in 1982, and since that time, the number of 1st degree murder convicts put to death remains at 0. So what is the big deal of voting it out now? Well, other than the fact that people argue that the death penalty is not a deterrent. Well no, not the way it is implemented here in New Jersey. Hell, the appeals process could probably last longer than some of these people will survive in jail.

I would hate for New Jersey to be held up at the beacon of those that are against the death penalty, because we saw fit to abolish it. Because here, it proves nothing other than our own incompetency on whether we are actually going to use it or not. So New Jersey may abolish the death penalty… so what? It is nothing here but a blue law, that has no teeth. The argument is pointless.

OK, so last year students learned that even a 4-1/2 year old can get suspended for “inappropriate physical behavior interpreted as sexual contact and/or sexual harassment” by giving his teacher a hug. OK, I said then it was stupid, and nothing has changed my mind. But what I didn’t see then was it seems that it was only the start of stupid suspensions kids would be getting at school.

Now we have students getting suspended for “spreading rumors” when they report a teacher for having sex with a student. What is worse is that rather than admitting that they screwed up the school administration says, “they had no hard evidence at the time, because both the teacher and student denied it” (gee… can I get a “duh” here?) so the only “logical” step they had was to suspend the student for the “rumor.” Only I wouldn’t have been quite as smug as these administration officials when the teacher was later arrested for having a sexual relationship with the student (which police discovered on their own, since the school never reported this “rumor”). I guess we should be happy that the school administrators finally saw fit to suspend her.

Things can’t get much more stupid can they? Well yeah, they can. How about getting a days detention (each) for hugging two friends as you say goodbye before heading home for the weekend? Stupid? But of course. And once again, you have a school official, in this case District Superintendent Sam McGowen rushing to defend school officials saying that the penalty was appropriate because the school policy handbook states:

“Displays of affection should not occur on the school campus at any time. It is in poor taste, reflects poor judgment, and brings discredit to the school and to the persons involved.”

I defy this clown to tell me what is in more “poor taste and reflecting poor judgment”… being, friendly and polite with friends, and giving them a hug goodbye?”  Or giving the girl detention for doing so?  That you have kids that would rather hug and say goodbye discredits the school?  No, I’d day that job is done quite well by idiotic school officials that apparently don’t have the critical thinking skills necessary to be able to discern  what would be deemed inappropriate or reflecting poor judgment.  The poor judgment is how these people got these jobs.  If I was a parent of this girl, I would be having a “hug in” on school grounds.  But I am vindictive that way.  (hat tip to Doug for this)

One thing our current government situation has going for it is a sense of loyalty, even when they get hung out to dry as the patsy. Yes, it is bad that once again FEMA is in the spotlight in a bad way over the staged news conference they pulled last week. But after Michael “Heck of a job Brownie” Brown, and the disaster that was FEMA after Hurricane Katrina, I don’t find this all that surprising. After the wildfires in California, it was an opportunity for FEMA to puff its chest and take (steal) the credit for all the fine work done by the firefighters, and they weren’t going to risk having a reporter screw this up by asking a question they weren’t prepared for, it to bring up something like Katrina, when they clearly wanted to show how competent they are “now.”

So, they screwed up, and got caught. Now they needed to find a fall guy, and that was publicist John Philbin. This is the way our current government works. They find the lowest person they can leave twisting in the wind, and sack that person. Again, not much of a surprise there. What I do find so astounding is the unwavering loyalty after the fact. I mean, Mr. Philbin was quite willing to accept all the blame, and says “I should have canceled the FEMA press briefing.” Nice and neatly packaged. Except, it seems to me that it is just a continuation of the lie.

C’mon, are we really supposed to believe that nobody, including Vice Adm. Harvey Johnson, who took the questions from the staff, and clearly from the tone and the actually addressing at least one person by name, had no idea that this was staged? Were these little nobody staffers that perhaps the Admiral was not aware were members of his office? Doubtful, since the questions were asked by people like, Cindy Taylor, FEMA’s deputy director of external affairs, and by “Mike” Widomski, the deputy director of public affairs as well as Director of External Affairs John “Pat” Philbin (yes the man fired, the man that put the news conference together. Let me just make this clear, in case it isn’t already. Vice Admiral Johnson contacts Philbin to put together a news briefing. Philbin is in the “crowd of reporters” asking a question at that news briefing… and Johnson suspects nothing? Even if that were actually true… aren’t you scared to have somebody so inanely curious in such a position?

So, you have already backed out of Verizon Wireless selling your information, for what they call, “ways to improve service.”  With that sort of word play, I guess you will then not be shocked to find out  that now the people behind “The Network” have altered their Terms and Conditions and have have explained the fact that their “Unlimited Data Plan”  has a cap at 5 GB.

If you look at the Terms and Conditions that have been modified since they were sued (and lost) for terminating customers for using “too much bandwith” on their unlimited data plans they now clearly specify:

Anyone using more than 5 GB per line in a given month is presumed to be using the service in a manner prohibited above, and we reserve the right to immediately terminate the service of any such person without notice. 

They have apparently stopped using the word unlimited on some of their advertising, but when you go to sign up (or renew) a plan, the price still includes “unlimited” in their offerings (with the disclaimer of defining what unlimited means.  Now, to some extent I can understand and appreciate what Verizon Wireless is trying to do in that this service (especially on a consumer account) is not designed for this purpose, and 5GB is a LOT of traffic to be pulling down to a mobile phone or PDA in a given month, but then why not just STOP CALLING IT AN UNLIMITED PLAN.  There are plenty of words in dictionary, can’t the folks at Verizon Wireless, stop redefining the meanings and just work with what is already there?  Hello!?!  Can you hear me now Verizon Wireless?

* Full Disclosure – I am a Verizon Wireless customer.  What that means… I don’t know, other than I am willing to call out even companies that I like when they are doing wrong by their customers.

And apparently my god has more pull in this country as Fred Phelps, the hate mongering leader of the Westboro Baptist Church and his two daughter were found guilty and hit with a $10.9 million dollar verdict this past week.

Of course, it is easy for most any reasonable person to applaud this. But there is some concern. Some, while in no way attempting to support Phelps worry and wonder Is Phelps Loss, a Loss for All? And I understand and appreciate the concern. Being on the “wrong side” (read in the minority) of issues like women’s rights, gay rights, and against the war in Iraq, I can say that I, as much as anybody, worry about anything that can erode free speech.

That being said (although admitting I am no lawyer), think that this has already been well established by the Supreme Court, that First Ammendment rights, does not allow a person to infringe on the rights of others. In Cox v. Louisiana (1965) the court stated, (c) The rights of free speech and assembly do not mean that everyone may address a group at any public place at any time. (Pp. 554-555). and (d) Communication of ideas by picketing and marching on streets is not afforded the same kind of protection under the First and Fourteenth Amendments as is pure speech. (P. 555.). These two statements go right to the heart of the matter. While Phelps may certainly have the right to say whatever the hell bile he wishes, he is not guaranteed the right to do it “at any public place at any time.” and picketing and marching is NOT afforded the same kind of protection as pure free speech. So the court has clearly drawn some lines already for exactly this sort of situation.

There are other cases as well, if you really wanted to dig into them you could check out, this synopses of Supreme Court Cases.  I am not going to, because I feel like I have already dedicated more time to Fred Phelps and his band of vile idiots than they are worth.

They should have tossed him off the balcony – I am sure there are people who will say that it is “only a dog” and that I am overreacting, but my this was my first impression when I read about the man that got 3 years for tossing a dog off a balcony, and will be elegible for parole in 20 months. Apparently, he got into a fight with his girlfriend and threw the 10 week old Yorkiepoo off the third floor balcony. What do think, anger issues? (I mean him, I know I have anger issues when it comes to idiots like this).

And speaking of uncaring idiots – Next time you look at your politician, that one that says he cares about you and what is important to you ask yourself this… “Why did he (and all these clowns) subvert the American people with the wiretap bill that will grant retroactive immunity to the telephone companies?” For all their talkabout caring about you, the constituent instead it seems that all they care about is the dollars from the telephone companies. The same telco companies that broke the law, and got caught. But rather than have to pay for their crimes in court, they opted to pay off the politicians that “forgive them” for their indiscretion with YOUR privacy.

Can toys just be toys? – Look, I am the first one to admit that since having a little girl that I have become far more tuned into and far quicker to react to stereotyping little boys and girls. Matter of fact I was quick to knock the Daring Book for Girls, just based on the description that what is “important skills for a girl to learn” include pressing flowers, how to put your hair up with a pencil, etc.

That being said, I have been caught somewhere between amused and shocked at the some of the complaining about things like a Tonka Truck ad, because it is targeted towards boys (also another one can be found here), and the horror shown towards the Hasbro’s Rose Petal Cottage, which has {gasp} Rose Petals on it, and is marketed to girls. Horkin Ramblings says it quite nicely when she asks Aren’t There More Important Things To Complain About. She even picked out the most amazing comment, which lamented that this toy was, “polishing the glass ceiling instead of breaking it.”  Seriously?

C’mon folks.  Little Suzy has plenty of time to recover and be whatever she wants to be, and her furture is not going to be dictated by a toy kitchen set, nor will she be irreparably harmed because the ad for a toy truck is not “equally” promoted directly to her.  If she wants a toy truck… guess what, she will play with one, or ask for one, regardless of whether they are advertised for “boyhood.”  Similarly with the kitchen, I laughed at one comment (which I am admittedly too lazy to go back and find) that said because the Rose Petal Cottage has flowers on it, it precludes any boy from playing with it.  Well um, dare I ask, who is defining gender roles now?  Can a boy not play with a toy that is pink?  Can he not like flowers?  You argue against a stereotype but using a stereotype.

In the end.  It is a toy.  And as Freud didn’t quite say, sometimes a toy is just a toy.

Over at Notes from the Trenches (and technically via Parenting before that), there were a question and an intersting issue raised.  Being the windbag that I am on some issues, I thought it better to post a response that fill comments.  Plus I wanted to see what some others thought as well.

Now the first, is the question of is there an age limit for Trick or Treating?  Personally I don’t hold it against older kids to go trick or treating.  I do sort of have my own personal “rules” on it though.  I will usually indulge them less (one piece of candy whereas I tend to give the little ones a bit more since they will not be walking as much, and hence not getting to as many houses), and secondly, I “expect” a costume.  Walking around in your street clothes and carrying a pillow case doesn’t cut it for me.  If you want the spoils of the holiday, you have to at least make an effort.  So do you have an age limit for trick-or-treaters?

The second point was raised, as sort of an aside where Chris ranted “about parents who let their kids run wild on Halloween night with no supervision.”  Now this one I really have to admit struck me as odd.  I guess because my thinking is  virtually opposite.  In a way, I feel sorry for kids today.  When I was a wee lad (granted this was quite some time ago), I think I was six the last time my mother took “the walk” with me to go trick or treating.  After that, she decided it was entirely too much walking, and I was off on my own to go trick or treating from the time I got out of school until dinnertime, and then (when I was a bit older) again for another couple of hours after dinner.

Today, it is so much different.  Going trick ‘o treating after school is a virtually fruitless endevour (at least around these parts) as most people are in work, and even half (or more) of the kids are in some sort of aftercare program.  So the time to gather goodies has become relegated to an after dinner event.  And then after a long day of work, preparing dinner, etc.  a parent has to then waltz their kid around the neighborhood, and they more often (except for the littlest of frolickers) worn out and tired first.  Thus limiting how much time the child has to “make the rounds”

Don’t get me wrong, I completely understand WHY parents do it.  I do it as well.  We worked out a bit of a plan, where TheWife takes LatteGirl out first, and I stay at home to give out the candy, and then we switch roles, this ensures we are home for those looking for candy, while allowing LatteGirl to get her fill of Halloween fun without one of us getting too worn out to continue.  But I still feel sad that I don’t feel safe to let her just traipse around the neighborhood on her own.  And if you live in an area where you feel comfortable with that sort of arrangement, I must admit, I am a bit jealous.  Halloween is about candy, but it is also about a bit of mischeif, mindless frolicking about.  And these days, that is completely lost.

This week, the new Prudential Center or “The Rock” as it will be called, opens in Newark. Only about 6 miles from my home, and available via short ride on public transportation, this new arena, home of my New Jersey Devils should be a dream come true for me. And from the perspective, I mentioned above, it is… sort of.

The public transportation is spotty in the best of times in that area, as New Jersey Transit is lacking in foresight. I really am afraid of what that is going to look like, at least until they get a clue and add more buses and trains on event nights. For example, I am actually lucky in that there are two separate bus routes that happen to pass my block. At around 10:30 or 11:00 pm (typical time for a hockey game or a concert to end), one bus is running at about 1 every 45 minutes, the other is about every hour or hour and 15. Bus full? Oh well wait another hour and hope you can get on. While it is easier for them to add a couple of cars to the trains, they also are running very intermittent at that hour. So if the event runs a bit long, or you have trouble navigating the crowd out and miss the train, Oh well, now you can wait another hour before you can even start your ride home.

But as a hockey fan, the hardest part for me to swallow, is something that I’ve known was going on, but tried denying it (to myself) for the longest time. Professional sports don’t give a damn about the fan. In today’s local paper (I don’t link to them, because they remove their stories behind a paid archive after 2 weeks), the headlines about the new arena read, “it is built, but will they come?” Referring to the “illusive fans” that it was believed did not attend the games in the Meadowlands because it had almost NO public transportation or easy access. But, rarely was the trouble in the Meadowlands really the fans.

With Tickets upwards of $95 (last time I went a couple of years ago), sure there were some seats empty. But the perception was really off. On a typical non “event” (i.e. playoff, games against the Rangers, etc), when TV cameras panned around, you saw a lot of empty seats. A lot of empty high priced or corporate owned seats. If the camera ever went up to the upper level (where the best seats were about $50), it looked far more “packed” But camera crews don’t pan the upper deck, all you see are the seats around the ice.

Fast forward to the new arena, those seats that were expensive (I think) at $95 in the old arena, now carry a face value of $200. Yes, you read that right. $200 for a single ticket for a single game. A regular season game. But this is exactly what I mean, when I say they don’t care about the fan. These seats are mean for “making deals” These are the seats that Prudential, and other corporations will own and give as perks to clients, partners, elected officials (did I say that?) etc. As a matter of fact nothing in the arena, short of an “upper balcony” seat goes for less that $65.  Yes, there are actually a few $10 and $20 seats in the upper corners.  But you better bring binoculars if you want to see anything more than “dots” moving around the ice.  Any story about the new arena talks about the Two club lounges, the “goal bar”, terrace area, as well as the 350-seat gourmet restaurant, and 76 luxury suites that are all off limits to “ordinary people” that can’t afford Season Tickets.

So where does that leave “the fan?”  Will they say “it is New Jersey”  (again) and that New Jersey just doesn’t support its local team?  Or will somebody realize that they are just pricing out the regular fans?  Tell me… honestly… am I wrong?  Can you imagine bring a family of 4 to a hockey game, getting mediocre balcony seats, and being out $260 on tickets alone?  How many games would you be attending a year?

I know other sports have done it too.  Football has been that way for quite some time.  But unlike football, hockey doesn’t not have football’s following.  Nor does it translate as well to television.  And now they are cutting out the fans actually going to their games.

Is there nothing anymore that is just for normal people?  Does it all have to be about corporate sponsorships, and corporate boxes, and corporate whatever else?  What about the fan?

Both Cathy and Dad Gone Mad brought up issues recently, that are completely separate with the exception that they are both pet peeves of mine. Pet peeves, because they both wind up making me do or act in ways that I don’t necessarily want to, but seem to bend to the will of others.

First, there is the issue of the “Helicopter Parent.” This is a tough one for me because I straddle such a thin line. LatteGirl is always initially shy around new people, once she warms up she is fine, but she will rarely do it without encouragement and would tend to withdraw if not prompted. Secondly, she wants to much to be accomodating to others she will often wind up rather unhappy when certain kids (including her cousin) tend to take advantage of this “weakness” and boss her around. I don’t want to wind up being (or even appearing to be) a Helicopter Parent, so I have in the past, not exactly fed LatteGirl to the wolves, but I didn’t step in, where I think I probably should have in the past, because of this.

I have also made her be the “bigger person” when another child is rude or such, because it was not my place. This can be quite frustrating. Particularly with some of her friends, that apparently are children of parent’s that don’t seem to see anything their child does wrong, or give the “kids will be kids” explanation.

I still don’t want to be seen as what is (really) a Helicopter Parent, but I also no longer want it to prevent me from being my daughter’s best advocate. One question that goes along with this however. How do you deal with kids that have parent’s that won’t take charge of thier kids ever? For example, is it proper to ask another person’s child to stop screaming? Or to tell them to share? I’m not talking about scolding, but more about playing peacekeeper. What do you do, when it seems like it is always your child that has to make concessions, and “be understanding” with other kids, who apparently are raised by people that don’t have the same common courtesy?

The other issue, is “bragging.” I have read plenty of books, articles and even blogs of people that do a lot of complaining about how much parents talk about (or brag about) their kids. Yet, I know as for myself, and virtually if not every single blog I read, the parents while certainly proud of their kids, often keep it very subdued, if not downright humble. We tend to minimize everything. Or we decide it is “no big deal.” We keep conversations about our kids “short and sweet.” Yes, I know there are people on the other end of the spectrum, people who are sure that their kids are gifted and bound for greatness and already enrolled in the Albert Einstein Program for the Gifted by the time they are 6 months old. But that doesn’t mean I need to compensate by keeping the spotlight off my own daughter at all times.

So, now as he suggested, I am going to put an end to that. (And I of course invite you to do the same, either in comments or your own blog).

LatteGirl is incredibly bright. She is disappointed when she comes home with a less than perfect score on a test (even though we do not in any way put any pressure on her in that way. Matter of fact, we are usually having to tell her that nobody is perfect).

LatteGirl is a good sport. She is not necessarily good at all sports, but she enjoys playing just about anything. She is not the most athletic, her athsma often hampers her, but she gives it 110% always, and has fun while doing it.

LatteGirl is a sweetheart. She has compassion to spare for anybody, everybody, and every creature she encounters. She is friendly (when she gets past her intial shy stage), she will do anything she can to try and make somebody else feel happy, loved, and welcome. She doesn’t hate anybody, and in her 7 year old philosophy, there is nothing in this world that is so bad, that it can’t be fixed with a hug and a kiss.

Your turn.

I mentioned when we were trying to adopt a dog back in January, how difficult it seemed to be. As a matter of fact is wasn’t until late March that we were finally successful. At the time, I was astounded by some of the stories others had shared about how they had been denied.

Look, I appreciate the work that these shelters and rescue places do. I can even appreciate that they have some sort of review process to try and find a suitable home. But, it seems to me that they have all just gone a little crazy and overboard with their “guidelines.”

This was just highlighted again just how out of control these places can get, with the high profile case of the dog that was adopted by Ellen DeGeneres. She apparently adopted a Brussels Griffon terrier mix. The dog did not get along with her cats, so she found the dog a new home with her hairstylist’s family. But it seems that the place that DeGeneres adopted the dog from didn’t think, “this is the type of family that should have the dog” and removed the dog from that home.

Now first of all, who the hell made them god of dogs, and decided what “type of family” should have a dog?  Second, if they showed up at my house to take my dog away, the only thing they would be leaving with would be my shoe firmly planted in their ass.

It seems that the agency, Mutts and Moms (located in Pasadena, Ca.) has a rule that NO FAMILY can adopt a dog that has children under the age of 14.  This is the most arbitrarily  loony rule I have ever heard.  Of course there are some dogs that can not be placed with children because of temperment, or because of how the dog was treated at a previous home that makes certain dogs not suitable.  How many people would not have dogs at all if everybody enforced this age limit?  How many childhood memories would go up in smoke if you had to erase the dog out of the picture?  And in this case, the children were 12 and 11, so while they did not make the “predetermined” age, they were certainly close enough for consideration, I mean you are not talking about a couple of toddlers where you are worried about them pulling on the dogs tail or fur or some other poor treatment.

Unfortunately, in this case (as in many others), these rules, as arbitrary and random as they are, become hard and fast denials that give no consideration for that family that is just looking to give a dog a home.  These people really need to get a clue.

It must be true – Last year I said that, I must have Alzheimer’s since I never seem to learn my lesson about what a waste of time a yard sale it when you really break it all down.  Well, I broke down, gave in to TheWife who wants to clear things out, and LatteGirl who wants to sell stuff and raise money (I love her capitalistic spirit), and we will be having a yard sale again tomorrow.  Will I ever learn?

The devil is in the details – The RIAA wins a key victory against file sharing. It is not the generality of the case that bothers me, as I can see how a court can rule that distributing files hurts their income. It is the small details of the case that are quite disturbing. Fact one: In this case, the argument was made that the file doesn’t actually have to be downloaded, but just by making it available constitutes damages. There are lots of things that often made “available” either accidentally or uknowingly through file shares, etc. that can now be attacked as “piracy.” The second was when a RIAA lawyer argued that even RIPPING a CD constitutes piracy. So that CD that you ripped into iTunes (or Zune)… that according to this clown is piracy. These are some really scary people, and now they have a court case on their side.

Favorite Blog Quote of the week comes from Cynical Dad:

The Hi-5 girls are wholesome; they should not be hawking birth control. That would be like a former Mouseketeer being ordered by a judge to take parenting classes and undergo drug testing.

Oh wait. My bad.

(from the post How Birth Control Destroyed Two Childhood Memories)

Did you receive a notice of change in your customer agreement?  More importantly, did you READ IT?

Verizon Wireless plans on selling information on you, such as “quantity, technical configuration, type, destination, location and amount of services you purchase.”  Together this is known as you “Customer Proprietary Network Information (CPNI).”

They are going to do this so that may “better serve your communications needs and to identify, offer and provide products and services.”  In other words, so they can sell you more sh– errr… stuff.

Now even the FCC and other regulatory bodies realized how important it was to safeguard this information, and Verizon Wireless is required to do so by law.  But now they are seeking your waiver so that they may use this information to sell you stuff from them, their parent companies, affiliates, partners, and anybody else they can profit from.  They also however are using the standard sneaky ass backward “opt out” method of permission.

You have 30 days from the time the letter was sent to you to “opt out”  and unless you do, Verizon Wireless “will assume that you give the Verizon Companies the right to share your CPNI”

In case you didn’t save the letter (or don’t feel like waiting for it to come), you can call 1-800-333-9956 and follow the recorded instructions to opt out.

I recently bought tickets for the upcoming debut of The Little Mermaid on Broadway.  We got 1st balcony tickets and they ran about $90 a piece.  Expensive?  Yes, but I didn’t expect to find discount tickets for a show that has yet to appear, and since that is what tickets generally run, I was not at all shocked.  Not happy… but not shocked.

Then came the request for tickets for Hannah Montana.  It would be an early Christmas present for LatteGirl.  OK, I thought.  No big deal.  But imagine my surprise when I discovered that tickets for this concert would cost MORE than a Broadway show!  It took about 1/2 hour once the tickets went on sale before I was able to secure tickets.  Upper Level at the new Prudential Center that will be opening (theoretically) this week.  Read that again… UPPER LEVEL!  Cost? $120 a piece.  For Hannah Montana!   Now, I understand I am old now… but I don’t think if I add up the cost of every concert I have ever attended, that it would cost more than the $240 I had to lay out for this one event.

I was even more shocked when I heard that the concert sold out in a hour, and that tickets were now being given away on local radio stations, just like “real” concert tickets.  I guess at these prices that this is a real concert, but somehow it just doesn’t seem the same thing to me.  I saw this much more like a “Kiddie Concert” but I guess I was wrong.

I thought I had seen (and heard it all) when it came to telemarketing.  Every time I  think they have sunk as low as they can possibly go, the prove me wrong, and reach a whole new level a sleeze.

HSBC Bank has come up with a new way to reach new lows that will be  difficult  (I won’t say “impossible”  any longer)  to  beat.  Tonight I answer the phone, and get what starts to sound like a typical sales call, and I am ready to quote the law and the fact that I have already asked to be placed on their do not call list, when I realize that the person on the other end of the phone isn’t exactly replying exactly to what I am saying, but something I can only deem as “close.”

At first I think, it is just some new guy that is sticking a little too close to the script and not listening.    But then he replies to one comment with a completely different reply and a chuckle.  And I think to myself, “Wait a minute.”  So, I ask “Are you a real person?”  The line gets static and after a pause, he says “Yes, this offer is real.”

Bingo!

There wasn’t even a telemarketer on the other end of the phone.  Now I can’t even try and feel sorry for somebody that is just trying to earn a living and doing their job.  Now it is nothing but a talking computer with a voice recognition algorithm trying to “understand” what I am saying.

Tomorrow I am closing all my accounts at HSBC.  That is just plain wrong!

Every so often I get what I can best describe as a “Conservative Streak” that is so out of line with my normal liberal leanings, that I find it quite uncomfortable, and it leaves me unsure of what to really think. Such is the case when I read to day how the House of Representatives moved to expand Mortgage Protection.

Now my normal liberal way of thinking says that I should support anything that is going to help people out of a bad situation. And in general I do believe that. Rebuilding the areas worst hit by Katrina? Absolutely! Help an area after a Tornado wracks an area? Of course. But bail out some guy who took out a questionable mortgage deal, so he can get more house than he can really afford, and gets caught because that floating mortgage that enabled him to buy a house bigger than mine with more land than me has now gone up (as everybody but the sap that actually signed for this loan knew it would do)? Um… Hold the phone a moment will you please?

Look. I don’t want to sound mean. I realize that these are people we are talking about. People that could very well lose their homes. That is of course a very sad situation. It also hurts the economy, so I understand that there are some widespread consequences that lawmakers are hoping to stave off by this maneuver as well. But I have a hard time rationalizing how I need to pay taxes for my own home, and then watch my tax dollars go to help pay for somebody that is not paying their own taxes and mortgage. Not because of some natural disaster, not by act of war or terrorism, not because of changing boundaries or zoning issues, not even because of illness or even job loss, but because they got caught. They got caught trying to bite off more than they could chew.

Want to lay blame somewhere? Lay it at the feet of these mortgage companies that came up with these “sub-prime” loans. Interest Only loans? Who plays that game? Somebody that is trying to flip a home for a profit? Well, that is why it is called speculation, let them absorb their loss. Somebody that was conned by a mortgage broker that this was an excellent way to get “more house for your money?” Well then hang the broker out to dry for swindling this hard-working individual out of their “American Dream” by convincing them to do the ill-advised, after all it was the broker that profited from these loans.

But please, don’t ask the hardworking men and women that work hard and find a way to pay their mortgages and taxes on time to foot the bill for somebody else’s mistake.

You know, I really feel sorry for women who have to deal with this idiocy day in and day out.  I mean for me, it seems like once a year, I have a post about some knuckle-head that finds breastfeeding offensive, or makes some half-assed comparison of breastfeeding to some bodily function or another.

It was back in 2005 when I went on my first (public) rant about this, after a Op-Ed piece at the Philadelphia Inquirer by Christine Flowers compared Breastfeeding in public to urinating in public, smoking, and blaring hip-hop music and suggests that women who breastfeed should use the bathroom.  This initial rant really caught me off guard, when Ms. Flowers actually responded to my post, calling me an “Alan Alda Femenist” (whatever that means) because she has every right to sip her Latte at Starbucks in peace, and women should just use the restrooms to breastfeed. (Yeah, that sounds sanitary… why don’t you go sip your Latte in there?)  But it did illustrate to me, exactly how pathetically dense these people are, and thus made me far less likely to ignore them… because they are not going to “just go away” or “have an epiphany” since light will likely not dawn on their marble heads.  (My apolgies, but philly.com apparently decided to pull this from their archives, so I can not link to it any longer).

Last year brought us another two incidents of stupidity.  The first being Victoria Secrets, where an employee insisted a woman use the employee restroom to breastfeed her child. Now, we can not blame the entire chain since according to Limited Brands (the parent company), policy certainly allows women to breastfeed, so it was apparently only a particular employee, but still was certainly a telling example of how even at a store which you would think knows a thing about women’s breasts, you can still run into this sort of silliness.

Of course last year also brought us the melee that started when LiveJournal decided that Avatars depicting breastfeeding were offensive.  Not being a LiveJournal user, and not exactly being a big fan of Six Apart in general, I did not find this all that bizarre (LiveJournal seems to have a history of finding ways to upset their users), but upsetting none-the-less.  Since it was “only LiveJournal” this really didn’t get all that much attention (outside of a few blogs), but of course that lack of attention comes back to bite when now Facebook has decided to go this same route and ban breastfeeding pics.  Proving once again, that just by ignoring a problem it will not go away, and will even manifest itself elsewhere, as it has done in this case.

But this pales in comparison, to the hairy chested machismo offered by Bill Maher in response to a story about a Mother that was humilated to tears, while attempting to breastfeed at an Applebee’s in Kentucky and is now trying to get Applebee’s to change their policies.  To be honest, I guess I don’t find it all that strange.  Much like LiveJournal, Maher despite being a seemingly progressive person, is prone to proving himself to be a jackass frequently.

I’m not going to break down his stupidity point by point, partly because it is so indefensible, it baffles me how he can try and  justify this.   Breastfeeding is no different that masturbating in public?  Really?  I’d say Mr. Maher needs some serious therapy, I mean either he has a seriously twisted view of breastfeeding… or of masturbaring.  I don’t know which, and in all sincerity, I really do not wish to know the answer.

But the reason, I will defer to others is really because you can already find it done better than I could hope to (and without the caveat of it coming from “some guy that shouldn’t be getting into women’s issues”…. hmmmm… I wonder if that is what an “Alan Alda Femenist is supposed to mean).  So, for the complete lowdown you can start with Sarah over at Suburban Oblivion.  Then go get the view from the Velveteen Mind who credits Sarah this time rather than stealing her idea  (I’m just kidding of course).  And the Huffington Post has chimed in as well.  And admittedly I fully expect to find something over at Domestic Psychology soon. (But no pressure Cathy :wink: )

You can see the YouTube video here.

I like many if not most Americans that can remember 9/11 will do so for the remainder of our lives.  However, this year for the first time, I will not dwell on it.  I don’t need to relive the pain of that day to remember.  I don’t need to sit in a corner and cry.  I don’t need to recall the funerals that I attended, several with empty or near empty coffins.

I couldn’t forget this day if I tried.  I documented a lot of my own personal post traumatic stress disorder last year, when a lot of bad feelings came rushing back after the terrible accident that took the life of Yankee Pitcher Cory Lidle.

Admittedly, I tend to try and point out what it wrong NOW, since 9/11 on this day.  I have pleaded with the people in Washington and in the news to  just stop with the fear mongering and playing with our emotions. I like others (and documented quite nicely this year by Newsweek) wonder why 6 years later, there is still just a whole in the ground where the World Trade Center once stood.

But as I sit here this evening, looking at the lights reaching into the cloudy evening, lights meant to represent the buildings that once stood there, the people that lived and worked there, and the rescue workers that perished, I am angry.  After the WTC bombings in 1993 it was known that there were issues with the FDNY radios communicating in this area due to the amount of steel and such.  The “fix” was so flawed that they could not get it to work properly that day and did not use it (9/11 Commission: Chapter 9 ).  USA Today first reported in 2003 that the money from the Department of Homeland Security is not going where is should.  I found it interesting and infuriating at the same time, when I read this article in Newmax that showed GOP leaders complaining about too much money going to Democratic areas, as if that should have any impact on where the money should go.  The response from this… more politics.  Just last year, the DHS slashed the funding to NYC by 40% because it determined that New York City has no National Monuments or icons.

So now, as I look forward, rather than spending my time dwelling on what was, my focus is more to how can we deal with it now?  It is time for each of us to stand up and demand that we stop playing games in the name of security, and to actually have something done about it.  We need to make our elected officials actually put together something meaningful in the way of a plan.  Let me stress that again… MEANINGFUL.  I don’t feel safer because airport security is “so perfect” that they make little kids take off their flip flops and walk barefoot through the x-ray machine, since they obviously can’t tell by looking that a 99 cent piece of rubber can’t possibly hold the explosives to take down a jetliner.

We deserve better.  And I for one am going to start demanding it.

Rotten Apples – Well, for those of you that had to be early adopters because the iPhone was going to be “impossible” to get “forever” how do you feel now that Apple has killed off the 4GB model and dropped the 8 GB model by $200? Seems that the iPhone is not the end all be all that prognosticators had anticipated. But don’t worry, according to Job’s letter, you will get a $100 back… as a gift certificate.  Hell, Apple even announced the new iPod Touch, which I guess means they have more than enough inventory of the Touch Screens that they can shove another product out the door. Of course at $299 for an 8GB model, I am wondering how many people will actually want one of these things either.

Oh Vanessa – In case you missed the shockwave that went around the Internet yesterday, it was confirmed by one of her representatives  that the nude picture of Vanessa Hudgens that was going around was real. (No, I am not linking to the picture… sorry Google Searchers)  Shall we start the bets now on whether or not she will be in High School Musical 3?  If rumors were true that she (and Zac Effron) were holding out for more money… this may have just cost her in more ways than one.

Coffee Comrade? -  I was a bit surprised that this was done so low key, considering the fanfare some corporation gets when they open overseas operations, but farfare or not, you can now get Starbucks Coffee in Russia.

Come Out Already – Say what you want about former New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey, when his day of reckoning was upon him and he was caught, at least he had the decency to admit it and resign.  Larry Craig now saying he may not resign, because he needs to “prove” he is not gay.  So far all he has proved is that he is an awful liar, and desperate.  I mean to have your kids (well not actually his, his wife’s from a prior marriage) out there stumping that they believe your “I’m a wide guy so I brushed the foot of the guy in the stall next to me because I am so big” excuse is just plain mean.  It was bad enough when you used that sad excuse.  But to make them go out there and appear just as dumb (if not dumber) by believing it and claiming you were a ‘victim of circumstance‘.  Well… That is just sad.

Well would you? – Wendy over at Things in Your Head asks the tough question on the validity of sites like eHarmony with their “29 levels of compatibility.” That question of course being, would you wind up with your same spouse if you had to try and “match up” with them?

In case you weren’t aware, or forgot (as I did), today starts the Kim Possible, Every Episode Marathon on the Disney Channel.

Now, since we are all Kim Possible fans here, we are both excited about the marathon and sad at the same time.  The reasons for excitement are obvious of course.  But the sadness stretches in two directions.

The first of course being that at the end of the marathon is the series finale.  It felt like such a long hard battle that was waged to get the fouth season out of Disney, and suddenly it is here and already gone.  There are those that are striving to get a 5th season out of the folks at Disney, however according to rumors  on SaveDisneyShows.org, the creators of Kim Possible are leaving (or have left) Disney World.  So the chances of that happening are slim.

The second reason for sadness?  What brain trust a Disney runs a kids show from Noon to 6 am during the first week (at least around here) of back to school?  I mean do these people not have children?  Do they not know how hard it is to get kids back on a school friendly sleep schedule?  And even if it wasn’t… what KID is going to be watching this throughout the night?  Or are they hoping (as LatteGirl was) that I would just blow away everything on my Tivo in order to record every episode that would be missed?

Kim, I will miss you when you are gone, but just understand when bedtime comes around tonight, I am not going to be your biggest fan.

An alternate title for this could very well be, “What do we do next year?”

Well, today LatteGirl returns to school.  Yesterday she was of course lamenting the end of summer vacation as we were going through the checklist of back to school items to pack in her backpack.  So, as we were doing this she complained, “I can’t believe that summer is over already.  I mean, we didn’t even get to do anything yet.”

After retreiving my jaw back off the floor where is landed, I asked her to explain.  Now I should point out that last summer, she went to Day Camp 4 days a week, and Fridays she and TheWife would do something together (usually).  This year however, she requested to go to camp 5 days a week because she felt that she had missed out on so many things that her friends got to do on that day that she wasn’t there.  So, she felt that there were a lot more trips that should have been made.

That being said, this was a rather expensive and busy summer around here.  Since school got out we have made trips to Buskill Falls, Disney World, a couple of trips to the beach, Chestnut Grove Resort in the Poconos, Mountain Creek Waterpark and Six Flags Great Adventure (where we will also be returning this weekend as well).  She has visited Adventure Aquarium, Turtleback Zoo, and the Bronx Zoo.  With camp she has gone swimming at 4 different lakes, been ice skating, bowling, roller skating, and more.

Hell, as we slip into September, I am starting to regret the purchase of the new pool, because between feeling like we were always on our way somewhere, LatteGirl being “all swimmed out” from trips to the lake, and weather that kept the pool a little cooler than we had hoped most of the year, the amount of use pool saw this year was nominal.  I spent more time keeping the pool clean than anybody spent actually in the pool.

Now I know that when back to school time arrives, no kid is happy about it, and summer always is “too fast” and the knee jerk reaction is to say they did “nut in’” all summer.  But park of me is thinking, if she felt she was bored this year.  I better get a second job to start paying for next year, because what the heck are we going to do for an encore to try and improve on this summer?

I admit at times to being a bit jealous of “The Mom.”  When it comes to child rearing, and childhood memories, and everything to do with building a relationship with a child, it seems that marketers believe that there is nobody else but “The Mom.”  This is not a slam against mothers.  History certainly shows why marketers tend to steer towards them in such cases (even if it is an “unwanted” Butterball Turkey Pot Holder… sorry I couldn’t help myself).

I have of course learned over the years that there are plenty of “The Dads” out there as well that strive much harder than previous generations to do more with our kids, to be a bigger part of their lives from the outset, and not just be, “The Provider,” that comes home from work looking for his Pipe and Brandy, then patting his kids on the head as the nanny whisks them off to bed.  Nope, we got the message, and we have made sure we have time to tell the kids, “Lets go fly a kite.”

Then I ran across this article on msn, about Paving Memory Lane, from Best Life Magazine, and by the time I was done, I was… I don’t know annoyed?… sickened?… generally pissed.  It seems that in the eyes of this author, the only way for a Dad to ingrain his place in his children’s head is to trick them into it.  He offers “tricks” such as giving names to events so they are catchy, family slogans, the buying of “tourist-trap junk”, and even hookey day to “prove” you are cool.

I like many men want to create memories with our children, but if the only way you can create them it to trick your kids into remember it, then I say either you aren’t trying hard enough, or often enough.  Just being there for your kids is a gift your kids will cherish.  Being there for that soccer game, or dance recital, or whatever else is important to them when they are young is far more important and will be remembered far longer, than the trinket you indulged on the one time you actually did something for them.

Just being a Dad for your kids is enough.  No slight of hand required.

One week until we head up to this place in the Poconos for a vacation.  One I desperately seem to need all of the sudden.  But leading up to it, is the week from hell.  Two family functions, for both sides of the in-laws, to “family reunion events” that just may very well suck the life force out of me.

Now don’t get me wrong, some of my in-laws are very nice.  However, I can count them on one hand.  As for the rest of them, well all I can say is the best feeling I ever had about them was when my mother-in-law moved 1/2 way across the country one week after our wedding.  (She has unfortunately since moved back).

These are people that are difficult to take in small doses on a one-on-one basis.  Get them together, and it could send the strongest willed people screaming for the hills.  So bookend them on successive weekends, and you have a recipe to send me straight to the nut house.

I have never understood the facination with the family reunion in the first place.  Yes, there are times that you sort of lose contact with one or two people because everybody is too busy with their own lives, raising kids, etc.  But you can pick up the phone and call those particular people.  Invite them over for dinner, or drinks or whatever.  Why the whole big event with EVERYBODY including the people that you haven’t spoken to years.  If you were honest with yourself, there is probably a reason that you haven’t spoken to them.  And it will all come rushing back, most likely several minutes after they arrive, and now you will have to deal with them for the rest of the day  (or worse if they are the “never leave” type… think Cousin Eddie from Christmas Vacation).

Family Reunions?  Just say No!

It is that time of year.  Back to School sales and the like reminding you that school is only “just around the corner.”  And that is bad enough.  But as LatteGirl has gotten more involved in other activities, I have noticed that a lot of them seem to coincide with the start of the school year.

So not only do we need to prepare for Back to School, it is also, back to Soccer, Back to Dance Class, Back to Karate, and so on.  Am I the only one finding this daunting?  Isn’t there a chance that they could, you know, spread things about a bit?  Maybe somebody start, oh I dunno, maybe the SECOND WEEK in September!  Is that really too much to ask?

Forget the Holidays, Labor Day Weekend is turning into my new version of “Black Friday.”

Oh, and while I am complaining about this, would it be too much to ask to have the stores run their back to school sales, somewhere closer to the school year?  Last Week of July?  First week of August?  Do none of these people consider that some people actually take vacations in the summer?

Now I understand there are those of you that plan ahead and don’t wait for the last minute, but to make room for all the back to school stuff, they have to close out their “summer sections” way too early.  And somehow, it has become impossible to find a pool toy or back yard game after 4th of July weekend.

I know, I know, I am all over the place.  But suddenly I feel like I am hunkering down to do battle with the “overscheduled” monster again, and I am just not ready.

And while I am at it… Where the heck did summer go?

Dear obnoxiously “smelly” lady,

It is 90 degrees out, and I guess you are afraid of smelling bad, but what the hell did you do, take a bath in that gawd awful Dollar Store knockoff swill you were wearing?

You were almost clear across the bus, and I was still overcome by the toxic waste smell eminating from you. Does you nose no longer work? Can you not smell that?

I am not talking about the fragrence as everybody has different likes and dislikes, but do you think perhaps you could use several gallons less. On behalf of all your fellow commuters, we would really appreciate it.

A bit of a rant to start off the day today. I ran across this post, whining about Ratatouille. Not about the film per se (everybody is entitled to their own opinion of course), but about how it is an “assault on G rated movies.” The author complains mostly about 2 things, the use of the word “hell” in the movie, and “violence.”

Before I start, if you would like to see a more levelheaded response, you could look at this one.

Now I will start with the “violence.” Violence in cartoons as a cause, is sort of a pet peeve of mine. As I pointed out yesterday, countless Bugs Bunny and other cartoon that have been yanked because they are “too violent” while other subject matter which is just as questionable (if not more so) is given a pass.

Worse, there is no clear cut definition as to what constitutes violence. It follows the “I know it when I see it philosophy. The complaint against Ratatouille revolves around a 10 second scene where a woman is apparently threatening a man with a gun. You hear the gun go off (fired through the ceiling apparently), and then see them kissing. It is a quick nod towards noir type films, and perhaps a quick “shot” at the French. This is his “assault” on G ratings. He somehow manages to overlook the point in the movie in which Collette pins Linguini to the cutting board with carving knives, one after another. Or when she is preparing to spray him with Mace. The fact that there is a character that is in this movie that “killed a man, using just his thumb” is also neglected.

Now, I am not suggesting that the film IS too violent for these reasons. It is striving at a difficult balance to make a movie that appeals to both adults and children. Most of these things (if not all of them) go right over a child’s head. Think back to when you were a child. Did you think it was violent that Wile E. Coyote was using Dynamite to try and kill the Roadrunner? Did you contemplate how Elmer Fudd constantly using a shotgun would make you want to go out an own a gun? No, of course not. There was easy slapstick laughter that you saw as a kid. And only when (or if) you saw it again later as a teen or an adult did you “catch” these things.

Is there violence I would rather not see in “kids” stuff?  Of course, as any reasonable parent would.  And yet, I don’t here anybody complaining that a movie like “West Side Story” is shown, very often on a Saturday afternoon, which is “prime children TV time.”  But you will say, West Side Story is a classic musical.  You are correct.  But it also shows graphic violence,  street fighting and stabbings.  Why isn’t the Parental Television Council looking to get that banned?  I don’t hear anybody clamoring for Snow White to be rated PG, and yet here a hunstman pulls a knife and (half-heartedly) attempts to stab her, and the Wicked Queen tries to poison her.  That is far more violent, and clearly part of the basis of the movie.  But again, that is “classic” so it gets ignored.

I realize this is running in several different directions, but lets be honest for a second, so is the whole “too much violence” issue.

As for the use of the word, “hell” in Ratatouille (and Cars as the author points out).  The word was used once in each movie.  My daughter has heard it used more than that in a single Sunday Sermon.  “Hell” has never been considered part of the “dirty word” lexicon.  So I really don’t understand what the hell the problem is.

I am one to often be picked on for being to “politically correct” because I don’t condone things such as racist language for the sake of it, or sexist behavior (side effect of having a little girl).  But even for me, there is a point where you have to say, are you complaining for the sake of complaining?

And finally, while the original author takes shots at Disney and Pixar to “grow up” I will point out that it is the job of the MPAA to rate the movie, not the producers, so if you have a problem with the rating.  Complain to them.  But in all reality, if your biggest gripe about a movie is that a character complained that he is in “Hillbilly Hell” or that a character in warning another what to expect says, “Welcome to Hell” then I suggest you grow the fuck up.

One thing TheWife and I came to the sad realization of during a recent trip to Six Flags Great Adventure, was that LatteGirl knew very few of the characters who were in the park actually were. We would be saying to her, “Look Honey, there is Porkey Pig” or “This is Granny’s House.” And she would just look at us kind of odd and say, “Who?” or “I don’t know who that is.”

There are several reasons for this. The biggest one of course being that there is just so much more available now than when we were kids.  It is rare that our television is tuned to something other than the Disney Channel, with the rare exception made usually for Scooby-Doo on Boomerang or Cartoon Network.

The second reason being that of course many of the Classic Looney Tunes were of course pulled off the air because they are “too violent” (a rant I will go into separately tomorrow).

But in either case, we found it quite sad that she has been denied exposure to this so far. It didn’t really take away from her enjoyment of the park, but I think that the Tivo is going to have to get a few new “Season Passes” so that she can find out why exactly Daddy was so excited to see Marvin the Martian, that he actually was willing to be on the other side of the camera for a change.

What did you watch as a child?  And do you want your children watching it now?  Why?  Why not?

Who the hell am I to write about healthcare?  I have by most standards, excellent insurance coverage provided by my wife’s employer.  Before that, I was able to insure through the same company with a small business policy, and before that I had insurance coverage that was (partially) paid for by an employer.

My only real problem came with some “in between” times, where I learned the perils of Cobra coverage (which is supposedly designed to take care of those specific times), as well as the dreaded, “pre-existing condition” issues that arise (more on that as we go along).

So yes, I am fortunate enough to have “good” coverage, and lucky enough that my family has no “factors” that render them “uninsurable.”  But it is just that.  Lucky.  And as with anything else, it worries me that it is only a matter of time until my luck runs out, and I find myself in a position, like so many others, either unable to afford, or unable to get (at any price) insurance because somebody has some condition that blackballs us because some statistician has determined that a particular condition is “too risky” for them to cover at all.

Now let me state up front that I am in no way a fan of Michael Moore.  I find that unfortunately, as much as he wants to make a good point (as with the recently released, “Sicko”) that his showmanship is a bit too much, and that the message that he is trying to get across gets lost because of his overboard tactics.  That being said, his timing and topics are often right on, and that is certainly the case with the healthcare in this country.

If you think health care in this country is not a problem, then either you are a major stockholder in one of the Health Insurance Companies,  are being paid off by the or are just not paying attention.  Because even if you have insurance, you almost have to be forcibly ignorant not to see what is going on.  How many valid claims do you have to resubmit, explain, or challenge to get paid because they seem to be almost randomly denied.  I say randomly, because at a glance there is most likely no obvious and legitimate reason for it be denied.  And even trying to ascertain the actual reason for the denial can be a challenge as it is cloaked behind codes, and asterisks and run-on sentence explanations that seem to say completely different things within the same sentence.

Despite having continuous coverage that dates back to somewhere in the early 90′s (the last time both TheWife and I had employers that didn’t provide coverage at the same time), we have more times than I can count, had to battle with “pre-existing conditions” issues.  I’ll give you a few personal examples.

The first is  my own, and one that can be arugued either way.  Back in the early 80′s I was working as an EMT with an ambulance company (that ironically did not offer health insurance).  While on the job one day, I got caught in gunfire in a not very good neighborhood, and got hit in the head.  The bullet (fortunately) did not penetrate my skull, but was embeded below my scalp.  The insurance company that handled my workman’s compensation claim decided that since there was nothing life threatening about the bullet, they denied the hospital the ability to perform surgery to remove it.

Fast forward 20 years, I still have that projectile embedded there, however now a doctor I have gone to says that it really should not have been allowed to remain considering that many projectiles are made from (or contain) lead, and that it would be wise to have it removed.  So, we send the paperwork in to my insurance company now.  Denied.  Pre-existing condition.  Which, by technicality is true, but it is only now that the actual “risk” is being determined.  Worse, anything that I may develop later because of it, would also be denied. So, really it comes down to whether or not I am willing to pay for it myself.

Less arguable is the situation with LatteGirl.  She was born with the unfortunate circumstance of being the child of a mother that has both allergies and asthma, and a father that also had major allergy problems as a kid.  But in her case, she has not been without insurance basically since the day she was born.  A “Pre-existing” condition clause on a chronic condition is normally done to deny claims within the first 6 months of new insurance, where none existed before (presumably to avoid people buying insurance only when they find out that they have something serious that needs immediate attention, and then not staying with the company long enough for them to make up in premiums what they have laid out in coverage). But since LatteGirl has not had any lapses in coverage, this should not apply.  And in actuality doesn’t.  But that doesn’t stop them from denying claims made for both doctors appointments and denying prescription coverage on a routine basis.  I then have to spend hours (and a few times days) on the phone with Customer Service Reps, and their supervisors, before I (once again) have to fax over proof of previous coverage to once again get coverage reinstated.  Only to have to play the same game a few months later (you would think that this stuff would be “on file” eventually wouldn’t you).

Finally, and what may be the dumbest of examples.  My mother has cancer.  She has thus far outlived all projections, and has been doing quite well on a chemotherapy regiment, that has been keeping the tumors at bay.  Not improving her situation, but actually keeping it from getting worse for the past three years now.  Of course, as most are aware, the drawback to chemotherapy is, severe nausea.  So her physician prescribed medication that helps deal with this.  However, the medication is supposed to be for “short term” use only, and thus since she does not have a “medical condition” that warrants the continued use of the drug (“side effect” is not a medical condition apparently), every month we have to challenge the ruling and justify the use.  You would think that at some point it would be cheaper to actually keep the previous rulings (again) on-file rather than having to repeat the same process ad nauseum.   But it goes back to what I said earlier about them seemingly doing this randomly in hopes that people get too tired or just give up fighting so that they don’t have to pay.

We have these kinds of issues, and we have health insurance.  I can’t imagine the nightmare that those without have to deal with.  Or worse (I think), not being able to get insurance because a spouse or child has a condition that they don’t want to cover. Something like 1 in 150 children every year are now diagnosed somewhere along the Autism Disorder Spectrum (Based on prevalence statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2007)).  I am not going to debate, nor is this about whether something belongs in that “Spectrum” but the fact is that most of these kids (and or their parents) will have problems with insurance at some point.

It is easy to sit back and say, “There but for the grace of god go I.”  But that solves nothing.  And what happens if unfortunately at some point you are not so “graced” and find yourself in that position?  It is a serious problem that needs serious solutions.  Now.  Not eventually.  Not when it is a “critical problem.”  Because, if you run into one of these issues… your perspective on what is critical, will suddenly and drastically change.

I am so glad to be back at work.  First of all, so I can get some rest, second of all, somebody has got to pay for all this stuff.  2 days, 2 parties (1 kids, 1 family), if we had had the kid’s party in our house rather than out, you may very well be reading my obituary today.

But as it goes, anything worth doing is worth doing until your near death… or something like that.

But in it all, a single moment of guilt.  Something, I never thought I would do.  Between the time she got her presents, and the time she opened them, I noticed that in one of her presents, she got… gah… the dreaded Bratz Doll.  And I am a very lenient as parents go (I think anyway) but there was no way this scourge was going to start populating and invading our home… and…  I stashed the offending present.  I saved the card, will buy her something else, place it in the same bag from the child and let her “get” that gift instead.

One small problem has snuck into the plan.  We normally (we… TheWife does it, not me… too lazy), always has LatteGirl mention the gift in the Thank You. (Why is this?  Is it supposed to make it a more “personal” Thank You by mentioning what you were given by that particular person?  So, now we will have to omit that step on one child’s card.  My sneaky suspicion is that LatteGirl will catch on that something is different… why not list the present on this child’s card.  All I can say is that I am glad that I am not the one helping fill out those cards.

Now, I want to cut the mother some slack here because… well because she only has boys, and I am guessing she had no clue.

Now, please indulge me and those that are a bit more used to dealing with children’s parties than I,  Let me ask a couple of questions here.   First, is there anybody in this day and age that doesn’t give a gift receipt along with the present?  I feel petty asking this, but I mean particularly for a children’s party where you may not know the other people well enough to know what the child wants or needs… or may have already received two of, why wouldn’t you give a gift receipt?  I mean hell, Target gives me one whenever I buy a toy there, whether I want it or not.

The second one is far less clear.  How would you deal with an inappropriate parent?  Allow me to give some needed details.  One child’s mother shows up at the children’s party (which was held indoors, at a place where no less that 4 different child’s parties are going on at the same time.  (Children from toddlers to tweens. )  First of all this lady shows up where a criminally short micro-mini-skirt and a top with so much cleavage showing, if you looked straight down from above, you could probably see her navel… and her shoes.  If that wasn’t enough on its own to be a bit embarrassing to have her associated with “our party” she (apparently being divorced), took it upon herself to take a crack at each of the dad’s that were there with their kids (no, she did not take a crack at me, which would be why I am not currently busy trying to raise bail for TheWife).  So what would you have done with the lady that has now been not so affectionately been known as Desperate-Slut-Mom?

I am starting to come to my wits end when it comes to consumer electronics these days.  Being a “gadget guy” that is saying a lot.  Because, I like my electronic toys, and I always want them to have the coolest new features, and such.  But today it isn’t about what makes the product better, it seems to be all about what you can tack onto the product, which only makes it more confusing, and many of these features are really of questionable value.

The first and most obvious today are mobile phones.  Can we just have one that works, and works well?  Is that really too much to ask?  It doesn’t have to be a camera, an MP3 player or have 1.3 bajillion ringtones  built in (with more available “starting from $1.99″).  Yes, it should probably have a decent contact manager for the phone book.  For gadget guys like me, the ability to sync it to my computer is a benefit.  But it has to first and foremost make phone calls.  Efficiently, clearly, and preferably with a decent battery life.

What really got me started on this, was my shopping for a Mother’s Day present this year.  I decided, it was a good time to pick up a personal GPS system for TheWife’s car.  With prices coming down dramatically over the past few years, it seems like a good idea.  And with the ones available today that can be used walking as well as driving.  Well, I just loved the idea.  So, I started as any reasonable person would (I think), and started looking at reviews of the devices.

Now as prices come down, inevitably newer models come out offering this or that so that there can be new “high end” models.  I understand that.  But does that make “yesterday’s” models really any less reliable at what they do?  Or any less valuable as a tool?  I don’t think so, but apparently others do.  As I am looking at these models, I start reading things like, “a ‘good’ model today must have the ability to show pictures, and good music software.”  And I can’t help but to ask… “WHY????”

I want it to get me from point A to point B.  I am not showing pictures of my daughter to neighbors on it.  The car stereo can already handle MP3 files, or I can burn a CD from my downloaded music, or even better, the stereo has a port to plug in TheWife’s iPod.  Why does the GPS player need to play music?  I even ran across a reviewer that complained that none of the models he had reviewed had an integrated camera, and suggested to readers that this would most likely come in the next wave of models, and that “you should probably hold off on one until then.”  Again, I was stunned.  Why should I hold off, to get a more expensive model later, that will offer a subpar camera (I am already stuck with one of those in my phone) and pay a PREMIUM for the privilege to snap cruddy photos with a device that I purchased to get me to where I want to go?

Ultimately I settled on the Garmin C330 (review to follow once we give it a test drive).  It is an “outdated” model in that it just does directions.  How awful.  It is simple to use.  Easy to understand since it doesn’t have all the tacked on junk.  And since it is “antiquated” by today’s newer models, rather than having to sink $800 or more into a device that does exactly the same thing, but offers features I don’t know anybody but places like PC Magazine reviewers desire.  Nope, I will pocket the $500+ savings.  Even, with the digital music player I am considering buying for myself, if I plunk down $250 for a higher end device, I will still save more than $250 over the “hot” devices, and get a better overall experience.

Maybe someday,  (and I am not even really sure who to blame here, the manufacturers or the “experts”) they will figure out that when people want a mousetrap, they will pay more if you build a better mousetrap, but not necessarily so if you have the same mousetrap but it also plays music.

I forget who it was, that pointed out that “A while fly in your Chardonnay” along with just about everything else listed in the song, Ironic by Alanis Morrisette is actually unfortunate and not actually ironic.

So, I thought I would provide a really good example.   President George W. Bush, today signing the Law Day Proclimation that in part says,

Generations of Americans have served the cause of justice and shaped our legal institutions to ensure that the blessings of liberty extend to every citizen. The men and women of America’s legal community have worked to defend the Constitution, protect the innocent, and secure the rights of their fellow citizens. Their efforts have helped make our Nation a shining example of justice.

Now THAT is irony.

We are a nation of immigrants (with the exception of the Native Americans of course). The vast majority of us “hail” from another nation. We even try to hold ties to those nations, by hyphenating our nationalities, much like a woman that adds her husbands name onto her own. We are Italian-Americans, African-Americans, Irish-Americans and so on. So what is it that give people the right to complain about “foreigners?”

Now, I am not talking about illegal immigration here, that is a whole other topic, for another time. No, I am talking about plain old racism. And it burns me to no end, when people whine about the “PC Police.” Because these same whiners would be the ones up in arms if something derogatory was said about “their people.”

I have head people ask, do you teach your child how to not be a racist? This is of course, the silliest thing I have ever heard. Of course I don’t. I have no need to. Not because my child is special, or has some sort of difference than other kids. No, she is exactly the same as all kids in this world. Racism is not “baked in.” The seeds of racism are planted by adults, nurtured and cultivated, as the children learn from the actions of adults.

Now to be fair, it is not all the adults. There is enough blame to go around, since children can also be influenced by teachers, friends (who have racist parents), and even television. Not that I would ever condone a child watching Faux News Channel (or anybody else for that matter), but what kind of a world do we live in when you have “News” reporters saying thing like, the Iraqi people are knuckle dragging savages from the 10th century. You have many people who believe that Barack Obama can not be President. Not for any reason of his qualification, but because, “America isn’t ready for a BLACK President.”

Have we really progressed so little? Can’t we just learn from our children that we are all really the same and that the color of our skin, or the nation from which we claim our roots, really doesn’t matter? Is it really that hard? And if not, why haven’t we done it?

OK, I have to admit, since I am not a big fan of American Idol (to put it politely), I got a real kick out the VoteForTheWost.com pushing of Sanjaya.  I was most amused by the letters and e-mails that “Idol” fans were sending… filled with hate, and outrage.

It gave me pause when I ran across a couple of letters that tried so desperately to “put things in “perspective” and tell how Important Idol is, and how manipulating the events is wrong, because then the outcome is not correct (please note I have removed all the expletives that would have made those phrases considerably longer).  And I stopped laughing.  And I pondered it for a moment.  And I got really sad.

Our President led us into a war, under false pretenses.  He lied to the American people.  He continues to this moment to manipulate and cajole in an effort to get his way.  And people remain quiet.  (Not everybody of course but you know what I mean).  But mess with a faux talent show on Television, and people are outraged, and screaming bloody murder and talking about how “Un-American” it is.  Lead us into war so that our soldiers get killed on a lie?  OK.  Take away civil liberties?  Hey no sweat.  Abuse and overstep the autorities of the Presidency?  Why do I care?  Just don’t mess with American Idol.

We as a country really need to get our priorities straight.

Yes, I am back with another opportunity to pick on Brian Williams. As I was reading (along with the rest of the world) about Va. Tech shooting, I ran across this article (which I guess was inevitable) linking together this story with the Columbine Massacre. In it, I found the following passage:

Authorities did learn that Columbine killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold played violent games, made violent videos at school, and were the victims of bullying because they befriended the Trench Coach Mafia, a group of students who clashed with school athletes.

Perhaps somebody on the staff of MSNBC could, oh I don’t know, run a Google Search, or do some background checks on your information. Perhaps you may like to take a peek at this Salon article which states in part:

Five months after the massacre, investigators also refute other key allegations about the pair: that they were members of the Trench Coat Mafia, raised by negligent parents, practicing Goths or frustrated gays.

Harris and Klebold are still routinely referred to as belonging to the Trench Coat Mafia. As recently as Wednesday, in a report on Sears’ decision to stop selling a trench coat-wearing action figure, CNN Headline News was referring to “the two Trench Coat Mafia teens who were responsible for the Columbine High School massacre last April.” But sources unanimously and unequivocally confirm that the group had nothing whatsoever to do with the murders, and very little to do with Harris and Klebold.

So if Vinny in the Bronx (or Jay in NJ in this case), can find this information for his stupid little blog, why can’t the respected journalists at NBC (and their sister stations) get the story correct? I mean after all, you did talk about how you are the only credible source… right?

The saying goes, “the cream rises to the top.”  In times of despair and tragedy, you see the good come out in people.  And for the most part, I do still believe that is true.  However, after Columbine, Sept. 11th, and now the Va. Tech shooting, I have come to another conclusion.  Insanity rises to the top as well.

That is the only reason I can figure that, in times of crisis like these, you start to see  some of the nuttiest  people in America come out of the woodwork to start spewing divisive, hurtful, and yes even just plain nutty things.

Exhibit A.  Debbie Schlussel.  Even as the reports were coming out that there were no terroristic ties to the events, Schlussel wasn’t satisfied.  Even as the reports came out that it was an “Asian Male” that was the shooter, she continued to justify her rantings because, “there is a large Muslim community” at Va. Tech and “Pakis” are considered “Asian”  She doesn’t actually say who equates “Pakis” to Asians except for herself.  Schlussel has obviously been overexposed to VP Cheney talking points, and “clearly sees” connections where none exist.  She was so convinced that the “liberal” media was ready to cover this up that even has the experts provided information, she continued to believe her own interpretation of events.  This pathetic Ann Coulter wanna-be should now hopefully go back under the rock from which she crawled.

Exhibit B.  Ken Ham, President of Answers in Genesis offers this “reason” for the tragedy:

We live in an era when public high schools and colleges have all but banned God from science classes. In these classrooms, students are taught that the whole universe, including plants and animals—and humans—arose by natural processes. Naturalism (in essence, atheism) has become the religion of the day and has become the foundation of the education system (and Western culture as a whole). The more such a philosophy permeates the culture, the more we would expect to see a sense of purposelessness and hopelessness that pervades people’s thinking. In fact, the more a culture allows the killing of the unborn, the more we will see people treating life in general as “cheap.”

Regardless of what your belief or religion is, to rush out and try and tie these horrific events to what you are taught in a science class, is nothing short of pathetic.  He couldn’t wait 24 hours after the shootings to get this “evidence” out there.

Exhibit C.  Fred Phelps, from his own Website (Link not safe for Sane People)

WBC will preach at the funerals of the Virginia Tech students killed on campus during a shooting rampage April 16, 2007. You describe this as monumental horror, but you know nothing of horror — yet. Your bloody tyrant Bush says he is ‘horrified’ by it all. You know nothing of horror — yet. Your true horror is coming. “They shall also gird themselves with sackloth, and horror shall cover them; and shame shall be upon all faces, and baldness upon all their heads” (Eze. 7:18).

Why did this happen, you ask? It’s simple. Your military chose to shoot at the servants of God today, and all they got for their effort was terror. Then, the LORD your God sent a crazed madman to shoot at your children. Was God asleep while this took place? Was He on vacation? Of course not. He willed this to happen to punish you for assailing His servants.

Is there any commentary really needed for this loon?

Exhibit D.  Representative Ron Paul (R-Tx) told the Politico

Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) has a simple solution to future shooting massacres such as the one that ripped apart Virginia Tech university Monday: more guns.

“People are a little more cautious if somebody might have a gun there,” the GOP presidential candidate told Politico reporters Tuesday. “A concealed gun carried by a responsible person — that might have ended the problem that they had at Virginia Tech with one person being killed or two people being killed.”

Guns!  The answer is more guns!  Now I don’t really have a stance on either side of the gun argument (no, really I don’t).  But to suggest that MORE GUNS is the answer.  I don’t think so.

Exhibit D:  With a hat tip to Froggies Lillypad for finding this piece.

Advocates of gun ownership rights saw Monday’s massacre as evidence of the need to relax gun laws rather than tighten them.

“All the school shootings that have ended abruptly in the last 10 years were stopped because a law-abiding citizen — a potential victim — had a gun,” said Larry Pratt, executive director of Gun Owners of America.

Another pro-wild west solution.  Again, I am on the fence on this issue, and more than suggesting more gun control, I would like to see the rules we have better enforced, but the suggestion of more guns, and a “vigilante solution” would have prevented this situations is sadly short-sighted.   I think Froggie summed this up better than I could when she said, “Somebody, please tell me that I’m not going crazy for thinking that this is one of the most retarded things ever uttered.”

How did that song go, The freaks come out at night?  Well I guess… unless they have something to pedal to us during a time like this.  Then they come out during the day as well.  I rest my case.

I skipped over the easy jokes, and chose to ignore the Time Magazine Person of the Year Award, naming “You” the bloggers, as Person of the Year.  Many cracks were made (and at the time, I admit, I thought it was kind of dopey as well), and for the most part, the whole thing was laughed off as a silly publicity stunt, where Time just didn’t know WHO to make Person of the Year.

But as this year as worn on, I am starting to think more and more that they were actually right.  Oh sure, there are just as many (if not more) “worthless” blogs out there, than useful ones, but the fact is that there are many, many very good to excellent Blogs that have literally changed the landscape of information available. (and by worthless, I mean blogs that “dead” or not updating.  What is “worthless” to one person is a “goldmine of information” to another, so any active blog is not technically worthless.)

I have noted this before, back when the White House Press Corp. went on this little bender attacking blogs.  Now, and this is not the first time by any means, Brian Williams of NBC is whining about bloggers:

“All of my life, developing credentials to cover my field of work, and now I’m up against a guy named Vinny in an efficiency apartment in the Bronx who hasn’t left the efficiency apartment in two years,” Williams said Wednesday. “On the Internet, no one knows if you’ve been to Ramadi or you’ve just been to Brooklyn and just have an opinion about Ramadi.”

Gee, Mr. Williams if you along with some of your other press cohorts hadn’t stopped actually being news people, maybe you would have more credibility than “Vinny.”  Maybe if you didn’t show yourself to be such a neo-luddite.  Maybe if Katie Couric would stop plaugerizing. May if it was NBC News and not the Blog Talking Points Memo that actually uncovered and broke the Attorney Purge Scandal.  Even the LA Times points to this story as proof that blogs can top the press corp.  Unfortunately not once did the LA Times, or anybody else  mention that unless you did a live remote from Ramadi that you aren’t allowed to do anything but listen to those that have.

So it seems that the blogging world, and that fact that people have a voice is unnerving quite a few of the talking heads in traditional media as their influence has obviously been challenged.  So in the end, maybe Time was right.  Maybe “You” are the Person of the Year.  Because with so many so afraid of the changes and shift in power and influence, that the blogging world is even more powerful than some would like to admit.

I am really getting tired of it.  Is it possible to go even a month without reading about how another female teacher “slept with” one of her students?

(Side Note:  Why is it that if a male teacher “sleeps with” a female student, the headlines use words like rape, molested, took advantage of, etc.?  Which they should by the way.  But when it in involves a female teacher they say she “slept with”, “had a relationship with”, and so on.  In either case, it is statuatory rape of a minor, and should be judged just as harshly.)

In the latest case, which is way too close to me (in terms of driving distance),  Newark School Teacher Tracy Booth is accused of having sex with a 13 year old student.  13 years old.  Now I don’t think I need to go into the obvious and primary reason this is wrong.  But let me extend it even further.  How many times have you heard (or do you know) women that prefer older men because even at 18 or 20 years old, that men are just clumsy testoserone machines, and have not really grown up yet sexually.  Just what does a 31 year old woman get out of a 13 year old boy?  (Never mind, I don’t think I really want that answered.  Sick freakin’ people.)

Worse than even I thought

If you have the stomach for it.  Just try what I did, and see what comes up.  I went to Google News and just typed in “Teacher Charged” (without the quotes).  You can see the results for yourself here.

Originally, I thought I was going to list some of the more recent cases, but do you see how many came up in that news search?  I didn’t make it out of April 2007 before I realized how in over my head I would be to even try!

I don’t know what should be done, or could be done… but it seems obvious to me that something… SOMETHING has to be done to stem this tide.  Because this is just clearly out of control.

Well, I guess in a way that it is only appropriate that the Garden State be selected for the new home of the Live Earth concert to raise awareness of Global Warming.

Although the wise-ass in me would have loved to have seen it be moved to somewhere in Oklahoma, just to drive Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) absolutely batty. Of course the fact that Inhofe can still call Global Warming a hoax after the recently published IPCC Report, proves that he is already batty.

Over 130 countries have participated in the IPCC’s fourth report, which has involved over 2 500 scientific expert reviewers, 800 contributing authors and 450 lead authors.

In this country a handful of officials at the Department of Justice can’t keep their stories straight long enough to cover up the fact that they fired 8 U. S. Attorneys for purely political reasons, and Inhofe thinks that this hoax could be carried out with this many experts, authors, scientists? Heck, even the few scientists paid off by Exxon to dispute Global Warming, can’t keep their mouths shut long enough for people to actually believe that they came to their conclusions independently from the $10,000 reward offered by AEI (a thinly veiled “think tank” funded by Exxon) offered to try and counter the reports.

But of course, such a stunt would only prove to be a distraction as we watched Inhofe go into convulsions, so it is ultimately better off here in New Jersey (where we can paste posters for it all over the refineries along the New Jersey Turnpike )

Snark finally aside (I think), I am proud to have the event here in New Jersey.

I struggled a bit (FINE, more than just a little) when I tried to address the results of the study done by the Department of Education on using Technology (specifically “software”) for education.

However, in BusinessWeek this week, U.S. Representative Ron Kind (D-WI), does an excellent job of juggling the issues with the results, and showing how it was A Flawed Measure.

The finding raises the question whether this nation should only invest in tools whose effectiveness can be measured through test scores.

As I noted, this study was clearly flawed, but I did omit this point of the conclusion and how flawed the question itself was, thus rendering the rest of the results useless.  Because, there is more to education than standardized test scores.  I said the full potential of Education Software was not explored, but Kind does a much better job as he goes on and explains,

 The answer to that question should be no. This study attempts to show the ineffectiveness of educational technology. Instead it simply reveals the Bush Administration’s tunnel vision on the uses and value of it.

The benefits education technology offers students go beyond merely passing core-curricular tests. With it, students are gaining the technology skills and knowledge they will need to compete in the 21st-century economy. While ensuring that our students are proficient in reading, math, and science is critical to their academic and employment futures, their ability to use technology tools, mine the resources of the Internet, and collaborate virtually with peers around the world are skills that high-paying employers seek as well.

Clearly more needs to be looked at.   And we need to stop looking at things solely through the looking glass of NCLB.  There is more to life and knowledge than standardized test scores.

Every parent hits this situation once in a while.  You have a relative or a friend, one that doesn’t have kids, that give your son or daughter a present, no parent would would ever buy for their kids.

In this case, my daughter received a little yellow chick, dressed up in a bunny outfit, that quacks out “Here comes Peter Cottontail.”  I have been listening to this for the past hour now, and have been alternating dreaming of ways to make the chick meet an untimely end, and dreaming of finding a way for the person that gave it to her… meeting an untimely end.

I guess it is something of a cycle.  Before we had a child, my wife and I gave some gifts that in retrospect probably garnered similar feeling of disdain.  So for those that are child free, remember this, as it will ultimately come back to haunt you later.  For those that have kids.  Remember, it (probably) wasn’t just something done to torture you.  I said, “Probably!”

I wasn’t planning on writing about the stupidity that is the recent study conducted on children in daycare. Actually, the study wasn’t all that stupid, but more the hype and articles written about it were stupid. And I wasn’t the only one who noticed how this was being covered by the mainstream media.

Initially, I assumed that as nonsensical as the articles were that it would just blow over without much ballyhoo. Then I started reading some articles like at Career and Kids, where the frustration of yet another study on the subject shows. And I guess I can understand that since the way these articles tend to slant things, it always seems to be targeting the working mother. However there was something in the study she was missing, so I reviewed the source, and again it was missing some important pieces of the big picture. (which I will get to in a moment… just stick with me here.)

Worse, I saw this piece discount the frustration, because of what this study “proved” as “facts.” And now I had had enough.

All of these writings are based either on the Wall Street Journal version (you’ll need to be a subscriber to view the whole article) , or the New York Times version. But while the Newsweek version certainly offers up a similar shock value headline, and highlights the “problem” it also (briefly) includes some of the important aspects that I alluded to earlier that both the Wall Street Journal and New York Times didn’t bother with, like the study wasn’t designed to answer the question of “Why?” and the writers took it upon themselves to fill in the blanks, to help fuel the fire of the Stay at Home Mom vs Working Mom.

In the interview with Newsweek, one of the authors of the study admits as much, and goes on to say,

We did not look at why in this study, but other people have looked at this question and have some ideas. [One suggested reason is that] there’s been a move to make child-care programs more academic. Kids are supposed to start school knowing numbers and letters before kindergarten, and this process gives them less free time and forces them to do a lot more large-group activities and worksheets. It’s really hard for a 3- or 4-year old to sit and listen to the teacher talk for extended lengths of time.

So, perhaps then it is not the being away from the parent (as some would have you believe), but the fact that these “advanced” daycares, which are more and more being treated like “Pre-Schools” are not giving enough time for kids to just be kids? Perhaps there is too much pressure to make kids “excel” too early. But since the study was not designed for a “Why” we can not actually answer whether or not that is true.

It was also interesting to discover the following,

We saw no relationship between the amount of child care–whether by a nanny, a family member, or a babysitter–to how the child behaved in kindergarten through 6th grade. Interestingly, we also found that staying home with mom was statistically neither an asset nor a detriment in terms of academic outcomes and behaviors.

So it is NOT a question of having a “stay at home Mom.” A Nanny or another family member or babysitter was equal to Mom. Interestingly, both the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times appeared to miss that “fact” hence I cannot blame Inside Fatherhood when he draws conclusions like,

But like one commenter on my previous post had said, “I don’t know that day-care in itself causes these problems, but it does remove the consistent, parental influence that’s needed to reinforce good behavior.”

This brings up a good point and I think Jared nailed it. So what is it they are NOT doing? I raise 5 kids on my own and I know there are certain laws that prohibit more than 5 kids per Day Care Staff member. So what is it they are not doing that I personally do with my own kids? For one I know I kiss and hug my kids. This is something that staff members can not do and get away with without lawsuits. And who wants some stranger hugging and kissing your kids? We have lost a lot of trust these days from all the pedophiles out there.

Although, I could fault him for not reading further (as I did), and it seems that he was already predisposed to agreeing to the article to begin with. However, he did not have the benefit of seeing the fact that a Nanny, or other individual caregiver, who may not (or would not) provide the “kissing and hugging” that he suggests is the reason why children would be be better behaved.

This study while beneficial, is nothing more than a stepping stone suggesting further study be done. It is not a conclusion. It can’t be without a “Why.” It is simply proof that additional research is warranted. But you wouldn’t know that by the way some are reporting this.

From the department of I ate What? - We all know we want our kids to eat healthy, but will on occassion cave in to the desires for fast food, typically something like a kids meal. Want to be able to never cave to the pressure again? Do you want to be able to never allow your child (or yourself for that matter) to ever consider consuming another McNugget? Then just go ask yourself, what really is in a Chicken McNugget? Directly off the desk of “Duh” – Researchers concluded after a study, that hormones may explain teen moodiness. Perhaps if we throw a few million in grant money at them, they can determine that the sun may explain why some people get sunburn in the summertime.

Back to school – So Tony Snow seems to think that Congress has no oversight responsibility over the White House. Seems to me they need a copy of Schoolhouse Rock! sent over there… quickly. (I must tip my hat to Shakespeare’s Sister had the same idea of how to teach them the Constitution, since not only did she post this idea first, she included diagrams for them to follow)

This was no accident – Some in the government, are trying to push through laws that helped the richest of the rich avoid Estate Taxes or so called “Death Taxes,” and at the same time, under the guise of reining in the budget, last year made it so that pharmaceutical companies could no longer offer deep discounts to college students, and so as of this year (when the law took effect), the cost of Birth Control on campuses have doubled and in some cases tripled. I fail to understand at times how these clowns can sleep at night.

Give us your poor, your… no not those, I want them – Bill Gates is seems is a big supporter of Immigration Reform. Well at least as long as it will get him some more cheap programmers for his company. I guess he has enough low skill labor to manicure his palatial estate, because he was quote by Bloomberg saying,

“Any country should make it easy for people with high skills to come in,” Gates said in answer to a question during a news conference in Mexico City. “I’m hopeful there can be some immigration reform. Hopefully, it would be something that provides predictability and as much freedom of migration as possible”

Of course this is not anything new for the Microsoft Chairman. When he recently spoke in Washington, according to IT Business Edge:

To hear Gates tell it, even 115,000 won’t be enough. The U.S. should have access to an “infinite” number of skilled foreign workers to fill IT posts, he told the committee. During the dot-com days, the annual H-1B visa cap was as high as 195,000.

Yes, I remember those “Dot Com days”  I distinctly remeber towards the end, as the salaries were leveling off, and then the ensuing bust of not being able to find any jobs at a reasonable wage.  And that was before they really started shipping so much work outside the country.  So, I can only imagine what happens to this market if they give Mr. Gates what he wants.  But of course, with all the money he saves, I’m sure he will be able to live comfortably again, as I am sure the slow moving Microsoft stock price has really made him have to tighten his belt. (But I’m not bitter).

What part of personal privacy don’t they get? – It is always with the “best” intentions that lawmakers seem to come up with the most awful ideas, particularly (or at least so it seems) towards women.  Here in New Jersey, an influential lawmaker is proposing a law that would create mandatory HIV testing for all pregnant women.  Of course, it is a wise move to test if you are pregnant, and current State law already requires the availablity of the test to those that wish to take it, but apparently Mr. Cody has decided that he is going to make the decision for women now.  This really should go down in a ball of flames, but Cody has the political muscle to push through stupid laws, and has done so before, so I will be keeping an eye on this as it progresses.

 I just wanted to end on a fluff piece – The evening news always (or almost always) ends with a “fluff piece” and since I started doing these bits on Friday, I have started to understand why, as you look at what you are posting and ask, “Do I really want to end it on that note?”  So I vamp along waiting to find one.  Today I did not, but while the article is quite serious, I can’t help but be amused at the title of this article from the LA Times, If only gay sex caused global warming.  If only we could generate that same sort of homophobic rage into global warming, we could probably solve this problem in a week.

If you read political or news blogs, you probably heard last month about the White House Press Corp slamming bloggers (in particular “political” bloggers), and I mentioned some time back how ABC’s Brian Ross went to great lengths to claim he is a “journalist and not a blogger,” even though his segment known as “The Blotter” is published as a TypePad Blog.

Now the latest in this stream of “journalists” needing to puff out their own chests on how they are so superior to bloggers comes from Scott Anderson of the St. Louis Dispatch. It is almost comical when you read something like:

I don’t understand why we celebrate the growth of blogs. It seems to me that they are just another expression of our fascination with our own opinions. We are fast becoming a nation of Sayers, rather than Doers.

For all the hype about interactivity, blogs are first and foremost the epitome of one-way chatter. You can sit at your computer and spew a stream of consciousness. You can chuckle at your own funny lines, pat yourself on the back for a pithy comment, stand up and shake your fist while driving your point home.

I have what I hope is a helpful suggestion for bloggers: Instead of just sitting inside your house and commenting on the world around you, why don’t you, um, get up and leave? There is a whole non-cyber, non-virtual place waiting for you and your opinions. It’s called the world.

I guess maybe if we all stop blogging, we could get a job as a hack opinion journalist, who sits in front of computer and spew streams of consciousness, chuckle at out own funny lines, and pat ourselves on the back, how we are doing it at some newspaper, rather than doing from home.

I really don’t get it. Are these so called professionals, really so afraid of bloggers making them irrelevant that they need to lash out at every opportunity?

So where has No Child Left Behind (NCLB) gotten us to this point? Those in favor of it, have been touting the higher grades students have been “achieving” (and they MUST achieve them for the schools to continue to receive money). But according to a study reported in AMNewYork, Students’ skills are sinking as grades rise.

Twelth-graders’ reading skills have hit a new low, but their grades continue to climb, according to federal officials who suspect the nation’s schools are inflating grades.

Suspicions that teens’ rising grade-point averages may be unmerited are fueled by two new national reports released yesterday at a Washington, D.C., news conference. Both reports are from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, a U.S.-sponsored program that tests representative samples of students in academic subjects.
According to one report, the latest nationwide test results in 12th-grade reading have hit their lowest point since testing in that subject first began. On average, students nationwide scored 286 on a scale of zero to 500 during the last round of tests in 2005 — down one point from 2002 and six points from the first year, 1992.

Meanwhile, grade-point averages have continued their steady rise, according to a companion report on high-school transcripts. In 1990, the typical students’ grade average in English was 2.52 out of a possible 4.0, or the equivalent of a C-plus. By 2005, the typical grade average was 2.82, equivalent to a B-minus.

Federal authorities say they can’t be sure whether this reflects a conscious effort by schools to puff students’ achievements, or whether it may involve other factors as well, such as teacher inexperience in grading.

Of course they “can’t be sure.” If they accuse the schools of making a conscience effort of puffing students grades, there goes the whole NCLB actually working argument, and they can’t have that. But attempting to come up with a different rational explanation is apparently quite difficult… so far. But, don’t worry, I am sure they will figure out a way to blame somebody. They are not going to allow their steppingstone to class-warfare and elite privatization of the school system fall. (Go ahead, give a more valid explanation of what NCLB is than a way to justify school vouchers and privatizing the school system).

I am not one who has cared about the Academy Awards in a long, long time, and in particular, I am not one who cares anything about the “popular” awards as much as I like to see people get recognized for technical merit (the geek in me, I guess), things like best score, best animation, etc.

That being said, I will say two things about this years awards. One, does anybody believe that Happy Feet won for any reason other than to just NOT give it to Pixar Studios (again)? It is one of the things that make me disliked the awards so much in the first place. Happy Feet was by most accounts a “fair” at best. Not an overly great story, average all along the line. So why did it win? Was it to neatly fit in a “Politically Correct” night as some have suggested? Or more simply, that is was more “Academy-like” than Cars which would be more of the “Action” film that the Academy typically snubs?

Then of course, on to as the title alludes to, An Inconvenient Truth. I have to admit, I am quite happy on several levels that this film won. Fist of all, because it is, I believe important enough that it deserves the recognition. Second, because it was quite well done and very interesting as documentaries go. Third, because I can’t help but be entertained by the hosts of the Faux News Channel absolutely losing their minds over this. I mean Josh Gibson alone was absolutely livid, and without a decent scientist (or anybody even remotely credible) to turn to, they used Ann Coulter as their “expert” on Hannity and Colmes, to claim that being earth conscience is Anti-Human.

Maybe someday, sombody can explain to me, why wanting to leave this planet to our children in better shape than we found it is such an offensive thought to these people. I mean, I can almost understand why Exxon would offer $10,000 to try and bribe some scientist to say fossil fuels don’t harm the environment. But that is a cold heartless corporation. Don’t these people have children, or neices and nephews or some reason to think outside their pea-brained little world?

Update: OK, we can forget everything those silly scientist have been talking about. It has now been made “clear” by Jerry Falwell:

The Reverend Jerry Falwell says global warming is “Satan’s attempt to redirect the church’s primary focus” from evangelism to environmentalism.

[...]

Falwell said the Bible teaches that God will maintain the Earth until Jesus returns, so Christians should be responsible environmentalists, but not what he calls … quote … “first-class nuts.”

With Jerry joining, I guess the “first-class nuts” quota is officially all full.

Yup, that time again. The Friday Focaccia. Since somebody asked, I will answer the question I expected to come up much sooner, “Why the “Friday Focaccia?” Focaccia is a flat bread that is often used as a base for any number of ingredients and baked. There is no single Focaccia, it is a collection of whatever you want to put together. This is my take.

Through Phat Mommy, I found Parent Hacks. Parent Hacks is a “Daily parenting tips and ideas from the real experts — actual parents.” Some are common sense, some are a bit out of the ordinary, but there are some gems in there for everybody to use for kids regardless of age.

It was not a good month for Grocers with both Peter Pan Peanut Butter and Gerber Graduates Chicken Pasta Wheels being recalled. If you use either of these products, please check out the recall information.

I was interviewed for an article on the concept of the Sustainable Table by Today’s Diet and Nutrition Magazine. I sure hope I did more good than harm. I have to admit, I was nervous (although I am not sure why… I mean it was Diet and Nutrition Magazine for goodness sakes).  Don’t know when the article is coming out though.

Thanks to Chris at Rude Cactus for reminding me to look back at my Couch Potato Bets from September. I don’t get a lot to brag about, so I will take this opportunity to be an amazing prognosticator (or just really lucky):

What I said about ‘Til Death

Fox tries to pull out another “Married with Children”-esque clone with this series…but I have a feeling people will stay away… and the show will get canned before it can draw ‘cult’ status.

It hasn’t been canceled yet, but the numbers still show me to be correct as it continues to dwell in last place in the ratings.

What I said about Happy Hour:

Regardless, it stinks the critics hate it, it has no real show around to support it. Dead, Dead Dead. And seems to deserve it.

It lasted 4 episodes. Although Fox is threatening to offer this stink on DVD in the future.
What I said about Vanished, Kidnapped and Runaway:

I put these three shows together to avoid repeating myself… I will be surprised if even one of these is still on the air come springtime.

Well, as it turns out, Vanished was pulled after 9 episodes, Kidnapped was pulled after 5, and Runaway lasted only 3.

What I said about Lost:

… lost a bit of its luster and shine during season two, something I like to call the “Twin Peaks Effect.” When a show comes off a huge as Lost did it is hard to keep up that pace and expectation level. It will be interesting to see if Lost can hold on.

Now admittedly that is me being more of a voyeur than a prognosticator, but is seems that Lost is losing it.

What I said about CSI: Crime Scene Investigators:

But after seven season, I have to wonder how much is left in the tank.

This the only one I can say from actually watching the show faithfully. The answer is NOT MUCH. I didn’t realize (I guess I don’t read enough TV rags), that Will Petersen (Grissom) is apparently tired of the show, and took a 4 week hiatus in the middle. No offense to Liev Schreiber, I like him as an actor, but I don’t like his character, and I think the loss of Grissom will be the death of CSI. Add to that the fact that Grey’s Anatomy is kicking CSI’s butt, and the future becomes even more dicey.

Of course, I will readily admit when I am wrong as well.

I said of Men in Trees:

“Why Anne, Why?” This show is gone by Christmas if not sooner.

This I and the critics were apparently completely wrong, and people are watching. Not me, but there are people out there. Someday, maybe I will tune in to see what they see.

So what about you? What shows are you watching? What is better than you thought? What was supposed to be hot… but is not (besides apparently Lost). What interesting tidbits have I missed out on this week?

It is a subject I feel very passionate about, so I have sort of avoiding it up until now, since it is not very “today” thinking, but after reading this post from Cynical Dad, rather than just posting a comment, I decided to lay it out there, to allow some more discussion.

So what am I talking about, you are probably wondering by now, and rather than keep you in suspense any longer, it is about this seemingly new trend of holding children back when starting school.  Now under certain circumstances, there may be valid reasons to do so, but I think it is being done far too often these days, and not at all for the right reasons.

Take the case of Cynical Dad, his daughter’s Pre-K teachers admits that his daughter is smart, but still suggests that he delay her entering Kindergarten because “she’d rather socialize than do her work,” and “She worries about what everyone else is doing instead of concentrating on the work at hand.”  There are two glaring things that having gone through this recently enough both with my neice and then my daughter in sucessive years, I noted.

First there is no consideration taken for the fact that despite what they may be trying to prepare them for, unless this is a classroom setting, the kids still have more of an expectation of play-time at most Pre-K programs, especially ones that have kids from the time when they are toddler’s (or infants) up through Pre-K.  They don’t view it as “school” and hence they do not treat it as such.

Second, when they reach this level, if you think about it, it is much like being a high school senior (on a much smaller scale of course).  They are ready to move on.  They have outgrown the atmosphere and hence are just going through the motions as they await the time when they “graduate” (don’t get me started on that whole new tradition).  As such, they no longer feel challenged by what is being presented and they are looking ahead to the day they are “free” from that place.  In that case, they are not going to excel more by making them go through it again, they are just going to be bored longer.

Third, who is going to dispute with me that girls are naturally social creatures.  (Sure it applies to boys, but especially at this age, girls seem more likely to build social groups at this age.  At least that is what I have seen.

Now, I have in the past when taking on this subject usually blamed the parent.  But that was because my experience has been with parents that choose to hold their kids back in an effort to make them the “smartest and brightest” in the class by them being older and more mature than their classmates.  This is the one that really gets my goat and makes me want to slap these parents in the back of the head.  Because in this case it is not about the kid, it is about them.  It is about bragging rights, and about how their child reflects on them.  All the wrong reasons to hold the child back.

However, there is I have come to see more often now, the parents that are more struck with fear by the misguided recommendations of the teachers and others that really should be able to provide proper guidance.  Here is where somebody like Cynical Dad sits.  All he wants to do is what is best for his daughter.  An admirable goal.  But now he is forced into a decision by a teacher that wants to hold his daughter back from Kindergarten for what I believe is all the wrong reasons.  Of course as a parent, you get torn in this situation.  Because even if you believe as I do that the reasons are all wrong, you are still forced to sit there and contemplate it.  What if they are right?  Am I making the right decision?

It is an unfair situation to be put in. But one that seems far too common these days.  We have spent more and more time making school teach these kids more and more, and expect more of them earlier (I certainly know the work my daughter is doing in 1st grade was nowhere near 1st grade work when I was a kid. [shut up]).  But at the same time it seems like we are so ready to stall them starting.  But why?  Because we want them to reflect well on us?  Because the teachers want it easier?  Unless it is because of the child’s needs, it is not the right reason.

Where do you stand?  Would you (or did you) hold your child back? Why?  Why wouldn’t you?

It is not often I have a kind word to say that eminates from the State of Texas. Sure I know and read a few sane bloggers from there. But normally I blame TX for unleashing on the world the likes of Bush Sr., Dubya and Tom Delay on the world. I blame them for the Grassy Knoll. I hold them accountable for having a baseball owner that offered out the richest contact in baseball history. Hell, I even blame them for my parents requirement of being home and in front of the television for years just to watch Dallas. (Can I point out how annoying it was to go through High School with the initials J.R. after the whole “Who Shot JR?” thing.)

But for a change today, I get to praise Texas and Republican Governor Rick Perry. Texas became the first State to require the HPV vaccine.

Ms.
Though Governor Perry is known as a social conservative, his press secretary, Robert Black, told The Dallas Morning News, “He came to the conclusion it was the right thing to do. You don’t have opportunities like this where you can certainly prevent a cancer. It’s never happened before, so it would be irresponsible to walk away from it.”

I have written before about how this vaccination which can help erradicate cervical cancer caused by HPV has been controversial? How is something that has been proven 100% effective in clinical trials controversial, you may ask. Usually it is concerns about long term side effects and safety concerns (which is always valid). But in this case, the controversy stems from religious extremists, that somehow come to the conclusion that a girl getting a vaccine in the (approximately) 6th grade is somehow going to “encourage” promiscuity.

Portland Press Herald
Cathie Rossignol wants the best for her two girls but won’t vaccinate them against a virus that causes cervical cancer when the shots become widely available this fall.

The vaccine targets the sexually transmitted disease responsible for most of the cancer cases, making the lifelong Catholic from Brooklin feel like she would be “giving the OK” to premarital sex if her daughters were inoculated.

Presumably this shot is so strong, that any of life’s lessons taught by a parent to a child from the 6th grade on is simply lost on the child because they had this inoculation.

While, I agree that I think this is a ‘no-brainer’ I do not take lightly the political considerations that Gov. Perry had to consider. I can only hope now that the ice has been broken, that other states will quickly follow suit.

Update: It is important to note, that the Executive Order signed by Governor Perry provides the ability for parents to opt out for religious or philosophical reasons. So taking into consideration the fact that you can opt out, can anybody please explain to me a valid reason why the “social conservative” crowd is fighting so hard to stop this?

What was I thinking, tempting the fates? I dunno, but obviously when I said sometime back that we were fortunate having a really mild winter here in the NY/NJ Metro area, I did just that and now we are paying for it!

The temperature as I left for work this morning was 9… NINE!!! That is not a temperature, that is a lack of temperature! With the windchill it was negative seventeen (-17) degrees. That is farenheit (just a reminder).

Now I am sure there are people that are laughing at how I am whining about these temperatures. (I have been in these colder places myself a few times (Sioux Falls South Dakota, Minniapolis Minn.)) But those people live their by choice. I am not used to such things. Fortunately, I am still fareing better than TheWife and LatteGirl who have spent the last three days sick in bed.

Of course, I guess I should consider myself lucky that LatteGirl attends a school that is good with sending home work when she is sick. I found it amazing that in the past couple of days have found incidents not just once but twice (and I am sure if I look I will find more) where I read about parents that worry about sending their children to school while still sick because of pressure from the schools! What the hell is that? Do we have a new No Child Left Uninfected Act that nobody told me about? Sure, you want kids in school. And if no doctor’s notes were accompanying many absences, I could understand inquiring to ensure the child is actually sick, etc. But to threaten parents, where they need to actually consider rolling the dice and hope their child is “well enough” to go to school and make it through the day without relapse is not only cruel to the child, but to every other child in the classroom. And then these clueless wonders of nature try to figure out “Why?” all these kids are getting sick so often.

I joke about it, but in reality this is actually a product of the abysmal No Child Left Behind Act. In it, they dictate that schools must set a protocol for high attendance rates. While a laudable goal (We all do actually want the kids to be in school), the practice of setting some artificial number or percentage, and threatening the funding of the school if these rates are not met is tantamount to blackmail, and the very reason for these preposterous and inane policies by the schools. (I could continue my rant on No Child Left Behind, but I will save that for another day.)

So, fortunately I have no such problems… yet.  But if any school thought I would be risking my daughter’s health so they can hit some stupid quota… well, let us just say it wouldn’t be pretty.  Of course, if we could ditch these temperatures, it would be much easier now wouldn’t it?

So what would you do in such a situation?  Would you send your child to school?  What do you think?

Consider this a Public Service Announcement.

Parents are (naturally) always looking out for their children, and very often try to be good citizens that spread useful information on to others. (To a certain degree, isn’t that what many parents are doing with their blogs, sharing their experiences, to not only entertain, but to potentially inform others from their experiences).

However, in this age of Instant Information, far too many people are far too quick to help disseminate mis-information (unintentially of course) in the name of warning others.

Clues to mis-information that winds up in your e-mail inbox.

1. Lack of details – In order for these mis-informations to last as long as possible, and not be proven false, they usually lack details. Things like, “in the mid-west” or “a suburban household” rather than “in Chicago” (or others narrowed down location).

2. Lack of real people – A story that is actually run in a newspaper, or actually sent from “the friend” of a supposed victim (there is almost always a victim), would not receive an e-mail saying “my dog died because my child used a Swiffer.” Think about if you wrote this letter to your friend warning him/her about the horrors that have beseiged your home. You would tell your friend, “Timmy washed the floor with a Swiffer Wetjet, and now Lassie is dead.” Again, the, “I know a guy” helps perpetuate the myth by omitting details that would help somebody verify (or more likely debunk) the account.

3. Seemingly odd “facts” – Yes, it is true that there are some facts that are odd when you first hear about them, which I guess is what makes these slip by as true so easily. But when someething sounds overly technical, and yet implausable. It is worth thinking twice about it. Using my Swiffer example again, the claim was “the product is one molecule different from Anti-Fr