Monday, September 26, 2011
Fall is here!
It finally seems that fall is here! High temps in the 70s, lows in the 50's. For a few weeks, the weather will be perfect! And miracles of miracles, the Detroit Lions are 3-0!
Thursday, September 08, 2011
Kelo vs city of New London, update
Remember the Supreme Court case, Kelo v the City of New London? Where the Supreme Court ruled that it was legal for the government to steal your private property if they thought they might get to make money off of it?
Well, 6 years have gone by, and Ms Kelo's house is now officially the city dump. Seems that the government's greedy plans fell through, and Pfizer never built their mega-complex; thus no windfall tax profits for the Looters of New London. BUT, Ms Kelo still lost her private property. Private property is essentially what the Revolutionary War was about.
I hope that the ACLU would support a new case. Kelo v Supreme Court. Maybe Kelo v New London & Pfizer, as well. Seems she deserves some restitution, no?
Well, 6 years have gone by, and Ms Kelo's house is now officially the city dump. Seems that the government's greedy plans fell through, and Pfizer never built their mega-complex; thus no windfall tax profits for the Looters of New London. BUT, Ms Kelo still lost her private property. Private property is essentially what the Revolutionary War was about.
I hope that the ACLU would support a new case. Kelo v Supreme Court. Maybe Kelo v New London & Pfizer, as well. Seems she deserves some restitution, no?
Saturday, September 03, 2011
The soul of a man
"The soul of a man, left to it's own natural level, is a potentially lucid crystal left in darkness. It is perfect in its own nature, but it lacks something that it can only receive from outside and above itself. But when the light shines on it, it becomes in a manner transformed into light and seems to lose its nature in the splendor of a higher nature, the nature of the light that is in it."-- Thomas Merton, The Seven Storey Mountain
Thursday, July 21, 2011
The Future of America
This was emailed to me. No author was given. Welcome to...the Twilight Zone
Thanksgiving 2022
"Winston, come into the dining room, it's time to eat," Julia yelled to her husband.
"In a minute, honey, it's a tie score," he answered.
Actually Winston wasn't very interested in the traditional holiday football game between Detroit and Washington.
Ever since the government passed the Civility in Sports Statute of 2017, outlawing tackle football for its "unseemly violence" and the "bad example it sets for the rest of the world", Winston was far less of a football fan than he used to be.
Two-hand touch wasn't nearly as exciting.Yet it wasn't the game that Winston was uninterested in.
It was more the thought of eating another Tofu Turkey. Even though it was the best type of VeggieMeat available after the government revised the American Anti-Obesity Act of 2018, adding fowl to the list of federally-forbidden foods, (which already included potatoes, cranberry sauce, and mincemeat pie), it wasn't anything like real turkey.
And ever since the government officially changed the name of "Thanksgiving Day" to "A National Day of Atonement" in 2020, to officially acknowledge the Pilgrims' historically brutal treatment of Native Americans, the holiday had lost a lot of its luster.
Eating in the dining room was also a bit daunting. The unearthly gleam of government-mandated CFL light bulbs made the Tofu Turkey look even weirder than it actually was, and the room was always cold.
Ever since Congress passed the Power Conservation Act of 2016, mandating all thermostats - which were monitored and controlled by the electric company - be kept at 68 degrees, every room on the north side of the house was barely tolerable throughout the entire winter.
Still, it was good getting together with family. Or at least most of the family.
Winston missed his mother, who passed on in October, when she had used up her legal allotment of life-saving medical treatment.
He had had many heated conversations with the
Regional Health Consortium, spawned when the private insurance market finally went bankrupt, and everyone was forced into the government health care program.
And though he demanded she be kept on her treatment, it was a futile effort.
"The RHC's resources are limited", explained the
government bureaucrat Winston spoke with on the phone. "Your mother received all the benefits to which she was entitled. I'm sorry for your loss."
Ed couldn't make it either. He had forgotten to plug in his electric car last night, the only kind available after the Anti-Fossil Fuel Bill of 2021 outlawed the use of the combustion engines - for everyone but government officials.
The fifty mile round trip was about ten miles too far, and Ed didn't want to spend a frosty night on the road somewhere between here and there.
Thankfully, Winston's brother, John, and his wife were flying in.
Winston made sure that the dining room chairs had extra cushions for the occasion.
No one complained more than John about the pain of sitting down so soon after the government-mandated cavity searches at airports, which severely aggravated his hemorrhoids.
Ever since a terrorist successfully smuggled a cavity bomb onto a jetliner, the TSA told Americans the added "inconvenience" was an "absolute necessity" in order to stay "one step ahead of the terrorists."
Winston's own body had grown accustomed to such probing ever since the government expanded their scope to just about anywhere a crowd gathered, via Anti-Profiling Act of 2022.
That law made it a crime to single out any group or individual for "unequal scrutiny," even when probable cause was involved.
Thus, cavity searches at malls, train stations, bus depots, etc., etc., had become almost routine.
Almost.
The Supreme Court is reviewing the statute, but most Americans expect a Court composed of six progressives and three conservatives to leave the law intact.
"A living Constitution is extremely flexible", said the Court's eldest member, Elena Kagan. "Europe has had laws like this one for years. We should learn from their example", she added.
Winston's thoughts turned to his own children.
He got along fairly well with his 12-year-old daughter, Brittany, mostly because she ignored him. Winston had long ago surrendered to the idea that she could text anyone at any time, even during Atonement Dinner.
Their only real confrontation had occurred when he limited her to 50,000 texts a month, explaining that was all he could afford.
She whined for a week, but got over it.
His 16-year-old son, Jason, was another matter altogether. Perhaps it was the constant bombarding he got in public school that global warming, the bird flu, terrorism, or any of a number of other calamities were "just around the corner", but Jason had developed a kind of nihilistic attitude that ranged between simmering surliness and outright hostility.
It didn't help that Jason had reported his father to the police for smoking a cigarette in the house, an act made criminal by the Smoking Control Statute of 2018, which outlawed smoking anywhere within 500 feet of another human being.
Winston paid the $5,000 fine, which might have been considered excessive before the American dollar became virtually worthless as a result of QE13.
The latest round of quantitative easing the federal government initiated was, once again, to "spur economic growth."
This time, they promised to push unemployment below its years-long rate of 18%, but Winston was not particularly hopeful.
Yet the family had a lot for which to be thankful, Winston thought, before remembering it was a Day of Atonement.
At least, he had his memories.
He felt a twinge of sadness when he realized his children would never know what life was like in the Good Old Days, long before government promises to make life "fair for everyone" realized their full potential.
Winston, like so many of his fellow Americans, never realized how much things could change when they didn't happen all at once, but little by little, so people could get used to them.
He wondered what might have happened if the public had stood up while there was still time, maybe back around 2011, when all the real nonsense began.
"Maybe we wouldn't be where we are today if we'd just said 'enough is enough' when we had the chance," he thought.
Maybe so, Winston. Maybe so.
Thanksgiving 2022
"Winston, come into the dining room, it's time to eat," Julia yelled to her husband.
"In a minute, honey, it's a tie score," he answered.
Actually Winston wasn't very interested in the traditional holiday football game between Detroit and Washington.
Ever since the government passed the Civility in Sports Statute of 2017, outlawing tackle football for its "unseemly violence" and the "bad example it sets for the rest of the world", Winston was far less of a football fan than he used to be.
Two-hand touch wasn't nearly as exciting.Yet it wasn't the game that Winston was uninterested in.
It was more the thought of eating another Tofu Turkey. Even though it was the best type of VeggieMeat available after the government revised the American Anti-Obesity Act of 2018, adding fowl to the list of federally-forbidden foods, (which already included potatoes, cranberry sauce, and mincemeat pie), it wasn't anything like real turkey.
And ever since the government officially changed the name of "Thanksgiving Day" to "A National Day of Atonement" in 2020, to officially acknowledge the Pilgrims' historically brutal treatment of Native Americans, the holiday had lost a lot of its luster.
Eating in the dining room was also a bit daunting. The unearthly gleam of government-mandated CFL light bulbs made the Tofu Turkey look even weirder than it actually was, and the room was always cold.
Ever since Congress passed the Power Conservation Act of 2016, mandating all thermostats - which were monitored and controlled by the electric company - be kept at 68 degrees, every room on the north side of the house was barely tolerable throughout the entire winter.
Still, it was good getting together with family. Or at least most of the family.
Winston missed his mother, who passed on in October, when she had used up her legal allotment of life-saving medical treatment.
He had had many heated conversations with the
Regional Health Consortium, spawned when the private insurance market finally went bankrupt, and everyone was forced into the government health care program.
And though he demanded she be kept on her treatment, it was a futile effort.
"The RHC's resources are limited", explained the
government bureaucrat Winston spoke with on the phone. "Your mother received all the benefits to which she was entitled. I'm sorry for your loss."
Ed couldn't make it either. He had forgotten to plug in his electric car last night, the only kind available after the Anti-Fossil Fuel Bill of 2021 outlawed the use of the combustion engines - for everyone but government officials.
The fifty mile round trip was about ten miles too far, and Ed didn't want to spend a frosty night on the road somewhere between here and there.
Thankfully, Winston's brother, John, and his wife were flying in.
Winston made sure that the dining room chairs had extra cushions for the occasion.
No one complained more than John about the pain of sitting down so soon after the government-mandated cavity searches at airports, which severely aggravated his hemorrhoids.
Ever since a terrorist successfully smuggled a cavity bomb onto a jetliner, the TSA told Americans the added "inconvenience" was an "absolute necessity" in order to stay "one step ahead of the terrorists."
Winston's own body had grown accustomed to such probing ever since the government expanded their scope to just about anywhere a crowd gathered, via Anti-Profiling Act of 2022.
That law made it a crime to single out any group or individual for "unequal scrutiny," even when probable cause was involved.
Thus, cavity searches at malls, train stations, bus depots, etc., etc., had become almost routine.
Almost.
The Supreme Court is reviewing the statute, but most Americans expect a Court composed of six progressives and three conservatives to leave the law intact.
"A living Constitution is extremely flexible", said the Court's eldest member, Elena Kagan. "Europe has had laws like this one for years. We should learn from their example", she added.
Winston's thoughts turned to his own children.
He got along fairly well with his 12-year-old daughter, Brittany, mostly because she ignored him. Winston had long ago surrendered to the idea that she could text anyone at any time, even during Atonement Dinner.
Their only real confrontation had occurred when he limited her to 50,000 texts a month, explaining that was all he could afford.
She whined for a week, but got over it.
His 16-year-old son, Jason, was another matter altogether. Perhaps it was the constant bombarding he got in public school that global warming, the bird flu, terrorism, or any of a number of other calamities were "just around the corner", but Jason had developed a kind of nihilistic attitude that ranged between simmering surliness and outright hostility.
It didn't help that Jason had reported his father to the police for smoking a cigarette in the house, an act made criminal by the Smoking Control Statute of 2018, which outlawed smoking anywhere within 500 feet of another human being.
Winston paid the $5,000 fine, which might have been considered excessive before the American dollar became virtually worthless as a result of QE13.
The latest round of quantitative easing the federal government initiated was, once again, to "spur economic growth."
This time, they promised to push unemployment below its years-long rate of 18%, but Winston was not particularly hopeful.
Yet the family had a lot for which to be thankful, Winston thought, before remembering it was a Day of Atonement.
At least, he had his memories.
He felt a twinge of sadness when he realized his children would never know what life was like in the Good Old Days, long before government promises to make life "fair for everyone" realized their full potential.
Winston, like so many of his fellow Americans, never realized how much things could change when they didn't happen all at once, but little by little, so people could get used to them.
He wondered what might have happened if the public had stood up while there was still time, maybe back around 2011, when all the real nonsense began.
"Maybe we wouldn't be where we are today if we'd just said 'enough is enough' when we had the chance," he thought.
Maybe so, Winston. Maybe so.
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Forgive me for repeating myself.
I bought my first Kindle in 2008. It was the 1st generation. I loved it. Bought tons of e-books. My wife loved the fact that I wasn't taking up any more book shelf real estate.
I recently purchaced the 3rd gen Kindle, which I think is much better than the first version. Thinner, lighter, better contrast, faster response time, longer battery life, etc.
However, today I think I've seen what will kill the e-book readers. I was going to get a book that was reviewed in the Our Sunday Visitor. Went to Amazon's website, and they were asking $16.50 for the fricken' kindle edition! What the heck?
For just a few dollars more I could get a "like-new" hardback. That I can touch, smell and lend to a friend. Why should I pay that much money for 1's and 0's?
I know the publishers threatened to sue Amazon and are now the ones who set the e-book prices. But it costs the publisher's next to nothing to sell me the e-book, after it's been converted (once!). No paper to buy. No hard board for covers. No glue.
I bought my first Kindle in 2008. It was the 1st generation. I loved it. Bought tons of e-books. My wife loved the fact that I wasn't taking up any more book shelf real estate.
I recently purchaced the 3rd gen Kindle, which I think is much better than the first version. Thinner, lighter, better contrast, faster response time, longer battery life, etc.
However, today I think I've seen what will kill the e-book readers. I was going to get a book that was reviewed in the Our Sunday Visitor. Went to Amazon's website, and they were asking $16.50 for the fricken' kindle edition! What the heck?
For just a few dollars more I could get a "like-new" hardback. That I can touch, smell and lend to a friend. Why should I pay that much money for 1's and 0's?
I know the publishers threatened to sue Amazon and are now the ones who set the e-book prices. But it costs the publisher's next to nothing to sell me the e-book, after it's been converted (once!). No paper to buy. No hard board for covers. No glue.
Kindle Book Prices too High now
I realize Amazon has lost control of pricing now, and that it's up to publishers to set the prices. But this is outrageous. Once the book is in electronic format, there is little to no cost to the publisher to let me download a book. I just looked at a book that Amazon was selling for $16.50!!! For a few 0's and 1's. No paper pages. No hardback binding. No shipping packaging.
I wrote a review of my first kindle back in 2008. I now have a 3rd generation Kindle, which I think is even better. But I doubt I'll ever buy another one.
It's one thing to get an e-book for significant savings, but when I can hold a real book for just a few more bucks, I'll take the real thing.
I wrote a review of my first kindle back in 2008. I now have a 3rd generation Kindle, which I think is even better. But I doubt I'll ever buy another one.
It's one thing to get an e-book for significant savings, but when I can hold a real book for just a few more bucks, I'll take the real thing.
Monday, May 02, 2011
Rain, rain go away, come again another day
Man, will it ever stop raining? My back yard is like a swamp. I think we're gonna need a bigger boat.
May 1st, in history
On May 1st, throughout recorded history several important things have happened.
1. Adolf Hitler declared dead, 1945
2. Osama bin Laden shot & killed by US Navy SEALS, 2011
3. Blessed Pope John Paul II beatified, 2011.
Wonder what else happened on this date.
1. Adolf Hitler declared dead, 1945
2. Osama bin Laden shot & killed by US Navy SEALS, 2011
3. Blessed Pope John Paul II beatified, 2011.
Wonder what else happened on this date.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Gas Prices
Gas prices seem to be going up, up, up! And our president doesn't seem to care. When, at a presidential photo op, asked by a man what the President was going to do about gas prices, President Obama just laughed and said " if you're getting eight miles a gallon you may want to think about a trade-in.."
Once again showing how out of touch he is with real Americans.
They guy is having trouble buying gas, and the president just laughs it off. How does Mr Obama know what this guy drives? Maybe he already has a Prius or a Nissan Leaf? What kind of mileage does the presidential limo get? I know, he needs the protection. But still, don't make a joke out of something that is hurting most Americans who actually have to pay for what they need.
This sounds to me like a Marie Antoinette moment (let them eat cake...)
Once again showing how out of touch he is with real Americans.
They guy is having trouble buying gas, and the president just laughs it off. How does Mr Obama know what this guy drives? Maybe he already has a Prius or a Nissan Leaf? What kind of mileage does the presidential limo get? I know, he needs the protection. But still, don't make a joke out of something that is hurting most Americans who actually have to pay for what they need.
This sounds to me like a Marie Antoinette moment (let them eat cake...)
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