Guns in national parks

Only two types of people who go to national parks with guns: The park ranger and those going to kill someone and bury them in the park.

Seriously, why would anyone need a gun in a national park?! Is Bambi really that much of a threat? Or maybe that mountain lion some 3 year old brat or annoying yappy dog was harassing...

Then again, I would side with the mountain lion if it chose to eat either one.

I just don't understand how President Obama, Democrats, or any right-thinking human being could agree with this, much less sign it into reality.

Big Oil reluctant to trip down Obama's golden road

Can you honestly tell me that anyone could be surprised by this NY Times article about oil companies:

"...many of the oil companies are staying on the sidelines, balking at investing in new technologies favored by the president, or even straying from commitments they had already made."

Or this:

"The oil companies have frequently run advertisements expressing their interest in new forms of energy, but their actual investments have belied the marketing claims....

Shell, for example, said it spent $1.7 billion since 2004 on alternative projects. That amount is dwarfed by the $87 billion it spent over the same period on its oil and gas projects around the world."

Of course they are straying from the golden path of green technologies! They are in the business of profit. Americans, despite the growing number of motorized toy skates on the road, are forever addicted to their gas guzzling cars and trucks.

But it isn't just the vehicles as the article hints at. "The world consumes about 85 million barrels of oil a day." I'm sorry, be we'd have been dead a long damn time ago if that was all going into the gas tank.

That oil is in toys, plastics, cookware, roads, building materials, lawnmowers,...nearly everything we own, buy, use, and throw away is made from oil.

Is it really any surprise that our reliance on oil isn't such an easy habit to kick?

Barack Obama: Change you can believe in (and fear)

This is a comment in response to the Op-Ed piece by Maureen Dowd titled, "The First Shrink."

"April 05, 2009 3:15 pm

I am a student of history. Professionally. I have written 15 books in six languages, and have studied it all my life. I think there is something monumentally large afoot, and I do not believe it is just a banking crisis, or a mortgage crisis, or a credit crisis. Yes these exist, but they are merely single facets on a very large gemstone that is only now coming into sharper focus.

Something of historic proportions is happening. I can sense it because I know how it feels, smells, what it looks like, and how people react to it. Yes, a perfect storm may be brewing, but there is something happening within our country that has been evolving for about ten - fifteen years. The pace has dramatically quickened in the past two.

We demand and then codify into law the requirement that our banks make massive loans to people we know they can never pay back. Why?

We learn that the Federal Reserve, which has little or no real oversight by anyone, has 'loaned' two trillion dollars (that is $2,000,000,000,000) over the past few months, but will not tell us to whom, or why, or disclose the terms. That is our money. Yours and mine. And that is three times the $700B we all argued about so strenuously just this past September. Who has this money? Why do they have it? Why are the terms unavailable to us? Who asked for it? Who authorized it? I thought this was a government of 'we the people', who loaned our powers to our elected leaders. Apparently not.

We have spent two or more decades intentionally de-industrializing our economy. Why?

We have intentionally dumbed down our schools, ignored our history, and we no longer teach our founding documents, showing why we are exceptional and why we are worth preserving. Students by and large cannot write, think critically, read, or articulate. Parents are not revolting, teachers are not picketing, and school boards continue to back mediocrity. Why?
We have now established the precedent of protesting every close election (now violently in California over a proposition that is so 'controversial' that it wants marriage to remain between one man and one woman!). Did you ever think such a thing possible just a decade ago? We have corrupted our sacred political process by allowing unelected judges to write laws that radically change our way of life, and then allow mainstream Marxist groups like ACORN and others to turn our voting system into a banana republic. To what purpose?

Now our mortgage industry is collapsing, housing prices are in free fall, major industries are failing, our banking system is on the verge of collapse, Social Security is nearly bankrupt, as is Medicare and our entire government, and our education system is worse than a joke. (I teach college and know precisely what I am talking about.) The list is staggering in its length, breadth, and depth. It is potentially 1929 x ten. And we are at war with an enemy we cannot name for fear of offending people of the same religion, an enemy who cannot wait to slit the throats of your children if they have the opportunity to do so.
Now we have elected President a man no one knows anything about, who has never run so much as a Dairy Queen, let alone a town as big as Wasilla , Alaska . All of his associations and alliances are with real radicals in their chosen fields of employment, and everything we learn about him, drip by drip, is unsettling, if not downright scary. Surely you have heard him speak about his idea to create and fund a 'mandatory civilian defense force' stronger than our military for use inside our borders. No? Oh, of course. The media would never play that for you over and over, and then demand he explain it. Sarah Palin's pregnant daughter and $150,000 wardrobe is more important to the media.
Mr. Obama's winning platform can be boiled down to one word: change. Why?

I have never been so afraid for my country and for my children as I am now! This man campaigned on bringing people together, something he has never, ever done in his professional life. In my assessment, Obama will divide us along philosophical lines, push us apart, and then try to realign the pieces into a new and different power structure. Change is indeed coming. And when it comes, you will never see the same nation again.

And that is only the beginning."

Tom Woods, Professor, Missouri

Clinton: US Addicted to Mexico Addicted to US

How refreshing plain and direct speech is!

"Our insatiable demand for illegal drugs fuels the drug trade. Our inability to prevent weapons from being illegally smuggled across the border to arm these criminals causes the deaths of police officers, soldiers and civilians" (Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton).

She has a very strong point. It is very hypocritical for the US to bitch about "all those damn Mexican drug cartels" when in fact we're the ones buying and giving them every opportunity to increase their profit margin.

The day we take real responsibility for our growing addiction—to the big name drugs (cocaine) AND the small name ones (marijuana)—and the day we take real steps to solve these issues, is the day there will be real progress.

Until then, they'll keep selling, we'll keep buying, and everyone will continue to blame everyone else but themselves.

"Fitzgerald: The Ill-Founded Assumptions of Obama's Address To Muslims"

So I'm not the only one, along with a conservative I still can't believe I agree with, who sees and has a problem with President Obama's address to Muslims.

What's that make it? 3 to...millions of "kum-bi-ya why can't we all just get along" left-wing nut jobs.

Fuck.

Charles Krauthammer: Pres. Obama's kissing Middle East ass

Shit. A conservative I agree with? What is the world coming to.

But seriously. I actually don't think he went far enough. Is America enemies with the "Muslim world?" No. But here is a list of things I think we should be enemies of:

Killing children just because they are Jewish
Beheading bus riders
Religious persecution
Again, killing children
Infringing on Americans rights ON American soil
Throwing family members out of windows
Killing aide workers
Attacking people based on their sexual orientation
Beheading pro-government tribal leaders
Abusing societies disaffected

I could go one but I got tired of copy/pasting links. But you should get my drift. Was the Iraq war a mistake and thoroughly mishandled? Dear God yes. Was Afganistan mishandled? Again, yes.

But at what point are Americans and other "kum-bi-ya why can't we all just get along" left-wing nut jobs understand that not everyone can be friends with everyone? There are times when one side's "philosophy" is just so out of whack, that you have to step in and say, "hey, I'm not perfect, but even I know what you're doing is FUBAR and I'm going to have to impose my will on you."

No, America isn't enemies with Muslims everywhere or even Islam. But we should be enemies of the evil actions committed in the name of the "Muslim world" or Islam.

And damn if we should apologize for doing what we think is right to stop atrocities such as those listed above.

Polictial reflection during study break

Tomorrow, President-elect Obama will become Present Obama, leader of the United States of America.

In recent days, my "I voted for him out of necessity, not some fantasy of hope" bubble has been forced to rub elbows with the general sense of "oh isn't this wonderful" mindset of the masses. While I grumbled, I realized that perhaps I was not taking his inauguration in the fullness of its scope.

Despite what I think of him as a man and politician, he will be the first racial minority president elected. No small feat for a country built on inequality and violence.

Though I may find his "fancy rhetorical dance moves" overbearing and deliberately misleading, for the first time in years, we have a president who is not afraid of espousing the need and rightness of higher education. If indeed there is one thing I hope for from President Obama, it is the restoration of education as a good thing in the minds of American citizens.

In him we have a leader focused on individuals rather than corporations; community and national service rather than greed and rung-climbing; the reaching for high ideals rather than submitting to the ease of brute force.

Perhaps, perhaps, there is reason to hope. As they say, any change from what we had is good (minus Governor Palin).

To President-elect Obama: I don't quite like you and I still don't trust you. But good luck. As my President, I now stand by you.

Black Republicans are real?

I thought people like Richard Ivory and Tiffany Shorter were a myth. But, according the New York Times article, Young, Black and Republican in New York, there really are people like them are real.

Maybe I should rethink my position on Santa Claus, Tooth Fairy, and the Loc ness Monster.

Seriously though. I'm all for the separation of race and party affiliation. I've only been bitching about my struggles this presidential season. If I didn't believe in the freedom of choice, I'd be one of "those" voters. The ones who never look beyond party labels to the substance (or lack there of) beneath.

But being Black and labeling yourself a Republican? That's hard to swallow, even for me.

The GOP has never supported minorities they way Democrats have. They have been more homogeneous and self-serving than Democrats or any other "party" in our system. Who jumped aboard the civil rights movement? Who has tried to provide equality and opportunity to the underprivileged?

Minimum wage increases, paid maternal leave for parents, affordable health care, worker rights/protections, etc., etc. etc.

Democrats.

Still, I'm not one of those ignorant friends they talked about having. If I were friends with them, I'd continue being friends with them.

We just wouldn't talk politics. Ever.

Russian Roulette with the future

I had plans for this blog. It was supposed to be my corner for conversation on random world events and things I see in the news that interest me for good or for ill.

But, since the debacle that is our presidential election, it has turned into my corner to develop as a conscious voter.

Recently, my mother and I were talking about the candidates, foreign policy, terrorism, and Islam. My mother is two things: 1. The most knowledgeable about Islam as a religion, culture, and way of life than anyone who hasn't earned their degree in such studies, and 2. very opinionated.

She is, I think, going to vote for Senator McCain in November. Her reasoning for this comes down to security:
1. Nothing else matters if America is, as she will likely be, attacked again.
2. This future attack will come from the hands of Islamic fundamentalists who want to watch the West burn.
3. This attack will be better orchestrated and more powerful and more lethal than those of 9/11.

She believes that Senator Obama is naive and does not fully appreciate the threat posed by Islamic followers and states. She believes that Senator McCain has a better understanding, and will take those threats more seriously, and will be more likely to do whatever it takes to ensure America's safety.

I am torn. I want to elect a president who will take care of Americans first by improving health care, by improving chances for education, by reducing our foreign debt, by promoting green initiatives, etc.

But what good is all this if there are forces out there hell bent on destroying or subverting our way of life and very existence?

Threat to behead Canadian Prime Minister
60 Hindu's Killed in train fire
Homeless man beaten for eating during Ramadan
Father stabs daughter and crushes her head with a rock for seeing her husband

What do I do?

Barak Obama vs. Sarah Palin

Some of you may be appalled to know this.

I was actually considering crossing party lines this election.

Oh, did you already get that indication from the mass of blog posts regaling you with my distaste, distrust, and discomfort for Barak Obama? Then I guess the above statement isn't much a surprise.

Try this one on for size:

I'm voting for Barak Obama.

It's true. I was either going to cross party lines or write in Hillary Clinton. Now, before you try and label me some ultra-left wing, man hating, rabid Clintonite nationalist, remember this: I believe the duty of every American is to vote their conscience. My conscience said to vote Mrs. Clinton because she was (is) the most qualified and ready.

But now, in light of Mrs. Sarah Palin being nominated as John McCain's VP running mate (mistress), I feel it is my duty to make sure (s)he doesn't win.

Mr. McCain is old. He could keel over November 5th if his wife said, "honey, lets have sex to celebrate your win!" Suddenly Maverick McCain is stone cold dead, and "lifetime member of the NRA, anti-right to choose, abstinence education is all children need to know about sex, we're fighting God's war in Iraq, crazy right wing religious zealot" Sarah Palin is President of the USA.

Dear God no.

I do my part in the name of lesser evil: I vote for Barak Obama.

Watershed moment for African Americans in the USA

"You really have to give credit to the American people for being able to look past Obama's skin color to see the Harvard educated smart-ass underneath."

Historian Dr. Woodson.




Amen Dr. Woodson, amen.

Finally, it's over

It's official. We either get a toothless pup or toothless old dog.

But: "below the belt" insults aside, I'm glad this insanity is finally over. Obama picked Biden and McCain picked Palin. It is over. The divide is conquered.

All that remains is to vote in November.

All hail our shadowy overlords!

I always knew my vote counted for zilch...



...but I liked the illusion of democracy.

Don't misunderstand, I know this is satire (I hope...), but after 8 years of King George Bush, and looking down the loaded 4 year barrel of Crown Prince Barack Obama, you kinda start to wonder.

Heir Apparent to the USA

I'm going to move the general focus of this blog from political bitching, I swear. Just not yet.

Dana Milbank (Washingtonpost) said it best in todays article when she said: "Barack Obama has long been his party's presumptive nominee. Now he's becoming it presumptuous nominee."

Barak seems to have forgotten that he hasn't won (yet). Polls show him leading McCain, but never by much. American voters chose him over Hilary, but now it seems there not sure they want him or McCain. Basically, he has a lot of winning over to do.

Strutting around the globe, playing King George's first born golden child is not the best way to win any love. At least in my book.

Caveats and fancy promise side stepping

I was afraid this is what would happen if he won the Democratic party nomination.

Throughout this campaign, Obama made tall order promises I was certain he wouldn't be able to fulfill or, in the case of article linked to this post (or this one), would seek to find ways out of ("what I meant when I said that was...").

I'm not telling those who voted for him I told you so, but I will remind you of what he said:

"[Obama] repeatedly said voters should demand a clear plan on how to end the war from all the Democratic candidates. On Sunday afternoon, he flew to his hometown of Chicago for a boisterous rally attended by more than 8,000 people at the University of Illinois-Chicago, where he once taught.

'The time has come for us to end this engagement in Iraq,' he said, saying he was proud he had been "consistent and constant" in his Iraq message" (Washington Post, Feb. 2007).

Now it's,

"[The] United States cannot sustain a long-term military presence in Iraq, but [Obama] added he would be open to “refine [his] policies” about a timeline for withdrawing troops" (New York Times, July 2008).

Oh I give up.

I told you so.