Our zombie-fied nation

or why do people walk in the road? Regretfully might be a new feature of this blog.

This has been a phenomenon for years now and I don't mean simply crossing the street or even jaywalking but literally people, usually they're not alone but in groups of at least two, who walk down the road at a leisurely pace. This cuts across all racial and age groups, maybe in some cases of the young it can mean a statement of defiance, dunno, but none of them even look around them. You have to ever so slowly pass them and hope a toot or two won't anger them. My .02 worth, most of 'em are on drugs, could be the illegal variety, could be over-the-counter and prescription drugs. Saw a commercial the other day for some wonder drug and the woman goes nonchalantly "I take five different medications already." Oh, OK. The way I was brought up was roads are exclusively for motor vehicles, maybe a bike or two can get into the act but that's it, "cross at the green, not in-between", but when you have people in LA-LA Land, well, it's kinda like being in some horror movie, Zoloft Nation or something.

Meat Lasagna - European Style

The key to making a great European-style lasagna is your meat sauce, it has to be packed with flavor. Now you need a heavy-duty stockpot for this as you'll need to get this very very hot first, the oil will start to smoke, and a thin pot will have somebody call the Fire Department in no time. Get some nice white onions and dice them up rather small with a chef's knife, have some crushed garlic on the side and when that pot is hot enough put your onions in and a spoonful or two of the garlic. Now whenever any recipe calls for onions always sautee them first so as to bring out their flavor, 5 minutes or so. So you have your ground beef, not too lean 'cause you want that fat, and you put all that into your pot and mix it all up with a wooden spoon so it cooks thoroughly. Now you add your spices, salt and pepper, garlic powder, crushed oregano and parsley flakes, a few packets of Goya Sazon, really anything you can come up with, even some Italian dressing. When the meat sauce is almost done as it begins to turn brown add some cans of crushed tomatoes, some diced tomatoes, I like Del Monte with the basil/garlic/oregano blend, and a small can of tomato paste, depending on how much you're making you be the judge on how much. So the meat sauce takes a while but not too long either 'cause it's going to get cooked again when you put your lasagna in the oven. Meat sauce done so pour it into a colander over the sink but not too long, you want to save that fat, and when you're done straining pour it into a long hotel pan. Now you have another hotel pan and you ladle some marinara sauce on the bottom and spread it around, next I add my lasagna noodles, I tend to prefer the big industrial ones but no matter, and into your first layer you spread your meat around, then add your dollops of ricotta cheese in rows and then sprinkle in your shredded mozzarella and don't be bashful here, next spritz on some parmesan cheese, then add another layer of lasagna noodles and repeat the next layer as you did the first. When you're done adding your last noodles to form the top very important to spread some more marinara sauce all around else it will crack when you bake it and lastly spritz on some more parmesan, get a bakery sheet or parchment paper and put that on top and lastly some aluminum foil. If you don't add the paper some bits of the foil will flake off and you don't want that. You have your oven set to 350 or 375 degrees if you life and I bake it off for at least 50 minutes, better a little too long than too short, you want that mozzarella to melt. Take it out and let it cool on the side for about 1/2 hour before putting it in the 'fridge if you're not gonna eat it right away. A word about bay leaves which many chefs like to use when their meat sauce is simmering, when putting together your lasagna always take them out of your meat sauce as they're not really edible and people can choke, their use is purely for the flavor. Bon Appetit!

Book reviewers

I've long held that since we're all human it is virtually impossible to be 100% objective at all times and this came to mind after reading two very divergent reviews of the new book out by Melody Peterson sarcastically entitled Our Daily Meds. OK, so her whole premise is the pharmaceutical industry is greedy and gets dubious drugs to market before proper and thorough studies are done and once on the market lobbyists for these corporations strongly ply doctors to dispense them more and more and yada yada yada and do we really have chemical imbalances in our brains and what about all these potentially serious side effects to the most popular drugs and...well you get the picture, hers is not an uncommon position on the drug industry. Now the first review I read was very positive and called it important work but the second one was just the opposite and pretty much dubbed her part of the anti-medical progress crowd which brings home the point our biases are brought to bear on everything, ditto for movie reviews of films dealing with controversial topics, think Michael Moore. The point of today's blog is not my own personal position on the meds situation though I do tilt towards her position that we are a vastly overmedicated society but how we review and critique things we may strongly disagree with (or even agree with for that matter) which kinda got me thinking are book and movie reviews worth reading and considering in the first place? In an artistic sense isn't a review of anything literary or cinematic that may be loaded with social and political themes simply a reflection of ourselves and our own moral certitudes and pieties?

Our cashless society

I was watching this paid program on NBC last night about low fixed-rate loans by the government so more average folk can buy homes, it's Uncle Sam's way of trying to solve the subprime mortgage mess. The loans are completely protected by the federal government so lenders would not lose anything, they are guaranteed. Hey, I'm no egghead economic scholar, sounds good but the part that got me were the four people at the end who had questions for the expert. They had various questions about the loan program but all four were swimming in credit-card debt, not only that but the show's financial authority figure said nothing on this like tear 'em up and don't use 'em for now or only use them to rent a hotel room or if your car breaks down on a cross-country trip. I kid you not but the other day at Wendy's I saw a young couple whip out their piece of plastic to buy some burgers, is this worth going into debt over? I've made the personal decision to not use credit cards for now, I paid them off years ago and you know something? I'm better off, have more money in the bank and live well within my means. So these four troopers who maxed out on their credit cards are going for these government loans to own a home, well good luck but this Gotta Have It Generation doesn't set an example for the Next Generation.

Clearly Barack has rattled Hillary's cage

How else to explain her self-sabotaging ways? If it were anybody else, John Edwards or Joe Biden let's say, I'd bet dollars to doughnuts you wouldn't be hearing about all that sniper fire on the Bosnian tarmac or her pivotal role in the Irish Peace Process. NO, she didn't misspeak because she didn't remember every detail correctly or was sleep-deprived, she is clearly threatened by Barack's meteoric political ascendancy and so when you're under this much stress and pressure people weird themselves out. She wants it so badly she's self-sabotaging her own campaign and like the famous band still playing while the Titanic sank she doesn't know enough to say "stop the orchestra, we have a problem here."

Made in China

Don't know how we can protest and lodge our discontent over China's current crackdown of the pro-democracy movement in Tibet, after all even our toothpicks and keychains are made in China (apparently we now longer have the technology to make dolls over here). Sure the Administration always lodges its pro-forma condemnations but what kind of teeth does it really have? Nixon was famous for opening up trade with China but I don't think he had in mind that you couldn't walk into a Payless Shoe Source and not have trouble finding a sneaker made in America. New World Order.

Sex addiction, the new excuse?

So now we know what ex-NY Governor Eliot Spite-zer's problem really is, he's a sex addict. Now I know this stuff has been documented by people like Dr. Patrick Carnes, actor Michael Douglas once admitted to it but I think the real upshot of all this is therapy is replacing the concept of sin and free will. The famous psychiatrist Dr. Karl Menninger even wrote about this years and years ago in his Whatever Became of Sin? and that's going way back but even then rationalization was a problem. It probably helps explain wife Silda's apparent decision to stick it out with him but are serial cheaters now to be understood to be silently suffering with their addictions and is there a Pill just around the corner? They can even name it Spitzotrol or something, it'll be his legacy.

Should news conferences henceforth be rated?

As in G, PG, PG-13, R and NC-17? and how would you rate the press conference New York's new governor David Paterson gave the other day? Well it certainly had your adult themes, adultery and serial affairs, it even had some psychology thrown in (he did it because she did it first). It was kinda like a mild R so maybe we'll give it a PG-13, maybe it shoulda had a parental warning advisory scrawled at the top of the screen. Wondering, and it's probably wise but during his next meeting with reporters the kiddies should be shooed out of the room. If anything it doesn't set a good moral example, I've heard women say it's bottom of the barrel stuff. Maybe he can give his next press conference after 9 PM when the kids are safely tucked away.

Is McCain getting a free pass?

So far it's all about Barack Obama and his pastor problem, you know, the Rev. Jeremiah "God Damn This Country, Land That I Hate" Wright, and Barack was even forced to give a major speech distancing himself from the Rev's theology. For the last few days Hannity's been beating this horse on the airwaves but what about John McCain's own pastor problem? nary a word. McCain recently warmly accepted the endorsement of one John Hagee, prominent evangelical pastor and friend and advocate for Israel to the point where he has publicly said that when those Jewish settlers were forced to leave their settlements in the Gaza Strip God punished US with Hurricane Katrina. Not only that but Hagee holds that the Roman Catholic Church is the seat of the Antichrist. All Mac said was a tepid "I can accept someone's endorsement without agreeing with all of their positions." So where is his major Obama-esque speech clarifying his own Rev problem? and in fairness shouldn't Hannity be talking about this as well? I am not loyal to the Republican Party come hell or high water, I am loyal to conservative principles first, read into that what you will Mr. McCain.

Aren't we all crimed out by now?

Crime has been a HUGE staple of TV over the last several years judging by all the C.S.I.'s alone (next up - "C.S.I. Anchorage, Alaska") and it's not just crime, it's lurid crime. "Dateline", "48 Hours Mystery", even "20/20" has gotten into the act on occasion. Ever since Hannibal Lecter first made his debut we seem to have this cultural fascination with the dark side. Personally I find it very depressing like I was checking out the new Fox lineup last night, something called "Canterbury's Law" starring Juliana Margulies. So far so good, a new legal drama I thought but in walks some guy into her law office and opens up a duffel bag and there are human remains inside. He claims to be psychic and offers to help her find her missing son. Anyway turns out he may not be psychic after all and may have killed five or six young boys and buried them. Turns out he has an advanced and inoperable brain tumor and can't remember whether he did the crimes or not and so I wasted a good part of the evening watching the current weirdness of the latest TV schedule and then you go to bed in a disturbed mood like doesn't TV offer inspiration anymore, human interest stories and people helping each other out? When film critic Michael Medved knocked all the hoopla over "Silence of the Lambs" getting an Oscar nod I thought maybe he was just being his overly critical self, if it's not his cup of tea don't rent it but I now see it was only the beginning of a trend, a genre that Laura Ingraham calls "tragedy tv" and check out all those nasty and gruesome anti-smoking ads on the tube, we all know by now it's bad for you but as the NY Post's Andrea Peyser said the other day by golly children are watching. It might seem radical but I'm almost there. As the bumper sticker says

KILL YOUR TELEVISION!

Sesame Noodles

You can either use fettucine or else linguine noodles, box usually tells you something like "perfect in 11-12 minutes", Barilla fettucine takes a little longer but is preferred by more chefs these days. OK so after they're done you dump it all out in a colander in the sink and shoot some cold water through it if you're in a hurry. So now you've got your teriyaki marinade and sauce, I tend to use alot so as to have alot of sauce leftover, noodles can get that dried out look in short order after sitting in a bowl for a day or two. Grab that small bottle of hot chili sesame oil off the shelf, if they don't have that some mongolian fire oil is just as good. Don't be shy, pour the whole bottle into your mixing bowl to give it that kick. Get a bottle of, oh I don't know, a nice miso and sesame blend and, oh why not, a bottle of ginger-soy sauce and dump it all in. A bottle or two of sesame seeds and at this point some scallions, known as green onions in some recipe books but in the big YO we call 'em scallions, dice 'em up small with a good sharp chef's knife. Whisk up that baby and let it all blend and now add your cooled-off pasta and voila!, sesame noodles.

I'm so proud of our governors up here in the Northeast

Then there was the former Republican governor of CT, John Roland, involved in some corruption investigation, he later pleaded guilty to mail fraud and tax fraud and was replaced by his Lieutenant Governor M. Jodi Rell but before even Eliot Spite-zer there was former NJ Governor Jim McGreevance, you know the guy who while he was still married to Dina Matos and had a little family going and while he was still the Governor had anonymous and quickie gay sex at reststops along his State's highways and bi-ways. Now he's trotted out one of his numerous boytoys to tell the world that Dina and them had 3-way sex sessions and so she had to know he was gay the whole time. Of course they're all in the middle of a bitter custody dispute over their daughter so...but I don't believe a word of it, he's mental is all but just the same

it's awesome.

Eliot's Dilemma

The missus won't give him so much as a backrub, rumor has it they both pulled an I Love Lucy and sleep in separate beds. He can't see the escorts, everyone's onto his act by now and you can bet dollars to doughnuts he is being watched. Now maybe it's just me (although I don't think it is) but seems he's the one least bothered and devastated by this mishegas. What's missing is what the shrink class refers to as nostalgic depression, a shattering of your dreams, and it's what the winos talk and brood about on Skid Row, you know the best years of your life are behind you and boy how you messed it up. Maybe it's a divorce and it's all your fault and she ain't never coming back and she took you to the cleaners, whatever. So there he is happily waving to the press, there he is walking the family dog looking like there's not a care in the world, there he is getting into the limo with his wife always separated by him by at least a 3 foot bubble. He has a rich father and won't lack for a job in the family real-estate business but you keep asking yourself when is it going to hit him like a freight train, nostalgic depression, he ruined his whole life by his own doing, the apex of his career is gone, he can't drown his sorrows anymore in a loving ho's bosom, so when is he going to drink too much or dabble in the drugs or at least show some well-worn signs of angst and existential despair on his visage? Everyone else around him is positively devastated 'cept the main player. Oh well he has some choices, he can either move to Nevada or Amsterdam, they say in Holland people smoke doobies in cafes.

copyright 3/17/08 by Z-man, all rights reserved

OK, so quiche~~~

~~~Whatever kind you're making go to the frozen food aisle and get, say your frozen chopped spinach, broccoli, asparagus spears, mixed veggies maybe, imitation crabmeat for seafood quiche, sliced mushrooms is good for a nice mushroom quiche. The famous and always popular Lorraine quiche is simply done using diced ham. Anyway make sure you squeeze as much of the water out of the broccoli and spinach using a colander, you'd be surprised at how much water is in there! OK, so set that off to the side (mise en place, everything in place). Now you have your 6" pie shell, your 9"er if you prefer or hey, do both. Most important thing is your mixture, I use eggs, heavy cream, some 1/2 and 1/2, I mix it all up with my whisk (beat your eggs first of course), then I add some sugar, a dash of nutmeg (and I like a hint of cinnamon too, hehe), some red cayenne pepper for color, little white pepper as well, bit of paprika for the color too, a packet or two of Goya Sazon is great. You'll have to judge the quantity of these ingredients depending on how much quiche you're making. The grated cheese, they say it should consist of at least 75% Swiss and based on experimentation I have to agree here although I have seen in gourmet food stores all cheddar quiche and goat cheese quiche as well (dunno). Anyway with the Swiss Jarlsberg and/or Finlandia is the best. Don't use any low-salt cheese as your quiche will not turn out right, it'll look like an open-face grilled cheese sandwich that's burned. Now first into the pie shell I put some grated cheese, alot of quiche you see has a concave effect, I tend to use a little more cheese than most but don't overdo it. Ladle in your blended mixture and don't be shy. Lastly I put my spinach or broccoli or mushrooms or whatever on the very top and then I spoon in even a little more mixture so that when it cooks it'll all sink into the cheese but still be visible for a really nice effect. Into the oven for about 1/2 an hour it goes, usually a little longer if you're making a whole bunch. I like to go for that burned look, don't wanna blacken it of course but that nice browned on top look will have your guests ooohing and aaahing. Bon Appetit!

Yesterday I re-registered to vote

This time as a member of my state's Conservative Party (as Sean is fond of saying "I'm a conservative first, a Republican second"). Last time I voted as one of those influential and much-feared and sought after Independents. Years ago it was RTL (Right-to-Life). Now a pattern emerges here and that is I've been shying away from becoming an official Republican. I've analyzed this and I think it has to do with I'd be walking around one day and get poked in the butt with somebody's horn.

Ashley Alexandra Dupre Youmans - Part of the VRWC?

I'm surprised nobody has brought this up, that Sean and Rush may be running a prostitution ring to bring down high-ranking Democrats. No crack whores they, they have names straight out of some Harlequin tale or Gothic romance, nothing but the best for our Governors and Judges and Senators. Dig deep my friends, dig deep

THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE

You really look like you could use a glass of water

The Associated Press just concluded a 5 month investigation into our water supply, turns out there are trace amounts of various pharmaceuticals in many major American cities, things like mood stabilizers, medicine for whooping cough, high blood pressure, you name it. Guy on the Newshour last night said not to worry, only traces but then a few minutes later says even those traces can have an effect on your body, also water filtration plants don't even test for pharmaceuticals. Eh, small price to pay for our overmedicated society. Tom Cruise, we'll give you this one.

Daylight Savings Time & a new feature

They should leave the clocks alone at this point and let Nature take its course, not sure of the official reasons why this practice is still followed, had to do with the farmers years ago and maybe schoolkids getting hit in the dark so dawn "starts" earlier in late Fall but anyway we all set our clocks ahead by one hour last Sunday morning (2 AM to be exact) and the next day I felt like there were a pair of invisible hands pushing on my shoulders, "come on you slowpoke!", after such an enjoyable day (the weather was fabulous) you can't help looking at the clock and when it says 5 you go it should really be 4. Let President McCain or HillObama work with the new Congress to get rid of this anachronism, it upsets our sleep patterns and biorhythms, whew!!! into the dustbin of History.

Guru Watch

He even looks a little like Dr. Wayne Dyer so I had to do a double take but caught Dr. Daniel Amen's show on some PBS station the other night. Now these gurus all begin good and rational and that's how they suck you in, just look at the sheeple in their audiences with their mouths agape in Awe, but then they say something that you really have to question and one of Dr. Amen's points about brain health, the subject of his lecture, is this, that if you don't get a minimum of 6 hours sleep every night you will suffer from chronic stress. Now not to downplay the importance of a good night's sleep not to mention its pleasures but there were many times I went to work the next day with 4 or 5 hours sleep and functioned fine, it's not ideal and you're likely to feel somewhat tired during the second half of the day but imo his position seems rather radical, many of us don't get the mandated 8 hours of sleep a night for various reasons and yet we live our lives. One wonders where the very lucrative pharmaceutical industry ties into all of this, is there some Lunesta connection but keep your eye on the gurus folks, a new feature here (woo hoo!).

One of my favorite talking heads

Mark Shields of The Newshour with Jim Lehrer, uncommon common sense for someone with liberal leanings, said a few years back that it is important for the Democrats to not appear too pro-abortion, did they listen? The other night he said something incisive and not a little profound, "liberals have to learn to be a little tougher and conservatives have to have a little more compassion." Looking back on your life how many of you remember a liberal boss whom you thought was a pushover but he or she gave you some tough love and looking back on our folks, many are so perfectly blended, very conservative but when push comes to shove very compassionate as well, strict in our upbringing but would never let you be homeless either. Maybe by his liberal comment Shields had in mind people like Barack Obama and on the other side his conservative comment seems to point directly at Michelle Malkin, many great points about the subprime mortgage crisis in her recent columns but where's that dash of empathy and fellow-feeling? You may not agree but hats off to Mark Shields for so many great years on the Newshour.

"Agents of intolerance" can come in handy...

...around Election Time in a big way. Yeah, time was John McCain lumped the Rev. Al Sharpton and Pat Robertson/Jerry Falwell together in one big Fringe Element, "to the left to the left to the left" and then the right, but these days as Bill Moyers discussed on his Journal last night McCain and the Rev. John Hagee are buddy buddy these days. Sure he's a very prominent minister and vocal advocate for the State of Israel, he rails against the threat radical Islam poses to the rest of the world but he also refers to the Catholic Church as the Great Whore of Revelations, he's not Bill Donahue of the Catholic League's cup of tea to put it mildly and McCain fobs it all off as "I can accept somebody's endorsement without agreeing with all of their views." Dunno but this seems way over the line, it's being tolerant of intolerance if you will.

All Aboard!!!

As I recall our friend Newt said at the time that should the Republican Party not nominate a true conservative he might feel the tug, nay the moral duty to run as a bona fide right-wing American...ummm...

Whatever it turns out to be, HillObama or ObamaHill vs. McCain the general election may well turn out to be a referendum on the War, this could be good or bad for McCain as his powersurge pretty much defines him now, conventional political wisdom I guess would have it bad. "They" say that he'd have an easier time of it against her than against him (I'm still waiting for the soon-to-be-published book "The Collective Wit and Wisdom of They", if you're a regular reader of my blog or even an occasional eavesdropper you know that I quite often go outside of They). For the younger generation which seems pretty much primed to vote this time 'round Obama more symbolizes Kama Sutra and McCain Viagra, Nickelback vs. AARP, 2 1/2 Men up against I Love Lucy...I just get tired of the same talking heads is all, how 'bout Pee Wee Herman opining or even Barney the Purple Dinosaur?

Thought people mellowed with age

What's up with these liberal dinosaurs? always hating, never participating. Last time we checked Gloria Steinem embarassed herself on the NY Times Op-Ed page making the case that Bubba flashing Paula Jones was not sexual harassment but Clarence Thomas asking Anita Hill out more than once was, now she opines that McCain being a POW of the Vietcong for 5 1/2 years doesn't entitle him to the presidency (although methinks he's entitled to a free lapdance or two). Don't recall McCain running on this however, maybe I missed this as his platform, dunno but apparently everyone mellows with age except liberals, always fighting, always dividing the Universe into Good & Evil,

it's old.

Obama/Hill vs. McCain/Thompson

at least this is the way I see it. I agree with Beth, the idea of Obama in the White House is starting to get scary. Yeah I surfed the Obama Wave for a while there but to think of having him sitting in the Oval Office making major, and I mean major foreign policy decisions especially in a time of war and meeting rogue leaders like the upcoming Raul Castro with no preconditions, even Madame would never do this. BTW McCain needs the more conservative Thompson to balance out his own ticket, it sure as hell ain't gonna be Rudy.

Trouble in Paradise

What if Adam and Eve had never sinned? there would be no disease and death, be fruitful and multiply and so replenish the Earth but would God eventually have to come down and set limits? birth control people, you're all bumping into each other, a kind of Genesis conundrum.

The BIG issue in Ohio

jobs going overseas, NAFTA and GATT, plants closing, massive layoffs. Now here Republicans don't have any edge whatsoever although of course as has been amply pointed out in our blogs McCain ain't your typical conservative so maybe he can feel their pain but the issue naturally is a winner for any Democrat. Repubs are perfectly fine with the NWO (New World Order) stuff and they tend to belittle and disparage those who disagree with them...but I like Beth's point in her blog today about how most of us are going for McCain reluctantly whereas Obama excites real passion on his side. I used the analogy that for our side it's like going out with someone who you're not exactly crazy about like bothering some overharried secretary at work 'cause you're lonely as opposed to someone you really dig, who you're on the same page with, the connection (pizzaz, sizzle) in other words your dream date (I'm just chock full of the metaphors lately). Imagine an Obama-ite saying he ain't much but he's the best we have! Now I don't share Obama's political philosophy of course but he does excite me, like Stacy's mom he has it going on, turn gay for a day, have his baby,

dunno.

Hey brother, can you spare a couple of hundred?

Now I didn't know this but they were talking about panhandlers on the radio the other day and apparently alot of them are raking in the big bucks, sometimes $300 in a single day! Now I'm not overly judgemental about the homeless, there but for the grace of God. I know Sean and Rush take the position one should never be without a place to live, that they don't want to work. Wanting to work, that's a poor framing of the issue. Like Beth and I were talking the other day and we both agreed who exactly loves to work anyway? ain't the issue but they may have a point that they've stretched to an overgeneralization. You never really read or hear about some homeless guy having to be talked down from a bridge 'cause he's been out of a job for a couple years, maybe that's Sean's point, as long as they have a soup kitchen to go to and a place to sleep maybe they prefer it to your 9-5, dunno but I don't want to lose my compassionate conservative edge either...

GERALDO should just...

...get back inside Al Capone's vault and lock the door. Says there's no way the GOP will get the Hispanic vote, they're gonna go for the Dems 'cause of the illegal immigration issue. OK, let's explain this one again. Geraldo & co. bring up a chair and get a cup of coffee, class is now in session.

The difference between rights and privileges

(be quiet there in the back) "OK, so you've broken some law, a law, you didn't kill anyone or rob a bank, but you've committed a crime nevertheless, so what are we to do about it? The illegal alien has broken the LAW, violated our immigration policy and there are a myriad political views on the best way to handle this but if we allow you to stay and in effect we have (even conservatives like Sean Hannity) because we haven't deported you yet, then this is what is known as a privilege but you really have no absolute right to be here. Shakespeare said sometimes justice needs to be tempered by mercy but that's for us to decide, you cannot arrogantly demand a right for yourself that doesn't exist...OK, this is just a short class to get us started, to lay the proper legal bedrock for a sensible discussion of this controversial topic. We'll continue this at 9 sharp tomorrow morning so have a good day."

GERALDO (whispering): "This teacher sounds like a gran pendejo."

"WHAT?!?, you know I took a little Latin in the high school. If you can't control yourself..."

Karma and the Christian faith

Daniel Ruwe's excellent blog about religion got me thinking about faith in general. Pope Benedict said once about mainly the Eastern religions, I believe this was when he was still a cardinal, that the Christian faith is naturally and far superior to these systems based on good and bad karma. You see if I'm a Christian and have wronged somebody else or they have wronged me we can simply ask for each other's forgiveness and move on with our lives, we don't have to get stuck in that karmic rut. Beth and I once had this debate, maybe it started at some forum, I forget, but it was about forgiving and forgetting. My position, simply forgive and forget, her position you can forgive someone without forgetting. I think I understand her point better, it's like if a husband strays and his wife forgives him she will always remember the fact, the original act, if she had moral "amnesia" about it all this would hardly keep him in line. At any rate no karma to deal with, ain't that a bargain?

Some thoughts on the Sean Bell case

I've given the background to this tragic case many times in my blogging and it's easy enough to google. I was never into the whole bachelor party scene but that's just me. Re strip joints there are upscale ones and seedy ones, I'm not advertising for them but you do have men who go to these places not to relax and have a good time, they get some watered-down whiskey under their belts and before you know it there's a stabbing on the sidewalk. Happened once outside a place in Yonkers here and another incident in a "gentlemen's club" in Mt. Vernon once. Now the one Sean Bell and his friends went to on that fateful night was known for rampant drugs, guns and prostitution and the four officers in Queens who are about to go on trial for taking Mr. Bell's life were there because of the type of place it was. Moral of the story and as insensitive as this may sound Sean Bell was not in a good place, wrong place at the wrong time, and I'm sure the young woman whom he was going to marry that day knows this in her heart of hearts. I'm also more than a little tired of all the cop-bashing out there and personally have grown more pro-cop over the years, I most often give them the benefit of the doubt in these complicated cases. We'll see what happens but this case bothered me from Day One.

The speech Rudy never gave

I still say that there is almost a poetic requirement that the Mayor of 9/11 be the One to continue and eventually win the War on Terror but most people don't seem to agree with this script, Life need not be that artistic I guess but Rudy's big mistake was this. He courted his party's conservative base way too late in the game, if you're going to woo you have to get your application in early otherwise you're transparent, maybe a bit frenzied and not at all sincere. He should have laid the groundwork a year or two ago with a major speech or two soley on the Life Issues as in, "Upon further reflection I've come to the conclusion that the abortion issue lends itself best to some kind of legislative solution which Roe vs. Wade pre-empted. How can the Supreme Court, any Supreme Court, act like a bunch of OB-GYNs and dictate to the nation as a whole that aborting the fetus is legal up to the 3rd month or the 6th or even up until birth? You can even have some choicers who believe early abortions are ok but who are against some of the later mid-term ones still allowed by the Court. The late Harry Blackmun, who wrote the majority opinion in Roe, endlessly complicated the issue and for this reason I've adjusted my earlier pro-choice views. Federalism is the best way of dealing with this contentious and highly emotional issue."

If he had done this early enough some of us might even have gotten a faint whiff of sincerity in the man, we all reserve the right to change or modify or calibrate our views over time and it would have showed that he gave further thought to the issue. It's just a hunch but I think most conservatives would more than gladly put up with a true pro-choice federalist in office.

Are you a...

...bang your head against the wall type of conservative? Used to listen to Sean Hannity for awhile but stopped, I understand he's for the War and all but I was worried there for awhile, he's one of those Ann Coulter type conservatives who can't seem to accept the fact that there's so many different kinds of political views out there let's just accept it and live with each other, doesn't mean you have to lose your passion though, just keep it in perspective. Take Coulter's books, of course her first one was funny, forget the title but it probably went along the lines of Liberals are Stupid and We're All Good but she's churned out like 10 books now and the formula never changes. I myself, being older in Life now, gotta watch the high blood pressure, hating is so yesterday which is why I have Laura Ingraham linked up to my blog. Passionate and conservative, highly intelligent and yet she can totally disagree with a big-time lib and yet say "but we still like them." She's the type of rightie you might accidentally catch in the Mall one day having a cup of java with Al Franken in the Food Court. Dunno, I'm just tired of banging my head against the wall my whole life. I don't want Hill as president but I'm with Beth on this one, the Sun will still rise the next day and we'll all go about our everyday lives.

Seems we're living in the Golden Age of Psychos

Well not a few months don't go by before there's another one, this time at some college in Illinois, seems some erstwhile bright and normal student hid behind a curtain onstage during a geology lecture and shot and killed five students and injured several others before taking his own life. Now whenever this happens you will duly note how the meds are to blame or, more specifically the fact that the person stopped taking his meds. Well if a pill is the only thing holding this person's life together then God help us all, he ain't living right. Vast majority of people who are mentally ill are not dangerous or violent although they can be annoying at times point being if you have a strong moral code and compass to begin with you can go bonkers but only up to a point. You may walk into a road and babble to everyone, tell everyone at work that they're conspiring to get rid of you but there are limits to your madness, the Good Lord gave you free will, if you're against killing to begin with maybe they'll just put you away in a nice home overlooking a lake somewhere for a time. Our friend Britney may do all kinds of whacked out things but she hasn't pulled a Columbine or VA Tech yet, my guess is her moral code is still there although frayed around the edges. Now I'm not against medical progress by any stretch but methinks they're pushing pills on society. You don't have to agree with me though, that's a'ight.

Fat Acceptance

I am sympathetic with the whole Fat Acceptance Movement. I don't make fat jokes and if you're in that category you don't need people constantly reminding you of your state, as if you didn't know. BUT it ain't good for your health in the long-term.

Subprime musings

Michelle Malkin has finally touched on the subprime mortgage meltdown in two recent columns and I've been asking myself why I didn't bash her in my blog the next day as your typical conservative lacking compassion. Well I considered her points carefully that oftentimes it's the would be homeowner with delusions of grandeur that's the problem here, not that there aren't any predatory lenders out there. I went back over my own situation with credit cards. Overall I have a good credit history but for a few years there I was living well beyond my means, had to have this and that and it caught up with me, maxed out and needed help paying 'em off. That's behind me now but I have made a personal decision in my life, I don't have them and I don't use them anymore, cash and checks for everything. It's all about personal responsibility and wise decision-making. I learned my lesson, will these people out of their "homes" learn theirs?

File this under what was I thinking?

You may have heard. A branch of the ACLU has come out for Sen. Larry Craig, not so much in his denial but that toilet sex is protected, as long as the door is closed, gosh, people have "a reasonable expectation of privacy." So you have the runs or the cramps or your kid ain't feelin' too well,

gotta wait buddy

there's constitutionally protected activities going on in them thar stalls, you can put a cork in it and read a newspaper, they'll probably be done in a couple minutes anyway,

must be a penumbra of a penumbra or emantion from Roe, ah the spirit of Blackmun!

Morose thoughts

Like why can't they scientifically prove once and for all time that there's life after death then we wouldn't have to worry (and for those of you who say you don't give it a second thought it's in the back of your mental attic somewhere next to the ice skates and the Flexible Flyer). Then again in some cases there may be some who would still have to worry, sorry I brought it up. BTW I'm not the least bit afraid of dead people, live people on the other hand.....

Spontaneous Human Combustion

"uh, this is z's mother. He's not coming in today, he spontaneously human combusted last night."

Why I'm not your typical conservative right-wing Republican

First off I'm registered as an Independent not as a Republican. Although my bedrock philosophy is one of conservatism in every old-fashioned sense of the term, no globaloney, I am of the mind that the retirement age should actually be lowered instead of raised, let's say 55. Not gonna happen and all you economic conservatives out there will scold me for wanting to bust the national piggy bank and they're probably right but it's an ideal, it's what I feel in my heart. You've devoted say 20 or 25 years of your life to pure hardcore work, that should be enough and have a nice life. As well I feel if you as a conservative are really serious about doing something about the illegals either deport 'em all or regularize most of them, don't just talk about building a bigger and better fence. I've already made my position known. In theory anyway I am not against the idea of labor unions although I know there are drawbacks which cons like Linda Chavez and George Will are only too happy to point out. I am not just for lowering taxes, that's easy talk, but am for eliminating the income tax entirely and replacing it with a national sales tax. I'm not a dove but I'm not a hawk either. I am a conservative with an independent mind and God bless and have a nice day.

The voters are going to vote...

...for their national security blanket, Bigger Government, like that comforter you snuggle under on a bone-chilling winter night after you've had your goblet (or two) of the good stuff. Men too which is why McCain is up there on top and Huckabee is even in the running. Don't throw me out on a cold winter night to venture out alone, that's too libertarian. I want a bubble bath that maybe you can pay for, why don't you give me a rubber too 'cause I'm too lazy to go down to Walgreen's myself speaking of which I messed up a couple months ago with my girlfriend and now she has a bun in the oven. I can't quite scrape up the $350, can you help out a guy and gal down on their luck? I want to go to the ER because I have the runs and hang around the waiting room watching a Seinfeld rerun even though somebody else just came in with a real problem but has to wait a couple hours 'cause me and my friends are here.

I don't just want my mind masturbated, I want my life masturbated as well AND you're going to foot the bill.

In the curious matter of the male fetus...

...how is this just a part of the Woman's Body if you catch my drift? just one of many many inconsistencies of the choice movement like the 24-week cutoff point many states use to proscribe later abortions, by what mysterious alchemy is the unborn child not human just 3 days before "viability"? I call this the Cinderella Paradox as in "quick, it's 11:45, abort it, the fetus turns human at midnight!" OR the common agnostic approach to abortion which is we don't know the moral and human status of the fetus but let it happen anyway. You should have to prove the fetus is not human before you can suck it into oblivion which brings up the next point. Our science in general and in particular the study of the unborn known as fetology is so far advanced (think transvaginal ultrasound) that we can no longer fall back on the agnostic position, it ain't a bovine fetus after all.

It's all just masturbation of the mind folks.

The current crop...

...of Republican presidential contenders, McCain, Romney and Huck and the lack of real influence of third parties reminds me of the playlists of radio stations today. You don't really care for it but you have no choice, the songs are bland and slightly irritating but it's what everyone is listening to so it has to be good. They keep playing it over and over, think The Fray, and so you brainwash yourself and try to get into it (McCain would be a slow waltz, think Lawrence Welk). You don't have a CD player in your car (the 3rd Party) and you realize Maroon 5 is in that other party, Fergie's over there too and as a rock-ribbed conservative you're just depressed all the time.

"Sittin' by the dock of the bay
watching all the conservatives go away,
Traveled a thousand miles from home
Just to make this third party my home."

But who would Mary Jo Kopechne have endorsed?

Teddy Kennedy backs Obama and betrays Hillary.

So when can we say we have enough laws?

The function of the Congress or any legislative body for that matter is primarily to pass laws. If they don't pump out the legislation this is, you guessed it,

a bad thing,

and so it will haunt a candidate in the next race. Legislation is all about addressing issues and showing concern for people's problems but the second question before the Board today is how many laws do we as a society actually need? Why the obsession and constant need to legislate? as well the more laws you pass the less freedoms you have, it's basic arithmetic. So when can we send our parliament of ho's home?

How the Catholic Church has changed

In the olde days, as soon as a baby was born he/she was baptized as quickly as possible, probably within a few days at most. Today there's no hurry, a recent papal theological commission has pretty much dispensed with the never official dogma of Limbo anyway and so a few months go by after the birth, various people may be asked to be the godparents and an application is finally submitted to the parish but again, there's no rush. The pastor is likely to wait until a group of people need the sacrament and do 'em all on the same day. The issue before the Board today, maybe the sacraments aren't as important as they used to be. Can we blame the usual villain, Vatican 2?

Fred Thompson - a consistent political philosopher

He may not be a pro-life purist like Judie Brown of the American Life League, always going for the touchdown, aka that Constitional Amendment, but he's not a life-choicer like Mitt Romney either. He's a federalist or a believer in states' rights. Laura Ingraham brought up the fact that he was against government intervention in the Terri Schiavo case, well he can say he was consistent in his own head anyway. I myself was more into the whole angle of Terri could swallow on her own and so the laws in all 50 states say you have to feed a person by mouth. Her feeding tube was always a side issue anyway, they could have given her saline hydration by IV and as for his misguided comments about a federal law banning abortion meaning women and possibly their Moms and Dads going to jail, this had a silver lining. It allowed pro-lifers and in particular us bloggers to clarify the issue, hey, maybe Fred knew this all along. Anyway he has my vote if he's the nominee.

Whatever happend to our beloved frontrunner?

Rudy, down there in single digits in all the primaries so far, widely considered by far the odds-on favorite hands down even months before Iowa and New Hampshire. At this point in time his only option would appear to be to pull a Joe Lieberman and run as an Independent and then return to his old party after he's won (if this is even possible).

Rudy, wha'happened?

When the Law collides with Reality

There are laws on the books in many states, or proposed legislation, to treat drivers who have gone without sleep the same as drunken drivers. Makes a certain degree of sense but then again most people commute to work in cars, are you supposed to call out sick whenever you've had a sleepless night? Insomniacs hold down jobs just like the rest of us, maybe you can get away with calling out once or twice but what do the chronics do? will your typical boss understand that you may have a medical condition and you are trying to obey the Law? will the problems of Life never cease?

stranded in civilization.

What Mike Huckabee really is ~~~

~~~is a pro-life Democrat in the Bob Casey mold.

If SEX rules your life...

...Rush said something about this once, if you're the kind of person who lets sex rule your life then you'll destroy yourself in the end (something like this anyway, I don't remember his exact words but he put it rather dramatically). So this guy at work, he gets called to a union meeting because a young woman accused him of sex-chal harassment. Now this guy's a real playa or fancies himself to be but I also know this guy's style, he chats up any eye candy in sight but I think he stops short of the complete grossout, this woman has a history of making these type claims (good luck finding a boyfriend honey) but there's a lesson here -

when you're a playa you'll get by with most women but you're heading into some rough waters in this post-Anita Hill, post Anucha Brown Sanders age, the perils of a man whose mind is always on SEX, you think about it, you dream about it, you pursue it constantly, you want more notches on your belt. It's like Phil Donahue ALWAYS talked about IT on his show and you know something, his face started to resemble the male organ itself towards the end and have you seen Clinton's nose lately? Am I making sense here?

I was thinking...

...you'd think by now abortion would peter out and become more or less a thing of the Past, we have about a 100 methods of birth control now and even if you're for abortion there's always the annoyance and inconvenience of having to make an appointment and going through with it (myself? I hate having to get haircuts and oil changes, can you take my car in for me please?) and geez, you could've really used that $300 for something else not to mention the off-chance that your God just might be against it in the End.

Some people thrive on chaos.

The wisdom of celebrities

From today's Page Six Magazine, actress Eva Amurri (whom I never heard of btw) gives us this pearl of wisdom:

On her parents Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins:

"Both of my parents have been arrested. Not many people can say that."