More Discrimination in the News.

I was floored this morning when I read an article in the Seattle Times about the federal government threatening to sue Southern Illinois university for discrimination against, get this, white males. I cannot say this is the first of its kind, but wow. It was a shock to see. I just love the last two sentences of the articles' excerpt.

From The Seattle Times
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002619730_sue12.html

CHICAGO — The U.S. Justice Department has threatened to sue Southern Illinois University next week unless the college opens up three paid fellowship programs once reserved for minority and female students.

The government says it will file the lawsuit because the fellowships discriminate against "whites, nonpreferred minorities and males," according to a letter dated Nov. 4.

Federal officials say the graduate programs, which include stipends, violate Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which bars employment discrimination.

In its reply, the university has asked for more time to "consider appropriate modifications" and to provide the Justice Department with information about the programs, a spokeswoman for the university in Carbondale said.

How about a modification such as DROPPING RACE AND SEX?

"We have no reason to believe that these programs are discriminatory," said spokeswoman Sue Davis.

Silly federal government... it is not discrimination when you do it against a white male.

Competition is crazy

Anyone else in Pullman notice that ever since the Safeway gas pumps have opened up gas prices in Pullman have been going down. The latest price at the Tesoro on Grand by Coungar Country had it at 2.49 9/10 per gallon at about two o'clock pm today.

Up until this time every pump in Pullman had only a difference of about two cents per gallon. Now the gas stations are being forced to compete with Safeway and I, as a consumer, am seeing the benefits of it.

For now I am going to continue to go to Safeway, as for years, I have felt that all the gas stations in Pullman kept their prices higher than they could have.

Protected Free Speech?

Howcome the courts allow people to burn a flag but not a cross?

Washington's Possible Smoking Ban... Bad.

An issue of ownership rights is being taken to the voting booth this year. It looks like there will be an initative to ban smoking in all public places, including bars is going to the ballot.

I am not a smoker and it is fun not to smell like smoke, but at the same time I believe that as a business owner I should be able to say if smoking should be allowed in my place of business. Smoking is a legal activity. While it is such, it should not be illegal to do it if I want.

If a place of business chooses to make it non-smoking, then the owner had his choice and did it as such. If there were enough people who refused to go to places that allowed smoking, the owner would change his mind. But, to take yet another right away from business owners is just not right.

I hope that people, both smokers, and non-smokers will see this issue not as a smoking issue, but as an issue of ownership rights.

Who would you save?

I found the following on someone's blog:

An old woman (very nice grandma type) and a small child are being dangled over a cliff and you are the only person that can save them. The dilemma? You can only save one and know that. Which one do you save and why? Keep in mind that they are both looking up at you with extreme pleading in their eyes.

My answer: As INCREDIBLY DIFFICULT as it would be, I think that I would choose the small child, only because he or she would have their whole life ahead of them and the older woman would have had more of a chance to live. To be honest, if ever presented with that situation I'm not entirely sure how I'd react and would obviously try to save both, but would then probably end up losing both. I hope I'm never in a situation like that.

What are your thoughts?

Here are my thoughts:

It is like that in the gay community... over 30 - over the hill...

It is not my rationalization to choose to save one based on age and possible life experiences. How about if I told you the lady was in the middle of a cure for cancer and the child is Hitler? You cannot base everything based on age alone.

I would save the one who I could get to first. I would save the one it would be the safest for me to save; In otherwords I would watch out for number one. If I fall over the cliff with the one I save, I really have done no good to anyone, therefore it would come down to a triage:

Who can I safely get to?
Which one can I get to at all?

How would you answer this if, instead it was two men of the same age and upbringing. However one is severely retarded and one has average brain power? Would you save the normal guy, because no one would want to live as a retard? That is the same as saying the old person has already lived a good life. You're making a decision on someone elses life bases on flawed criteria.

What if the old lady was yet to become a grandma, and her daughter was going to give birth the next day to a grandchild the elderly woman so dearly wanted?

Bottom line age is not a good determining factor. It is shallow and opens a can of worms that will lead to elderly extermination by the child you saved!

Garfield High and Military Recruiters

Irony - Garfield High School students' parents use first amendment rights, that were fought for and paid for by the death of men in the military, to try to keep the military recruiters from talking to the students in the school.

Why do people play the race card?

Can you tell me why people pull the race card over things that make them look like a dumb crap...

Here is the story. A man has a gun, knife, and pitbull and crashes a baby shower in Bellevue, WA. Police arrive. He points the gun at them. They shoot him.

One of his friends claims that Bellevue police targeted him, because he was mixed race. WTF!?!?! When you point a gun at a cop you're gonna die, it has nothing to do with race.

STOP PLAYING THE RACE CARD!

Sorry, I normally do not get emotional like that, but my goodness... The man pointed a gun at the citizens at the party and the police. It was not because he was a threat to life, rather it was because he was a minority that the police shot him? Put down the crackpipe. Back away from the kids and get your tubes tied, because you don't need to be reproducing.

Here is the news article so you can read about it for yourself...
from the KingCountyJournal.com

2005-06-28
by Chris Winters
Journal Reporter

BELLEVUE -- Police shot and killed a 19-year-old Bellevue man Sunday night after he crashed a baby shower with a pit bull and started threatening people with a handgun and a knife.

The man was identified Monday night as Reginald Coleman II. An autopsy determined he died of multiple gunshot wounds, said an investigator for the King County Medical Examiner's Office.

.... read the rest http://www.kingcountyjournal.com/sited/story/html/210790

The Death of Property Ownership

The supreme court made a ruling that I find to be curious. Private property can be taken by another private individual/corporation if the use would generate more tax revenue. The idea of eminent domain has been around since the Constitution was written. In the Bill of Rights, the fifth amendment says no person shall be "deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation. "

So the thing is that the property can be taken for "public" use, but nothing is said about private use. A corporation would be a private use. Even if it is a shopping mall, it is private property. If it were used for a road, a park, or a government building, then that would be public. So I do not see how they could make such a ruling.

That brings into question the right to own property. I guess we should shy away from calling it ownership and change it to "stewardship". You can be the steward of the land you have your house on, but it can be taken away from you. If I owned it, I would have the ability to not sell if I did not want to, unless of course the fifth amendment would kick in. Well, that is the way it was. Today, I am afraid that some of the older neighborhoods where small houses on large pieces of property will soon go under the plow blade to put up larger houses on a postage-stamps sized piece of property.

I hope that congress will do something about this abuse of the eminent domain clause in the Bill of Rights.

Rossi is done

He just announced he will not seek to take the case any further. Because of this, I believe those who support him will remain supporting him. I think that he will remain in many peoples' positive attitude.

I wonder if he will go for the senate or if he will wait around until 2008 for then next shot at governor.

The verdict is in

The judge has found that Rossi and the Republicans could not prove the illegal votes changed the election. So therefore the illegal votes were legitimized by the ruling, and now the answer to the question of what to do about legal votes is to make them legal and countable as long as they get by the screening, but to subtract the number of the final total votes.

So when you look at the total votes for governor, it will be lower then when you add the number of votes of each of the candidates.

Non-Minority Only Scholarship.

A few years ago I found this exact text on the KOMO TV website. The only thing I changed was Minority to Non-Minority and I changed Non-White to White. You can see that people would be outraged with the way I changed it. This scholarship was changed from something any Liberal would be proud of to something that is a hatefilled piece of racism.

Up to $10,000 in Scholarships Awarded for Non-Minority Students
in Broadcast, Marketing and Journalism

Since 1987 Fisher Broadcasting has sought to attract
non-minority students into careers in broadcasting with
annual scholarships. In 1990, because of the high
caliber and success of the students we have assisted,
the stations formally established a Scholarship Fund,
an endowed trust which will ensure perpetual
scholarship awards. Fisher's interest in non-minority
broadcasting students goes back many years and has
included training programs in technical areas and
on-air. As a result of this nurturing environment,
non-minority employees have made numerous contributions
to the standards of excellence which have come to
personify Fisher Broadcasting and strengthen the
diversity of our workplace.

ELIGIBILITY

• YOU MUST BE OF WHITE ORIGIN
  
• YOU MUST BE A CITIZEN OF THE UNITED STATES
  
• YOU MUST HAVE A MINIMUM 3.00 cumulative GPA in Broadcast,
  Marketing or Journalism curriculum courses.
  
• YOU MUST BE A SOPHOMORE ENROLLED IN:
  
  
  
  • A broadcast, marketing or journalism curriculum leading to a baccalaureate degree at an accredited four-year college or university.
    
  • A broadcast curriculum at an accredited community college, transferable to such a four-year baccalaureate degree program.
    
  • A broadcast curriculum at an accredited vocation-technical school.
    
  • If you are a permanent resident of Washington State, tuition may be applied to an out-of-state school. If you are an out-of-state resident, tuition must be applied to a Washington State School.
    
  
  

ELECTION CRITERIA

Successful applicants will be chosen on the basis of:

1. NEED
   
2. ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT
   
3. PERSONAL QUALITIES
   

Please submit the following with your application packet:

1. Copy of your college transcript
   
2. Two letters of recommendation from non-family members
   
3. Written essay explaining your financial need (list scholarships, grants and loans received and applied for), your educational and career goals, involvement in school activities, and any experience or interest you have in broadcast communications which you feel qualifies you for this scholarship.
   

AMOUNT OF SCHOLARSHIP

Scholarship funds will aid each grantee in funding tuition and whatever
other educational expenses are deemed appropriate by the trustees of the
Fisher Broadcasting White Scholarship.

APPLICATION PROCEDURE

Qualified applicants should access and print the form
below. Complete and return with your essay, transcripts
and letters of recommendation to:

NON-MINORITY SCHOLARSHIP

FISHER BROADCASTING INC.

100 FOURTH AVE. N.

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON 98109


APPLICATION DEADLINE IS APRIL 30!

Scholarship recipients may reapply for additional
years, provided you are enrolled full-time and
your financial need and academic achievement
continue to meet application guidelines.

FISHER BROADCASTING INC.

NON-MINORITY SCHOLARSHIP APPLICATION

Please print this form using your web browser's print function,
complete and return to the address above.



Origional Link is Minority Scholarship

32 years ago today...

The Americans
By: Gordon Sinclair
Aired: June 5, 1973
CFRB, Toronto, Ontario Canada
Text From: http://www.cfrb.com/content/cfrb_information/archives/archives_americans_2.asp

The United States dollar took another pounding on German, French and British exchanges this morning, hitting the lowest point ever known in West Germany. It has declined there by 41% since 1971 and this Canadian thinks it is time to speak up for the Americans as the most generous and possibly the least-appreciated people in all the earth.

As long as sixty years ago, when I first started to read newspapers, I read of floods on the Yellow River and the Yangtze. Who rushed in with men and money to help? The Americans did.

They have helped control floods on the Nile, the Amazon, the Ganges and the Niger. Today, the rich bottom land of the Misssissippi is under water and no foreign land has sent a dollar to help. Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy, were lifted out of the debris of war by the Americans who poured in billions of dollars and forgave other billions in debts. None of those countries is today paying even the interest on its remaining debts to the United States.

When the franc was in danger of collapsing in 1956, it was the Americans who propped it up and their reward was to be insulted and swindled on the streets of Paris. I was there. I saw it.

When distant cities are hit by earthquakes, it is the United States that hurries into help... Managua Nicaragua is one of the most recent examples. So far this spring, 59 American communities have been flattened by tornadoes. Nobody has helped.

The Marshall Plan .. the Truman Policy .. all pumped billions upon billions of dollars into discouraged countries. Now, newspapers in those countries are writing about the decadent war-mongering Americans.

I'd like to see one of those countries that is gloating over the erosion of the United States dollar build its own airplanes.

Come on... let's hear it! Does any other country in the world have a plane to equal the Boeing Jumbo Jet, the Lockheed Tristar or the Douglas 10? If so, why don't they fly them? Why do all international lines except Russia fly American planes? Why does no other land on earth even consider putting a man or women on the moon?

You talk about Japanese technocracy and you get radios. You talk about German technocracy and you get automobiles. You talk about American technocracy and you find men on the moon, not once, but several times ... and safely home again. You talk about scandals and the Americans put theirs right in the store window for everyone to look at. Even the draft dodgers are not pursued and hounded. They are here on our streets, most of them ... unless they are breaking Canadian laws .. are getting American dollars from Ma and Pa at home to spend here.

When the Americans get out of this bind ... as they will... who could blame them if they said 'the hell with the rest of the world'. Let someone else buy the bonds, Let someone else build or repair foreign dams or design foreign buildings that won't shake apart in earthquakes.

When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down through age, it was the Americans who rebuilt them. When the Pennsylvania Railroad and the New York Central went broke, nobody loaned them an old caboose. Both are still broke. I can name to you 5,000 times when the Americans raced to the help of other people in trouble.

Can you name me even one time when someone else raced to the Americans in trouble? I don't think there was outside help even during the San Francisco earthquake.

Our neighbours have faced it alone and I am one Canadian who is damned tired of hearing them kicked around. They will come out of this thing with their flag high. And when they do, they are entitled to thumb their nose at the lands that are gloating over their present troubles.

I hope Canada is not one of these. But there are many smug, self-righteous Canadians. And finally, the American Red Cross was told at its 48th Annual meeting in New Orleans this morning that it was broke.

This year's disasters .. with the year less than half-over has taken it all and nobody...but nobody... has helped.

War and Terrorism... Who is at fault

Actually, if you trace it back far enough, I am sure we can find a way to blame this on Hitler....

I mean, if he won world domination, then the terrorists would not have struck against us, because we would all be one people. And without that attack against us, we would not have gone to war, therefore those people would not be dead. So blame Hitler.

But now, lets go more. If it wasn't for thousands of Americans and other countrymen from far off lands, then we would not have beaten Hitler. So, we should blame those from the WWII generation for fighting against Hitler, if he had won, would have made it so those attacks against American's and later the Iraqi citizens would have never happened.

But wait, shouldn't we really blame the Chinese for discovering gun powder? They are the ones who enabled all these human bombs and guns and other deadly actions to happen. That allowed Hitler to take over the world only to be thwarted by the Americans and other countrymen from far off lands. And as we know, with Hitler stopped that paved the way for the terrorist to attack America and for us to have to go to their land and fight them all. And because we are fighting them all, people are dying, but we should also remember if it wasn't for us giving the Iraqis that silly idea of freedom and democracy, then the insurgents would not need to strap bombs to their kids and send them into kill other people.

So yeah, Andy, that website is correct, it is all the fault of Bush.

MoveOn PAC

This is a joke. These two places are online petitions to get rid of DeLay and to stop the Nuclear Option in the Senate. But what is funny is they want 500,000 signatures in both. But if you go to the site and click Reload a bunch of times, you will see the number of current signatures go up and go DOWN!!!! So it looks like it is raising for a while then it will drop. The one for DeLay moves slowly and only goes up or down one or two at a time. The one for the Nuclear option goes up and down by hundreds. Sounds to me that they are doing something fishy.

http://www.moveonpac.org/delay/
http://www.moveonpac.org/nuclear/

Donkey Basketball stopped at Skyline HS

Article text from the Seattle Times online newspaper, the full story can be found at:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/eastsidenews/2002278945_donkey18e.html

Wednesday, May 18, 2005 - Page updated at 12:00 a.m.
Skyline school benches donkey basketball
By Cara Solomon
Seattle Times Eastside bureau

The fund-raiser at Skyline High School in Sammamish would have featured a game of hoops with players seated astride actual donkeys. Proceeds from "donkey basketball," which had been scheduled for yesterday, would have helped pay for the school's student-body activities.

But concerns over animal cruelty have stopped it in its tracks.

According to the district, a Skyline student brought his concerns to the school's Associated Student Body (ASB) last week, and the student council decided Thursday morning to cancel the event.

A few students at the school of more than a thousand complained about this. A few. Let's take that as ten, which I think is more than the real number, but it is nice and round. So, ten people complain that they think this is cruel to the donkeys.

On the radio I listened to a member of PETA and the local host talk about this. The lady from PETA said it was cruel in part because the animal does not know what he is doing out there. He is confused by everything. He is being laughed at by everyone.

I have a few issues with all this. First off when did the country decide that the majority no longer rules? I never got the memo. I never was told that when one person doesn't like something, we will cancel it because we don't want to force things that are offensive on someone who would be offended.

On a tangent now... one must choose to be offended. I need to post about that one of these days and explain myself. But those who are offended choose to be.

I am back... This was not cancelled because of someone being offended, but because of a concern over cruelty to the animals. Why would they schedule this and then cancel? If it was cruel, it would have been cruel before they scheduled it, not after someone brings it up. So a "few" people see this as cruel, therefore it is now deemed as such. Is that how hanging became "cruel"?

Anyway, the point I am trying to make is that we have become a nation of overcompensating rulers trying to protect the minority at the expense of the majority.

Next, there is PETA claiming that the donkeys are confused. When I moved to a new house I could say my dog was confused at first. She did not recognize her surroundings, but soon she learned her new surroundings and life was good.

So, you have these donkeys that are raised to play basketball. How can you say they are confused? That is what they have been doing their whole life. Sure, take a donkey from the Grand Canyon and put it on a basketball court, and it would be confused. There is a concern about the basketball hitting the donkeys. It is not like dodgeball where the basketballs are thrown at the donkeys at a high rate of speed. I am sure the donkey doesn't like it when the ball bounces off of him, but is that really "cruel"?

As for being laughed at, I bet the ones being laughed at are the people riding the donkeys, not the donkeys themselves. She did say that we should not in today's world use animals are workers. Police dogs - cruel. Service dogs - that is a grey issue. Horses pulling stuff - no need for it in a mechanical world. She made it clear that no matter what an animal is used for it is cruel unless the animal is allowed to roam free around the world. However, cutting off their sex organs is okay. I did learn that from her. We can choose to make the animal celibate for life, but that is all the power we have over animals.

The bottom line is that this is not cruel. PETA and those complaining don't know what it means to be cruel to animals. Look at what some kids in Seattle did in 1994. They beat a donkey to death. It was a donkey tied to a tree. There was an article I just read about some teenagers burning chickens alive and others were using lacrosse sticks to bat around some other chickens.

That is cruel. Playing basketball is not.

Washington State Democrats

So we have a situation in Washington where the democrats control the house, senate, and governor's mansion. With their control they keep raising the taxes. I-601 was put in place a few years ago by the voters of Washington. One part made it so the government had to get a super majority to raise the taxes. That is what the citizens wanted. The Democrats passed a bill that by-passed that and now they can raise taxes with a simple majority. The Democrats did not have enough to pass taxes with a super majority, but with this new bill they do.

So, now we have a 9 1/2 cent gas tax. But gas station owners cannot raise the price by 1/2 cent, so in reality it will be a ten cent increase in taxes on our already high gas prices.

They also passed a "sin" tax that will cover tobacco, alcohol, and even canned meats. WHAT??? It is a sin to eat meat from a can?

Rather than finding a way to balance the budget without tax increases, they choose to again raise the taxes. That is the answer for Washington. Raise, raise, raise.

A couple radio show host from 570 KVI are talking about a new website, http://www.nonewgastax.com/home.htm, that is going to attempt to get a citizen initiative to repeal the gas tax. A few years ago there was a proposed 9 cent increase. The people said NO. The government then raised it by 5 cents anyway. Now they want 9 1/2 cents more.

I love living here, but there is so many things that can be done to make this situation Washington with the continued taxation better.

Writer's subject covers his death

While reading through the Urban Legends Website I came across one about a person who wrote about not wearing seatbelts, and then dying in a car accident because he was not wearing a seatbelt.

Derek Kieper, 21

I looked into it a little bit more. His name was Derek Kieper, 21. He was a junior at University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He has a Four-Point-Oh grade point average. He had five majors: Economics, history, sociology, psychology, and political science. He wrote for the school newspaper, the Daily Nebraskan. He was right of center on political issues and sounds like pretty outspoken on campus.

On September Seventeenth of ought-four he published an opinion piece titled "Individual rights buckle under seat belt laws"

In the opinion piece he wrote, in part: (The full text can be found at The Daily Nebraskan)
I'm from the school of thought where everyone should have the right to do as they please as long as they are not infringing on the rights of other people. This comes from the political philosophy that inspired our founders and freedoms.

The duty of government is nothing more than to make sure everyone's rights are protected and not infringed upon. Uncle Sam is not here to regulate every facet of life no matter the consequences.

No law, or set of laws, has made the government more intrusive and ridiculous than seat belt legislation. Nothing is a bigger affront to the ideas of freedom, liberty, yada, yada, yada. Whether you are a pinko liberal or a right-wing whack job, there are plenty of reasons for just saying to hell with seat belt laws.

As laws become increasingly strict for seat belts, fewer people will respond positively by buckling up in response to the laws. There seems to be a die-hard group of non-wearers out there who simply do not wish to buckle up no matter what the government does. I belong to this group.

What frightens me more about safety belt laws is the intrusion they represent to Americans. Democrats should take notice. Choice is an important aspect of freedom - choice to do as I see fit with my body and being.

Yet, the government has decided that I do not have the choice to drive around without my seat belt. And if I want to be the jerk that flirts with death and rides around with my seat belt off, I should be able to do that, too.

He included stuff about the tax money that was being used make this law happen, and stuff about states' rights. I mainly focused on his personal choice issues as written. I know it is good to wear a seat belt and that it will save lives. Many of the deaths due to lack of seatbelts come from bodies hitting the windshield and others come from being partially ejected and then the car lands on top of you. Some others come from being thrown free and sailing head first into a rock or a tree or a telephone poll or another car or something else.

I usually wear a seatbelt. The only time I leave it off is when I go from the store to my house on the backroad where I am the only one driving. But, the point is should the government FORCE people to wear seatbelts. As Aaron, my old neighbor said, "what if that my way of seeking thrills? Some people bungee jump, I don't wear a seatbelt." It is not the job of the government to save people from themselves. That was never a function of government, nor should it be.

So, I agree with Derek that it should be personal freedom to wear or not to wear. I choose to wear. He chooses not to wear.

On January fourth of ought-five Derek was riding in a Ford Explorer with two friends. They were buckled up, he wasn't.

It was about Three o'clock am when the Ford Explorer hit a spot of ice, skidded off Interstate Eighty just outside of Lincoln and rolled several times, throwing Derek out of the car. The other people in the car lived.

Pretty interesting.

Murder victim's 911 call was a prank?

So there is a story about a man names David Steeves. He was nineteen years old. He was in the trunk of his mom's car when he called Nine-One-One in Elgin, Ill. They asked him where he was but he said he did not know he was in the trunk of a car. He at one point said "Oh my God, you gotta please help me. Please help me. Oh my God, Please help me. God." He knew he was on South Street. The police spent about ten minutes and the chalked this up as a prank call.

About six days later he had not been seen until they found him shot to death in the trunk of his mom's car.

Sounds like a horrible and sad ending to such a young life. Then you learn more about it. He was in a drug deal and the dealers decided to throw him in the trunk, rob him, and kill him.

Another case of criminal on criminal crime. Those kind of crimes that makes me just think to myself that maybe if he wasn't doing drugs he would not be dead right now. It is the kind of thing that makes you shrug your shoulders and move on with life.

Now, that the deed has been done, I hope that the murders get the death penalty. That would take care of three criminals. One has been taken care of, and the rope will take care of the other ones.

I seem like I don't care about criminals, huh? Well, you're right. Like Charlie Daniels said "Take a big tall tree and a short piece of rope. Hang 'em up high and let 'em swing 'till the sun goes down."

Music and Memories

When I hear certain songs they take me back to a specific place and location in time. When I hear Cult of Personality by Living Colour I always get taken back to eighty-nine when I was driving down highway five-eighteen. I was heading towards four-oh-five going in to Tukwila. It was going to be the first day of my fire cadet training with the Tukwila Fire Department.

The song Battle of Evermore by Led Zeppelin remind me of driving my truck around the highlands after I got my license. I was cruising with friends and I had some Oreo cookies.

Then there is the song Ziggy Stardust by David Bowie. That takes me to ninety-three when I was living in Stephenson East. I was also doing a radio show. That was one of the song I would play and it just reminds me of my freshman year at college.

The Offspring's song Smash takes me back to May of ninety-seven. I was in my apartment. The first time living on my own like that. I had all sorts of dishes my mom bought and I was washing all of them by hand. It was taking a long time. I did not have cable yet because I had just moved in. I just got Smash, the Album, so I listened to that over and over and over while I was working.

An old one is Kenny Rogers' Coward of the County. I was in day care at Busy Bee. The lady who drove us to Apollo everyday asked to borrow my record. It was a single with that song on it. I handed it to her one day getting into the van. I remember her putting the record in the pocket of her vest. I remember when I got it back there was a scratch on it and I was very sad about that.

It is strange how certain songs can take you to a very specific place in time and how for some reason those events get tied in your mind to that event.

Terri Schiavo is not a vegetable

Why is it that many people are trying to say that to take Terri Schiavo off a feeding tube or not is a private matter and now that the federal government passed a bill there is doubt whether other private matters will remain private?

This case is not like many others that people are trying to say it is like. Dori Monson, a right-wing talk show host from KIRO-Radio in Seattle claims that no one was fighting for his relative in the final months of the disease that took her life. He said it was a private family issue and he is glad the government did not interfere. The difference that Dori is overlooking includes the fact that his relative was in a terminal illness and even with machine would die in short order. Dori is also ignoring the fact that in Schiavo’s case you have a public issue. It has been in the courts for years and there are questions whether justice is being served. In Dori’s relatives’ case there was a choice for no machines. So there was no argument, there were no issues. In Schiavo’s case there was no living will. There is a husband who claims she said she does not want to live that way, but there is also an affidavit from a former co-worker of Schiavo where she made a statement about someone else being taken off of life support and how the person should not have been taken off of it. Leading people to believe that maybe she was not against life support.

Many people are trying to compare apples and oranges in this case. In most cases the family makes a joint decision or there is a living will that states the person's wishes. Schiavo's case is different.

In this case you have her parents who say she is responding and there is hope. You have a husband who claims she wished not to live this way and is only trying to follow her wishes. In my view it is not in writing so it did not happen. I say that because we are talking about a life and death issue and we should err on the side of life if there is nothing in writing. Maybe the day Schiavo told her husband that she did not want to live on machines was an anomaly and she would actually prefer to be given every chance. I think the lower courts have made some presumptions that I would hate for someone to make on my behalf. Also, I could not imagine how hard it would be for the parents who want to give Schiavo every chance to rehabilitate. I think of the situation of Nick Berg. He was decapitated in Iraq. His parents were helpless as someone else made decisions about his life and his parents were only able to sit by and watch him die. Schiavo's parents can see their daughter, hold her, feel her, and are able to do something to stop her from dying, but the court said no, she will die. That would just eat me up inside.

I spent some time at http://www.terrisfight.net and watched some of the videos. This was after listening to a Nobel Prize-nominated doctor in the field of head injuries. He spent more than ten hours with Schiavo and said she can be rehabilitated. That she can swallow and eat. That she could watch movies and interact with people. But she has been held back by her husband who has not allowed those things to happen. The doctor spoke of things she was doing I had no clue she was doing. I have always thought she was a “vegetable” just lying in bed doing nothing at all. That is far from the truth. Now more than ever I think that if she dies it will not be a nice thing for her finally, instead that it will be a tragic situation where a life was cut short. There is no reason she should die right now. She needs to be given to the custody of her parents who will work with her and rehabilitate her.

Would you let your daughter die?

Terri Schiavo has been in a coma for many years due to a medical problem when she was having an operation. He husband has since moved on and want to have her feeding tube removed so she can die. He claims that is what she would have wanted.

He parents on the other hand have not given up hope and want to fight for her to live. They are holding out what hope there is left. They are willing to take over her care and keep fighting for her. But her husband will not give her over.

The lawyer for her husband, Michael, said "It's a constitutional right to say, "I don't want medical treatment" and the state can't force you to have it." I will not argue with that, but show me anywhere in writing where she said that. It is not in writing. You only have one person's word for it. And if my life were on the line I would hope that someone would not believe the word of one person over my life.

So we are to the point where the judge says pull the feeding tube which will starve Terri to death over the next few days to weeks. She will then die. But she has people who want to help her fight. So why not give her the chance? Why is the husband so willing to give up the fight even though other want to fight.

I think the most scary thing is that she is someone's daughter. She is wanted by her parents and they have no rights in this whole thing. Their wishes are being superseded by a man who wants their daughter dead.

That would be such a horrible feeling for the parents. To know that your daughter will die and you have no ability to stop it, yet you could if the legal system would give them the ability.

Foreign Bigots

I saw a bumpersticker on someone's car. It was an American flag. I was thinking how people say that American's are not welcome in many places over seas.

So here is my question to people. Should we not have a war, defend ourselves, do what is right because French, Spaniards, etc will not like us?

What does that say about a Frech person who will not like me because I am an American?

If I got robbed by an Asian guy. And from that point on I started to hate all Asians because one person from that group harmed me, wouldn't most people say that is silly of me? Wouldn't I be called racist?

So, why is it that we do not recognize the French as bigoted rather than worry about them not liking us?

The Third Presidential debate

When I got home I watched the third presidential debate. I think Bush did better. But the thing is people seem to only care about presentation and not what the person says. Kerry talked about using biometric information to track people, raising the minimum wage, using a litmus test for Supreme Court Justices, affirmative action, and he pulled out the race card.

I cannot believe that people don't pick up on stuff like that and question what Kerry is thinking. He also likes to divide American's by demonizing the rich. He wants to soak them because of their success. It is like being punished because you were able to make the American dream work for you.

Yes I would like Bush to win. He has some things I don't like. He wants the assault weapon ban. He also does not want to do what needs to be done with social security. What needs to happen is that every born after say, seventy-five will not get social security. It will be a system that will go away. Sure those who are young will have to pay and see no benefit. However, the future kids will not have to deal with it anymore. Those who are still young have time to plan for retirement and can set aside money for their own retirement. It is not up to the government to set aside money for my retirement. Also, on a side, ask anyone if they think they will get by on social security alone. Of course not!

Nick Berg Decapitated

First off the war is justified and needed to be accomplished. So I will not argue that we need to get out of there.

Berg is not the first innocent person to be captured and tortured by terrorists. It has been happening for years. This is one time where the footage of it is caught. There is also a video I have were another guy is decapitated with a large knife. It was a lot more graphic than this because it was clear footage. You could see his pain on his face, listen to his pain, and at the end when he head was almost all the way off you could hear him still breathing through what was left of his neck. It was loud and sounded horrible. This is sad to see happen to anyone. It does not matter if the person is an American or not.

Who would not be outraged by an innocent bystander killed by a group of people for a "political" reason? It had nothing to do with politics. It had everything to do with those people being wacked.

Here are some questions that I have. Why was he detained and put into jail. I would assume that not everyone who goes through a check-point is detained like he was. What did he do or what did he have that would make him attractive to the check-point guards to detain him.

He account information from the U of Oklahoma was found on the "twentith terrorist" for the September 11th attacks. I am not claiming any direct relationship to him and the terrorists. Remember the whole idea of six degrees of separation. It could be as simple as that, but I am interested to know more about that.

What pissed me off was his dad getting on the TV and broadcast coast to coast saying that it was as much our fault as it was the people who did it. He actually said they the people who did it *may* be as back as Bush and Rumsfeld. Ummm.. What!?!?! The people who cover their faces, kidnap regular citizens, and then decapitate them on video *may* be as bad as Bush and Rumsfled??? Come on! He is using this opportunity to camera time to turn this into a political attack on the American President.

The only thing that I can point to as America being at fault for this would again be the six degrees of separation. We fought a war. We ousted the leader of another county. We allowed civilians to enter said country for the purposes of making money. He entered the county to make money. He was there only because what we did to clean up the area. He was a victim of opportunity. He would not be dead today if we had not ousted Sadam because he would have never been there.

If you are going to make those leaps, then I think we can also say it was capitalism that killed him, because he was there for one reason. To make money. If he was not a capitalist he would have not been there to make money and he would not be dead.

The bottom line is his dead was horrible, but not as bad as other people have been killed by terrorists. Could you imagine being in a large building and having a huge plane crash into it, being killed by burning alive?

Terrorists and people who harbor them are worthless scum. Their tactics of operation are low and unjustified. If they don't like what Bush is doing, or what Clinton did, or what Reagan did, then they should take it out on them and not the people who happen to live in America.

Think about this, that guy was killed, not because of what he stood for, but because in the whole world, where there is soil, he was born in the area that setup imaginary boundaries and called it America. There are invisible lines in the dirt and he was born on the wrong side of the line. That was his real crime in their eyes. They don't make distinctions on what you believe in or who you are, they only killed him because of where he was born.

The terrorists on September eleventh killed American civilians because of where they were born or where they live. It is not like they crashed a plane full of soldiers into an army base. Terrorists are going about the whole thing wrong, they are fighting the wrong people. I would bet that many of the people they killed protested the fact that we fought the first Iraqi war, and they would have protested this second war. They killed people that would have wanted the same thing that those terrorists want.

Think about the mentality of someone who is willing to strap a bomb to himself and detonate it. He knows he will die. He knows he will take the life of women, children, and innocent men who are just at the wrong place at the wrong time. These people have something screwed up in the head. I do not draw a distinction between them and the people like Harris and Klebold who shot up their high school in Colorado. They are terrorists who are killing the wrong people.

But I digress... does it suck that Berg was killed? Yes! Does it suck that terrorists kill hundreds of innocent people every year? Yes!

Could have just as well been talking about gays.

I watched the movie School Ties. Through out the movie I could see that if you replaced Jew with Gay it would pretty much make sense.

The whole thing where they accepted him for him and they liked him, but when they found out that he was a Jew they did not like him. They said he lied about it. That is funny because they never asked if he was a Jew. So, he is supposed to say it up front. That would be like getting mad at a gay guy because he does not tell you he is gay when you meet him; however, at the same time getting mad at gay people who make a big deal about it because they are flaunting it.

No one will ever be happy with the answers you give and the things you say. You really need to be happy with yourself and live your life like you don't give a crap about other people because if you do, you will be unhappy.