Here lies Common Sense
Today we mourn the passing of a beloved old friend, Common Sense, who had been with us for many years. No one knows for sure how old he was, since his birth records were long ago lost in bureaucratic red tape.

He will be remembered as having cultivated such valuable lessons as knowing when to come in out of the rain, why the early bird gets the worm, life isn't fair, and maybe it was my fault.

Common Sense lived by simple, sound financial policies (don't spend more than you earn) and reliable parenting strategies (adults, not children, in charge.)

His health began to deteriorate rapidly when well-intentioned, but overbearing regulations were set in place. Reports of a 6-year-old boy charged with sexual harassment for kissing a classmate, teens suspended from school for using mouthwash after lunch, and a teacher fired for reprimanding an unruly student only worsened his condition.

Common Sense lost ground when parents attacked teachers for doing the job they themselves failed to do in disciplining their unruly children. It declined even further when schools were required to get parental consent to administer Panadol, sun lotion or a Band-Aid to a student - but could not inform the parents when a student became pregnant and wanted to have an abortion.

Common Sense lost the will to live as the Ten Commandments became contraband, churches became businesses and criminals got better treatment than their victims. Good is evil; evil is good. Common Sense took a beating when you couldn't defend yourself from a burglar in your own home, and the burglar could sue you for assault.

Common Sense finally gave up the will to live after a woman failed to realize that a steaming cup of coffee was hot. She spilled a little in her lap, and promptly was awarded a huge settlement.

Common Sense was preceded in death by his parents, Truth and Trust; his wife, Discretion; his daughter, Responsibility; and his son, Reason. He is survived by three stepbrothers; I know My Rights, Someone Else is to Blame, and I'm a Victim. Not many attended his funeral, because so few realized he was gone.

If you still remember him, pass it on. If not, join the majority and do nothing.

~ Rev. ARCHIE WILSON, Alta Loma ~

It is unnecessary for so many homes to be lost in So. Cal. fires!

While I have a small bit of empathy for those who have lost their homes in the So. Cal. fires, I also have even more disdain for them.

Let me fill the rest of the country in on what these homeowners have done. The canyons and hillsides of So. Cal. are nothing more than chaparral - dry chaparral ripe for Santa Ana conditions (low humidity, high temperatures and fierce winds). Yet people want to buy/build in these areas - mostly for the view, but also for the prestige of living in these so called rich enclaves. They do so knowing that every summer we have no rain and what turned to a lovely shade of green during our rainy season (which is very short-lived here) will dry out and become fodder for fires.

Then the fires come and burn them out. They shed their tears and then hold out their hands to FEMA for assistance - to rebuild their home right back in the same place. They may be lucky for several years, but eventually, the fires will ravage the area again and the cycle starts all over again. Then the rainy season comes and there is the danger of landslides in their area.

I live in the flatlands of So. Cal. I choose to do so because I am in no danger of losing my house to fires during the Santa Ana conditions (unless my crazy neighbor sets fire to their house accidently). I am also not in any danger of flooding or landslides. I do not feel that any view/prestige is worth the loss of my personal property.

As a lower middle-income family, I will be subsidizing the monies FEMA hands out to these high income families to rebuild their mini-mansions. Is this right for me to help them rebuild when I use common sense and they will never have to subsidize me? I do not think so.

From what I am hearing on the news, it sounds like insurance companies are wising up and are going to be refusing to take on homeowners who continue to build/live/rebuild in these areas. Good. Maybe this is what it will take for these homeowners to finally use some common sense in selecting where they will live.

If you could see the huge homes that are built in our mountain resorts, these homes are second homes for the rich in the LA area. When you hear of the loss of homes in the mountain areas, the majority of these homes are people who live there 365 days a year. For them, I have sympathy, but not for the homes that were lost that are 2nd homes. These people still have the main residence to live in.

EVERYONE needs to use their good judgement in deciding where to buy/build. And cities should cease allowing developers to build in these fire prone areas. Sometimes they need to consider what is best versus the almight $$$.

Republicans stand for Family Values (cough, cough, cough)

And yet another post from theconservativepost.com on July 12, 2007:

You can’t make this stuff up! John McCain’s Florida Campaign Co-chair, a Florida Republican State Representative, has just been arrested for offering to perform oral sex on an under cover male police officer for $20. Man, there are just a whole bunch of freaks out there…

Funny how nothing is said about it being yet ANOTHER Republican person who espouses family values getting caught in a sex scandal!

Republicans were so quick to jump on Bill Clinton for his indiscretion (his mistake - lying about it), but purposely stay away from any controversy when it comes to indiscretions within their own party.

Bush Family Table Talk

Sherman Yellen
Posted September 22, 2007

"America's Grandma," Barbara Bush, is at it again. No, she is no longer advising us that half-drowned African American's who survived Katrina should be comfortable in their distress because they are accustomed to living in squalor, today she is offering up advice on how to raise our children - based I suppose upon her great success in raising hers. She is a public advocate for gathering one's family around the dinner table for conversation, assuring us in her new TV ad that this very act of togetherness will prevent our children from becoming alcoholics and drug abusers. This, from the mother of George and Neil and Jeb??? The first being a former drug abuser and alcoholic, the second a principal figure in an S&L banking scandal that cost the country billions, and the third complicit in the stealing of elections for his brother, which nearly cost the country the country. Can there be no end to Republican Chutzpah?

Early last week we were told by the very people who abused decorated Vietnam hero Max Cleland and John Kerry that the MoveOn ad about the packaged testimony of General Petraeus was an assault upon our military, and now we are to take the advice of the mother of one of America's most dysfunctional families. Momma Bush I fear has more in common with Ma Barker, the notorious mother of a criminal gang of the 1930's than she does with Whistler's mother, or your mother, or mine, assuming that our mother's did not raise a criminal cabal.

Can you imagine that table talk in the family manse in Maine? "Georgie, little Herbie down the street stuck out his tongue at Daddy, and I think he stole our newspaper from the front lawn last week, so I want you to go over to his house and set it on fire. After you've finished with your shock and awe assignment I want you to occupy his property indefinitely. We can't be safe in our lovely American home until you do it - after all, he might do more than make faces at Daddy in the future. He may come over here and pee on the rose bushes."

There had to be a lot of fine talk at that particular dinner table. It never ceases to amaze me that Barbara and Laura, those public advocates for education and reading always confuse literacy with Republican morality, which includes fear mongering, accusations of treason, innuendo about the opponent's patriotism, and creatively vicious name calling. "Now how do you spell traitor, Georgie? A hint. There are two t's in it, not in the middle but at the beginning and at the end"

I would rather take advice from an illiterate mother in the Brazilian rain forest who struggles to keep her family alive than from such women. Mother's of America unite. You don't need your kids sitting daily at the dinner table for them to grow into good men and women. Indeed most mothers are working mothers and they are more concerned about feeding their kids than seating them at family discussions - a lovely thing, and a luxury more easily afforded by two parent households, but alas, almost gone with the fifties. Forced to sit at the dinner table they will only be playing with some computer game on their laps as you lecture them.

Decent kids grow up by example, your example of decency and generosity, not by hectoring or lecturing. And they grow up to be good citizens if given the chance of good public health care and good public schools, something you don't talk about much in your world. Why, why, that would be "socialized opportunity!" I can only imagine the example set by Ma Bush on those long ago Maine summers, as they sat around that dinner table. All that talk about "us" and "them." And all of us "thems" - which means most of America - have grievously suffered from it.

Unfrigginbelievable!!!

12-year-old gives birth in bathroom
A 12-year-old girl gave birth to a girl in her bathroom Wednesday before a neighbor and the baby's 16-year-old father brought the child to a Medical Center.

Police were called to the hospital about 5:30 p.m. Wednesday about the baby, according to a police news release.

Police said they were investigating the circumstances of the baby being delivered in the bathroom. Police are not releasing the names of the young parents or the address of the residence.

Police said paramedics treated the young mother at the house before she was taken to the hospital where she was later released and described as being in good condition.

"Right now both the baby and the 12-year-old fall under the umbrella of CPS (Child Protective Services)," police said.

The parents have been in a relationship for more than a year.

After the baby was treated Wednesday at the hospital, it was transferred to a hospital where on Thursday the child was listed in fair condition.

Police said they informed the young girl's parents about the baby and the circumstances surrounding the delivery.

Where the hell have her parents been? Why were they allowing this child to have a boyfriend at 11? Why was this girl not being treated as a child and as such, being allow so much freedom that this could have happened? Was she attending school? If so, her teachers did not see anything out of the ordinary (geez, a 12 year old pregnant, well it has so show somehow, don't you think?)? If she was not in school, then the parents should be charged.

Nothing was said about whether the "father" (and I say that very lightly!!) was arrested.

This is just too gall darn ridiculous that people have children but never take on the responsibility of a parent.

That baby should be taken away permanently and put up for adoption. The "mother" is too young to take care of it and her parents - well they could not take care of their 11 year old daughter, what makes anyone think they would do a better job with the baby?

And while the police are at it, I think the parents should be charged with child negligence!!!

This sends a really strong message to parents!!

And if it doesn't then they have no business having children!!!

Just another stab at the already downtrodden elderly

In the Washington Post letters to the editors today:

A House bill would fund expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) by stripping funds from the Medicare Advantage program, on the theory that health plans providing comprehensive protection for seniors are overpaid.

I would like to know why no mention of who is behind this bill? I think people have the right to know who their representative is that is so willing to hurt the senior citizens in lieu of the children.

While it is not fair that either take a beating, I know the children are our future, but it is the seniors of this nation that have had a hand in the state (or disarray) of this nation today.

I know of no other nation that so easily disregards their elderly. Most nations respect them.

The "unreasonable" reasoning!

Ken Burns's upcoming PBS documentary "The War," which has weathered complaints from Latinos about their World War II contributions being represented, is now prompting responses from another group: managers of public TV stations.

The stations are concerned that four words of profanity in the 14 1/2 -hour documentary could subject them to hefty indecency fines from the Federal Communications Commission. Their worries have prompted Arlington-based PBS to take the unprecedented step of distributing two versions of "The War" for broadcast next month: Burns's original film and an FCC-friendly version from which the profanity has been removed.

Ken Burns agreed with PBS's decision to distribute two versions of "The War." Several stations, including WETA in Arlington and Maryland Public Television, say they will air both versions. WETA and MPT will carry the unedited "War" when the documentary begins its multi-night run during prime-time hours Sept. 23, and will switch to the "bleeped" version when they rebroadcast it during daytime hours the following weekend.

WHUT, operated by Howard University, will carried the scrubbed version only, a spokeswoman said.

WETA's decision is particularly notable given that the station is a co-producer of Burns's work. WETA and MPT offer the same rationale: Because children are more likely to be watching the film over the weekend, broadcasting "The War" with its profanities removed will respect community sensibilities and avert potential problems with the FCC.

Now, I have one question. What parent is going to allow their children to watch this and ONLY be concerned about the obscene words? They would have no problem allowing their children to see the obscenities of war? So, it is okay for their children to see people being killed brutally, but they have a problem with some bad words, which I am sure they have heard before, perhaps not on a regular basis?

Go figure the reasoning of some people!

Ted Haggard needs to get a real job!!

Have some extra cash? Feel like going to heaven? Then you might consider sending Ted Haggard (remember him - he who sinned with another man, but in a few short weeks was cured of his homosexual tendencies?) and his family some monthly checks for the next two years while they move into a halfway house and get psychology and counseling degrees from the University of Phoenix.

Haggard indicates that he and his wife Gayle, along with their two underage younger sons, are planning to move into a one-bedroom apartment in a Phoenix halfway house to minister to the residents. They are both, he wrote, enrolled at the University of Phoenix.

In what is clearly a fundraising letter, Haggard indicated, "we need to raise our own support." However, he doesn't mention that when he left the church, New Life Church leaders agreed to pay his salary through 2007 - estimated at about $138,000 annually.

He also does not mention that he still owns a 5-bedroom, 3-bath home in Colorado Springs. Sitting on 5.1 acres, its current market value is listed at $715,051.

The organization that Haggard is asking people to send money to is Families With a Mission.

An independent confirmation with the Colorado Secretary of State's office shows that the organization's corporate offices were moved from Kailua-Kona, Hawaii to the Town of Monument, north of Colorado Springs, in July, 2003.

Its Colorado Springs mailing address is the same one to which Haggard is asking people to send donations. However, Secretary of State records show that Families With a Mission was administratively dissolved earlier this year, on Feb. 23 (something Haggard fails to mention!).

And the man who is listed as the president of Families With a Mission, Paul Gerard Huberty, appears to be the same Paul Huberty who was convicted in 1996 of having sex with a 17-year old girl while he was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Air Force stationed in Germany, and who later registered as a sex offender in Hawaii. The organization Family Watchdog, which tracks sex offenders, currently lists Huberty at the same Monument address that was the principal address of Families With a Mission.

Gee, I wonder if there is anything else he has left out!!

I think before he ask people to support his ways, he sells his house and use the money from that to get his college education. Do it like everyone else does.

But, being a "minister" they only know the art of sucking money out of everybody else!!

People like him give the ministry a bad name (along with all the pedophile priests).

US won't tell Britons why they're banned from travelling to America

British holidaymakers and businessmen banned from travelling to America under anti-terror laws will no longer have any right to know why they have been turned away.

The US Department of Homeland Security, set up following the September 11 attacks, last week applied for a blanket ban on disclosing the information it holds on Britons and other EU citizens.

Last month, Britain agreed to send the secretive US department all details of UK passengers before they fly to America.

The agency was given full access to huge amounts of information on individual passengers, including details of their credit cards, home addresses, e-mail addresses, frequent-flier records and even requests for special meals.

And, despite a huge privacy row in the European Parliament, it was also given permission to keep the airlines' lists of passengers' names for at least eight years.

The Department of Homeland Security last week said it intended to make this information available for 'routine use' by the intelligence community 'to protect the United States from terrorist threats' and to tackle cases of identity theft.

But it said it was also applying for a complete ban on disclosing the information it holds on individuals and then uses to turn passengers away.

Last week, it published a "notice of proposed rulemaking" for an exception from the US Privacy Act, which allows individuals to check records the American government holds on them.

The law is supposed to allow anyone to check files for mistakes but the new exception rule is being brought in on the grounds of national security and law enforcement.

If I were a Brit wanting or having to travel to the US, I would be plenty pissed that the US Government had all my personal information, especially credit card information. It would serve our country right if anyone in the UK never stepped foot on our soil again.

Does anyone else see the dangers of President Bush's new "laws" that he can glean information for anyone, at anytime, and in whatever means they deem possible? It ain't gonna get any better, folks!

Archives of Political Cartoons

For anyone who knows who Ann Richards was, you will understand this cartoon. If you never heard of her, you missed out on alot. This was a Texan through and through. She had served as a governor of Texas. She spoke her mind and you always knew what she was thinking. She was not one to mince words, colorful as they were. No matter what side of the political line you took, she was a person who was respected by all.

Enlightenment of who our true heroes are!!

A case for gun control

PETALUMA, CALIF. -- The buzzards led Nick Bursio to his prized calf. He found the body just over a rise in the field, with a bullet hole in its left shoulder, near the heart.

Bursio had heard of animals killed by rustlers for their meat. But not until that May morning had he ever imagined anything so senseless as shooting cattle presumably just to watch them die.

"I had a hollow feeling in my gut, to see that dead calf laying there, with the mother cow bellowing nearby," said the Sonoma County rancher. "I thought, what the hell's going on in this place?"

Authorities are searching for a drive-by shooter who guns down cows as they calmly munch grass in the rolling pastureland 50 miles north of San Francisco. Since February, five cows have been found dead in two counties, shot with small-caliber bullets designed to inflict prolonged pain and suffering.

Nationwide, an increasing number of animal cruelty cases are being reported outside city limits: Horses, cows, goats and other farm animals are being killed, authorities say, often by angry, reckless youths, perhaps acting on dares.

Although there are no statistics on such crimes, newspapers detail scores of cases. Two Texas college students were indicted last fall for slashing a horse's neck before stabbing it in the heart with a broken golf club handle. In Pennsylvania in 2005, three joy-riding men killed a pony named Ted E. Bear that belonged to a 4-year-old boy.

Last year, two Tennessee teens shot and killed 24 cows, many of them pregnant. "They just wanted to see what shooting cattle was like," said Hickman County Sheriff Randal Ward.

While many people will read this and rant about "guns don't kill, people kill", without the gun, this would not have happened.

I wonder what the parents of those teens in Tennessee think. Do they find what their kids did as amusing? Or are they outraged at their children? Odds are, as gun owners themselves, deep down inside they are feeling might proud of their kids for being such ace shots. Probaly not at all disgusted at their behavior. But will have to put on a face of outrage for the public to view.

Taking the blame and not taking responsibility!

EDWARDS HEDGE FUND $OAKS 'CANE VICTIMS
By ANDY SOLTIS
August 18, 2007 -- Embarrassed presidential hopeful John Edwards promised yesterday to take millions of dollars of his own fortune out of a hedge fund tied to subprime lenders who foreclosed on victims of Hurricane Katrina.

The populist candidate - who has denounced such lenders - invested $16 million of his $30 million in assets in Fortress Investment Group. The Wall Street Journal reported that 34 New Orleans homeowners struggling to overcome Katrina's aftermath faced foreclosure suits from subprime-lending units of Fortress.

Yesterday, the red-faced Democratic candidate vowed to remove from his portfolio any Fortress funds that have a stake in those lender units.

"I will not have my family's money involved in these firms that are foreclosing on people in New Orleans," he said while on the campaign trial in Des Moines, Iowa.

When Fortress' connections to subprime lenders were reported in May, Edwards said he was unaware of it and would ask the company to help Katrina victims faced with losing their homes.

Any person who invest their monies has the responsibility to research any company they are thinking about investing in. Finding out after the fact that the company does some dirty dealing does not absolve anyone of their part in it.

While it is admirable that Edwards will be removing the funds from his portfolio, the damage done to unsuspecting people has been done and he has a part in this.

Funny how only AFTER someone digs and finds out this information that the guilty party claims to just now know about it. Bull - perhaps he was not aware of it, but that is his own fault for not doing his research.

This is just toooo sickening!

I cannot for the life of me figure out why any Mother would want her very young child to emulate Paris Hilton. Can you imagine what this young child will grow up to be like? Truly pathetic.

I couldn't even bring myself to categorize this under entertainment!

Do you know who this would be referring to????

He slept with his mother and then had her killed. He poisoned his friends and kicked his pregnant wife to death.

For the answer see bottom of the page

She's right, but . . .

"What are we doing to this younger generation? We're so focused on the wrong things. We're teaching young girls that this is what they should be focusing on: rich and famous girls who are rich and famous for nothing."

"I just think the media should take this country in a different direction."
~ Ellen Pompeo ~

While I agree with what she says, considering the character she plays in "Grey's Anatomy", it comes out sounding so hypocritical.

Open mouth - Insert foot - part 2

According to an editorial published Wednesday in the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, Rep. Randy Kuhl (R-N.Y.) - a man alleged to have once pulled two shotguns on his then wife at a 1994 dinner party - "has thought of arming himself, given the perception -- not accurate, he said -- that he is an inflexible supporter of President Bush's approach to the Iraq war."

The editorial board's blog quoted Kuhl as saying he has "thought about packing" in light of the perceived security threat to himself and his offices.

A spokeswoman for Kuhl confirmed that Iraq war protestors targeted the congressman's offices in Bath and Fairport, New York, on Monday of this week but that Kuhl wasn't working at either office that day.

And while she acknowledged that the protests have made her boss rethink security, she disputed that Kuhl is seriously considering arming himself. "That comment was taken way out of context," the spokeswoman, Meghan Tisinger, told the Sleuth.

She said when Congressman Kuhl told the Democrat and Chronicle editorial board that he had "thought about packing" - he was just joking. (Get a sense of humor, people!) "It was one of those sarcastic, offhanded comments," she said.

Plus, Tisinger explained, Kuhl was joking about arming himself in the context of increased security on Capitol Hill in light of the approaching anniversary of 9/11.

Will people never learn? Think, think, think before opening your mouth

Open mouth - Insert foot

"We finally cleaned up public housing in New Orleans. We couldn't do it, but God did."

-A Louisiana State legislator quoted in the Wall Street Journal in Hurricane Katrina's immediate aftermath.

Whoever that legislator is has no business being in office with an attitude/opinion like that!

In every city, be it large or small, there will always be the poor families in need of housing.

This statement just screams "good, now New Orleans can start anew with the higher middle income and wealthy families".

But, no city can exist without the lower income families to do the menial jobs such as busboy at restaurants and working at fast food restaurants. And the lower middle income families provide services such as trash pickup, street sweeping, delivery mail, and more.

Think about what you say before you open your mouth, people! Cause what you say could well come back to bite you in your rear end!

U.S. Weighs Anti-Drug Trafficking Aid For Mexico

Aug 8, 2007 1:24 pm US/Pacific
(AP) WASHINGTON President Bush will propose tens of millions of dollars in assistance to Mexico to fight drug trafficking and violence that has ravaged the country and threatens to spill over into the U.S., a Texas congressman said Wednesday.

Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, said Congress will come up with the final sum to assist Mexico.

Officials said they began to talk with Mexico's President Felipe Calderon about new and substantial counter-narcotics aid shortly after he took office in December.

U.S. anti-drug officials have been impressed with Calderon's crackdown on drug traffickers since he took office. From December through June, Calderon sent more than 24,000 troops to areas plagued by drug violence.

Calderon has repeatedly pushed the U.S. to take more responsibility in fighting the two countries' common drug problem, including doing more to stop the flow of illegal U.S. arms into Mexico and trying to combat the demand for drugs north of the border.

Calderon has said he will work with the U.S. in any way possible to bring down Mexican drug lords.

Ok - so Mexico wants our help to stem the drug traffiking. How about the US make him a counter offer. We help you with stem the drug traffiking, you get your people who are in the US illegally back into your own country and help them in a way that makes it profitable for them to remain in Mexico.

Gee, I think that is a super plan. Very simple but effective.

But, do you think Congress could possibly deal with something so simple? Noooooo! Way too easy.