Ok, so I thought I’d just drop a few ramblings because I’m home, alone, with Jim — Beam. I’ve skipped through several of the blogs listed on my blog roll on the right. Some of you people drive me insane.
First – Jedi, update your freaking posts. Lord man. I go for a few weeks without posting, but you haven’t posted anyting since February. I love ya, darlin. But, get your head out of your rear.
Bayer explosion – Yep, it was an “f’d” up situation. Damn dangerous and people DIED. But what the hell you gonna do? You want to send all the chemical companies packing? Shut down the industry? I’d like to think that we have some concerned citizens working at these places. But, people get lazy. They take short-cuts and when they get away with them they do it again. I live just a few yards off a major railroad track. If one of the chemical cars leak or derails, I’m f’n dead. Facts are, the railroad and the chemical companies were here before me. The people working at that plant live here. They have families here. If they were REALLY concerned that things were not safe why wasn’t there a whistleblower? You wanna blame management or the “mean old nasty chemical company”, I say blame the men who didn’t expose their “brothers” who were taking shortcuts.
Gretta Van Sustren — what the hell is wrong with her mouth? It gets worse everytime I see her. I don’t usually watch Fox this time of the night, but honest to the gods there isn’t a damn thing on worth watching. Plus, I really haven’t been paying attention.
Shawn Hanity — Ok, even though I am a Conservative, I’m not a fan of Hanity. All he does is name call and argue. His hand gestures are so rehearsed I can almost tell you exactly which ones will happen next. He’s interviewing some guy who is a nephew of Warren Jeff, that poligamist. This guy is coming across so fake to me. I should probably be ashamed, but I’m drinking.
Gay marriage — I believe “marriage” is a religious term. I don’t think it should be co-opted for same-sex contracts. If two people of the same sex want to shack up, I don’t care. If they want to leave what they have to each other, fine. If I have a contract of co-habitation with someone I should be able to pay for their healthcare. It’s my money. But, I think “marriage” belongs to religion.
Waterboarding — Scaring the dog piss out of some sorry bastard who’s hell bent on killing my people is fine with me. Ask Daniel Pearl about it. No, wait. You can’t. His head was sawed off his body — while he was alive.
Severe economic crisis — give me a damn break. Things are hard right now. And the blame can not be placed on any one person. It’s been the perfect storm. I can tell you how the banks caused it because they lent money to people who couldn’t pay it back, I can tell you how it’s the consumer’s fault for wasting all their money with credit cards. I can go on and on. Fact is, there is plenty of blame to go around. But times have been much worse.
Unemployment is around 10%. During the Depression, unemployment made it to 24%. So, 90 out of 100 people, today, are working right now. Consumer credit card debt was running aboutn $7k per person in 2007. That’s just stupid. Have I been there, yep. But I’ve paid off my credit cards, taking big swipes at it with my tax returns instead of using it for a TV. It’s all been a matter of choices.
And, right now, I choose to end rather clumsily. I’ve had enough to drink. Now I’m hungry and sleepy.
10 Comments
May 22, 2009 at 7:55 am
I’ve always wondered if the unemployment statistics include people who aren’t working, but don’t want a paying job (such as myself – a housewife)? I always list my occupation as “homemaker”.
May 22, 2009 at 1:24 pm
ETW – I’m thinking they only “count” those showing up for benefits. Back in the depression women were just barely thought capable to vote, so I highly doubt they were counted as unemployed. There have been times when the military and migrant workers were or weren’t counted depending on who wanted what number to show.
May 22, 2009 at 7:58 am
[...] Ramblings [...]
May 22, 2009 at 10:54 am
And I clumsily respond!
Jedi: Yes! For a guy who usually posts novels, he’s been awfully quiet. Surely he can’t claim he’s too busy! Good to see he’s actually alive, though.
Gretta Van Sustren: Yes! Her mouth looks like a letterbox!
Shawn Hanity: Yes! He and Rush do your side no favours. I’d love to see more conservatives defend their position like Tony Snow and Joe Scarborough do/did on Bill Mahr’s show. Even though (or maybe *because*) they were out-numbered and in front of an audience that was probably not going to agree with them, they were polite and never resorted to the ‘b-b-but’ tactics. Same goes with the left, by the way. It would benefit humanity enormously to hear “let’s agree to disagree” more.
Gay marriage: I know a couple of gay people who are very religious. More dedicated to their church than a lot of straight people I know. I don’t have a problem with individual churches being uncomfortable with it and saying no, but a legal blanket “nope, gay people can’t marry” is no different to me than “nope, black people can’t marry” or “nope, blonde people can’t marry”. What philosophies you tolerate (or don’t tolerate) in your own house is no business of mine, what gets sign into law, is. It just doesn’t make any sense, and it’s creepy. But quite honestly, I find the actions of most organised religions creepy anyway, whether it’s jihad, excusing kiddy fiddling or “dad gummit, we in’t gorna let them queers git hitched and mess up the sanctity of marriage… and ma fifth wife agrees wit’ me!”
Waterboarding: It’s a nice idea, when you work on the assumption that A: everybody at Guantanamo Bay is guilty and that B: it’s a reliable way to get factual information. Quite honestly, if someone turned me upside down and drowned me, I’d tell them I had worn a kilt and liked bagpipe music just to get them to stop. And you *know* that ain’t true! There’s been plenty of people who have been released from there after spending gawd knows how long in dreadful conditions, including three UK citizens who were detained and tortured in order to get what they say were false confessions. They were released within 24 hours of returning to Britain. This is the sort of behaviour we put embargos on other countries for, because we’re supposed to be the civilised ones who respect law and order and human rights. If we heard Cuba or Iran or North Korea was doing this to people, we’d all snort and say “Ugh, those animals!”
…so look at that! We agree more than we disagree!
Drink lots of water and a few diet cokes, those are always good for a hangover! =D
May 22, 2009 at 1:20 pm
Ah! My friend, no hangover. I seldom get them and then they are mostly fatigue. I ask you only this …
How many people imprisoned at Gitmo were waterboarded?
May 22, 2009 at 10:48 pm
If it’s any more than zero, it’s too many. The “I only did it a wee bit” defence doesn’t wash.
WASH! I just, like, totally punned there! Open a window! XD
May 22, 2009 at 11:31 am
Maybe JJ is just really really proud of his “Scrabble Indoctrination” post.
May 22, 2009 at 1:47 pm
Oh — another thing Spike — on the gay marriage.
If your friends’ church wants to recognize their “marriage” so be it. I was really thinking about the legal union versu the religious union.
In the United States, we don’t have to go to a church to enter into a legal contract of “marriage.” We can go to the courthouse. Any plenty of churches don’t recognize every marriage. Depending on what church I belong to, one of my marriages would not have been recognized. And that isn’t because I married a jack-ass either. It’s because the church didn’t recognize divorce. That church Ted Kennedy belongs to thinks that way.
So, why aren’t divorced people rasing the same hell?
Look, “marriage” is as rooted in religion as “baptism.” It’s a religious ceremony in my opinion. Without the legal paperwork on file with the state, the religious ceremony isn’t recognized.
I’m not advocating against *legal* recognition of the committed contract between people of the same sex. But why would they want to be “married?” That’s like me wanting to be Muslim then raising hell about how screwed up it is.
May 22, 2009 at 3:47 pm
Interesting ideas, Muze, as always. Divorced people aren’t raising hell because they can get married by the state even if the church doesn’t recognize their union. Simple as that. And they get the tax benefits, legal rights, and all those other benefits that go along with being legally married. Note that these are legal rights and not religious ones. If the church (whichever one) doesn’t recognize these rights, they’re perfectly fine not doing that. It’s one of the nice things about separation of church and state. The way it is now, if a church marries a gay couple (and some do), that union is not recognized by the state, which in my view is the state trumping what the religion has done, which is not American.
It’s kind of nice the way that many European countries do it. Legal and religious marriage are 2 separate ceremonies. Couples go through both ceremonies to have the union recognized by the state and the church. Since we have allowed the ceremonies, legal and religious, to be combined, the lines have gotten fuzzy in our minds.
And on the Bayer issue, what really angers me is not the chemicals themselves. Want chemical companies? Sure, and let the market decide if they’re worthy. I love me some Seven dust to get rid of the Japanese beetles. The problem that I have is that they are storing this MIC, which is NOT allowed to be stored. They have to make up a new batch every time they need it, according to the regs. It’s that nasty. And the plant in Institute is the ONLY place in the world that MIC is stored. So we’re down below the level of third world countries.
And, on unemployment, the unemployment numbers are based on the number that are drawing benefits, which are limited in duration. So if you’re out of work for longer than you’re drawing unemployment, you no longer show up on the roster of unemployed. And nobody really keeps track of that number. So the unemployment rates are generally underrepresented.
And is Jedi alive? I”ve seen no sign of it lately.
Thanks for the thoughts and conversation.
May 29, 2009 at 1:11 pm
Muze wrote:
“But I’ve paid off my credit cards, taking big swipes at it with my tax returns instead of using it for a TV. It’s all been a matter of choices.”
I did a blog post precisely about this false idea that we are consuming more junk than we used to.
http://crystaldawnrulz4evah.blogspot.com/2009/05/big-screen-tvs-decline-of-middle-class.html
Based on data collected by Elizabeth Warren, we spend a considerable amount more on fixed items such as mortgages, health care, and day care….while we spend less on flexible items such as clothing, food, and appliances… than we did a generation ago.
The problem does not lie upon unnecessary consumption, but the fact that these large fixed expenses have just gotten so much greater.