This looks like a long blog...but it isn't. I call it: YOU DECIDE

It is a sign of age when your drive time is punctuated by listening to talk radio, but such is the case with me. Yesterday I heard a conversation that was at once fascinating, frightening, and foreboding. I'll leave it up to you to decide for yourselves (that is...all 2 or 3 that actually read this blog). There are at least 6 - and possibly more - talking points here, and I honestly don't know where to begin.

Key:
Talk Show Host = TSH
Caller = CL

TSH: What do you want in life?
CL: I want peace.

TSH: Define peace.
CL: Peace is when we withdraw all of our troops from Iraq and Afghanistan to within the confines of our own shores, reduce the size of the military to cut expenditures, and stay within our own borders.

TSH: So you define peace as an absence of conflict?
CL: I define peace as the United States minding its own business.

TSH: So you feel we should allow evil to permeate the world, and be separatist?
CL: There is no evil.

TSH: There is no evil?
CL: Correct.

TSH: Was Adolph Hitler evil? Was Stalin evil?
CL: Adolph Hitler could have been negotiated with.

TSH: I see where you are now. So we should be negotiating with Osama Bin Laden?
CL: Yes, absolutely.

TSH: I've just theoretically appointed you chief negotiator to Bin Laden. What would you say to him?
CL: I'd offer him whatever amount of money he wanted to leave us alone.

TSH: And you'd trust that he'd comply if we paid him?
CL: Of course he would. He'd build schools, roads, and a modern infrastructure.

TSH: He wouldn't use the money to finance more terrorism?
CL: Never. I know in my heart he's an honorable man.

TSH: Would you give him $100 million? $200 Million?
CL: Yes, I'd give him $200 million. It's better than any of our soldiers dying.

TSH: Ok. Peace to you means an absence of conflict, and you think negotiating is the way to go. Additionally, you think the U.S. should be isolationist in the world.
CL: I'll go along with most of that, but those are your words - not mine.

TSH: Do you live in a single family home? Condo? Townhouse?
CL: Single family home.

TSH: Ok. You hear your next door neighbor screaming that she's being raped by a man with a knife. What do you do?
CL: I'd call the police.

TSH: Ok. You call the police and they tell you they can't get anyone there for at least 8 minutes...what do you do?
CL: Nothing. I'm against violence of any kind.

TSH: But next door, a violent act is occuring.
CL: You want me to fight violence with violence?

TSH: If necessary, yes. I believe that is the appropriate response.
CL: It can't be...I'm sure I could talk the rapist out of finishing his actions.

TSH: So you'd do nothing? That's your neighbor...possibly your friend. And you'd do nothing? She may die. Are you going to let her continue to be raped and possibly die?
CL: (Long pause and a whispered sigh) Yes. My interests are in myself and the United States.

TSH: What?
CL: We are here to talk about the United States' involvement in the Middle East, are we not?

TSH: That is what we're talking about. Confronting a violent enemy with violence of our own.
CL: (Sigh) And we're wrong for doing that.

TSH: Ok. Ok. Thank you for the call.
CL: You're welcome.

C'mon...gimme a break already

Approximately 10,000 people marched in Washington D.C. this past Saturday in an effort to stop the Iraq War. The usual suspects were there - the chick from "The Rocky Horror Picture Show", "Barbarela", and "Spicoli" from "Fast Times at Ridgemont High."

Lost on what appears to be either an ignoramus society - or at least a naive one, is the fact that "Spicoli", arrested several times over the years for assaulting photographers attempting to take his picture, was pleading for the violence to stop in Iraq.

In any event, the totally legal protest went on without incident until several unseemly types decided to deface the Capital Building with graffiti. The Commissioner of the D.C. police gave the order that "no one was to be arrested", and the felons-without-a-charge continued their assault on property that belongs to every legal citizen of this country by standing around and taking photos of their handy-work.

Look, you wanna invite Hanoi Jane out from whatever rock she was under to be a speaker?...go ahead. You wanna invite Anny Savoy from "Bull Durham" to be a speaker?...go ahead. And you are even encouraged to invite "I'm so wasted" Jeff Spicoli if you want to as well.

But defacing something that has been a part of this country for over 200 years? Now, you're just being a fucking douche-bag. You claim to be part of the "progressive movement", and you do some trailer trash stunt like that? Wanna know why no one with half a brain wants to listen to your crap?

Read back a few lines, assholes.

Take your pick

"No great civilization has ever died from murder. It committed suicide, instead."

- Arnold Toynbee


You don't like the happenings in Iraq...fair enough. You don't like the inferences that Iran is next...fair enough. You don't like the "Surge" plan...which is actually reinforcements under a different name...fair enough. Speaking of which, if it were called "reinforcements", would you be so against it?

In any case, the debate will go on about all of these things listed above, while our country erodes in a sea of violence in the cities, myspace paranoia, Paris Hiltonish celebrity fascination, anti-parenting legislation, and educational apathy among minorities and poor non-minorities.

I would prefer middle ground for sure, but if my choice for who rules the world were the neo-conservatives in the White House or the people who blow off car bombs in Baghdad markets, I'll take the neo-con's every day and twice on Tuesday.

I want freedom of thought and action, but then I see where 1.7 million legal abortions happen every year, with untold thousands of coat-hanger and knitting needle abortions happening as well, and I wonder if there isn't a better solution. "Stop the killing in Iraq, but keep abortion law as it is," seems to be the sentiment shared by the same minds in most cases, and therefore makes no sense to me. This statement doesn't make me pro or con abortion rights; it simply means I'm attempting to sort it all out.

I believe America has long passed their melting pot stage, and they are more like a salad now. A melting pot brings all the ingredients together to form one. A salad has the lettuce, veggies, croutons, and dressing together, but each item is still distinct and separate and not melded into one. Some say this is a good thing; others say it's not.

Our roll models in society are George Clooney and Terrel Owens? This is our choice? I nominate my father for roll model of the year. He's 76, has Parkinson's, can't drive in the proper lane, is so deaf he couldn't hear a nuke go off in his pantry, but he is and has always been - a good guy.

We can't decide if it's ok to be fat or ok to be skinny. And we blame others for this national epidemic. It's obviously McDonald's fault, because they drive their goods to your home, and force you to eat it at gunpoint.

Our lawyers chase votes by procuring charges against kids who didn't do anything more than drink a keg of beer at a college party and then make the bad choices that come with that intoxication.

Myspace is at fault, not parents who fail to monitor their child's activities. Currently there is no law against teaching your children as they enter their teens that all those boogeyman stories are actually real, you know.

But I'm sure we're working on one.

In California, a childless state representative is trying to pass an anti-spanking law. She states too many children are abused and beaten in California - subsequently redefining "spanking" and calling it "assault." When queried, she did acknowledge she owned a cat. Ahhhh, I see.

Fourty plus years of post secondary educational placement by race and ethnicity, and the number of minority collegiate graduations has grown a sorrowful 13%. And no one wants to bring the guilty to task on this. The powers that be are afraid to tell the truth and chew the social ass that needs to be chewed.

So what do you do? Move to Montana? I think not...the Unibomber hung out there. Move to Mexico? Perhaps. The population of Mexico decreases by thousands daily. I sometimes wonder where they're all going?

Maybe it's all a bad dream, caused by hitting my head on the window sill or something like that...

Heels together...now, click them three times....

Our upside down world

Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonzo Compean turned themselves in to go to jail today for failure to report and do proper paperwork. Barring a pardon, they will be in jail for 11 and 12 years respectively.

You see, apparently pardon's are only given to the criminals, not the defenders.

Border Patrol officers Ramos and Compean caught Osvaldo Aldrete Davila smuggling 100 lbs of pot across the Mexican border into the U.S. When he broke free of their grasp and ran, the officers shot him in the ass. Our drug smuggling/illegal immigrant friend Davila, worked his way back across the border, and told his mommy what happened.

Davila's mommy knew someone on the U.S. Border patrol staff, and she made a complaint. It turns out the officers feared prosecution for the incident, so they failed to report it. They were recently convicted of hiding the incident, and today they went to prison - many inmates of whom are people these two officers were a part of placing them in the prison as well.

Davila? He testified for the U. S. government, and was granted full immunity from prosecution. The illegal immigrant/drug smuggler was granted full immunity. Sorry, I had to say that twice.

So Davila went back to Mexico, lesson learned, and lived happily ever after...right? Uuuuuuummmm....not so much.

He was busted 40 days after the incident - AGAIN smuggling over $1 million in pot across the border, and was pardoned by the same people who gave him immunity from the first felonious activity. Meanwhile, the border guards are in prison.

Whew!! Justice was served and I feel a lot safer now!

Excuse me. Ma'am? I think you're using that word incorrectly.

When did we start to mix and mingle terminology meant specifically for a particular group of people, yet now used by the masses?

This morning I was listening to a great conversation on education, education reform, and the problems we face in our public schools. Going backwards 40 years, I remember when I was in school the term for a child that couldn’t grasp the concepts presented – and I speak here of a child specifically identified as having some sort of clinical medical reason for their difficulties – was "retarded." I know that term has taken on a cruel insensitivity over the decades, and it was justifiably changed to the two word phrase “Learning Disabled”, or LD for short. My wife has been lifelong friends with a woman who teaches LD children in a Virginia elementary school, and again, I’m talking of the clinically diagnosed.

On this radio talk show I listened to this morning, a woman from Denver called in and spoke of her two children in elementary school. The woman was intelligent and made several cogent points, but I was alarmed at how she described child #1. She laid the groundwork for her discussion by stating both children attend public schools and normal classes. She stated child #2 was doing fine and received relatively high marks in all areas and tests. Child #1 was different. She kept referring to him as being learning disabled, and described how he struggled with both in-school tasks and homework. I was struck by the fact that she kept saying he was LD, when it seemed obvious to me that he was merely academically average. He received modest grades, and was modestly successful. She was rationalizing it by saying it wasn't his fault...mother nature is playing a large role here. Perhaps...but I doubt that.

I am of a mind that it is not acceptable for this woman to place her son’s difficulties in school in the LD mode. Look, all people are actually NOT created equal, and school is one of the major benchmarks in determining where a child will fit into society. I’d love to be able to play golf like Tiger Woods, but I can’t. I’d love to have the mind of some great thinker at Princeton, but I don’t. And her child is not especially bright. Although I feel for her and others like her, I believe we need to keep phrases like LD specific to what they were always intended to be. That way we can deal with the true issue of clinical learning disability in a forthright manner, and focus our attention thusly.

And parents need to understand that C students happen…all the time as a matter of fact. And it’s ok to be average.

Peace.

American History, 101

It's time for the younger readers out there to learn a bit. The business of running a democratic republic the size and political might of the United States is many times an unseemly one to the untrained eye. Everyone in our nation would love to hear that the acts, deeds, and policies of the country are always in the best interests of the entire world, and conducted with the utmost standards of honor and respectability.

Unfortunately, that is nothing but a pipe-dream.

For most who bemoan a lack of international or national integrity, the fact of the matter is sometimes things are done in the interests of this country only, and that's the way it is. If those who don't like it were to step into the same situations, they themselves would be faced with the same tactical, financial, and ethical dilemma's faced daily by our nation and its leadership.

With that said though, lines do have to be drawn and upheld. Sometimes our leaders lose their compass, and fail to notice or draw those lines between the dirty business that is necessary to keep the behemoth that is our country moving, and acts that are downright unacceptable to anyone.

In what has been well documented for over 30 years now, the President of the United States and dozens of his closest officers committed what amounted to a never-ending series of criminal acts and the coverup thereof, now known as "Watergate." I'm not going to give you the entire Watergate story; there are hundreds of books, movies, and on-line articles that would keep you busy for months if you started reading them right now. I wanted instead to talk briefly about one person, John N Mitchell.

John Mitchell was the Attorney General of the United States at the beginning of the 70's. As AG, by definition, he was the "top cop" in the U.S., and therefore should have been above reproach or suspicion. He was not. In charge of the committee to reelect the president as well as AG, he was directly involved in the Watergate proceedings. In 1977, he was sent to jail in Alabama for 19 months for "Perjury", "Obstruction of Justice", "Illegal spying on American Citizens" (Democratic party leaders), and numerous other charges. John Mitchell died in 1988.

The highest ranking law enforcement officer in this country turned out to be one of its biggest criminals.

In 1999, Sandy Berger was the National Security Advisor to President Clinton. In September of 2005, Mr. Berger was found guilty of stealing secret sensitive documents from the National Archives in Washington after the events of September, 2001. Berger and his lawyer said he knowingly removed the documents and his own handwritten notes by placing them in his jacket, pants and socks, and also inadvertently took copies of actual classified documents in a leather portfolio.

"I deeply regret the sloppiness involved, but I had no intention of withholding documents from the 9/11 commission, and to the contrary, to my knowledge, every document requested by the commission from the Clinton administration was produced," Berger said in a statement.

Interestingly, some drafts of a sensitive after-action report on the Clinton administration's handling of Al Qaeda terror threats during the December 1999 millennium celebration are still missing, officials and lawyers said. Officials said the missing documents also identified America's terror vulnerabilities at airports to seaports, and these documents never ended up in the possession of the 9/11 commission for their review. Mr. Berger was convicted of his crimes, and was fined $50,000.00 and given community service.

The highest ranking official in charge of our national sovereignty and security tried after the fact to hide his mistakes, and in doing so incriminated himself, held out documents we still need to see at this point but cannot, and lied to the commission investigating the worst thing that ever happened to this country.

So there my friends is your history lesson for today.

The highest law enforcement officer in the land broke the law and ending up where he belonged - in prison.

The highest security official in our nation broke the law, endangered the lives of every man, woman, and child in the land, and ended up on the first tee at Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, Maryland for his morning foursome.

Who says "History repeats itself" ? Does not.

Words and their meanings

Hate (Verb used with object): to dislike intensely or passionately; feel extreme aversion for or extreme hostility toward.

I used the word hate in an e-mail to a friend about - of all things - the College Football National Championship Game. I said I "hated" the two teams playing because they've both come under decades of scrutiny about their social and academic ethics vs. their sports goals. In any case, argument was rendered stupid because I used an inappropriate term. The return e-mail led off with the sentence "Hate"?

It was a few days before I thought about it, then came to the obvious realization that "hate" is a word we should really curtail in this country. If someone says they hate the President or hate Senator Clinton for example, perhaps they should reconsider. It's perfectly acceptable to hate soldiers dying in Iraq and Afghanistan, but to hate the leaders that sent them there takes you into a totally different reality and dimension. In fact, it could easily be argued that hating a human being who has never really done anything to merit hate, put's the user of the word in a category to be hated themselves. I personally don't like Senator Clinton or the President, but by no means do I hate them, their political positions, or their policies.

I hate people who commit rape, murder, and crimes even more atrocious - if such a thing exists - and I believe it does. I don't like the Rev Al Sharpton; but I don't hate him either. I don't like raging feminists or chauvinists, but I don't hate them. I disagree with - and at times I'm angered by - attorney's and judges - but hate never enters the equation. At least...it shouldn't.

From here on out, I'm going to try and be selective in the verbiage that dominates both conversation and my lousy writing. I can disagree with, dislike, abhor, condemn, despise, detest, deplore, eschew, resent, scorn, and admonish without changing who I am.

But I will save "Hate" for those individuals and situations most deserving.

You got all A's? That's terrific!

Prequil: None of this - NONE OF THIS - is exaggerated or made-up. It is fact, followed by fact. I'm not kidding.

The Young America's Foundation - a 40 year old conservative non-profit organization - among other things does research on the most bizarre college and university offerings every calendar year. The listings are at once hysterically funny, while simultaneously frighteningly stupid. Los Angeles area institutes of higher learning have walked away with no less than 25% of the awards in the 6 years these listings have come out, and this year is no different.

2007's overall winner was Occidental College in L.A., with 2 entries in total, to include the number 1 winner: "The Phallus."

The Phallus is a survey, offered by Occidental's department of critical theory and social justice, focused on - and I quote directly - "Feminist and queer takings-on of the phallus." Topics include "the relation between the phallus and the penis, the meaning of the phallus, phallologocentrism, the lesbian phallus, the Jewish phallus, the Latino phallus, and the relation of the phallus and fetishism." Before I go any further, I believe two things need to be noted:

1) I'm no prude, but I do believe the sexual habits, customs, and thoughts of individuals belong in non-public settings, and ....
2) In the not-so-distant past, Professor Jeffrey Tobin, who wrote and teaches the course, might be required to seek psychiatric help before he was allowed back into the classroom. These days, he's considered "innovative" and "refreshing." I still think he's a perv, but that's just me.

Also this semester, Occidental will offer the course that the Young America's Foundation rated No. 5 in bizarreness: "Blackness." This class will explore "new blackness," "critical blackness," "post-blackness," "unforgivable blackness" and "queer blackness." They also offer a companion course, "Whiteness", which discusses the obvious right to privilege that all white males are entitled to. Their words...not mine.

Annual tuition at Occidental, a private college, is $32,800. That means if you take "The Phallus" and "Blackness" (plus its prerequisite "Whiteness") this year on a four-course-per-semester schedule, you will have set your parents back $12,300. That's just terrific, isn't it?

UCLA won the coveted No. 2 slot on the list, with "Queer Musicology." Queer musicology is a new field dating from the 1990s based in part on the idea that if you're gay, then music by gay composers such as Benjamin Britten will sound different to you than it would if you were straight.

Nipping at UCLA's heels was Amherst College in Massachusetts, with "Taking Marx Seriously." The first sentence of the course description is: "Should Marx be given another chance?" 100,000,000 people died in gulag's while Marx was in charge, evidently a minor inconvenience to be overcome by the Amherst prof's teaching this lovely course.

There is more...and here it is, in order:

1. "The Phallus"Occidental College. A seminar in critical theory and social justice, this class examines Sigmund Freud, phallologocentrism and the lesbian phallus.

2. "Queer Musicology"UCLA. This course welcomes students from all disciplines to study what it calls an "unruly discourse" on the subject, understood through the works of Cole Porter, Pussy Tourette and John Cage.

3. "Taking Marx Seriously"Amherst College. This advanced seminar for 15 students examines whether Karl Marx still matters despite the countless interpretations and applications of his ideas, or whether the world has entered a post-Marxist era.

4. "Adultery Novel"University of Pennsylvania. Falling in the newly named "gender, culture and society" major, this course examines novels and films of adultery such as "Madame Bovary" and "The Graduate" through Marxist, Freudian and feminist lenses.

5. "Blackness"Occidental College. Critical race theory and the idea of "post-blackness" are among the topics covered in this seminar course examining racial identity. A course on whiteness is a prerequisite.

6. "Border Crossings, Borderlands: Transnational Feminist Perspectives on Immigration"University of Washington. This women studies department offering takes a new look at recent immigration debates in the U.S., integrating questions of race and gender while also looking at the role of the war on terror.

7. "Whiteness: The Other Side of Racism"Mount Holyoke College. The educational studies department offers this first-year, writing-intensive seminar asking whether whiteness is "an identity, an ideology, a racialized social system," and how it relates to racism.

8. "Native American Feminisms"University of Michigan. The women's studies and American culture departments offer this course on contemporary Native American feminism, including its development and its relation to struggles for land.

9. "'Mail Order Brides?' Understanding the Philippines in Southeast Asian Context"Johns Hopkins University. This history course cross-listed with anthropology, political science and studies of women, gender and sexuality is limited to 35 students and asks for an anthropology course as a prerequisite.

10. "Cyberfeminism"Cornell University. Cornell's art history department offers this seminar looking at art produced under the influence of feminism, post-feminism and the Internet.

11. "American Dreams/American Realities"Duke University. Part of Duke's Hart Leadership Program that prepares students for public service, this history course looks at American myths, from "city on the hill" to "foreign devil," in shaping American history.

12. "Nonviolent Responses to Terrorism"Swarthmore College. Swarthmore's "peace and conflict studies" program offers this course that "will deconstruct 'terrorism' " and "study the dynamics of cultural marginalization" while seeking alternatives to violence.

You mean - - - - it isn't that way?

The way most want it to be:
The way it is:

A chicken in every pot
The homeless

Racial stability and fellowship
David Duke and Al Sharpton

Great music for our children to hear
MTV

Athletes who are role models
OJ & Mark McGuire

Good entertainment
Survivor, part XXXIV.

Flying cars
Segway’s

Great food for less money
McDonald’s

Honesty and integrity
Politicians

Talent
American Idol

Safe highways
Cell phones

Intelligent conversation
Blogger’s – myself included

Safe city, low-cost fun
Orlando

Unbiased news
CNN, FOX, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, CBS

The world...Sep 1oth, 2001
The world...Sep 11th, 2001

Peace
Iraq, Darfur, Afghanistan, Somalia

Respect and unity
The U.S.A.

My own wish list

For 2007, I wish...

...no one would talk about Paris Hilton, Nicole Ritchie, Brittany Spears, or anyone without talent who has become a "celebrity" because they go out to clubs after midnight and get drunk.

...the middle east would calm down.

...gas prices would go back to $1.50 (remember when we were pissed about that?)

...left wing liberals and right wing hard-asses would stop running each political party.

...the clock would strike 12, and Cindy Sheehan's 15 minutes would be up.

...teenagers would realize that hip-hop music is disruptive and at times destructive. No one ever committed murder after attending an Aerosmith concert. Too stoned, most likely.

...MTV would go back to showing videos. If not, drop the TV and just call yourself "M".

...Al Sharpton and the Rev. Jesse Jackson would appear on TV and tell the black community - in particular, young black males - that they need to get off the schnide and start assuming responsibility for their own actions.

...PETA would drop their stance on medical research using animals, and cures will start popping up.

...judges would sentence murderer's, rapists, and child molesters to jail time.

...Michael Jackson would stay in Abu Dabi or wherever he currently lives.

...defense lawyers would get a Webster's and look up the term "justice" before they get their client off from his 15th "assault with a deadly weapon" charge.

...the President would end the Iraq mess. Escalate it if you have to; de-escalate it if that's the answer. Either way, shut down the bad guys and get outta there.

...Rosie O'Donnell would get a 5 month long case of laryngitis

...there were no more info-mercials, especially those with the bearded "OxyClean" guy...or the creepy ones where the dude is talking about good bowel movements and the joys of a soft yet solid feces.

...the children were all fed, educated, and happy.

...parents would start parenting. No, no, no, it's not the schools fault. No...it isn't!

...the new Congress would pass an ethics bill that they would then obey.

...everything I just said would come true, but of course I chose things that probably won't.

Would you?

Throughout our lives, we have either said, heard someone else say, or the combination of both:

"If I had it to do over again, I would..."

Would you? Consider this if you will. I believe the universe is somehow all tied together. I can't really say how, but I'm sure Carl Sagan or someone like him can explain it to you. I just believe that's the way it is. Call it an act of faith on my part.

So the question remains: Would you? Why would you?

To assuage a past heartache or disappointment? Perhaps an unexpected death occurred and ripped your world apart. Money problems? You go back and take a different path, and all will be better...right? Perhaps...unless my belief about the universe is correct.

I have faith that everything does happen for a reason, to include the death of children, poverty, and ignorance. However, not all things that happen for a reason are negative, even though that is predominantly the way we apply the phrase. If you succeed in business, athletics, music, parenting, or whatever it is you aspire to do, the successes are because of hard work, passion, dedication, and in some small way - good luck. I must tell you though, the more you work at something, the better your luck becomes.

In any event, there is nothing I would do over again and change - to include the fact that I've had 3 major strokes, as devastating to my life expectancy as they have been.

Perhaps I would consider going back to 1990 when PETA put a stop to diabetes testing at Stanford University Medical Center and tell them they were doing the human race - and my teenage son - a great disservice. In March of 2005, he was diagnosed with Type I diabetes. 100% insulin dependent, and it carries a life sentence. But I would only consider it, not actually do it.

Other than that, I'll take every disappointment and success that came my way, because positive or negative, they were earned with honor and integrity...two characteristics that have no equal.

Pat

It used to be kinda funny, but not any more.

Pat Robertson needs to seek psychiatric help. He is a terribly disturbed man, and it's very sad.

Look, my cat tells me stuff all the time, but he (the cat) only claims to be Moses, not God.