Driving home from my parents' I got gas in Bristol, VA, Exit 5. I got a drink and candy (don't tell my Mom), got in the car and took off. As I turned into the entrance to I-81 South, I heard a clunk and wondered what I ran over. Then someone yelled at me that I dropped something. I stopped the car, walked around it and then it hit me.
I had put my fannypack-purse on top of the car. By the time I got back to the intersection it was gone.
I called 911 - Of course, when you're in Bristol -- you call 911 and you get Bristol, VA, Bristol, TN, and Washington County and who knows what. So an hour later, I flag down a city policeman and give him my particulars.
I had already called my charge card and bank. Now, I must replace insurance cards, all those 'store member upc' cards. And my driver license. What an inconvenience.
One thing I did not do was melt into victimhood and cry, expecting someone to 'save' my arse. I totally detest worthless weak wimpy weeping women who manipulate with tears, expecting someone with a generous heart to come to their rescue. Women who manipulate give the rest of us a bad name. Especially if they're blondes.
Was it stupid? NAH -- blonde and carefree? Nope, blonde and careLESS. I've 'known' I was going to do this some time, but I never expected it to be NOW. I know stuff happens for a reason, so I'm waiting for my reason and hoping an honest person has found my fanny pack and will mail it back to me. Even if they keep the $50 my Dad gave me for gasoline.
Then I go to put an AD in the local Bristol Paper and it's going to cost me nearly $200 for ten days -- oops, I've cancelled that one. Will retry with a four day or weekend only ad tomorrow.
Yes, I'm blonde, retired, and need to pay more attention to detail.
Lesson Learned!
You Are Never As Anonymous As You Think!
Sign by Danasoft - For Backgrounds and Layouts
Monday, April 30, 2007
Sunday, April 29, 2007
Tokyo Rose "act alikes"
The Democrat Party has turned into Tokyo Rose -- the sultry voiced radio announcer based in Japan who tried to convince our WWII soldiers that Japan had won the war and the USofA should just give up. Well, sounds like Harry "Tokyo" Reid and Nancy "Tokyo" Pelosi are doing a fine rendition of the "Tokyo Rose" two-step. (Two steps back and no steps forward.)
"Congressmen who willfully take actions during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military should be arrested, exiled, or hanged."President Abraham Lincoln
March 4, 1837 - Andrew Jackson Quote
"You have no longer any cause to fear danger from abroad . . .. It is from within, among yourselves -- from cupidity, from corruption, from disappointed ambition and inordinant thirst for power -- that factions will be formed and liberty endangered. It is against such designs, whatever disguise the actors may assume, that you have especially to guard yourselves."Andrew Jackson, Farewell Address, March 4, 1837
Friday, April 27, 2007
Why we do not want socialized medicine!
Staff at publicly funded Mater Hospital in Dublin, Ireland, certified the death of a disabled man in his 30s. Morgue officials found him awake and alert in his bed when they arrived hours later to collect the body.
Last year publicly funded Beaumont Hospital in Dublin, Ireland, shipped the body of a dead English tourist back to England and stitched up a bag of somebody elses organs inside his body cavity.
This is what happens when a country has "socialized medicine." Do you think citizens in the USofA are willing to call this type of regularly occurring incident as "collateral damage?"
No matter how lovely a candidate for office tries to sugar coat 'government funded health care' there will be preventable deaths, misdiagnoses, lack of medical supplies, strikes by medical employees, and the like which they will not discuss. The government will run health care with the same 'expertise' as they've run the Postal Service. Anything the Federal Government has touched has turned into complete and total over-priced chaos.
I raised my children with Mr Robitussin(r) and Mr Triaminic(r). Others can too. A person without medical coverage is a lot more careful than a person with a 'Medicaid Card' who can run to the Emergency Room every time her child's nose drips.
If you wish to make a suggestion to your favorite candidate and your Congressperson, suggest "Partially-Government Funded Neighborhood Clinics" where local USofA citizen-residents, adults as well as children, can go for acute medical care. They'll pay a fee based on last year's Federal Income Tax adjusted gross income. Citizenship will be established by Passport or certified birth certificate. Unlawful immigrants would be referred to HS/INS who will have an expedited plan to return them to their native country.
Remember: The USofA is not the hospital or doctor's office of the world!
10 Easy Steps to Destroy America
From The Guardian:
This article was written from a leftist or liberal point of view and is quite revealing. #1 - The liberals would say one name for both: "Bush." #2 - North Vietnam after Jane Fonda's visit or Taliban & Al Qaida after Harry Reid's "lost war" remark. #3 - Isn't that what "Code Pink" and "P.E.T.A." and Cindy Shehan and Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton and John Kerry and Al Gore are? #4 - Every liberal Congressperson qualifies here. #5 - The ACLU, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Al Gore. #6 - Liberal Judges creating law instead of upholding it. #7 - And just how many Republicans have Liberals sacrificed at their altar of socialism? #8 - I laugh! Everyone, including the press, knows that the press is controlled by left leaning liberals. #9 - For Liberals, dissent of their agenda equals euthanasia, if they had the power to use it. And for one Senator in particular, strange death reports seem to follow her around. #10 - If the Leftists could suspend the rule of law, they would place socialism or communism in its place faster than you can say Karl Marx.
Anyone else have some comments to share?
From Hitler to Pinochet and beyond, history shows there are certain steps that any would-be dictator must take to destroy constitutional freedoms.
1. Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy
2. Create a gulag
3. Develop a thug caste
4. Set up an internal surveillance system
5. Harass citizens' groups
6. Engage in arbitrary detention and release
7. Target key individuals
8. Control the press
9. Dissent equals treason
10. Suspend the rule of law
This article was written from a leftist or liberal point of view and is quite revealing. #1 - The liberals would say one name for both: "Bush." #2 - North Vietnam after Jane Fonda's visit or Taliban & Al Qaida after Harry Reid's "lost war" remark. #3 - Isn't that what "Code Pink" and "P.E.T.A." and Cindy Shehan and Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton and John Kerry and Al Gore are? #4 - Every liberal Congressperson qualifies here. #5 - The ACLU, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Al Gore. #6 - Liberal Judges creating law instead of upholding it. #7 - And just how many Republicans have Liberals sacrificed at their altar of socialism? #8 - I laugh! Everyone, including the press, knows that the press is controlled by left leaning liberals. #9 - For Liberals, dissent of their agenda equals euthanasia, if they had the power to use it. And for one Senator in particular, strange death reports seem to follow her around. #10 - If the Leftists could suspend the rule of law, they would place socialism or communism in its place faster than you can say Karl Marx.
Anyone else have some comments to share?
Thursday, April 26, 2007
The Benedict Arnold of 2007
Harry Reid is akin to Benedict Arnold. He gives comfort and aid to the Terrorists. He emboldens the Taliban and al Qaida to stand strong until the Democrats remove the USofA presence from Iraq and the Middle East. When the USofA leaves, the Terrorists will take over and slaughter Iraqis who were helped by the USofA. Duncan Hunter thinks it's time for Harry Reid to recuse himself from the Senate and give up his seat to a Patriot. Even Benedict Arnold knew when to move to Canada.
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
There's language and then there's Bad language
Okay, time to speak out. If the two reverend's, Jackson and Sharpton, are going to pounce on Imus for his bad language, as described by them, then they better look to their own 'house' and to the 'rap' and 'angry' words that disguise themselves as 'music' in the Black Afro-African-American genre.
Someone who claims to speak for the public and decry Imus' use of language is hypocritical if he makes some kind of 'ethnic' excuse for the use of the same and more descriptive language coming from the Black Afro-African-American community in the guise as 'music' (and I use the term very loosely).
The body-part-words, body-action-words, slang-words, curse-words, incorrect grammar in the Black Afro-African-American music genre need to be placed under the same scrutiny as Imus' casual remark, ugly as it was, or no one should give credence to anything the two reverend's, Jackson and Sharpton, say from this day forward.
If you can locate a snail mail or an email address for either reverend, please pass it on to me in the comments. Thank you.
Someone who claims to speak for the public and decry Imus' use of language is hypocritical if he makes some kind of 'ethnic' excuse for the use of the same and more descriptive language coming from the Black Afro-African-American community in the guise as 'music' (and I use the term very loosely).
The body-part-words, body-action-words, slang-words, curse-words, incorrect grammar in the Black Afro-African-American music genre need to be placed under the same scrutiny as Imus' casual remark, ugly as it was, or no one should give credence to anything the two reverend's, Jackson and Sharpton, say from this day forward.
If you can locate a snail mail or an email address for either reverend, please pass it on to me in the comments. Thank you.
Adalaide, a short story
Adalaide was brought up in a fairly well to do family and had no wants from birth. The proverbial silver-spoon was indeed in her mouth, although not until she was fed solid food, as her first year she was fed the nectar reserved for newborns. Her first years were, as they say, "unremarkable" other than that she seemed to pout much when her siblings were reprimanded as if she, in some way, had also committed the infraction and was also being punished. By being the youngest child, she was the tag-a-long of her sisters and the go-fer of her brothers.
Adalaide was her father's and mother's late-in-life child, her father was 47 when she was born and her mother turned 47 the day after Adalaide was born. At the time of her birth, her siblings were Ned 8, Paul 9, Mike 10, the twins, Rita and Rose 12 and Mary 13. Adalaide's grandparents were 70 the year she was born. There was only one set of grandparents for Adalaide as her maternal grandparents had passed away the year before she was born.
As soon as she could toddle and talk, the boys would allow her into their enclave behind the old barn on the property and commission her to go get cookies from their mother or permission to raid the refrigerator for bottles of juice. Mother always said yes, so the reason for having Adalaide run those errands was as much for the boys' amusements as it was for permission or cookies, which is why they never asked her to get cookies and permission on the same mission.
Now the girls, all of whom being older than the boys, looked on Adalaide as more a tag-a-long nuisance. She was their 'baby sister' and they often treated her as if she were not there or could not understand what they were saying. The oldest sister felt tender towards Adalaide, but would not try to stop her twin sisters from their teasing and tricks. Adalaide looked up to her older sisters and always felt that there must be something wrong with her because they didn't treat her as they treated each other.
Each fall until she was old enough to attend school, Adalaide would watch her sisters and brothers walk out the door on their way to school, make the turn onto the sidewalk and briskly walk the three blocks to the school complex. Although they were in different grades, her siblings all attended schools in the same educational complex. From her earliest age, she wanted to join them and walk to school too.
Adalaide's mother became involved in volunteering when Ned started Kindergarten. She had graduated college with a degree in Home Economics and put her education to good use raising the six children. Volunteering was her respite, her chance to speak to other educated adults and her way to get out of a busy but fairly happy household each week. When she had ventured out of the house to volunteer for the first time, she felt insecure because the other women seemed to know so much beyond babies and diapers and feeding schedules and household help, but it wasn't long before she, too, felt comfortable among her peers. She enjoyed her pregnancy and the birth of Adalaide, but she wasn't ready to return to the enclave of the nursery after Adalaide's birth and had employed a full-time English Nanny for Adalaide when she turned a year old.
Adalaide's father, the eldest of eight brothers, was an executive at the family's banking and insurance company. He had worked himself up from mailroom as a fourteen year old to junior executive by the time he'd graduated from college at twenty-one when he married his high school and college sweetheart. He took graduate studies while working and growing his family with children. Adalaide was his surprise and his delight. Like most executives, he worked long hours but made a point of eating the evening meal each workday with his family. Saturdays were 'his' day and he'd go to the club around ten in the morning, after having a quiet five minutes with each of his children. He would not return until the children were fed and put to bed and the household help had left until the morning, other than the housekeeper and the Nanny who each had their own small bedrooms in the house. This was his time with his wife and he never missed a Saturday evening with her.
Sundays were the day that the entire family gathered at Adalaide's grandparents' home after attending church. Grandfather and Grandmother were the patriarch and matriarch of their eight sons. They had a huge castle of a house on the highest hill in town. It was an enormous Victorian house with three full stories and an attic full of wonderful antiques, treasures to discover and a wonderful balcony outside the attic gable which faced toward the sea. All the way around the first floor was a wonderful porch with rockers and swings and plant stands overflowing with ferns. The yard in front was the scene of many games of badminton and croquet. The sides and back yards had tall oak trees which provided homes for birds and bases for games of hide and seek and tag. The attic, however, was the favorite place of all the grandchildren and although it seems impossible, every cousin could find a special space for himself and herself among all the boxes and trunks and old furniture. The grandchildren spent many happy hours in the attic as they shared their secrets, hopes and dreams with each other.
The first floor of the house was all parlors and dining room which seated all the adult children and their spouses and a kitchen big enough for a staff of three. The kitchen included a children's table with benches and room for highchairs as there seemed always to be at least one grandchild in the family in need of a highchair. The second story had four bedrooms and the third story had six more bedrooms. There was a full bathroom off of each bedroom. Grandmother's and Grandfather's bedroom was the largest and had a huge sitting room where visiting grandchildren spent the night on pallets after being read to by Grandmother and occasionally by Grandfather.
This was Adalaide's world. She was nurtured by parents and grandparents and had one of the best English Nannies on the East coast. Yet, something inside Adalaide was different from her siblings and her cousins. As she grew, she always felt "different" but had no vocabulary to explain it until later in life.
Adalaide's schooling began the year that Mary graduated from High School. No longer was she the face behind the storm door looking out at her siblings. Now she was one of them, tagging along as fast as her legs would propel her, down the walk, onto the sidewalk and three blocks to the school complex. Mother had come to the school in late summer to make all the arrangements, so Adalaide walked into the Primary School building without benefit of parent. The first day of school was the day the Nanny was 'let go' and a second housekeeper was hired. Mother was out volunteering and of course Father was at work. The first day of Kindergarten was full of noise as the teachers welcomed each child and asked them questions about themselves, such as "what's your favorite color" and "what animal do you like best" and "do you have a favorite story." The teachers were gathering information so that they could include children's favorites into the classroom lessons to help make the children's education fun and personal as well as informative. Adalaide's favorite story was Sleeping Beauty. She didn't know why. Her favorite color was sky-blue with white clouds. Adalaide's favorite animal was the Blue Jay that laid her nest high in one of Grandmother's and Grandfather's big oak trees. Each Spring, Adalaide would run up the flights of stairs to the third floor and peer out of the windows of the bedrooms until she found the tree where the Blue Jay had prepared her nest.
After school that first day when she was five years old, Adalaide skipped home, happy to be returning to a place she felt secure and loved, only to remember, as she raced to the kitchen, that Nanny was no longer there. The new household help was an older woman with a kind face, but it wasn't Nanny. After her light snack and a 'thank you,' Adalaide went up to her room, plopped on her bed and sobbed into her pillow. She missed Nanny and somehow she felt responsible for Nanny not being at home on the first day of school.
From every viewpoint except Adalaide's she had a very normal life through her school years. She watched Mary graduate and leave home to attend college, and then Rita and Rose joined Mary at college after their graduation. Something internal always gripped Adalaide as she watched her older sisters walk down the aisle of the school auditorium to receive that rolled up piece of paper. Adalaide would later describe the intense pain as a "tearing" or a "burning up" of something deep inside her heart. There was a respite between the twins' and Mike's high school graduation. Mike was a star athlete and would be attending a university on the West Coast. Adalaide was happy and sad at the same time as she watched him walk the same aisle as her sisters had. The next two years were kind of a blur as Paul graduated and Mother and Father sorted through their accumulation of 30 years of marriage to facilitate a move from their home into Grandfather's and Grandmother's house. Mary married in between Paul's and Ned's graduations. Mother and Father gave Mary and her husband their house as a wedding present. Adalaide did not want to give up her bedroom, the sight of the old barn from her window, or the security she felt in that house. However, she never verbalized that because she did not think her parents would pay much attention to the "baby" in the family. And she was probably correct thinking that. Grandmother and Grandfather could no longer live alone and since Father was their oldest child, it fell to him to be their caretaker in their old age. It was just the way things were done and no one questioned it.
Rita and Rose graduated from college with their teaching degrees. At the very next Sunday family gathering with many of their aunts, uncles and cousins in attendance, they announced there at Grandmother's and Grandfather's house that they had both felt the call to become Religious Sisters in the Church. There were no dry eyes as everyone there gave them hugs and advice. Adalaide stepped backwards from the group and leaned against one of the old oak trees, silently sobbing. Everything seemed to be dissolving right in front of her. Her family was going away, in different directions and eventually she would be the only one left. She would be all alone, except for her parents and her aging and frail grandparents. And the waves of guilt swirled around Adalaide's mind and heart.
The year that Rita and Rose left for the Convent was the year that Ned graduated from high school. Adalaide was ten years old. Something inside her froze as she watched him eagerly walk the aisle to obtain that diploma which he always said was his first step in his plans to become a lawyer. Two days after high school graduation, Ned left for summer school at Harvard as a legacy, following in his father's footsteps but opting for law instead of banking.
And now, Adalaide was the only one at home. Well, the only child at home. Grandmother and Grandfather each had a private nurse on duty all the time. They went no where without the ladies in starched white dresses and caps gingerly watching out for them. Two parlors had been converted into bedrooms for Grandmother and Grandfather as they could no longer walk up the flight of steps as they had done for over 53 years. Adalaide had chosen one of the third-floor bedrooms for her own, much to the household help's consternation, since that meant a walk up all those steps in order to clean and bedroom and scrub a bathroom every day. She never mentioned it and Adalaide never thought anything of it, since household help were never allowed to disagree with a task unless they wished to be let go.
When Adalaide was 12, Mike graduated from college. Mother and Father took Adalaide with them to the graduation ceremony. Mike looked wonderful to Adalaide and he teased her a little asking her to ask Mother for some cookies before he had to take his place with the graduates. Watching him accept the diploma from the university president's hand gave Adalaide such a gripping fear that she nearly yelled the "NO" that was bottled up inside her chest. No one paid any attention to her plight, and she was quickly able to compose herself. At the campus wide reception after graduation, Mike introduced his parents to the agent and the coach of the Farm League he would be joining the very next day. Mike could have gone directly to the Major Leagues, but he had planned out his future and wanted to start at a Farm League. Since the Major League Team coach couldn't convince him otherwise, to keep Mike on their Team, he was accepted in their Farm League. (This turned out to be a very wise move on Mike's part. When he joined the Major League Team at the age of 25, he was the healthiest and strongest he'd ever been and he always said the reason he had no injuries during his football career was due to his having spent those early years in the Farm League.)
The next year, Paul graduated from college and was accepted at Yale where he would pursue his Master's degree before attending Yale Law School. A year later, Ned graduated from pre-med and went to the State University of New York to obtain his Master's degree before applying at Johns Hopkins Medical College.
It seemed like so short a time to Adalaide as she stared at her graduation dress in the full length mirror in her third floor bedroom since that first day of school eighteen years ago. Her parents were now 65 years old and her grandparents were now 88 years old. Time had dulled the eyesight and hearing of Grandfather and he walked in a slow shuffle, but Grandmother seemed not to have changed at all since Adalaide could recall except that she now required a wheelchair. And her parents were nearly the same as she always remembered them: busy at work or at volunteering. The household help had been replaced four or five times since Adalaide was a young child, so there was no continuity and no lasting friendships there. Her elder siblings were off doing what they believed was their life's calling. And then there was Adalaide.
At the graduation ceremonies later that day, her dress covering by her gown, that same conflicted terror gripped her heart as she started up the aisle, up the steps, took the handshake and the rolled paper representing the diploma which had been given to the class the day before, then across the stage, down the steps and into the auditorium seats, safe once again. Finally the ceremony was over, the class sang the school anthem, balloons were released, and as one, they walked back out of the auditorium to the applause of parents and friends. None of Adalaide's siblings were in attendance. She had said it was okay when each called, wishing her their best, but in her heart, it wasn't okay. Her parents were there, beaming as usual. That made her feel even worse. No one knew the terror she harbored in her heart. No one really understood her.
All through her academic career, Adalaide had made many friends, but never a best friend, although had you asked her, she could have rattled off five or six names of the girls in her class. She was more a hanger-on than friend to any of them. They invited her to come with them to various activities because all their fathers did business in Adalaide's father's bank and their parents had coached them well to "be nice to Adalaide." Now, she was a high school graduate with college in the immediate future. Adalaide had never been asked if she wanted to attend college. She was asked merely, of these five colleges, which three shall we submit your applications to?
The summer between High School Graduation and her Freshman year in College, was a blur of visiting siblings, buying clothes for college, picking out sheets and towels and bedspreads and accessories for her dorm room. But Adalaide still felt that gnawing fear but could not find words for it. One morning two weeks before she was to be driven to college, Adalaide was upstairs in her room sorting through her drawers, deciding what to toss out, what to take to college, and what to leave at home. She walked over to the third story window and looked out into the branches of one of the oak trees in the yard. A flicker caught her eye and she watched as a baby blue jay tried to jump up from the nest to the tree branch and then back into the nest. Adalaide was mesmerized by the little blue bird. "That's how I feel," she thought, "I'm not really ready to leave home, but I know I have to spread my wings and fly." Adalaide stood there for fifteen minutes or so, then saw the little bird take off and fly toward her window. Her mouth opened in horror, she watched as the bird slapped into the window pane and then slid down the window and tumble onto the roof shingles, just short of falling off the roof. Adalaide looked carefully and saw that the little blue jay was stunned and breathing. She tried to will it to get up and fly, but it only raised its head, look around and then lay its head down again.
Adalaide was caught up into the baby blue jay's plight. She carefully opened the dormer window, removed the screen and leaned out of the window to rescue the bird. The little bird was just beyond her reach. She pulled herself back into her room and looked around for something she could stand on so that she could reach farther. She pulled her rocking chair up to the window with the front of the chair barely touching the wall. Stepping over the arm of the rocking chair, she leaned out of the window and carefully pulled most of her body through the window. She reached for the little bird with her right hand, placed her left hand under the bird, gently cupping it. At the same time, she raised her feet and put her weight on her toes. Gravity pulled the front of the rocking chair forward and Adalaide's body downward.
As if in slow motion, Adalaide slid out the window and quietly tumbled the three floors down to the grassy yard below, the little blue bird safely clutched to Adalaide's breast.
Adalaide was her father's and mother's late-in-life child, her father was 47 when she was born and her mother turned 47 the day after Adalaide was born. At the time of her birth, her siblings were Ned 8, Paul 9, Mike 10, the twins, Rita and Rose 12 and Mary 13. Adalaide's grandparents were 70 the year she was born. There was only one set of grandparents for Adalaide as her maternal grandparents had passed away the year before she was born.
As soon as she could toddle and talk, the boys would allow her into their enclave behind the old barn on the property and commission her to go get cookies from their mother or permission to raid the refrigerator for bottles of juice. Mother always said yes, so the reason for having Adalaide run those errands was as much for the boys' amusements as it was for permission or cookies, which is why they never asked her to get cookies and permission on the same mission.
Now the girls, all of whom being older than the boys, looked on Adalaide as more a tag-a-long nuisance. She was their 'baby sister' and they often treated her as if she were not there or could not understand what they were saying. The oldest sister felt tender towards Adalaide, but would not try to stop her twin sisters from their teasing and tricks. Adalaide looked up to her older sisters and always felt that there must be something wrong with her because they didn't treat her as they treated each other.
Each fall until she was old enough to attend school, Adalaide would watch her sisters and brothers walk out the door on their way to school, make the turn onto the sidewalk and briskly walk the three blocks to the school complex. Although they were in different grades, her siblings all attended schools in the same educational complex. From her earliest age, she wanted to join them and walk to school too.
Adalaide's mother became involved in volunteering when Ned started Kindergarten. She had graduated college with a degree in Home Economics and put her education to good use raising the six children. Volunteering was her respite, her chance to speak to other educated adults and her way to get out of a busy but fairly happy household each week. When she had ventured out of the house to volunteer for the first time, she felt insecure because the other women seemed to know so much beyond babies and diapers and feeding schedules and household help, but it wasn't long before she, too, felt comfortable among her peers. She enjoyed her pregnancy and the birth of Adalaide, but she wasn't ready to return to the enclave of the nursery after Adalaide's birth and had employed a full-time English Nanny for Adalaide when she turned a year old.
Adalaide's father, the eldest of eight brothers, was an executive at the family's banking and insurance company. He had worked himself up from mailroom as a fourteen year old to junior executive by the time he'd graduated from college at twenty-one when he married his high school and college sweetheart. He took graduate studies while working and growing his family with children. Adalaide was his surprise and his delight. Like most executives, he worked long hours but made a point of eating the evening meal each workday with his family. Saturdays were 'his' day and he'd go to the club around ten in the morning, after having a quiet five minutes with each of his children. He would not return until the children were fed and put to bed and the household help had left until the morning, other than the housekeeper and the Nanny who each had their own small bedrooms in the house. This was his time with his wife and he never missed a Saturday evening with her.
Sundays were the day that the entire family gathered at Adalaide's grandparents' home after attending church. Grandfather and Grandmother were the patriarch and matriarch of their eight sons. They had a huge castle of a house on the highest hill in town. It was an enormous Victorian house with three full stories and an attic full of wonderful antiques, treasures to discover and a wonderful balcony outside the attic gable which faced toward the sea. All the way around the first floor was a wonderful porch with rockers and swings and plant stands overflowing with ferns. The yard in front was the scene of many games of badminton and croquet. The sides and back yards had tall oak trees which provided homes for birds and bases for games of hide and seek and tag. The attic, however, was the favorite place of all the grandchildren and although it seems impossible, every cousin could find a special space for himself and herself among all the boxes and trunks and old furniture. The grandchildren spent many happy hours in the attic as they shared their secrets, hopes and dreams with each other.
The first floor of the house was all parlors and dining room which seated all the adult children and their spouses and a kitchen big enough for a staff of three. The kitchen included a children's table with benches and room for highchairs as there seemed always to be at least one grandchild in the family in need of a highchair. The second story had four bedrooms and the third story had six more bedrooms. There was a full bathroom off of each bedroom. Grandmother's and Grandfather's bedroom was the largest and had a huge sitting room where visiting grandchildren spent the night on pallets after being read to by Grandmother and occasionally by Grandfather.
This was Adalaide's world. She was nurtured by parents and grandparents and had one of the best English Nannies on the East coast. Yet, something inside Adalaide was different from her siblings and her cousins. As she grew, she always felt "different" but had no vocabulary to explain it until later in life.
Adalaide's schooling began the year that Mary graduated from High School. No longer was she the face behind the storm door looking out at her siblings. Now she was one of them, tagging along as fast as her legs would propel her, down the walk, onto the sidewalk and three blocks to the school complex. Mother had come to the school in late summer to make all the arrangements, so Adalaide walked into the Primary School building without benefit of parent. The first day of school was the day the Nanny was 'let go' and a second housekeeper was hired. Mother was out volunteering and of course Father was at work. The first day of Kindergarten was full of noise as the teachers welcomed each child and asked them questions about themselves, such as "what's your favorite color" and "what animal do you like best" and "do you have a favorite story." The teachers were gathering information so that they could include children's favorites into the classroom lessons to help make the children's education fun and personal as well as informative. Adalaide's favorite story was Sleeping Beauty. She didn't know why. Her favorite color was sky-blue with white clouds. Adalaide's favorite animal was the Blue Jay that laid her nest high in one of Grandmother's and Grandfather's big oak trees. Each Spring, Adalaide would run up the flights of stairs to the third floor and peer out of the windows of the bedrooms until she found the tree where the Blue Jay had prepared her nest.
After school that first day when she was five years old, Adalaide skipped home, happy to be returning to a place she felt secure and loved, only to remember, as she raced to the kitchen, that Nanny was no longer there. The new household help was an older woman with a kind face, but it wasn't Nanny. After her light snack and a 'thank you,' Adalaide went up to her room, plopped on her bed and sobbed into her pillow. She missed Nanny and somehow she felt responsible for Nanny not being at home on the first day of school.
From every viewpoint except Adalaide's she had a very normal life through her school years. She watched Mary graduate and leave home to attend college, and then Rita and Rose joined Mary at college after their graduation. Something internal always gripped Adalaide as she watched her older sisters walk down the aisle of the school auditorium to receive that rolled up piece of paper. Adalaide would later describe the intense pain as a "tearing" or a "burning up" of something deep inside her heart. There was a respite between the twins' and Mike's high school graduation. Mike was a star athlete and would be attending a university on the West Coast. Adalaide was happy and sad at the same time as she watched him walk the same aisle as her sisters had. The next two years were kind of a blur as Paul graduated and Mother and Father sorted through their accumulation of 30 years of marriage to facilitate a move from their home into Grandfather's and Grandmother's house. Mary married in between Paul's and Ned's graduations. Mother and Father gave Mary and her husband their house as a wedding present. Adalaide did not want to give up her bedroom, the sight of the old barn from her window, or the security she felt in that house. However, she never verbalized that because she did not think her parents would pay much attention to the "baby" in the family. And she was probably correct thinking that. Grandmother and Grandfather could no longer live alone and since Father was their oldest child, it fell to him to be their caretaker in their old age. It was just the way things were done and no one questioned it.
Rita and Rose graduated from college with their teaching degrees. At the very next Sunday family gathering with many of their aunts, uncles and cousins in attendance, they announced there at Grandmother's and Grandfather's house that they had both felt the call to become Religious Sisters in the Church. There were no dry eyes as everyone there gave them hugs and advice. Adalaide stepped backwards from the group and leaned against one of the old oak trees, silently sobbing. Everything seemed to be dissolving right in front of her. Her family was going away, in different directions and eventually she would be the only one left. She would be all alone, except for her parents and her aging and frail grandparents. And the waves of guilt swirled around Adalaide's mind and heart.
The year that Rita and Rose left for the Convent was the year that Ned graduated from high school. Adalaide was ten years old. Something inside her froze as she watched him eagerly walk the aisle to obtain that diploma which he always said was his first step in his plans to become a lawyer. Two days after high school graduation, Ned left for summer school at Harvard as a legacy, following in his father's footsteps but opting for law instead of banking.
And now, Adalaide was the only one at home. Well, the only child at home. Grandmother and Grandfather each had a private nurse on duty all the time. They went no where without the ladies in starched white dresses and caps gingerly watching out for them. Two parlors had been converted into bedrooms for Grandmother and Grandfather as they could no longer walk up the flight of steps as they had done for over 53 years. Adalaide had chosen one of the third-floor bedrooms for her own, much to the household help's consternation, since that meant a walk up all those steps in order to clean and bedroom and scrub a bathroom every day. She never mentioned it and Adalaide never thought anything of it, since household help were never allowed to disagree with a task unless they wished to be let go.
When Adalaide was 12, Mike graduated from college. Mother and Father took Adalaide with them to the graduation ceremony. Mike looked wonderful to Adalaide and he teased her a little asking her to ask Mother for some cookies before he had to take his place with the graduates. Watching him accept the diploma from the university president's hand gave Adalaide such a gripping fear that she nearly yelled the "NO" that was bottled up inside her chest. No one paid any attention to her plight, and she was quickly able to compose herself. At the campus wide reception after graduation, Mike introduced his parents to the agent and the coach of the Farm League he would be joining the very next day. Mike could have gone directly to the Major Leagues, but he had planned out his future and wanted to start at a Farm League. Since the Major League Team coach couldn't convince him otherwise, to keep Mike on their Team, he was accepted in their Farm League. (This turned out to be a very wise move on Mike's part. When he joined the Major League Team at the age of 25, he was the healthiest and strongest he'd ever been and he always said the reason he had no injuries during his football career was due to his having spent those early years in the Farm League.)
The next year, Paul graduated from college and was accepted at Yale where he would pursue his Master's degree before attending Yale Law School. A year later, Ned graduated from pre-med and went to the State University of New York to obtain his Master's degree before applying at Johns Hopkins Medical College.
It seemed like so short a time to Adalaide as she stared at her graduation dress in the full length mirror in her third floor bedroom since that first day of school eighteen years ago. Her parents were now 65 years old and her grandparents were now 88 years old. Time had dulled the eyesight and hearing of Grandfather and he walked in a slow shuffle, but Grandmother seemed not to have changed at all since Adalaide could recall except that she now required a wheelchair. And her parents were nearly the same as she always remembered them: busy at work or at volunteering. The household help had been replaced four or five times since Adalaide was a young child, so there was no continuity and no lasting friendships there. Her elder siblings were off doing what they believed was their life's calling. And then there was Adalaide.
At the graduation ceremonies later that day, her dress covering by her gown, that same conflicted terror gripped her heart as she started up the aisle, up the steps, took the handshake and the rolled paper representing the diploma which had been given to the class the day before, then across the stage, down the steps and into the auditorium seats, safe once again. Finally the ceremony was over, the class sang the school anthem, balloons were released, and as one, they walked back out of the auditorium to the applause of parents and friends. None of Adalaide's siblings were in attendance. She had said it was okay when each called, wishing her their best, but in her heart, it wasn't okay. Her parents were there, beaming as usual. That made her feel even worse. No one knew the terror she harbored in her heart. No one really understood her.
All through her academic career, Adalaide had made many friends, but never a best friend, although had you asked her, she could have rattled off five or six names of the girls in her class. She was more a hanger-on than friend to any of them. They invited her to come with them to various activities because all their fathers did business in Adalaide's father's bank and their parents had coached them well to "be nice to Adalaide." Now, she was a high school graduate with college in the immediate future. Adalaide had never been asked if she wanted to attend college. She was asked merely, of these five colleges, which three shall we submit your applications to?
The summer between High School Graduation and her Freshman year in College, was a blur of visiting siblings, buying clothes for college, picking out sheets and towels and bedspreads and accessories for her dorm room. But Adalaide still felt that gnawing fear but could not find words for it. One morning two weeks before she was to be driven to college, Adalaide was upstairs in her room sorting through her drawers, deciding what to toss out, what to take to college, and what to leave at home. She walked over to the third story window and looked out into the branches of one of the oak trees in the yard. A flicker caught her eye and she watched as a baby blue jay tried to jump up from the nest to the tree branch and then back into the nest. Adalaide was mesmerized by the little blue bird. "That's how I feel," she thought, "I'm not really ready to leave home, but I know I have to spread my wings and fly." Adalaide stood there for fifteen minutes or so, then saw the little bird take off and fly toward her window. Her mouth opened in horror, she watched as the bird slapped into the window pane and then slid down the window and tumble onto the roof shingles, just short of falling off the roof. Adalaide looked carefully and saw that the little blue jay was stunned and breathing. She tried to will it to get up and fly, but it only raised its head, look around and then lay its head down again.
Adalaide was caught up into the baby blue jay's plight. She carefully opened the dormer window, removed the screen and leaned out of the window to rescue the bird. The little bird was just beyond her reach. She pulled herself back into her room and looked around for something she could stand on so that she could reach farther. She pulled her rocking chair up to the window with the front of the chair barely touching the wall. Stepping over the arm of the rocking chair, she leaned out of the window and carefully pulled most of her body through the window. She reached for the little bird with her right hand, placed her left hand under the bird, gently cupping it. At the same time, she raised her feet and put her weight on her toes. Gravity pulled the front of the rocking chair forward and Adalaide's body downward.
As if in slow motion, Adalaide slid out the window and quietly tumbled the three floors down to the grassy yard below, the little blue bird safely clutched to Adalaide's breast.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Want better behaved children?
A new study from Mississippi State University explains that children with religious parents are better behaved and adjusted than other children.
Monday, April 23, 2007
Another Border Agent to be Prosecuted
Why is President Bush providing protection of UNLAWFUL criminal immigrants who try to enter the USofA via Mexico by prosecuting Border Agents who are doing their jobs?
Why is he touting an Amnesty Bill that will provide more Border Agents if he's going to allow Border Agents to be prosecuted for doing their jobs?
US CITIZENS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO SHOOT TO KILL AND APOLOGIZE FOR THE COLLATERAL DAMAGE, BECAUSE NO ONE HAS A RIGHT TO BREAK A LAW TO ENTER THE USofA!
There is a lawful way and an unlawful way to enter the USofA. If someone chooses the unlawful way, he or she becomes a TARGET. If someone chooses the lawful way, he or she becomes a "green card" holder.
Take your pick before you enter the USofA and live with the consequences!
Why is he touting an Amnesty Bill that will provide more Border Agents if he's going to allow Border Agents to be prosecuted for doing their jobs?
US CITIZENS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO SHOOT TO KILL AND APOLOGIZE FOR THE COLLATERAL DAMAGE, BECAUSE NO ONE HAS A RIGHT TO BREAK A LAW TO ENTER THE USofA!
There is a lawful way and an unlawful way to enter the USofA. If someone chooses the unlawful way, he or she becomes a TARGET. If someone chooses the lawful way, he or she becomes a "green card" holder.
Take your pick before you enter the USofA and live with the consequences!
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Violence and Gender Orientation
Political scientist Francis Fukuyama believes the common denominator between the terrorist suicide bomber and the suicidal mass murderer is their sexual frustration and gender.
Suicide bombers and the Virginia Tech killer, Fukuyama suggests,
Well, it's not Bush's fault after all. It's women's fault. If at first you can't fault Bush, fault women.
It is a LOT of people's fault but ultimately, it's Seung Hui Cho's own fault. He wasn't created a mass-murderer. He allowed himself to evolve into one.
There are thousands and perhaps millions of children who mirror Seung Hui Cho and who will not transpose into mass-murderers. What's so 'special' about him?
You want special; I'll give you special! Everyone of the real victims, the students and teachers at Virginia Tech, are special. Whether they survived or died, they are the lives and the personhoods we honor, memorialize, and respect. They are the innocents. They blame no one for their being at Virginia Tech and in Norris Hall for classes last Monday. And they rightly blame Seung Hui Cho for nurturing murder in his heart until it spilled over and contaminated their lives with his poison. The wound will be cleansed with the tears of the living. As the dead are laid to rest and the living are discharged from the hospitals, the healing has begun.
If you wish to lay blame, lay it at Seung Hui Cho's feet. That's right where it belongs. How can I make such a statement? Cho gave himself away with the purchase of the guns, ammo and magazines for reloading. He premeditated his murderous rampage and his suicide rather than be caught.
The saddest part of his scheme is that the bullet he saved for himself should have been the first one he shot.
“It really is young men between 15 and 30 who are responsible the vast majority of crimes, although it is politically incorrect to say this too loudly,”he says.
Suicide bombers and the Virginia Tech killer, Fukuyama suggests,
“fall into the same demographic of young males, a lot of whom are unemployed, without a clear place in the social hierarchy. These guys have the most to gain and the least to lose by martyrdom”.And often, he adds, they are upset about girls
“whose attention they can’t get”.
Well, it's not Bush's fault after all. It's women's fault. If at first you can't fault Bush, fault women.
It is a LOT of people's fault but ultimately, it's Seung Hui Cho's own fault. He wasn't created a mass-murderer. He allowed himself to evolve into one.
There are thousands and perhaps millions of children who mirror Seung Hui Cho and who will not transpose into mass-murderers. What's so 'special' about him?
You want special; I'll give you special! Everyone of the real victims, the students and teachers at Virginia Tech, are special. Whether they survived or died, they are the lives and the personhoods we honor, memorialize, and respect. They are the innocents. They blame no one for their being at Virginia Tech and in Norris Hall for classes last Monday. And they rightly blame Seung Hui Cho for nurturing murder in his heart until it spilled over and contaminated their lives with his poison. The wound will be cleansed with the tears of the living. As the dead are laid to rest and the living are discharged from the hospitals, the healing has begun.
If you wish to lay blame, lay it at Seung Hui Cho's feet. That's right where it belongs. How can I make such a statement? Cho gave himself away with the purchase of the guns, ammo and magazines for reloading. He premeditated his murderous rampage and his suicide rather than be caught.
The saddest part of his scheme is that the bullet he saved for himself should have been the first one he shot.
Friday, April 20, 2007
As I said . . . it's a myth! And Kyoto MUST be stopped!
John Stossel of ABC News explains why the Media continue to promote the global warming myth . . . because it's financially rewarding.
And what about the Kyoto Treaty?
So why do liberals, leftists and the mainstream media continue to support Kyoto and the myth they call global warming? It makes headlines, it scares children, it creates a smoke screen so that people like Al Gore can purchase carbon off-sets and still use as much energy as he wants. It creates hypocrites out of the Kennedys who claim they promote wind farms but do not want one near their property or in their line of sight in Nantucket Sound.
And what about the Kyoto Treaty?
Eighty percent of the world's energy comes from fossil fuels. Kyoto would decimate just about every Third World country's economy, and deliver a catastrophic blow to our own.
Far better to keep studying global warming, let the science develop and adjust to it if it happens, rather than wreck life as we know it by trying to stop it.
So why do liberals, leftists and the mainstream media continue to support Kyoto and the myth they call global warming? It makes headlines, it scares children, it creates a smoke screen so that people like Al Gore can purchase carbon off-sets and still use as much energy as he wants. It creates hypocrites out of the Kennedys who claim they promote wind farms but do not want one near their property or in their line of sight in Nantucket Sound.
Armor and Thompson on Gun Control
John Armor practiced in the US Supreme Court for 33 years. John_Armor@aya.yale.edu He lives in the 11th District of North Carolina.
Let me explain the dynamics of “gun control.” I’ll do this in terms so clear that even Senator Barbara Boxer has a chance of understanding it. People who decide to shoot other people don’t give a cr*p about laws against murder. Obviously, they don’t give a cr*p about any laws on something as trivial as possessing a gun.
Therefore, ‘gun control” laws which makes it harder to buy, carry or use a gun, will have zero influence on those intending to murder their fellow citizens. If Senator Boxer wanted to find out how easy it is to get guns illegally, she should talk to police who are experienced in the weaponry available for cash on the barrel head, near any California high school, especially but not solely in the rough sections of town.
“Gun control” the way it is conceived and practiced by the likes of Senator Boxer means taking guns away from law-abiding citizens, and guaranteeing the criminals that they can ply their trade in a free-fire zone. Gun control, properly practiced, means take a wide stance, use both hands, “aim small to miss small,” and squeeze, don’t pull, the trigger.
Fred Thompson comments on Gun Control. Fred Thompson is an actor and former United States Senator from Tennessee.
The statistics are clear. Communities that recognize and grant Second Amendment rights to responsible adults have a significantly lower incidence of violent crime than those that do not. More to the point, incarcerated criminals tell criminologists that they consider local gun laws when they decide what sort of crime they will commit, and where they will do so.
So Virginians asked their legislators to change the university's "concealed carry" policy to exempt people 21 years of age or older who have passed background checks and taken training classes. The university, however, lobbied against that bill, and a top administrator subsequently praised the legislature for blocking the measure.
The logic behind this attitude baffles me, but I suspect it has to do with a basic difference in worldviews. Some people think that power should exist only at the top, and everybody else should rely on "the authorities" for protection.
Many other universities have been swayed by an anti-gun, anti-self defense ideology. I respect their right to hold those views, but I challenge their decision to deny Americans the right to protect themselves on their campuses — and then proudly advertise that fact to any and all.
Guns do not kill, PEOPLE kill
Two opposing views over at Fox News dot com regarding the gun issue as related to the Virginia Tech shootings.
Tom Plate states:
Now, excuse me if I appear confused, but I've never seen a 9mm handgun get up out of its case, load itself and then take aim and fire at a human being. Has Tom Plate? If so, do we need to concern ourselves with his mental health? Tom Plate was robbed at gun point recently. Perhaps he does need to sit down with a counselor and work through this trauma.
Ted Nugent states:
Had there not been a 'gun-free zone' at Virginia Tech, someone legally carrying a firearm could have disabled Cho Seung-Hui, possibly before he even got one shot fired. It is people such as Tom Plate and those who support the Brady Act who are indirectly responsible for Cho Seung-Hui's rampage with a gun. There were plenty of students available to stop Cho, but none of them were allowed to carry their guns on campus!
Gun free zones do not protect the innocent, they merely mean that the innocents are targets of someone with an evil mind and loaded firearm.
Tom Plate states:
These students were not killed by a Korean, they were killed by a 9 mm handgun and a .22-caliber handgun.
Now, excuse me if I appear confused, but I've never seen a 9mm handgun get up out of its case, load itself and then take aim and fire at a human being. Has Tom Plate? If so, do we need to concern ourselves with his mental health? Tom Plate was robbed at gun point recently. Perhaps he does need to sit down with a counselor and work through this trauma.
Ted Nugent states:
Evil is as evil does, and laws disarming guaranteed victims make evil people very, very happy. Shame on us.
Already spineless gun control advocates are squawking like chickens with their tiny-brained heads chopped off, making political hay over this most recent, devastating Virginia Tech massacre, when in fact it is their own forced gun-free zone policy that enabled the unchallenged methodical murder of 32 people.
Thirty-two people dead on a U.S. college campus pursuing their American Dream, mowed-down over an extended period of time by a lone, non-American gunman in illegal possession of a firearm on campus in defiance of a zero-tolerance gun law.
Had there not been a 'gun-free zone' at Virginia Tech, someone legally carrying a firearm could have disabled Cho Seung-Hui, possibly before he even got one shot fired. It is people such as Tom Plate and those who support the Brady Act who are indirectly responsible for Cho Seung-Hui's rampage with a gun. There were plenty of students available to stop Cho, but none of them were allowed to carry their guns on campus!
Gun free zones do not protect the innocent, they merely mean that the innocents are targets of someone with an evil mind and loaded firearm.
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Thoughts about Virginia Tech
Liviu Librescu, a Holocaust Survivor, was one of the 32 murdered by Cho Seung-Hui on Monday morning at Virginia Tech.
Professor Librescu did something so courageous and awesome that it brings me to tears when I recall it. He gave his life so that his students would be saved. Would you be willing to die if someone else got to live because you died?
I pray that his memory will live forever among students at Virginia Tech. I pray that his family is comforted by his gift to his students.
If you haven't read about this hero, please click the link and read about him and all the others. Honor his memory in some way this week.
And if you're so inclined, respond and tell me what you did to honor Liviu Librescu.
Pace e Bene.
Professor Librescu did something so courageous and awesome that it brings me to tears when I recall it. He gave his life so that his students would be saved. Would you be willing to die if someone else got to live because you died?
I pray that his memory will live forever among students at Virginia Tech. I pray that his family is comforted by his gift to his students.
If you haven't read about this hero, please click the link and read about him and all the others. Honor his memory in some way this week.
And if you're so inclined, respond and tell me what you did to honor Liviu Librescu.
Pace e Bene.
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Blacksburg, Virginia
I drove up I-81 today and passed the exit to Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, VA. I wanted to stop, but didn't think I should interrupt their healing process since I am a stranger and have no connection to the school. However, I did stop at a Cracker Barrel and pick up a VT cap to wear in the memory and honor of those who died and were injured on Monday.
Comments I want to make:
1-The Media needs to ask themselves what it accomplishes to second guess Va Tech authorities' decisions after the first murders at the dorm. It is the Media who are causing the uninvolved vultures to circle and to ask the most anti-social, uncouth, indecorous questions of the hospitalized victims, their families and the uninformed, disconnected to Va Tech public. PULLLEASE! Give it a rest and work at becoming Journalists instead of Gossip Columnists.
2-Anyone who has even thought "why God?" or who blames God for what happened at Va Tech doesn't know God very well. If you read what is being reported, Cho Seung-Hui had numerous occasions to obtain the mental health counseling he needed. Cho is responsible for his own actions. Va Tech is not responsible for Cho's actions. His professors are not responsible for Cho's actions. Cho's classmates are not responsible for Cho's actions. Other students aware of Cho's existence at Va Tech are not responsible for Cho's actions. CHO SEUNG-HUI IS RESPONSIBLE FOR HIS OWN ACTIONS! I don't care who tells you otherwise! Professors did all they could reasonably do to get Cho to accept the fact that he needed mental health counseling. It was CHO who failed to work with the counselors.
3-CHO put on his "normal person persona" when he purchased the Glock 19 a month before the shootings. There was nothing remarkable about the purchase. There is no reason to blame the gun for the shooter's trigger finger. He could have used a machete or a baseball bat. Would the media rush to demonize machetes and baseball bats if that had been his weapon of choice?
I'll have more to say on this subject later this week.
In the meantime, pray for the families who are affected by this tragedy. Pray for other young men and young women who may copy-cat Cho Seung-Hui's actions. Pray that any copy-cat will obtain mental health counseling and work with the counselors to overcome their anger and depression.
Comments I want to make:
1-The Media needs to ask themselves what it accomplishes to second guess Va Tech authorities' decisions after the first murders at the dorm. It is the Media who are causing the uninvolved vultures to circle and to ask the most anti-social, uncouth, indecorous questions of the hospitalized victims, their families and the uninformed, disconnected to Va Tech public. PULLLEASE! Give it a rest and work at becoming Journalists instead of Gossip Columnists.
2-Anyone who has even thought "why God?" or who blames God for what happened at Va Tech doesn't know God very well. If you read what is being reported, Cho Seung-Hui had numerous occasions to obtain the mental health counseling he needed. Cho is responsible for his own actions. Va Tech is not responsible for Cho's actions. His professors are not responsible for Cho's actions. Cho's classmates are not responsible for Cho's actions. Other students aware of Cho's existence at Va Tech are not responsible for Cho's actions. CHO SEUNG-HUI IS RESPONSIBLE FOR HIS OWN ACTIONS! I don't care who tells you otherwise! Professors did all they could reasonably do to get Cho to accept the fact that he needed mental health counseling. It was CHO who failed to work with the counselors.
3-CHO put on his "normal person persona" when he purchased the Glock 19 a month before the shootings. There was nothing remarkable about the purchase. There is no reason to blame the gun for the shooter's trigger finger. He could have used a machete or a baseball bat. Would the media rush to demonize machetes and baseball bats if that had been his weapon of choice?
I'll have more to say on this subject later this week.
In the meantime, pray for the families who are affected by this tragedy. Pray for other young men and young women who may copy-cat Cho Seung-Hui's actions. Pray that any copy-cat will obtain mental health counseling and work with the counselors to overcome their anger and depression.
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
No More Amnesty!
ONE -
TWO -
What is so hard for our government to understand about the American voters’ wishes? No on amnesty, no on guest workers, and yes on deporting illegals. That is the correct wording, illegal aliens. Not 'Undocumented Workers’ or ‘Undocumented Citizens' ---they are illegal aliens.
And what is so hard for our government to comprehend about the word "Illegal", Adj. Unlawful, against the law? "Alien", Adverb: relating, belonging, or owing allegiance to another country. Another simple word.
TWO -
AMNESTY means never having immigration enforcement!
Those 'undocumented' are actually 'highly documented' with fraudulent documents our government readily accepts.
Calling an illegal alien an undocumented immigrant is like calling a burglar an uninvited house guest.
Sunday, April 15, 2007
The Boston Globe's failure to comprehend
Op-Ed piece by Robert Kuttner states in the body of the article:
Jimmy Carter, the most conservative Democrat since Grover Cleveland.Now, I wasn't around when Grover Cleveland was POTUS (1885-1889 and 1893-1897) but somehow Mr Kuttner missed this information about President Grover Cleveland:
Cleveland vigorously pursued a policy barring special favors to any economic group. Vetoing a bill to appropriate $10,000 to distribute seed grain among drought-stricken farmers in Texas, he wrote: "Federal aid in such cases encourages the expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character. . . . "
This from a Democrat President? Lyndon Johnson was a Democrat President (1963-1969).
The Great Society program became Johnson's agenda for Congress in January 1965: aid to education, attack on disease, Medicare, urban renewal, beautification, conservation, development of depressed regions, a wide-scale fight against poverty, control and prevention of crime and delinquency . . . .Was President Lyndon Johnson unaware of President Cleveland's statement on "paternal care?"
Unfortunately the Democrat Party and those in office, hold to a "take from those who have and give to those who have not" philosophy. As stated by Mr Kuttner:
We would restore taxation based on ability to pay and use the proceeds to create a more secure America of broad opportunity.
Can someone explain why the middle-class end up paying more than their "fair share" every time this phrase is used to promote "tax reform" or "progressive tax reform?" Why is it that the rich have loopholes and the poor don't earn enough but the middle-class pays the bills? The Democrats would do themselves a favor by studying President Cleveland and taking his statement quoted above as part of their agenda.
So will they put up Crucifixes for Christians?
A Dutch police station trying to help Muslim detainees face Mecca for their prayers painted arrows in cells pointing East.
Originally the arrows pointed West, but the gaffe was immediately corrected. So what happens to those prayers prayed by the Muslims who faced the incorrect direction? How many of their 72 Virgins will be forfeited?
And what about other religious cultures? Crosses or crucifixes for Christians? Or is this religious discrimination, once again with a bias toward the "religion of torture and terror"?
God help us all.
Originally the arrows pointed West, but the gaffe was immediately corrected. So what happens to those prayers prayed by the Muslims who faced the incorrect direction? How many of their 72 Virgins will be forfeited?
And what about other religious cultures? Crosses or crucifixes for Christians? Or is this religious discrimination, once again with a bias toward the "religion of torture and terror"?
God help us all.
Islam is "Faith (Thought) Police" in Malaysia
Fox news reports:
It starts small and then it grows and become insidious. What? Islam, Muhammadanism, "submission" to terroristic threats. And in the end? The USofA doesn't exist. This is why your participation in the right of every US Citizen to vote is so important in 2008!
A Malaysian state has closed down a museum exhibition on ghosts, ghouls and supernatural beings after Islamic clerics claimed it was detrimental to Muslims' faith . . . .
Some 60 percent of this Southeast Asian (Malaysia) country's 26 million people are Muslims, who are subject to Islamic laws and fatwa council edicts even if they have not been enshrined in national or Islamic Sharia law.
Abdul Shukor Husin, chairman of the fatwa council which advises the government on Islamic regulations, said spirits and supernatural beings involved the "invisible world" and were beyond the comprehension of the human mind.
It starts small and then it grows and become insidious. What? Islam, Muhammadanism, "submission" to terroristic threats. And in the end? The USofA doesn't exist. This is why your participation in the right of every US Citizen to vote is so important in 2008!
Fred Dalton Thompson for POTUS in 2008!
Islam Coexist? Muhammed said "Never!"
Patriots For Action dot org
