He Picked the Wrong Cereal!

Yesterday was not Larry Krueger's day.

The San Francisco talk show host stumbled upon not one, but two new ways of offending people and will certainly lose his job as soon as the caterwauling becomes shrill enough or congress gets involved--whichever comes first.

In the same commentary where he coined the ethnic slur, "Caribbean" (see previous post), he tried to improve upon the common metaphor, "his brain is mush," used to describe someone who doesn't think clearly.

Instead of the word "mush," Krueger got fancy and used the actual name of an actual mush, Cream of Wheat, when describing Giants' Manager Felipe Alou's brain.

He picked the wrong cereal.

Cream of Wheat packages have the picture of a smiling black chef offering up a bowl of steaming cereal to entice us. Apparently Krueger saying, "You have a manager in Felipe whose mind has turned to Cream of Wheat" is some sort of code for "Felipe Alou looks like that subservient black fellow on the box of Cream of Wheat.

Good thing he didn't use Count Chocula.

He could simply have said that Alou was a Fruit Loop--that's a cereal. And come to think of it, Fruit Loops have the advantage of being many different colors. They have diversity, yeah! You could call into question a persons mental processes and imply that they are part of the rainbow coalition all at the same time! Not to mention that a toucan is part of the rain forest.

It seems that Mr. Krueger needs to attend some sort of sensitivity class for serial offenders. Maybe local supermarkets could expand their businesses by conducting such classes right there in the cereal aisle. Certainly if you are going to be in radio you would need to know all the various connotations of foods in your grain group.

I wonder what would it have meant if he used Quaker Oats Instant Oatmeal as his mush of choice. Wouldn't it be more offensive for a Dominican to be called an old white guy with a wig?

Somehow I don't think anyone would have even noticed if that was the cereal he picked.

Update: Surprisingly, Larry Krueger was fired today.

"Caribbean" is an "Ethnic Slur"?

To be sure, it probably wasn't a wise thing to say if you live or work in the Socialist Republic of San Francisco.

Larry Krueger of the San Francisco Giants' flagship station KNBR is under fire today after criticizing the style of play common among players from certain Latin American countries. Angry at the team's play, he cited the "brain-dead Caribbean hitters swinging at slop nightly" as one of the club's problems.

Apparently, you can add "Caribbean" to the list of "unapproved" adjectives in the Bay Area. Not only is it dangerous to discuss religion and politics, but hitting characteristics of ballplayers from certain geographical regions are taboo too.

Apologizing for KNBR, Senior Vice President Tony Salvadore said that the station takes offense that Kreuger "defamed our Latin players with an ethnic slur."

Move aside, n-word, there's a new slur in town: the c-word. Go ahead, you can call someone "brain dead," but don't dare call them "Caribbean".

What the knee-jerk slur police are missing in this case is that Krueger was simply criticizing a style of play that he felt was not working for the struggling Giants. Players from the region are brought up in systems where they are trained to be free swingers, just as players on the Oakland A's, for example, are trained in a farm system that emphasizes plate discipline and the value of working the count.

If Krueger were an A's talk show host, would it be alright for him to pin blame on players from that farm system who take too many pitches? Of course it would! Why then can't he say something negative about a group of players whose training emphasizes an aggressive style of hitting?

In fact, it is certain that he would not be in any trouble today if he just left out the word, "Caribbean". He could have said that the team had "brain dead hitters who swing at slop nightly." Would it be better to criticise the whole lineup instead of being more specific? Apparently so.

So far they say Krueger will not lose his job. Yeah, right.

Irony of all Ironies!

Okay, so I exaggerate a bit, but what I describe below is at least worthy of mention on one of those "Murphy's Law" posters.

My family does not have the neatness gene. We've all heard the old line about "being a one-legged man in a butt-kicking contest." Well, that is about the scope of the disadvantage I find myself in when it comes to keeping our family van clean.

It seems that no matter how often I grab trash out of the car after using it, there is still mounds of trash there the next time I get in. The problem is simple math: one person takes trash out of the car and five people put it in--there is no way I can win against those numbers.

So I had this plastic Target soft drink cup in my car (the clean one). The day I bought this drink at Target the drink machines stopped working after I had poured but three-slurps worth of my slurpee-like drink. Right then and there I vowed to right this injustice by saving the cup and getting what was rightfully mine on my next trip.

That was today. When I reached for the backseat cupholder where I had placed the cup, I came up empty-handed. Since this is no trifling matter to me, I called my wife on my cell to ask her if she had seen my cup. Well, you guessed it. My wife--who only takes old cups out of her cupholders when there are none available to use for new drinks--helpfully removed the trash from my car, leaving me slurpee-less.

Make that Murphy's Law number whatever: If you are saving something that is valuable only to you, someone will turn neat freak at precisely the wrong time.

Why I Should be in the NBA

I really want to play in the NBA. I have no skills, I'm past my prime (a prime that, sadly, included no skills either), and I don't have the time to work out in an attempt to develop some skills; still,I really want to play in the NBA. Isn't that good enough?

Is it outrageous that in spite of my total lack of apptitude I am not able to play the sport I love? I bet Modesto, California's Karen Cox would be on my side--she might even vote me onto the all-star team.

How do I know? Well, Karen wrote a letter to The Modesto Bee in support of 8th graders who fail their U.S. Constitution test. It seems that failing said test--a requirement for graduation--bars one from "walking the stage." These kids are not special ed, but do have some learning disabilities that make it difficult for them to pass the test. According to Karen, there needs to be "respect for individual differences" and an end to discrimination in Modesto City Schools.

Here, here! I've got some "individual differences" that separate me from the typical NBA player: I'm only 6-feet tall, can't dribble, can't shoot, and certainly can't jump. What kind of country do we live in where somebody with little or no talent is systematically denied the same opportunities as elite world-class athletes? I am ashamed to be an American!

I want to come out 100% behind Karen's proposal to give non-graduates the same benefits as graduates; after all, we're all different and different is good, it's just that we all deserve the right to use our differences to be considered the same. See you in the NBA!

Wendy's Chili tale just tip of finger, er, iceberg.

As most of blog-reading America chokes on the sordid tidbit about the finger for hire, the ever-growing mental and moral underclass of this country undoubtedly chortles its approval at the near success of the dirty trick that took more than a few digits off of Wendy's sales totals for two months.

In our whatever-you-can-get-away-with culture, Anna Anaya and her family are the modern equivalent of a band of gypsies, playing us all for every ill-gotten cent they can. The Las Vegas woman's near-miss screwing of Wendy's would be as funny as it is disgusting if these people were an aberration, but even "decent" folks these days are unabashedly "working the system" any way they can.

Even people who have neither seen nor heard of shows like Jackass and Viva La Bam have experienced the trickle down immorality and disrespect that is infecting this nation. The Springer-ization of our culture flashes big when we learn about the lady giving the finger to Wendy's, but millions of other people do the same thing every day without any headlines.

You only have to work retail for a short time to see just how dishonest and low people can be in their everyday dealings. We're not talking out-and-out thiefs--though there is plenty of that--but supposedly upstanding citizens who think nothing of socking it to the retailer with their lies and deception.

There's the nicely-dressed couple who very clearly and deliberately order new windows "with grids" at Home Depot, only to insist later that they didn't want grids; later, they complain and scream enough that they get them for half price. On the off chance that screaming and yelling doesn't get them what they want, they just refuse the windows and purchase them at a fraction of the real cost when they appear later in the clearance bin.

Or how about the nice old lady who orders a whole new kitchen of cabinets and decides later that she doesn't like the grain in the natural maple that she picked out. After ordering new drawer and cabinet fronts three times to find a bunch that met her liking, she finally demands and receives her $10,000 back.

And here's one: A customer gets a whole new hardwood floor installed at the store's expense because he insisted that the installer put in the original floor in a manner contrary to the manufacturer's recommendation. The installer and the store told him it wouldn't work, he pitched a fit and demanded they do it anyway, he signed a disclaimer putting the responsibility squarely on him, then pitched another fit to get a new floor when it turned out the store and the installer were right.

I could go on! (Help me out, do you have some more examples?) Suffice it to say, customers are lying dogs. You can tell that they are lying when they open their mouths. So just because you don't know anyone who used a finger to try to extort some cash, don't assume that the general public is any different.

The Attack of the Knuckleheads

Where have we gone wrong in this society where it is generally accepted that a paying customer has the right to be rude, obnoxious, and hurtful?

From the frustrated shopper who mercilessly unloads on the minimum wage cashier at Home Depot, to the fan who purposely picks seats with a night of verbal harassment in mind, the leeway we have given because “the customer is always right” has gotten to be a bit too much; customers in America have been given so much power that they treat the hired help as something less than human.

Just look at the reactions to Friday’s NBA brawl. In a nutshell, most of the response has been: players bad, fans good. Certainly the players should not have gone into the stands to fight and deserve to be punished severely, but let’s have some consequences for the fans too. If I am the D.A. in that town I examine every available video tape and prosecute anyone who so much as threw a popcorn container that night.

And I must confess that I love how that knucklehead in the Pistons jersey got clocked--more than once--when he walked menacingly toward players on the court. I really think he got what he deserved. I am not advocating violence (I don’t think I’ve hit anyone since I was 12), but there is a measure of satisfaction in seeing knuckleheads getting their just desserts.

Sadly though, even this pummeling will be the highlight of the knucklehead’s life and he will wear it as a badge of honor. There will probably be a large cash settlement and tons of media attention thrown his way, while the players he goaded into defending themselves may be banned from the NBA for life. Years from now, Mr. Knucklehead will be showing that video to his knucklehead grand kids.

When I worked at Home Depot I always said that I wished I had a hidden camera to show the world how poorly customers actually treat people. Now we have a video on how the customers in Detroit acted, and all we hear about are the big bad thugs in the NBA--it’s just not right.

I say we hold people equally accountable for their actions, whether they make millions or they throw things at people who make millions.

If You Have an Erection for Over Four Hours...

Can someone please tell me what all the screaming and shouting is about over the Monday Night Football Promo? Since when is it out of the ordinary to feature sex on television?

Don't get me wrong. I would have been DIVING for that remote had my children been watching MNF with me last Monday night. It is ridiculous that we are constantly bombarded with the sleazy values of Hollywood. But as bad as it has become, I find it interesting that NOW someone is getting upset about it. Why is that?

There has been plenty to be upset about for a long time. One of my favorite (meaning I hate it the most) groping-for-the-remote-and-singing-loudly-moments are the many ads for Viagra, Cialis and other "erectile dysfunction/ enhancement" products. I am waiting for the moment when one of my younger kids ask me what it means when they say, "If you have an erection for more than four hours, seek immediate medical attention." Okay...

Anyway, my bottom line here is that there is way to much sex on TV. I am hoping that the outcry over the MNF promo will spill over to some of the other problems that normal (not thinking about sex 24/7) families face on the tube.

Does America Have a New Attitude?

The old adage, "Attitude is everything," seems to have taken on another meaning these days. The idea that you can achieve more success with a good attitude in life, work, and school has morphed into the newer idea that having a bad attitude is much more cool and useful.

And nowadays, having that edgy "attitude" is celebrated in many walks of life, from the world of music and entertainment, to the everyday folks who emulate those puffed up icons. Nice guys don't just finish last anymore, they don't even get noticed. If you're not in-your-face outrageous, rude, crude, and profane, then you'll have a hard time even registering on the radar of popular culture.

In a world where the adjective, "extreme," is attached for marketing purposes to a wide range of products and services, plain old "nice" just doesn't cut it anymore. Take the gym down the street that just reopened under the banner "Extreme Family Fitness." Or how about the fact that on any given day I can eat "ExtremeDude Beef Jerky," watch the video show "Max X" (for extreme), and even participate in extreme ironing? Even the technical, nerdy type has gotten in on the action as is evidenced by the multiple websites touting "extreme" programming. Nothing good can be normal, it's got to be normal with attitude--extreme normal.

And don't look now, but even the girl next door is a bitch--and that is one of her good points. Whether proclaiming it from her license plate frame or on the profile of her blog, sweetness and nice has now become anger and vice as the attitude of the fairer sex has had an extreme makeover. Just a quick surf around the blogosphere will reveal multiple women who revel in their bitchiness and wear the title with honor. What once was a term of derision, has now become a selling point in a world were attitude has taken a turn for the worse.

But certainly America has always loved its rebels--Frank Sinatra, James Dean, and the Fonz come to mind--but there has always been a place for the polite, the sweet, the innocent, the cuddly, and the cute--until now. Suddenly the only people who are "suspect" are the ones not considered police suspects. Our culture loves to distrust the goody two-shoes of the world and celebrate the bad and the ugly.

Who, for instance, is more detested than all-around clean-cut good guy Jeff Gordon of NASCAR fame? Whoops, not any more, it looks like he is more marketable and accepted now that he's screwed up and been involved in a messy divorce. And of course we hate Martha Stewart for her lack of tattoos and her pretty table settings--boy, are we glad she got what she had coming to her.

It seems that while the behavior of the truly outrageous is ignored with a "judge not lest you be judged" attitude, gleeful ambulance chasers line up 'round the block for a chance to find flaws in the previously flawless, or to bring down somebody's hero.

And without saying that TV was ever a force for good in the world, it is hard to not notice that "The Waltons" and "The Brady Bunch" have become "The Simpsons" and "South Park." At least in simpler days the idiot box just wasted our brains, now the same medium regularly turns them to toxic waste.

And speaking of inspiration, we've all seen in the school room or the board room the professional-looking poster with the solitary drop of water making ring after ring of ripples in pretty blue water that reads, "Attitude: A small thing that makes a big difference."

Maybe an updated version should be a close-up of a gnarly face, tongue stuck out with a tiny, shiny circle piercing the pure pinkness and reading, "Attitude: A small ring that makes a big difference."

The Difference Between Elephants and Donkeys

What do you tell people who want to know the difference between the parties? Are you of the opinion that there is no difference worth mentioning, or could you stand on your soap box for hours on this topic? Personally, I think there are many profound differences between Republicans and Democrats, but they are not always easy to explain in stark, clear-cut terms.

I ask because last week before the election my students asked me what the difference was. At the time I refused to comment because it was not part of my lesson plan and they were just trying to get out of the work they were supposed to be doing. What would you tell junior high students if you had but one shot to make the differences very clear to them?

Here’s my example to get us started:

When the Administration approved a rebate of $600 for many working families in the Summer of 2003, Democrats were upset because low income families who paid no taxes would not get a refund on the taxes they didn’t pay.

I often struggle to hit the bull's-eye of my students’ understanding zone, but I did not have to point out to them the bizarreness of wanting to refund money to people who paid no money in the first place.

Anyway, that is my example of the difference between the parties. I am very interested in hearing examples from people on both sides of the aisle as each of us will probably be made to look silly for different reasons. In an effort to be more balanced, if I think of an example that makes Republicans look silly I certainly will post it. I know such things exist.

The Saddest Thing About this Election

By far the most amazing thing about the recently completed Battle Royal that we call a national election is that seemingly scads of people based their ultimate pick on a very dubious source--"Fahrenheit 9/11."

That I personally spoke with many people who punched a ballot based on Michael Moore's "monsterpiece" is just mind boggling to me. People can (and will) argue until the next election about the film, but reasonable people have got to admit (but won't) that this mass-marketed celluloid rumor had little basis in truth. Heck, one would do just as well to consult "The Weekly World News" for reliable information!

But wait. People do actually believe the libelous tabloids for their facts and that is what Michael Moore and the democrats who pretend to believe the film were counting on. People who were voting for Kerry because they believe in the policies of the Democratic Party didn't need a faux documentary to make their decision. People who have no clue about what goes on in this world will believe anything, especially if it is released on a limited edition DVD.

What might Tuesday's result have been had this film not been available for free on the internet the day before the election and shown on various cable networks to get one last good mass brain-washing before the big date?

There is no shame in voting for your party and its principles; shame abounds if you have no idea what either party stands for, but vote anyway based on a clever marketing campaign masked as a documentary. Extra shame for you if you know deep down that the source is dubious, but choose to cite it anyway hoping to fool the foolish.

Not that the Truth Matters to Anyone but...

As was heartily recommended to me by Gary from "What's Happening to my America?" I have been using factcheck.org to see what shenanigans the candidates have been pulling during the campaign. Gary offered this site as a resource for making sure we make well-informed decisions.

It turns out the latest update from factcheck.org exposes quite a doosey from the Kerry campaign. A new Kerry add claims the same thing that Fahrenheit 9/11 does: that Bush allowed Bin Laden relatives special treatment and safe passage out of the country before air space was reopened after 9/11. Factcheck calls this "one of the worst distortions we've seen."

Now my point is not to say, "Neener, neener, neener" to Kerry supporters. To be sure, on Factcheck there are just as many (if not more) distortions from the Bush camp--though none have been made into a major motion picture that spawned legions of lie-fueled Bush-haters.

I mention this because it causes me to wonder why people insist on spouting these blatant untruths as a basis for their pending presidential choice. Why does each side insist on pointing out the others' lies as a defense for their vote when their side does the same thing? As a dog (see photo) it seems a bit like me insisting that my doo-doo stinks less than yours!

Being truly informed doesn't mean collecting a pile of dirt on the candidate that you wouldn't vote for in the first place! It is disingenuous for a member of either party who believes in the historical tenets of that party to claim support of his candidate based on the supposed misdeeds of his competitor.

Bottom line: Most Kerry supporters will somehow find a way to discredit Factcheck as a source, but even if they choose to acknowledge its accuracy, their vote will not change and was in fact never in danger.

So why do they (both sides) bother making this doo-doo up?

A Crass Commercial Interruption

I can already see a great increase in the traffic to my site in the mere hours since I have joined Blog Explosion . You can help the world see more of me and help them see more of you if you join too. Click on the link or on one of the pretty flashing rectangles on my sidebar. If your not interested, read my last post as I think it is good one.

Another Reason to Pass IQ Test Before Voting

A lot of folks are saying in public what political correctness once banished to backyard barbecue gripe sessions among friends: stupid people should not be allowed to vote.

Really, I feel no shame in saying this given some of the amazing reasons people have for supporting their candidate. I just saw an "Entertainment Tonight" poll that said 46 percent of people would take the advice of their idols in the entertainment world to help them decide who to choose for president. Yikes!

And speaking of entertainment, it also seems that many people take their voting cues from the film "Fahrenheit 911" based on how adept they are at parroting some of the movie's claims. One such person, a blogger who goes by Bitchfire, even provided a link for lurkers on her site to do the responsible thing and "verify" the claims made by Michael Moore.

Boy was I eager to see these "facts" and all that "verification"...so I clicked. No sooner could you say "fair and balanced" and I was taken directly to the...Michael Moore web page?!

That's right, in order to verify that Michael Moore is not lying to me, this blogger sent me directly to the source. Do you think maybe we should just ask Scot Peterson if he killed his wife and save some time? Did anybody just ask O.J. if he committed double murder? He never took the stand did he?

We could cut out a lot of wrangling about what is true and what isn't if we just do the sensible thing and take peoples' word at face value. Now I don't even have to watch "Fahrenheit 911" with this cool web site telling me all I need to know!

All I have to do now is figure out who to believe if "FahrenHYPE 911" turns out to have a fact verification web page. Maybe I'm wrong. Everybody should vote, MTV says so, right?

Let's Stop Pretending it Matters!

Enough already! I am so tired of people using their pat lists of grievances to explain their support for one candidate or another. You know what I mean, you can't go anywhere without someone telling you that Bush has to go because:

*He lied about WMDs
*He wanted to get revenge for his father
*It's all about the oil
*It's all about Haliburton
*He skipped out on National Guard Duty
*Etc., etc., etc.

And if it is not about Bush, it's about Kerry and his supposed faults:

*Threw away his(?) medals
*Bogus purple hearts
*Wife donates to the commies
*"I have no SUV--oh, that's my family's"
*Flip Flopper
*Etc., etc., etc.

I just wish the people who mimic these campaign ads day after day would stop and be honest. They have no intention of voting for the opponent whether he did anything wrong or not. Michael Moore is not a supporter of Bush with or without the information he put in his movie; Rush Limbaugh is not a fan of Kerry whether he lied about Vietnam or not. So why bring it up!

I mean, if you could magically prove beyond any doubt that all the charges against Bush and Kerry were wrong, the people who gleefully parrot them would still not vote for the guy. I think they have to make this stuff up because they know no other way to justify their political choices.

The next time that someone starts bashing a candidate based on any of this type of balony, I am going to ask them, "If I could convince you that his faults are purely a tool of his opponents to defeat him and nothing more, would you vote for him?"

We all know what the answer to that question would be. People have their minds made up and somehow need to paint the opponent as the bogeyman to justify their vote.

The Media Always Takes Sides

When it comes to war and rumors of war why is the media consistently on the wrong side? This question just hit me today as I was doing a bit of research on the war in Bosnia (remember that one, I think we still have troops there).

Because of connections I have throughout the former Yugoslavia, I had always suspected that the U.N. case against Serbia was flimsy at best and totally off base at worse. Now I read that my ideas may have been correct and that the real bad guys in that conflict were the Muslim terrorists in Kosovo.

Now the general public would probably think that assertion preposterous for the simple reason that our media bombarded us with reports of Serbian atrocities for years and those attrocities have become the "truth" by virtue of repetition and selective film and sound bites.

But this is not the only time the media has decided which side we should be on. They wield immense power to shape which view of any conflict the majority of America and the world embraces. I am wondering what common thread exists between the following disputes and the side the media generally supports:

Israel versus Palestine. The media constantly portrays Israel as the bad guys when it seems to me that they are just defending themselves against horrific terrorist attacks. They don't even like that Israel wants to build a wall to keep out the homicide bombers. Heck, back in the day they used to call Arafat a terrorist, but next thing you know he meets with Clinton and wins the Nobel Peace Prize. I don't get it.

The current war in Iraq While not exactly taking the side of Saddam Hussein, our press sure seems to go out of the way to paint America as bad guys here. There is plenty of opinion to the contrary of the gloom and doom they are reporting, but they persist in painting every situation in the worst possible light.

Vietnam. The first conflict in which the media played a major role. Many feel that the American media won that war for the communists and I think they are proud of that. It didn't turn out too well for the Vietnamese, but Walter Cronkite got his way.

There are more instances I am sure. Maybe folks could add to this list and even connect the dots to explain how it is that the media decides these things.

Human Nature and my Loyal Union Buddies

People are naturally selfish. We have a natural bent to look out for our own self interest. Some try to mask that inclination to look out for number one at all costs, but some don't. This is not to say that people don't do good things--it is just not natural for them to do so.

Which brings me to labor unions. As a member of the Retail Clerks Union in the early 80s, I took full advantage of all the wonderful benefits my union secured for me. Those benefits included being paid nearly 14 bucks an hour for what was basically manual labor, the best healthcare benefits I have ever seen, and assorted other rights and privileges. Though not a gung-ho union guy, I did my best to balance my union responsibilities with commitments to management.

So you think that if I--the philosophically-opposed-to-unions person--could be a good union member, then the real union stalwarts surely must be better. WROOONG! Remember my premise about human nature and how we have to fight our inclination to do unselfish things? Well, listen to this.

Our union was about to go on strike against the grocery chain for which we worked. So there was me and my very pro-union work buddies looking at missing a few paychecks. Imagine my shock when all of the guys on our night crew were going to blow off their loyalty to the union to work as scabs for big bucks!

I was the butt of jokes for weeks as I was the only one who was going to support the union in this issue. Silly me, I figured it was somehow wrong to take all the good things the union had to offer, then stab them in the back when it was no longer convenient for me!

I will never forget how quickly and easily these wonderful union supporters turned their backs when their natural instincts for self-over-all took over. For me it was one of many lessons in human nature that I have learned over the years.

Easy Pickings for Kerry

Well, I didn't see the whole debate because I had other responsibilities, but the little I saw reminded me of when I worked at Home Depot--more on that analogy in a bit.

It is an axiom of life that it is way easier to criticize than it is to do something yourself (if it isn't an axiom, it should be).

John Kerry will probably be said to have won this debate handily and that is at least partly owed to the truth of my little axiom. You see, Kerry had the advantage of being able to slam everything Bush has done as President--slamming is easy since it's something we all learn in junior high.

The reason this reminds me of Home Depot is because whenever somebody takes over a department they have a field day ripping everything the previous supervisor did. The old boss could have been God himself and there would still be disparaging remarks about the way He ran things.

How often at your place of employment have you heard these statements from the new guy on the job: "I don't know what so-and-so was thinking, I have to clean up his mess before I can accomplish anything here," or "Things are going to be different. I can't believe what was going on here before I arrived."

Kerry is the potential new guy and had the opportunity tonight to do the same thing anybody does when he wants to make himself look good--make fun of the other guy. I am not saying that we should discount Kerry's effort because of this, I just thought it is much easier to win a debate when you are the one who is making promises rather than the one who is defending reality.

Issues Smissues... They Really Don't Matter

I love how bloggers and regular folk across the political spectrum play the same old game in order to discredit their political enemies, politics in general, or to make themselves seem so very noble. I wanted to come up with a catchy name for this game, but I'm not feelin' it. Let's just call it, Wishing for the Issues.

Here is how it is played:

You've seen it played when they complain about attack ads, shaking their heads and mumbling, "I just wish they would focus on the issues."

You've heard it played when their candidate is caught in a big lie, shrugging, "Well, I wish everybody would just focus on the issues."

You've witnessed it when they can't think of any good comeback while talking politics and they declare, "Well, what really matters is the issues and I just wish we could get back to them."

On and on the game goes. It is played just as well by Democrats as it is by Republicans. It is the game that is played when there is nothing left to say and one wants to be seen as "above" the larger game of politics. Politics is an ugly, dirty business, so in order to feel cleansed, people like to play the game. It makes them feel better.

But it is a lie. The game is a false front, empty words spoken when all else fails to ensure a soft escape from the unpleasantness of politics. Most people don't intentionally lie, in fact, they probably have no idea that by playing the game they are deceiving themselves as well as the ones they use it on.

If you really think about it, nobody cares about the issues. Like, what, Joe Conservative is going to change his mind about Bush if the Kerry folks would just talk about the issues? Are gung-ho Bush-hating bloggers going to consider voting Republican if somebody just breaks down and talks about policy? Will there be peace and understanding in Whoville? Heck no!

Except for the possibly non-existent "undecided" voter, everybody has made up their minds and an old-fashioned issues revival is nothing but a delusional exercise that has no chance of changing anything. Whether talking about issues or slinging mud in commercials, politicians and their handlers always do the same thing: lie to make themselves look good.

The only truth to be found in the process is with the parties. Within pretty definable parameters, we know what the parties stand for--no talk by anybody about anything is going to change that in the short term.

So anybody who plays the Wishing for the Issues game is deluding themselves because in the end they will vote the same regardless.

Why Unions are a Bad Idea

There is a fundamental problem with labor unions that cannot be ignored: a person can't answer to two masters; somebody has to be in charge.

Just think of all the inane junk that happens because of labor unions. Consider that people are paid outrageous amounts of money to perform non-skilled tasks--often just grunt work--and the resultant price increase is borne by all. You can't tell me that it makes sense for a company to pay somebody 14 bucks an hour in 1984 to put cans on a grocery shelf. That's what I was paid back then.

Or how about the way labor is divided? I know a friend who wasn't allowed to pick something up and carry it from one part of the warehouse to another because it was the job of a union employee. Never mind what works best for the company who pays the bills; "protecting jobs" for the unions is the only thing that matters.

And the situation in our schools is a joke too. Administrators who are paid to make sure students achieve have little power to do anything to make sure that happens. I can give you many examples of the whining, silly demands that teachers have that run counterproductive to helping students.

The rebellion of the people against the owners of a company or against authority is as old as Adam and Eve--it was wrong then and it is wrong now.

Oh, and spare me the balony about unions being needed to ensure workers are not taken advantage of.

Somebody is taken advantage of if management is in charge and somebody else is taken advantage of if the union is in charge. The person who has right of ownership and who is held accountable should be the one with the right to take advantage of the other party.

Now of course we have laws in this country that won't allow the owners to take advantage of the workers, but none that keep the workers from taking advantage of the owners. Isn't that kind of backwards?

Fired for a Bumper Sticker? Why Not?

Surely most people will insist that the boss who fired his employee for having a Kerry bumper sticker should be hit with a big lawsuit, but not me.

Oh yeah, the way our laws stand now, he is in big-time trouble. The Kerry-hating boss' bellow, "I own this place!" doesn't mean a thing in a country where the government decides who we can and can't fire.

But where does my right of ownership disappear and the laws controlling who I choose to associate with take over? I may invite (or un-invite) whoever I choose into the home that I own, but I don't have the same power in my business?

I can let anyone I please borrow my car and then change my mind on a whim simply because it is my car--not nice, but not illegal. Why can I do what I like with my other stuff, but not the business?

Now, giving somebody the ol' heave-ho because you don't like their bumper sticker kinda stinks, but when liberty collides with manners, I think liberty should win. I should be able to fire someone for whatever frivolous reason I want if I own the business. I mean, what part of "OWNER" do we not understand in America?

When you disagree with this (as Mrs. Ugly Naked Guy does) ask yourself this question: Why is it that people say "you can't legislate morality," but they still want to tell people who to hire and who not to hire?