Friday, October 23, 2009

Surprised

I've always been a big fan of Law & Order. I know the stories are unrealistic and the dialog treats the viewers like idiots. Also the show has been pushing more and more liberal viewpoint, some to the point where I get really offended. But I check the show out every so often.

I'm going to spoil this weeks episode, so stop reading if you're interested in watching it. Tonight the story centered around the murder of an abortion doctor. Surprisingly, very surprisingly actually, the show actually seemed to give a good pro-life argument, not a stupid one. Nor did they make fun of the pro-life argument. The show did its standard, where one or two characters take one side of the argument, and the others take the opposing side.

This show brought up more of the disturbing sides of this argument as well. It described in detail the horror of what is actually done in a late term abortion. It also gave a description of how a baby was killed after being delivered from a failed abortion attempt. I was shocked. I thought pro-choice people would not want to even touch that subject. Especially since our president voted to oppose a bill that would have required medical attention be given to such babies in Illinois. Finally, a woman testified about giving birth to a terminally ill baby. She described how blessed she felt for having the opportunity to hold her baby for 21 hours before she died. It was a very inspiring story that had a beauty to it, the kind of beauty found in the cross. The acting left something to be desired, but the effect the show was going for at this point was blatantly pro-life.

Finally, there were a few statements made that made it seem that Roe v. Wade was an 35yr old out of date court decision. They also made the statement that "most Americans are pro-life now."

There were arguments for the other side, but they didn't seem as effective. They were weak though, they could have portrayed it differently, but they chose not to.

Finally, the jury convicted the man who shot the doctor of murder, which I was happy about. Most people (not all) in the pro-life movement would not condone such violence.

So thank you Law & Order. I am shocked by NBC, I can't believe that episode actually aired.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Does this surprise anyone?

I saw one of those law commercials that fish for clients today, the kind where they say, "Have you had x happen to you, these people may be to blame and they might owe you money. Call us." They were looking for clients who have taken Yaz, Yasmin, and/or Ocella which are drugs for birth control. They say these may have caused a heart attack, stroke, pulmonary embolism, gallbladder problem, and/or deep vein thrombosis.

I'll leave aside my feelings of the litigiousness of our culture today. Does it surprise anybody that if you taking a drug to alter the way your body is supposed to work, it would cause problems? There is no need for such a drug. I'm sure there is a want, but no need. Changing the way your body is supposed to work is probably a bad idea.

Monday, October 12, 2009

Thank you Bishops

Praise God for courageous men and women who speak out against the evils of abortion. For this reason I'm thankful for our Catholic bishops who wrote this letter to Congress.

USCCB Letter to Congress, 2009-10-08

Dear Member of Congress:
On behalf of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), we are writing to express our disappointment that progress has not been made on the three priority criteria for health care reform that we have conveyed previously to Congress. In fact, the Senate Finance Committee rejected a conscience rights amendment accepted earlier by the House Energy and Commerce Committee. If final legislation does not meet our principles, we will have no choice but to oppose the bill. We remain committed to working with the Administration, Congressional leadership, and our allies to produce final health reform legislation that will reflect our principles.

We continue to urge you to
1. Exclude mandated coverage for abortion, and incorporate longstanding policies against abortion funding and in favor of conscience rights. No one should be required to pay for or participate in abortion. It is essential that the legislation clearly apply to this new program longstanding and widely supported federal restrictions on abortion funding and mandates, and protections for rights of conscience. No current bill meets this test.
2. Adopt measures that protect and improve people’s health care. Reform should make quality health care affordable and accessible to everyone, particularly those who are vulnerable and those who live at or near the poverty level.
3. Include effective measures to safeguard the health of immigrants, their children and all of society. Ensure that legal immigrants and their family members have comprehensive, affordable, and timely access to health care coverage. Maintain an adequate safety net for those who remain uncovered.

We sincerely hope that the legislation will not fall short of our criteria. However, we remain apprehensive when amendments protecting freedom of conscience and ensuring no taxpayer money for abortion are defeated in committee votes. If acceptable language in these areas cannot be found, we will have to oppose the health care bill vigorously. Catholic moral tradition teaches that health care is a basic human right, essential to protecting human life and dignity. Much-needed reform of our health care system must be pursued in ways that serve the life and dignity of all, never in ways that undermine or violate these fundamental values. We will work tirelessly to remedy these central problems and help pass real reform that clearly protects the life, dignity and health of all.

Sincerely,
Bishop William F. Murphy
Diocese of Rockville Centre
Chairman
Committee on Domestic Justice & Human Development

Cardinal Justin Rigali
Archdiocese of Philadelphia
Chairman
Committee on Pro-Life Activities

Bishop John Wester
Diocese of Salt Lake City
Chairman
Committee on Migration

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

What?!

Hey, Jimmy Carter, if you want to enter the Health Care debate, try having an argument first. Try "listening" to the oppositions argument and engaging it. This may not be as easy as calling President Obama's opponents racists, but using your brain is usually more difficult than name calling. I am not a racist. I oppose the Health Plan. I haven't heard any response to the (decent) arguments presented against it. You're infuriating!

Continuing to call people like me stupid, irresponsible, racist, and whatever other name you want to use, without responding to our arguments, only makes you look childish.

I spoke with some educated people today on the other side. At the end of the day, we disagreed, but they had some thought behind their arguments. I know there are people like them out there. Why do I not hear your voice? Why do I only hear people who call me names? People like me are not stupid. People who are undecided are not stupid. If you don't present a good argument, you will continue to lose support for your cause.

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Catholic Guilt

Stupid decisions and a lax tongue sometimes get me into trouble. This week has not been good for me so far. Going to try and make the rest of the week better, starting with confession today. Guilt sucks, but it is a good reminder that I am still a work in progress.

I am more like Valentine than Peter.

Sunday, August 30, 2009

Book Review: Ender's Game



This is widely considered Orson Scott Card's best work. The book takes place in Earth's future and is about a brilliant young boy's training to be a military commander. Andrew Wiggin or "Ender," is an extremely gifted boy who the military begins training to make their commander in an upcoming war against an unseen alien race. Ender succeeds at every challenge given to him, even in situations where he is set up for failure. There is also a video game he plays quite often that takes him through strange worlds and where he must do very gruesome things in order to proceed.

During his training in the school, he has a few encounters that pit him against other children. One such encounter leads to the death of a boy by Ender's hand. After this event he is taken out of the school and put into a new "training" situation. In these "training" exercises he is commanding several ships in what he thinks are simulations, but are actually reality. He is unknowingly commanding the human forces in their war against the alien race called the "Buggers." He eventually succeeds in destroying the bugger home world and destroys the entire race.

Overall I enjoyed the book. There were several interesting battle scenes that most people have who have referred the book to me have mentioned, but that's not what I liked most about this book. Card also makes some interesting political commentary about human beings that I found interesting. Specifically how everyone is filled with hate for an alien race that none of them has ever encountered. Two previous generations had fought wars against this race and videos detailing those exploits were available, but no one alive had ever seen them. They were an unseen fear. This fear seemed to motivate the whole race to join together. The whole of Earth's population was too busy hating the Buggers that they lived quite peacefully. Once this "threat" is neutralized, however, the world falls into waring with one another again. I'll come back to this in a moment.

The main thing I took away from this book was Ender's struggle with his inner demons. Ender was a good person who did bad things. His intentions were usually not evil, but the results were. Because of Ender's extraordinary talent, he would garner favor with the adults in his life. This would cause the other children in his life to envy Ender and then hate him. So they would corner Ender and try to hurt him. As Ender defended himself he would make rational decisions that would lead to disparaging consequences that would haunt him. He did kill two other children in these situations. His goal of self-preservation forced it at the time, but he did shape the events that led up to these deaths. For all his brilliance, he couldn't see things that far ahead, and he chose paths that eventually put him in what he thought was a kill or be killed situation. Ender was a killer. A remorseful killer, but a killer. This struggle climaxed when he destroyed the bugger race. Unknowingly, but he still did it. The epilogue shows him attempting to make up for his past sins.

The struggle of good and evil within Ender was personified in his sister and brother. His brother was a disturbing child, and often thought of death and sought power. His sister was kind and loving and nurturing. Most of the time, Ender would liken himself more to his brother than his sister, but I think he was wrong. Ender was a good person who did bad things, which is very different from a bad a person. The most telling sign of Ender's goodness was his name. His real name was Andrew but he called himself Ender, because his sister called him Ender. He found his identity in something good, and this is why the character is likable.

I liked this part of the book on a spiritual level. I have a Catholic world view that can be summed up like this: people are inherently good but prone to evil. Jesus is a reminder of the good within us and helps us back to that original innocence, separating us from the evil and returning us to the good. Another view that I've encountered in Protestant theology is that people are inherently evil. Jesus covers our sinfulness and this allows us to be loved by the Father. But that evilness is still there. When Ender chooses to be called Ender, he embraces the good in him. It is his core, his identity. I liked this because I thought it was a decent illustration of a fundamental Catholic belief.

Now, Card is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, so I doubt he was trying to further a Catholic belief over a Protestant one. He does bring up questions of good and evil, human nature, and sin. This is just what I took away from the book and probably what I will remember most about it. The author could be making the other argument, as illustrated in the war that breaks out after the destruction of the bugger home world. Even though peace was seen on earth, that evilness and hatred was still there, just suppressed by fear.

My final comment is about this fear. Fear is a powerful motivator and has been used to control or persuade many individuals throughout history and even today. The Nazis used fear of Jews to gain power. Both the Russians and Americans used fear to motivate their countries during the Cold War. Today it is used by all kinds of politicians to push agendas. I'm not interested in giving examples. Those on the right will claim it is being done by those on the left. Those on the left will claim it is being done by those on the right. Both are correct. It can be useful, but it doesn't promote the truth. Only the truth will set you free, fear leads to sin and death. There is no redemption through fear because fear is not of God.

For an entertaining plot, likable characters, and thought provoking theme, I give Ender's Game four and a half stars out of five. For another review of this book, please see
P. B. and Jorgy's

Friday, August 21, 2009

1315 Elapsed Time: 48 hours 15 minutes

I'm still alive, and more importantly, so are the kids. I kind of expected that at least one wouldn't have lasted this long (I'm only kidding).

Some highlights so far:

Sean: Lucy, are you alright?
Lucy: I had a accident.
Sean: Did you get any pee on your dress?
Lucy: No, it's ok.
Sean: Did you take your underwear off and clean yourself up?
Lucy: No.
Sean: Well, did you pee in your underwear?
Lucy: No.
Sean: You didn't pee in your underwear?
Lucy: (Smiling) No I pooped in my underwear.



Abby: One time my cousin's dog ate a toy snake. Dogs eat weird things.
Sean: Max likes to chew on Alicia shoes... Alicia doesn't like it when Max chews on her shoes.
Abby: Yeah, I don't like it when people chew on my shoes... except for Seth and for Lucy.
Sean: Who chews on your shoes?
Abby: Seth and Lucy.

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

2259 Elapsed Time 9 hours 59 minutes

Tired. Going to Sleep.

1905 Elapsed Time: 6 hours 5 minutes

Made it through dinner. Hot dogs and string cheese. How does a 1 year old eat two hotdogs. Amazing! Lucy ate her hotdog in half a minute and then spent ten on her bun. She ended up shoving the whole thing in her mouth and chewing on it for a minute or two. Abby spent most of the meal with mustard on her face, like the size of a dime. Wasn't until the end that I thought about getting napkins. Oh well, I'm learning.

1456 Elapsed Time: 1 hour 56 minutes

The kids are Bailey (age 7), Abby (age 6), Lucy (age 3), and Seth (age 1). * Abby wanted to type a star. That was what that was. Things are going well. Everyone is still alive. There was a close call when Bailey decided he wanted to fly and jumped off the dining room chair and knocked his head against the chandelier (right as I was saying no). But everyone is fine. Seth found Lucy's new book and removed a page for her, she hasn't noticed yet.

Changed a poopy diaper and put the youngest two down for naps like a seasoned pro.

1336 Elapsed Time: 0 hours 36 minutes

I am babysitting four kids for the next couple of days. Ages 7, 6, 3, and 1. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little apprehensive. People have been taking care of kids since forever. How hard could it be?

So far, no diaper changes, no big fights. They're getting out a game to play. The oldest was sad for about fifteen minutes until we started to play. Already read two stories. Things are going well so far. Oh, someone's banging on the piano, gotta run.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Overwhelmed

Wrote a long blog about this that I didn't post. I'm feeling better now.

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Book Review: Pontoon



Can be summed up as follows, "Big Disappointment." The book's author is Garrison Keillor, most well known for a radio show on National Public Radio called "A Prairie Home Companion." I've always enjoyed the radio show. It was always very interesting and insightful. I particularly liked the observational comedy he'd do about Lutherans and Catholics. He would usually gently poke fun at faith, pointing out little absurdities among the faithful, but in a very respectful manner. His radio show never gave me the impression he was attacking faith in anyway, just finding humor in little old ladies who are particular about random things. So I thought, "I remember him, he was fun, I'll read his book."

The book was about an older lady, Evelyn, who dies in Lake Wobegon, the made-up Minnesota town where most of his stories are based. Before she dies, she leaves a note to her daughter asking her to have her cremated, her ashes placed inside a hollowed out bowling ball and then dropped to the bottom of the local lake. She also reveals that she had long ago renounced her faith and was simply going through the motions simply because it was easier that way. She also had a boyfriend in another town and the two would travel the country together quite often.

The daughter, Barbara, to whom the letter was written is an alcoholic and a struggling Lutheran. While dealing with this secret life her mother led, the most pivotal point for her in the book is the moment when she curses God, rejects her faith, and decides she is the only person who is going to help herself and gives up drinking. There are some side stories about a "commitment ceremony" that's not a wedding, and Barbara's son who is trying to figure out what to do with his life.

Apparently, his radio shows are edited quite a bit. I found Barbara's "growth" quite offensive. He portrayed the (Lutheran) church as full of people I would call lukewarm. Not one character was actually attempting to live their faith, they were all just going through the motions. Barbara's rejection of her faith is portrayed as a coming of age, a shedding of archaic ways, and a birth into a new and better life. The whole book seemed to be an attack on the small town country faithful, and I found his arguments shallow and poorly constructed.

On top of that, it seemed as though he was trying to give offense, to shock his reader with stories of old ladies talking frankly about sex and giving graphic descriptions. That may be how some old ladies talk, but its not fair to portray them all that way. His "musings" about the faithful and their practice were much harsher. The only Catholic priest in the story was (of course) having sex with a married woman at his church. There was a group of Lutheran priests who were touring the nation, they were portrayed as drunken materialists. The only character in the book who seemed "decent" was the Lutheran priest in the town who was trying to push his views on everyone, he was an antagonist.

I found the book sad. Just a sad story from an old guy who was trying to shock his reader but just ended up sounding perverted and crude. The only fun part of this book was the end, when of course nothing goes as planned. The son is going to drop the bowling bowl from a hang glider tied behind a boat, trips during taking off and gets dragged through the water, losing his trunks, and just ends up flying through the air flailing and completely naked. Maybe I'm being childish, but I thought it was kind of funny. Just kept thinking, "Ow, poor kid."

All in all, a big disappointment. Probably won't ever listen to the guys radio show again either. For a couple of genuinely funny moments and an interesting story telling style, I give the book 1 star out of 5. A big disappointment.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Book Review: Into the Wild



This is a book about guys being guys, in some good ways and some not so good ways.

The book tells the story of Christopher McCandless and how he ended up starving to death in the Alaskan wilderness. McCandless graduated college, gave all his money to a charity that helps feed the hungry ($20,000) and drove away from his DC suburb life, never to be heard from again. He wandered the country for a while and ended up spending a couple of months in Alaska, where he eventually died of starvation.

What I liked about the book: McCandless seems to have tapped into the fact that materialism is nonsense. Material things don't bring happiness, and he was willing to give away most of his earthly possessions and seek something greater. He also believed in providing for himself and found great value in manual labor. He had a hard time accepting handouts and preferred to work for what he received. He also chased his dreams.

What I didn't like about the book: McCandless seemed to hate anything organized, such as the government and religion. He believed more in a spiritual communion with nature than in anything else. He also seemed to think that one could only provide for themselves in the moment and not for the future. He didn't believe in planning ahead, preferring to let "life" lead him where it may. He therefore ended up relying on the kindness of strangers for food and housing. But when it came to money or other material things, he had to work for it. There seemed a disconnect here to me because he was willing to accept one form of charity but rejected another. Furthermore, that charity was provided for by the very system and way of life he rejected. If everyone lived as he did there would be nobody to be charitable.

I also didn't like the way he treated his family. He seemed a little late in maturing. He could forgive others their faults, but when it came to his family he held grudges. He dropped off the face of the earth and never spoke to them again, his heart was filled with a lot of hatred of his father. I had a hard time being sympathetic to a guy who treated his family like garbage, regardless of whatever sin they committed against him.

Finally, the book has a lot of anti religious sentiment, preferring that people "seek their own path" or "find their own way" or some other new-age crap like that. How is it someone can be so arrogant as to reject a philosophy based solely on the fact that other people have believed it, and think that they are the first in all of human history to stumble on the path of true enlightenment? There is nothing new under the sun. People believe all kinds of nonsense and feel as though they are the first of our race to actually "get it." This is pride, plain and simple. To reject something simply because someone else thought of it first is foolish and could not be more self centered.

The poor spiritual aspect of the book was disappointing, but the story and a few of the questions raised were interesting. I give the book two and a half stars out of five. I'd recommend it on a conditional basis, its definitely not something everybody should read, but some may find it interesting.

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

The Phone Store

Several times in my life I have wished I was making a documentary. Some things take place in front of me that make me laugh, but then give me pause. One such instance happened today at the phone store.

Set up. My wife "needed" a new phone cause hers was being lame and mine "needed" a new battery. As I'm waiting for the customer service people to finish setting up my wife's new phone, I find a comfortable seat and wait. A couple in about their fifties comes in the store and begin to speak with the customer service person who is waiting there to help. The couple's names are Bonnie and Wayne, as I would come to overhear. The gist of the situation is that Bonnie decided that she and Wayne "needed" an upgrade. So Mr. Nice Customer Service Guy starts showing Bonnie and Wayne all the nifty little toys they have.

At one point, Wayne, (who seems like a sharp guy, clean clothes, and clean shaven) decides he needs some expert advice on this situation. Wayne removes his flip phone from his belt compartment accessory and makes a call. The store was rather busy so he stands two or three feet from me as he makes this call and this is what I hear...

"Joe? Hey, It's Wayne. I'm at the (phone) store because Bonnie and I needed a new upgrade for our phones. I wanted to ask you, because I remembered we talked about this, what all the features I need for my phone. She wants a blackberry, but I don't think I need all that fancy stuff."

He pulls out a piece of paper from his shirt pocket and a pen as well and begins to write as he is talking.

"Number one, I need something that I can make and receive telephone calls with, right? Number two, I need to be able to do the text messaging. Three, I need to have pictures. And four, I need to be able to check my scores online. Does that sound right? Uh huh. Yeah. Is there anything else I need to be doing? Oh, OK. All right, thanks Joe."

Short aside:
Okay, Wayne, I'm pretty sure just about every phone they sell has the ability to make and receive calls. I admire your thoroughness, but that's like asking for a steak at a steak house and checking to make sure it's meat. Secondly, if you are referring to it as "the text messaging," I'm pretty sure you don't need it. If you're not sure why, try looking it up on "the Google." The camera phone I can't fault you for, probably a good feature for you, although that's pretty standard on most phones these days. But checking "your" scores online, is that honestly something you "need?" You're willing to pay an extra hundred some odd dollars for the fancier piece of technology, and an extra fifty or so dollars every month for a service that will give you information you're probably going to read in the newspaper every morning? This just doesn't seem like something you "need."

After Wayne hung up the phone, he went over to show Mr. Nice Customer Service Guy the list he just made. Then he proceeded to read the list and explain why he needed all these things. The sales rep, a very professional man, (and a much kinder human being than I) didn't laugh at Wayne, but proceeded to show him some phones that would suit his "needs."

I try not to eaves drop because it is kind of creepy, but Wayne is just too much fun to resist. Shortly after having selected a new phone, he removes his old phone from his little holster and proceeds to call customer service for Lexus. He wants to make sure that the new phone he's selected is compatible with his built in blue tooth technology in his car.

This is where Wayne stopped amusing me and just made me sad. Here is a guy who has got to have all the nicest and newest of everything in his life. And he pushes it off as a "need." It makes me sad that that word gets used as often as it does. Does anybody understand the difference between a "want" and a "need?" Nobody ever says "I 'want' this" or "I 'want' that." Everything is in urgent "need" of being obtained, of being finished, of being fixed. Just stop. Breathe. Relax a bit. The world will still be here, you're probably not going to die. Take a little time and obtain some needed focus.

If Wayne could do that, he'd realize what he really needs is a pair of pants that didn't go out of style in the sixties.

Saturday, July 25, 2009

Friday Night

I spent last night hanging out with some people from work. The group is cliquey, but I don't always think that's a bad thing. Jesus had a clique. Sure he'd do all that preaching, but at the end of the day he'd say "Peter, James, John, come with me." Like I said, I don't have a problem with cliques in general. People tend to hang out with the people they like and are comfortable with. This just makes sense to me.

Anyway, I have somehow managed to find myself becoming more involved with this group. They extend me invitations to various things and I'm now on some email distribution list they use when they want to communicate with each other. This is just odd to me. I'm not complaining, I just find it interesting. One particular invite was for dinner yesterday evening, which I decided to attend. It was a nice evening and I got to know some of the people from work a little better. They are fun people.

High school seems to get a bad reputation for being cliquey, but this doesn't seem fair since it happens everywhere. Perhaps the difference is that high school students don't often work at being outgoing. Not that I'm much better. I'm very happy with my GuMP clique. Inviting others would just seem like work, because then I would have to get to know them. Suppose I don't really like hanging out with them, then I'd have to find ways of hanging out with my current clique and excluding them. See, I haven't grown up yet. I'm still as sophomoric as ever. My friends who I got to know last night are better people, hands down.

Monday, June 22, 2009

Quote...

"Oh this is going to be terrible...
I'm so excited!!!"

Alicia before seeing "The Proposal"

Friday, June 19, 2009

Why is it...

A clean house keeps me on a good spiritual path. I find that if my house is not clean, I tend to wander. But if my house is clean, I am eager to spend time reading my Bible. I don't understand this.

I got home today and I was actually bored for the first time in a long while. My wife had cleaned the house and I felt like there was nothing to do. She did the laundry too so I've got nothing to do tomorrow.

Hmmm...

That is all.

Thursday, June 18, 2009

Letter to Congress

I found this the other day and I felt like passing it on.

--------------------------------------------------------------

I am Janet Contreras, a concerned, home-grown American citizen. I am 53, and I have been a registered Democrat all of my adult life. Before the last Presidential election, I registered Republican because I no longer feel the Democratic Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. I now no longer feel the Republican Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. The fact is I no longer feel any political party or representative in Washington represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me.

There must be someone, please tell me who you are. Please stand up and tell me you are there and are willing to fight for our Constitution as it was written. Please do it now.

You might ask yourselves what my views and issues are that I would feel so horribly disenfranchised by both major political parties. What kind of nut job am I? Will you please tell me? These are briefly my views and issues for which I seek representation:

* Illegal Immigration—I want you to stop coddling illegal immigrants and secure our borders. Close the underground tunnels. Stop the violence and trafficking in drugs and people. No amnesty, not again. Been there, done that, no resolution. P.S. I am not a racist. This not to be confused with legal immigration.

* TARP Bill—I want it repealed and no further funding supplied to it. We told you “NO!” but you did it anyway. I want the remaining unfunded 95% repealed. Freeze! Repeal!

* Czars—I want the circumvention of our checks and balances stopped immediately. Fire the Czars. No more Czars. Government officials answer to the process not the President. Stop trampling on our Constitution and honor it.

* Cap & Trade—the debate on global warming is NOT over, there IS more to say.

* Universal Health Care—I will not be rushed into another expensive decision. Don’t you dare pass this in the middle of the night and then go on break. Slow down!

* Growing Government Control—I want states rights and sovereignty fully restored. I want less government in my life, not more. Shrink it down. Please mind your own business; you have enough to do with your REAL obligations. Let’s start there.

* ACORN—I do not want ACORN or its affiliates in charge of our 2010 census. I want them investigated. I also do not want mandatory escrow fees contributed to them on every real estate deal that closes. Stop all funding to ACORN and its affiliates pending impartial audit and investigation. I do not trust them with the taking of the census or with taxpayer money. Face up to the allegations against them and get it resolved before the taxpayers get any further involved with them. It walks like a duck and talks like a duck—hello… stop protecting political buddies. You work for the people. Investigate.

* Redistribution of Wealth—No. If I work for it, it is mine. I have always worked for people with more money than I have because they gave me jobs. That is the only redistribution of wealth I support. I never got a job from a poor person. Why do want me to hate my employers? What do your have against shareholders making a profit?

* Charitable Contributions—although I never got a job from a poor person, I have helped many in need. Charity belongs in our local communities where we know our needs best and can use local talent and resources. Butt out, please. We want to do this ourselves.

* Corporate Bail Outs—knock it off! Sink or swim like the rest of us. If there are hard times ahead, we will be better off just getting to it and letting the strong survive. Quick and painful, like ripping off a band aid. We will pull together. Great things happen in America under great hardship. Give us a chance to innovate. We cannot disappoint you more than you have disappointed us.

* Transparency and Accountability—how about it? No really, let’s have it. Let’s say we give the “buzz” words a rest and have some straight, honest talk. Please stop trying to manipulate and appease me with cleaver wording. I am not the idiot you obviously take me for. Stop sneaking around meeting in back rooms making deals with your friends. It will only be a prelude to your criminal investigation. Stop hiding things from me.

* Unprecedented Quick Spending—stop it, now. Take a breath. Listen to “The People.”

Let’s just slow down and get some more input from some “non-politicians” on the subject. Stop making everything an emergency. Stop speed reading our bills into law.

I am not an activist. I am not a community organizer. Nor am I a terrorist, a militant nor a violent person. I am a mother and grandmother. I am a working woman. I am busy, busy, busy and tired, tired, tired. I thought we elected competent people to take care of the business of government so that we could work, raise our families, pay our bills, have a little recreation, complain about taxes, endure our hardships, pursue our personal goals, cut our lawns and wash our cars on weekends, and be responsible, contributing members of society and teach our children to be the same, all the while living in the home of the free and land of the brave.

I entrusted you with upholding our Constitution and believed in the checks and balances to keep you from getting too far off course. What happened? You are very far off course. Do you really think that I find humor in hiring a speed reader to unintelligibly ramble through a bill you signed into law without knowing what it contained? I do not! It is a mockery of the responsibility I have entrusted to you. It is a slap in the face! I am not laughing—the arrogance!

Why is it that I feel as if you would not trust me to make a single decision about my own life and how I would live it, but you expect that I should trust you with the debt that you have laid on all of us and our children? We did not want that TARP bill. We said “NO!” We would repeal it if we could. I am not sure that we still cannot. There is such urgency and recklessness in all the recent spending. From my perspective, it seems that you have all gone insane.

I also know that I am far from alone in these feelings. Do you honestly feel that your current pursuits have merit to patriotic Americans? We want it to stop. We want to put the brakes on everything that is being rushed by us and forced upon us. We want our voice back!

You have forced us to put our lives on hold to straighten out the mess you are making. We will have to give up our vacations, our time spent with our children, any relaxation time we may have had and money we cannot afford to spend on you to bring our concerns to Washington.

Our president often knows all the right buzzword is unsustainable. Well, no kidding. How many tens of thousands of dollars did the focus group cost to come up with that word? We don't want your overpriced words. Stop treating us like we're morons.

We want all of you to stop focusing on your reelection and do the job we want done, not the job you want done or the job your party wants done. You work for us and at this rate I guarantee you not for long because we are coming. We will be heard and we will be represented. You think we're so busy with our lives that we will never come for you? We are the formerly silent majority, all of us who quietly work , pay taxes, obey the law, vote, save money, keep our noses to the grindstone and we are now looking up at you. You have awakened us, the patriotic spirit so strong and so powerful that it had been sleeping too long. You have pushed us too far. Our numbers are great. They may surprise you. For every one of us who will be there, there will be hundreds more that could not come. Unlike you, we have their trust. We will represent them honestly, rest assured. They will be at the polls on voting day to usher you out of office. We have cancelled vacations. We will use our last few dollars saved. We will find the representation among us and a grassroots campaign will flourish. We didn't ask for this fight. But the gloves are coming off. We do not come in violence, but we are angry. You will represent us or you will be replaced with someone who will. There are candidates among us when hewill rise like a Phoenix from the ashes that you have made of our constitution.

Democrat, Republican, independent, libertarian. Understand this. We don't care. Political parties are meaningless to us. Patriotic Americans are willing to do right by us and our Constitution and that is all that matters to us now. We are going to fire all of you who abuse power and seek more. It is not your power. It is ours and we want it back. We entrusted you with it and you abused it. You are dishonorable. You are dishonest. As Americans we are ashamed of you. You have brought shame to us. If you are not representing the wants and needs of your constituency loudly and consistently, in spite of the objections of your party, you will be fired. Did you hear? We no longer care about your political parties. You need to be loyal to us, not to them. Because we will get you fired and they will not save you. If you do or can represent me, my issues, my views, please stand up. Make your identity known. You need to make some noise about it. Speak up. I need to know who you are. If you do not speak up, you will be herded out with the rest of the sheep and we will replace the whole damn congress if need be one by one. We are coming. Are we coming for you? Who do you represent? What do you represent? Listen. Because we are coming. We the people are coming.

Saturday, April 25, 2009

My Amazing Wife

My wife is amazing. I've never met anyone who works so hard at loving their spouse. I am blessed beyond belief, and I take it for granted. Words don't do a good job at capturing how awesome she is. I'd need ten blogs, a thousand entries, and a google of words each to begin...

I would devote my life to trying to chronicle how awesome, but then I would miss too much. Besides, my efforts are better spent on loving her, then talking about her.

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Back to math

I've taken a hiatus from posting here for a brief period. That's ok though since no one reads this anyway. However I haven't just been laying on my couch and watching television. I've been working a on problem presented by a friend of mine. He has a (currently nine part) description of the problem that you can read here:

http://toomai.wordpress.com/

called "Partitions of a Graph." I've been spending my free time trying to write a formal description of the problem and present some of the things we've proved so far. I just this morning found a class of graphs that allows me to say this:

Theorem: For every positive even integer n = 2m, there exists a Q1 graph G of order n such that \delta(G) = m-1.
Proof: The graph K_{(m+1),(m-1)} is Q1 and prohibits the partition (2, 2, ..., 2).

That's as much detail as I'm going to give here, because as you can tell above, I much prefer doing my formal writing in LaTeX. I will however try and figure a way to upload a pdf for those of you that are interested, (all zero of you).

The great thing about the theorem though, is that it allows me to say this.

Corollary: For any given positive integer n, there exist Q1 graphs with minimum degree greater than or equal to n.

and

Corollary: For any given positive integer n, there exist Q1 graphs with connectivity of degree greater than or equal to n.

These two facts seem rather counterintuitive, even though the example presented is fairly simple. It just adds to my interest in the problem.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Today's Gospel

The Gospel for today was from Mark 1:40-45, The Cleansing of a Leper.

"A leper came to him [and kneeling down] begged him and said, 'If you wish, you can make me clean.' Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand, touched him, and said to him, 'I do will it. Be made clean.' The leprosy left him immediately, and he was made clean. Then, warning him sternly, he dismissed him at once. Then he said to him, 'See that you tell no one anything, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses prescribed; that will be proof for them.' The man went away and began to publicize the whole matter. He spread the report abroad so that it was impossible for Jesus to enter a town openly. He remained outside in deserted places, and people kept coming to him from everywhere."

It never fails that every time I hear a reading like this, I can't help but marvel at what I hear. I don't mean to trivialize the healing power of Jesus, what he does is awesome. It is what happens afterward that perplexes me. Jesus warns the man "sternly" to tell no one and what is the first thing the man does? He goes blabbing it to the whole town. Am I the only one in the world that finds this strange?

First of all, why does Jesus warn the man to tell no one? To me this is not so clear. Some dismiss it as a desire for people to not swarm him, which is what happened as word got out. I don't find this likely. This story is at the beginning of his public ministry. The same story appears in Matthew's Gospel, but it is preceded by the Sermon on the Mount, and in Luke's Gospel prior to the Sermon on the Plain. While the order of events is in question, the same warning is given by Jesus, "Tell no one." Jesus is beginning his preaching. If he wants to get a message out, wouldn't it be a good thing for people to be there to hear the message? Wouldn't he want people to come and listen? Would not a miracle have the effect drawing attention to his ministry? I am aware that my argument sounds like Jesus is playing more the role of a politician than a savior. That's not what I mean. I just think Jesus would know this kind of miracle would get a reaction.

I've had others tell me that it is human nature to not do what you are told. So if you're told not to eat a cookie, all you want is to eat the cookie. Thus, Jesus told him not to tell people so that he would immediately want to. This is just absurd to me. If you believe in the Trinity, Jesus is God. When Jesus speaks, he is speaking truth. Nowhere in the Gospels does Jesus do anything like this kind of manipulation. This can't be what he meant. If that were true, the 10 Commandments would read. "Don't love me, worship other gods, kill people, steal whatever you can get, covet your neighbors wife." This is just ridiculous. So, no, Jesus really meant don't tell anyone.

The second question I have is why the guy didn't listen. What an ungrateful little jerk. Jesus is moved with pity and heals him, then makes one simple request, and the guy totally blows him off. "Whatever Jesus, I'm tellin' people." I can't imagine this. I know I'm not completely obedient to the words of Christ all the time, but if Jesus just healed me of a disease and I had no doubt about it, I'd be on my best behavior for at least a little while. If the guy told me to walk around like a chicken, I'd probably do it. He just did something amazing, miraculous, for me. But this guy goes and tells everyone publicly. I suppose he's excited, and I can't blame him for that. But still I'm left scratching my head.

Thursday, February 5, 2009

Strange Attraction

A few years back I read "Confessions of St. Augustine." If you are into philosophy or are highly introspective I strongly recommend picking it up. There is one part in there (and its been so long now I can't remember where) that he questions why people are drawn to the suffering of others. He was motivated to ask the question because he noticed people going to see dramatic plays and becoming overly emotional because of it. He would have a much easier time locating examples in the present day. Most TV shows have characters that are struggling with something. Society loves to watch these fictional, and sometimes real people, suffer through their trials and tribulations. This is also why the news is always about people who got shot, or who lost their jobs, or who lost family members. The news is a business like any other and they are going to present what sells, and nothing sells better than the tragic story that catches everyones attention.

This is not all bad. There is some part of pain that moves people to compassion. We are designed to suffer with one another. It draws us closer to one another. I'm not pretending to be an expert on the subject, but I do know that God has his plans, and suffering is among them. Jesus did not come to rid our lives of suffering. If you believe he did, you don't understand the cross. You also don't know your bible; he was not shy about the subject. Read Matthew 10:37-39, just one example.

But some of that attraction is more pride than compassion. Some people try to "help" solely because they want to be a part of the story. To insert oneself into a situation for the "glory" of being the one to fix it does nothing but cause more pain. I call this the savior complex.

The definition of compassion is "to suffer with", not "to fix." If you want to be my friend, suffer with me. Please don't try and fix my problems when you don't know the first thing about me. When you do that, even if you are well intentioned, you cause me more pain. Jesus did not need someone to take his cross away from him, but he did need someone to help him carry it.

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Some good news

Good news and some enlightening news. The Bailout currently bouncing around congress had a portion of it marked for providing contraception and abortion. Thankfully, that has been withdrawn. Here is House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in an interview on ABC news before that part of the package was withdrawn.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Hundreds of millions of dollars to expand family planning services. How is that stimulus?

PELOSI: Well, the family planning services reduce cost. They reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children's health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs. One of those - one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So no apologies for that?

PELOSI: No apologies. No. we have to deal with the consequences of the downturn in our economy. Food stamps, unemployment insurance, some of the initiatives you just mentioned. what the economists have told us from right to left. There is more bang for the buck, a term they use, by investing in food stamps and in unemployment insurance than in any tax cut.

Abortion as an economic stimulus? Contraception as an economic stimulus? As absurd as this is, it is good news because it illustrates the progressive movement in this country. I'm tired of talking to people who say things like, "The government should pay for health care for its citizens." This is what happens when we count on government to take care of us. Government then has an interest in how that health care is being administered. They don't want to waste money treating people for "preventable" disease. So they're going to take action.

Examples: Government doesn't want to provide lobectomies and pneumonectomies for people who use tobacco, so it will take actions so it won't have to. There goes our right to smoke. But it won't stop there. Cirrhosis is an expensive disease which can be caused by alcohol consumption, so you could probably expect some kind of prohibition or restriction on your alcohol use. I'm sure your imagination can make the argument for gun control, so I won't elaborate. But lets not forget the national epidemic for obesity. Byopsies and heart meds are expensive enough and common enough that you'll probably be denied fatty foods. Government wants to put you on a diet.

I've got to say, I don't blame Government here. I think it makes a lot of sense. I don't want to pay for health care for those people that make "unhealthy" life choices either. I want those people to pay for there own health care. But that's not whats being presented with socialized medicine. We'll be paying for Cancer Man's chemo treatments. We'll be paying for Arthur's liver transplant. We'll be paying for Rosie O'Donnell's lipo. We'll be paying.

This is the logical conclusion of investing in something. Investors want to make sure they have a good investment and they're not wasting money. When government invests in your life, government has more of say in your life. Here's another way to look at this. When you're a teenager, your parents provide your food, your shelter, your transportation. I've often heard it said, "As long as you live under my roof, you live by my rules." And this is not unreasonable. Parents have a great deal of control over their children while they live at home. And this is precisely why kids leave the house... to enjoy the freedom that comes with supporting yourself. There is no freedom when you are not providing for yourself. You are a slave to your provider, and subject to their dictates.

Nancy Pelosi's comments illustrate this so well. Wait until health care becomes burdened, which shouldn't take long. You'll see a lot more "incentives" for so called "family planning." Translation, abortion and contraception. It won't be long before people start saying, "people with more than 3 kids are placing an undue burden on the socialized health care system." So there will be penalties for such people. Government will begin to dictate how many children couples will be allowed to have. If you think I'm crazy, go read Speaker Pelosi's comments again. The mentality is already there.

Saturday, January 24, 2009

Roe v. Wade

I was extremely disappoint in conservative media this week as they chose to ignore the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision. This is a tragic day worth mention to those outside of the liberal biased media. What the crap Rush? Isn't anybody going to do a story on this? Glenn, Sean, Bill? Nothing? Are you too scared? The Republican party can't handle it right now? Too many other problems? What a bunch of crap.

Oh, and John McCain, no time to come to the March for Life rally? Sam Brownback found the time. I'm glad I now know how important this is to all you folks. You don't care. Just string along the social conservatives to get the vote? The main stream media I understand, they don't present anything a conservative would want to see anyway. They'd probably laud this as a day where we became more enlightened as a country. But conservatives...

4000 a day. 50,000,000 since 1973. And we ignore it.

"A nation that kills its own children is a nation without hope."
-- Pope John Paul II

"It is a poverty to decide that a child must die just so that you may live as you wish."
-- Blessed Teresa of Calcutta

Sunday, January 18, 2009

Farewell

Since we are in a time of transition in America, I thought it fitting to take note of it here. I watched President Bush's farewell address just now and found it very interesting. I'll hold my comments for now because that isn't what I was intending to talk about. I noticed a link on the side of the page to other presidents farewell addresses, so I started watching and found it rather interesting. I thought you might find it illuminating as well. I tried to find the most complete speeches and my apologizes for any cuts in the speech, and any news commentary. I tried to keep it to a minimum. I'm also not promoting any specific news agency, just trying to post it in full.







I was unable to find the rest of President Clinton's speech. If anyone finds it, please let me know.

I was also unable to find any farewell address from President George H. W. Bush.





The only other speech I could find was from President Eisenhower in 1961. Again, if you find any more I would be happy to add them.



Sunday, January 11, 2009

Queen Covering Problem

Allow me to be nerdy for a bit. I came across an interesting problem the other day that a friend told me about. I did a little research and it turns out that it goes by the name "Queen Covering Problem." The problem is stated like so: Given an 'n x n' chessboard, what is the minimum number of queens that can be placed on the chessboard so that each square is occupied or being attacked by a queen. There is a varient called the "Independent Queen Covering Problem" where you have the added condition that the queens cannot be attacking each other.

So, being an amateur graph theorist, this kind of problem is right up my alley. A dominating set in a graph, G = (V,E), is a subset D of V such that every vertex of V\D is adjacent to some vertex in D. The dominating number of a graph G is the minimum order of any dominating set. This is often denoted gamma(G). The 'n x n' chessboard can be made a graph by taking the squares as vertices and defining two vertices adjacent if they are on the same horizontal, vertical, or diagonal. So the Queen Covering Problem is just a dominating number problem.

This is similar to another more familiar problem called the "Eight Queen Problem," place eight queens on a chessboard so that no two queens are attacking each other. There is even a wikipedia entry on this one:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight_queens_puzzle
The queen covering problem gets a one sentence mention lower on the page, (or at least, it did when I was writing this). Apparently this problem isn't cool enough to get its own wikipedia entry. And according to Wikipedia, (the fount of all knowledge) the domination number for an 'n x n' board is 5.

I've only played around with this problem a little, the next obvious step is just to write a computer program to find these, which I am going to work on. I'll also look around at some combinatoric and graph theory journals to see what people have come up with. If you're reading this and you have any references for me, I'd be happy to hear them.

My results so far:
For n = 1, 2, 3. gamma = 1.
For n = 4. gamma = 2.
For n = 5, 6. gamma = 3.
For n = 7. gamma = 4.
For n = 8. gamma = 5.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

New Church

January marks our being in Baltimore for one year. For that time we've been going to a church called "Church of the Crucifixion." We really love the church. The people seem really nice and the priests (yeah Idaho, that was plural) are awesome. Unfortunately we don't know anybody there. We haven't really found a way to fit in there. But despite this we really love the church.

My wife and I talked about going to a new church this year, which we did for the first time today. We went to St. Philip Neri this morning and it was good. It made us sad not to go to our old church, but we feel like there is no hope for community there. So we'll see how this new church goes.

I watched an episode of "King of Queens" yesterday where Doug and Carrie were looking for new friends. They decided a good place to go to meet other couples to hang out with was the paint department at the hardware store. Finding other couples to hang out with has been difficult for us so I found the episode kind of amusing. We have been blessed with an awesome couple that we have become friends with, and we have a lot of fun hanging out with them. But unfortunately for us they are Mormon, and so they don't go to church with us. Not that I have anything against Mormons, cause I don't. I actually love that about them. It would just be nice to have friends at Church too. Maybe I'm being too greedy... although being greedy for good friends has worked for me in the past. God has always been faithful to me in that.

This post depresses me. I just think about things like this too much. I promise I'll blog more about cooler stuff in the future. Once I get all this crap out of my system, that is.

Saturday, January 3, 2009

Computers


My wife just got a new computer. Her father decided to buy really crazy gifts for everyone this year and we got an Asus desktop. Problem was, we live in Maryland and they gave us the computer in Idaho. We returned it in Idaho and got a gift card, with the intention of getting the same computer when we got back to Maryland. But in doing all that we decided to get Alicia a laptop instead; so we got a hp. It is pretty nice and faster than anything she will ever need. She is a little frustrated because she can't get flash media to work, but I'm sure she'll figure it out.

The computer has become hers, even though the original was given to us. She gives me grief if I use it. But I've had a laptop since I started grad school that I always said was ours, but really thought of as mine, so I don't mind so much. Except that the power cord for my laptop decided to die recently. Her power cord will power mine, but it won't charge the battery, which I find odd. I just finished purchasing a new power cord from eBay this morning, which is cool. My computer is a Dell, and Dell wanted $70 for a new power cord which I thought was crazy. Luckily eBay has them for less than $20. Thank God for capitalism. I have to wait 10-14 days, but I don't mind. I'll just use my wife's computer until then.

Other than that our very old desk top has finally died. I'm going to try and rebuild it eventually just to see if I can. It needs a new mother board. Original was a Gateway. Oh yeah, I don't recommend a Gateway. I like the Dell, it crashes every once in a while but I can't tell if that is Windows or Dell. The hp is nice, but we've had it less than a week so I can't say for sure. I was sad to return the Asus because I've heard good things, but maybe in five years I'll give up on my Dell and try one of those.