GROUND ZERO. WHY NOT MAKE IT A PLAYGROUND FOR CHILDREN INSTEAD OF A PLAYGROUND FOR IDIOTS.

Regardless your stance on the whole proposition of a Mosque at Ground Zero that has again shown how volatile the tenets of our own Constitution can be, I found it

interesting to watch this Brit make his point.  Pat Condell is quite outspoken on a lot of issues, especially religion, but here he questions the reasoning behind the decision making and why America is treading on the same ground that the Brits have been facing for some time over Sharia law in the U.K.. And right or wrong, Condell points out one absolute truth; were the roles reversed, Constitution or no, there would be no American place of worship at the site of a Muslim memorial.  Or anywhere,for that matter.

So why are we so wrapped up in the minute details of Constitutional controversy? Why does the 2nd Amendment give us the right to bear arms and yet a permit be required, often denied thus restricting the very liberty that is a given under the Constitution?  To me that is the reasoning of not having absolutes. It was the logic that the framers of The Constitution installed a set of checks and balances.

Should there be a Mosque at the place where many died because of the Muslim extremist terrorist attacks? What do you think?

MisterWriter

WANNA SEE HOW LUCKY YOU ARE? IT JUST TAKES ONE!

The video is a time lapse from 1980 to the present that shows the tracking of asteroids. As you see as the time nears the present year that our tracking systems are better and we are able to see just how much of it comes across the orbital paths. Wait till the end of the video… it might make you have a better day!

Which one has our name on it? Select the HD option above.

If you want to learn more click http://www.naic.edu/~nolan/astorb.html

Happy Monday.

 

MisterWriter

IN YOUR FACE BOOK SELF LOVE HELP GROUP STARTS HERE. YOU NEED IT!

Over 500 million people worldwide have made Facebook their chosen method of social interaction, a very large number that has spurred a slew of studies about the value of social networking and its effects. 

Statistics from the Facebook site show the following:

• More than 500 million active users
• 50% of our active users log on to Facebook in any given day
• Average user has 130 friends
• People spend over 700 billion minutes per month on Facebook

Are you my friend? Well, a Facebook friend may be nothing more than a blip on the wall of your life. People have hundreds and even thousands of Facebook friends with husbands and wives sitting inches from each other in the bedroom updating their walls with the gossip of their lives with n’er a concern about privacy – their own, I mean – and open to comment by every person who has befriended them online.

Now a study had focused on the narcissistic nature of Facebook. After all why have friends when you can love yourself. York University psychologist Soraya Mehdizadeh concluded that: “The results showed that students with comparatively lower self-esteem scores and higher narcissism scores not only spent spent more time on Facebook, but also tended to "self-promote" more than the students with higher self-esteem scores and lower narcissism scores. Facebook "self promotion" is described by ShockMD.com as "any descriptive or visual information that appeared to attempt to persuade others about one's own positive qualities. For instance posting 'My Celebrity Look-alikes'. Use of picture enhancement etc.”

Well why not? after all Stuart Smalley said you were worth it, Gosh darn it! 

Facebook postings can be articulate and idiotic. Do we really need to know that you are bored right now? Do I need to know that you are having fish for dinner? Really – do I care?  As a means of connecting families and having the ability to chat in private is a nice feature but having to share with the world that your teenage daughter got knocked up or that you have purple underwear because it makes you feel sexy is ridiculous to post. 

Is Facebook just a means to self-gratify, a way to feel connected and important?  Does it feel good to have everyone wish you a Happy Birthday because Facebook remembered for you? Does this interconnected over personalization detract from having a unique self-identity?  Isn’t it one big fan club – after all those who disagree are slammed by all your friends if they are contrary?

Facebook can have a positive value but more often than not it serves the addictive need for self-gratification.

Getting a comment from a friend on my wall just does not have that warm feeling that the effort of a card and a stamp through the mail makes. It takes no effort to write on a wall. In fact, with the sheer volume of information posted by your friends, you have time only to glance at what was written. Yes, that’s nice – yawn – oh look, so and so posted again. Photos are good. Everyone likes to see faces. But 120 photos of the ugly purple dress you bought that you think makes you look sexy when it really makes you look pregnant is hardly a judicious use of storage space.

 

Privacy – a joke. Everything you write, every note, email, all time stamped into the great human book of life. It’s been called “The Stupid Epidemic” by some. here is what one author wrote about a posting: “Here's what's going on with Facebook besides posting emotions, and it's what prompted me to write this blog. I just saw someone post this on Facebook: “The family and I are about to go out of town. We're going to be away for 10 days in Europe starting on the 24th. The dog is at the sitters and, Oh God, I hope our house plants live!”

So why are you surprised when the house gets robbed? Or meeting new people that you chat with on Facebook. And I am not alone in the whole Facebook is stupid thing. in fact a Google search returned  about 121,000,000 results in 0.18 seconds. Click here to see the results.

Time magazine reported Twenty Five Things I Didn’t want to Know About You in a February 2009 article claiming that…  

viral narcissism has sent roughly 800,000 hours of worktime productivity down the drain
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1877187,00.html#ixzz0xjqurLLB

It is a bit much when you think about the level of ease by which this and other social media sites try to make it. Is it any wonder that people are socially inept at real life conversations, at job interviews and where it really counts?  I’m still waiting for Facebook Weddings and Facebook Funerals where we can gather en masse for the big events while still in our pajamas, unshaved and sipping that beer as we type out our condolences and transmit those cute hearts and flowers that people so love to send around. They could have a memorial wall where the virtually dead could be immortalized through time until the aliens come and question why they did not blow up our world thousands of years ago.

Perhaps as Bob Marley said: “Truth is, everybody is going to hurt you; you just gotta find the ones worth suffering for.”

Employers now use Facebook and other sites to background check their employees.  ZDNet asks whether those pictures you posted drunk are hurting your job. “A survey of HR and business managers in the United Kingdom has revealed almost a third (32 percent) search the Internet and check social networking Web sites to gather background and behavior information on potential recruits and existing employees.”

What about your doctor drunk on Facebook? “First came the story of William Wells, who arrived at St. Mary Medical Center in Long Beach, California on April 9 severely wounded. He died, but not before nurses could post pics of him on Facebook. Four staffers were fired, three disciplined, but none of the nurses involved were let go, the Los Angeles Times reports.”

That social media has served as the drug of choice, addicting billions to the ease, as cigarettes did to the social graces of the earlier part of the twentieth century, is a given. People are lost without their Internet connectivity. one need only look at what mobile phones have become. Now you can do all but cook a steak on your cell phone – although rumor has it that the ambient microwave radiation may do just that.

Walk any street and watch the majority plugged in, plugged up in their ears and out of touch with the world around them. You are too busy Tweeting to chat up the cute girl or guy, unless of course he or she is on Facebook in which case there is an application that can turn a cell phone photo into a search function.  At school “43% of all teens who take their phones to school say they text in class at least once a day or more. 64% of teens with cell phones have texted in class,” reports PewResearchCenter Publications in an April 2010 story. “One in three teens sends more than 100 text messages a day, or 3000 texts a month,” they report. Read their report HERE.

I admit to having a Facebook account. I use it mainly to repost blog items like this one. I do find friends – real people that I have met and have no opportunity to see in person; there I find a useful application. The rest of it; the constant, endless, meaningless updates about every minute of the day I do not need.  the sad thing is that people will take offense at this. It is not the people I have a problem with. Like any drug addicted or alcoholic a pattern of behavior is established that ultimately becomes obsessive. And well it should since millions of dollars are spent to keep you that way.

So before you complain about what I have just written, I challenge you to a test. Turn off your computer/ web enabled phone for a week. No texting, no Facebook.  Now pick up the telephone and call one of your friends and have a meaningful talk. Listen to how their voice sounds. Remember how you enjoyed watching that person’s eyes light up with a funny story. Make a date to go grab a coffee or something where you have no computer attached to you. Then come back and tell me I am wrong.

MisterWriter

SAD NEWS: HOMESCHOOLING IS GETTING KILLED LAW BY LAW AND COUNTRY BY COUNTRY

Recent attempts at legislation to curtail the rights of parents homeschooling their children have become prevalent on a global basis.

Homeschoolers Vow to Continue in Face of New Law

And yet when you peruse the list of famous homeschooled people what you see is a Who’s Who of important and influential people both past and present.

Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, Benjamin Franklin, Orville and Wilbur Wright, George Washington Carver, Albert Einstein, Michael faraday, Pierre de Fermat, Fred Hoyle, Ada Lovelace, Henri Poincare, Andrew Carnegie, Amadeo Giannini, Horace Greeley, Ray Kroc, Josephy Pulitzer, Ansel Adams, Susan B. Anthony, Davy Crockett, Margaret Mead, Ferdinand Porsche, Abby Sunderland, Frank Lloyd Wright, Louisa May Alcott, Hans Christian Anderson, Margaret Atwood,Jane Austen, Robert Browning,Pearl S. Buck , William F. Buckley, Jr.,Robert Burns, Agatha Christie, Samuel Clemens a.k.a. Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Robert Frost, Alex Haley, Helen Keller, Rose Wilder Lane journalist, ghostwriter, daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder, C.S. Lewis, Amy Lowell, Gabriela Mistral, Thomas Paine, Christopher Paolini teen author of Eragon, Alexander Pope English essayist, Eleanor H. Porter
author of Pollyanna, Beatrix Potter author of Peter Rabbit Tales, Carl Sandburg , George Bernard Shaw, Mary Shelley
best known for her Gothic novel Frankenstein which she wrote at age 18, Leo Tolstoy,Walt Whitman, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Virginia Woolf,John Adams 2nd President, John Quincy Adams 6th President, Grover Cleveland 22nd President, James Garfield 20th President, William Henry Harrison 9th President, Andrew Jackson 7th President, Thomas Jefferson 3rd President, Andrew Johnson 17th President, Abraham Lincoln 16th President, James Madison 4th President, James Monroe 5th President, James Polk 11th President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt 32nd President, Theodore Roosevelt 26th President, John Tyler 10th President, George Washington 1st President, Woodrow Wilson
28th President, Alan Alda, Louis Armstrong, Aaron Carter, Charlie Chaplin, Hillary Duff, Whoopi Goldberg, Alexander Gould, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Jonas Brothers, Yehudi Menuhin, Hayden Panettiere, LeAnne Rimes, Kristen Stewart, Maria von Trapp, Elijah Wood, to name a few…. 

If you do not know any of the names just Google them.

And when you look at the massive blob of legalized mush of public school curriculum that passes as standards these days, you get a clear picture why homeschooling should be the poster child and not the victim of our frenzied quest for homogenization. Bound by catering to the lowest achiever while pacifying the highest, and stuck by endless budgetary cancers, public education has become the whipping post of every politician (and former actor seeking office).

 

Not everyone can be homeschooled. That is a given. Nonetheless, where it works, so much more is done in a shorter period, with a greater retention and accessibility, not to mention test scores and careers that every apple pie baking mom could be proud of. Of course, who bakes anymore?

Systematically, the world is jumping aboard the “every child deserves an institutional education” program.  Lawsuits are prevalent globally defending the right of parents to not only raise their children, but educate them according to their own standards. Government is not so quick to agree that parents know what they are doing – as if government has demonstrated over the last few decades that IT knows what it’s doing. As if failing education standards and high dropout rates are a sign of good government insight. As if funding state prisoners on a level that state public students would love is insight. As if the level of school crime is an indication of a positive insight.

Or perhaps the needs of the many are determined by the needs of the few; a society that shouts democracy and yet where civil rights and personal liberty seems to be ever shrinking under the banner of legislation. Perhaps this is a practical need as the masses – the largely ignorant masses, as Jay Leno has often shown on “JayWalking” who know nothing of local government, need to be mustered and cajoled like large herds of cattle.  Perhaps all we need is a good beer, WalMart and a little hope for a brighter future as we suffocate under debt and exhaustion.  Just look at the obsession this country has with the American celebrity and you get a snapshot of the intelligence factor. When National Enquirer can outsell a local daily newspaper, times are tough. No we are not all stupid, but we are in danger of allowing the lowest level of intelligence to become the norm.

Good and bad. Right and wrong. truth, justice and the American way. Where are these now? Where is the justice?  Many believe that justice is a rare commodity. And yet we live in a country with enough lawyers to defend the personal rights of every American ten times over, especially if there is money to be made.  “Have you been injured breathing in the last fifty years. If so, you may be entitled to damages…Call Hector Shylock at 111-111-1111 and let us sue the bastards for you.” Uh-huh. Or my other favorite… “I owed the IRS $200,000 but thanks to Hector Shylock I only paid $2.55. Thank you Hector Shylock.” Nothing like stopping America from getting its only income source. Way to go. Of course it would help if America actually collected its dues from the likes of big business.

It is the ailment that homeschooling suffers. We do not want a nation of educated thinkers – what the heck would we do with that? Too many Berkeley types running around criticizing the country. Heck they already do that. No we want it simplified, diversified, homogenized, pasteurized and castrated. Win the lottery. Shop WalMart. Buy in bulk (for good reason). And let’s be sure to catch the Kardashians and see how spoiled rich people get to live.

Homeschooling is the last best hope. Public education, that Morpheus creature that sometimes takes the blue pill and sometimes takes the red pill has ticked and tocked over the generations to no avail. Once the whipping stick went away and the rules changed, schools had no power over the students and no power over the parents of the students. It is a shitty time to be in education, like watching the wall of water in Deep Impact heading your way. your raincoat and gum boots will not help.

As we watch the deficit clock tick well into the trillions of debt dollars that we will never pay off; as we watch China become a leading superpower and global economic engine; as we watch it take fifty years to built a piss ant little bridge addition to the Bay Bridge, is it any wonder why those people who believe in the right to parent and the right to educate their children with a system that might actually work, are getting upset? They might have a system that actually works. And under budget!

As a new school year begins, let us take pause and ask what our education should be like and how we can benefit the children we serve, for they are the future and we will get what we pay for in the way of their education. And if parents have the means to home school, they should be encouraged to do so, with lessons taken of things that can be transplanted to the public system and ways to make a lesson work well.  We should strip politicians of the ability to even speak the word “education” and concentrate on the rights of teachers to have order in their classroom, and parents required to supervise and restrain their children, especially those that bring their poor home values into the classroom. Sure expect higher teacher quality but likewise; expect a higher standard of parents and students as well.

Maybe then we will see hope. Maybe then we might stand with a first class education system rather than the third world system everyone sees us clutching to. And for God’s sake turn off the Kardashians, Kate plus 8 and all that nonsense.

MisterWriter

Jupiter PELTED By Rogue Meteor (VIDEO)

DUCK AND COVER WON'T HELP:

The insignificance of our species in galactic terms is not lost with this (video) impact of a decent sized asteroid on Jupiter's surface. The fireball which looked to be the size of Earth or larger should give us pause. The fact that this giant pinball machine has no shortage of killer asteroids, any of which could impact us but for chance and perhaps some pull from Jupiter's larger gravitational field, should awaken us to improve ourselves rather than wallow in the intellectual black hole that our modern culture has become. Then again, perhaps just another episode of the Kardashians won't hurt us too much...
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

THE BANK THAT COULD -STERLING FIRST T0 RAlSE HUGE CAPlTAL

In a press release today, "Sterling Savings Bank, Friday said it will raise a total of $730 million in new capital from institutional, private equity firms including Thomas H. Lee Partners, L.P. and Warburg Pincus Private Equity X, L.P, and other accredited investors.
The transaction, which is expected to close on or about August 26, will result in the issuance of 4.2 billion shares of Sterling common stock. "
Sterling, the parent company of Sonoma Bank - Located in the Todos Santos plaza in Concord, has managed to achieve an incredibly difficult feat in these difficult recessionary times. Being able to raise capital to help save banks may well be the model other banks will follow. "I will say this is a great day for our bank, once funded it will free us from the C & D placed on us in Oct 2009 and will allow us to move forward in Great Hometown Helpful Banking!" said Virginia Thomas, president of the local Sonoma Bank.
Sterling President and Chief Executive Officer Greg Seibly said, “This commitment of $730 million in new capital represents a major milestone in our recovery plan, and one that will substantially strengthen our capital ratios and provide a solid base for rebuilding long-term franchise value. The focused energies of many at Sterling have helped us to preserve and grow our core banking franchise in support of our customers and communities across the Pacific Northwest. Today’s announcement reflects the investment community’s recognition of this value.” -MisterWriter
Read more here.  http://www1.snl.com/irweblinkx/file.aspx?IID=101432&FID=9992620

The N-Word and our Collective Immaturity

It is not the word but the status of the user entitled or barred from use. This is a contradiction since it can be argued that only those subject to the evils of slavery have the right to utter it, and yet by that token no one alive today has that right. The descendants of slaves have no right to the word for they did not suffer the indignity or the injustice of slavery; but rather are the better for the rights accrued since that time. Thus the word needs to be relegated to the annals of history and no longer be used in any context by blacks or whites or blacks in the face of the whites who likewise have done no enslaving themselves.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

WHAT IS REALLY STUPID ABOUT THE WHOLE PROP 8 DRAMA IS…

…that in the end, especially in California, the “whatever” capital of the world, gay marriage will be legal. It is inevitable. It is as inevitable as the sun setting, as the rights of prisoners who should have no rights, as inevitable as the way the law changes to accommodate the one rather than the many. In short, it is just a momentary blip in the radar of life. No matter how much whining you do, it will be legal for gays to marry and enjoy the same rights as everyone else (for what those rights are worth these days.)  Go read…

Court Rules No Gay Marriages Pending Appeal

Now frankly, listening to the whole drama that went on with the election and those pro and those against, and those self-righteous wannabes who stand affirming their belief in the name of one deity or another who in actuality know…nothing… and lose sight of the fundamental premise of all faiths; “God judges, not you!”  So whether you agree with or against, or feel that it offends you or believe that everyone has the right to do what they will… this will come to pass. It is inevitable. Deal with it.

You see, if corrupt government, crooked lawyers, pollution, dictators, criminals, budget crisis, racism, to name a few, do not deter you enough, you will add an acceptance of gay marriage into the mix we call America. It will happen. And I won’t say that I told you so.

So why should YOU care? Well, I would rather two gay men having a happy life than the hypocrite heterosexual who cheats on his wife/husband, commits spousal abuse, child abuse or worse. You see….I do not ask what YOU do in your bedroom because I do not want to know. And interestingly that attitude covers both the hetero and homosexual scope of people. I do not want to know. And why should I know?  Really?  The same reasoning states that I do not need to know gay and lesbian historical information.  It has no bearing on learning history to know that Napoleon may have been down on one knee.  The Romans were the most sexually prolific and public. They printed coinage portraying everything from blatant hetero sex to homosexuality, and this was not a hush hush topic.  Of course their television choices were far less “exciting” than the crap we have on TV now, but the point is that America’s history of puritanical self-flagellation goes hand in hand with its excess of pornography that all but invented Internet commerce. So what are you whining about?

Now I am sure that some of you are huffing at this post. No I am not gay. No I am not stupid. But when you watch the news about millions of gallons of oil leaking into the Gulf in the name of commerce, you can hardly add gay marriage as a major hurdle in the pivot of the world, unless you have some closet tendencies that embarrass you.  No I do not want to watch American Gay Idol. But that is far removed from the right of two Americans of the same gender to enjoy a life together without me trying to screw it up for them. There are so many things in the world worth fighting for or against. There are soldiers dying in places we can argue that we should or should not be in. The rights of individuals to enjoy the liberties secured by the Constitution of life, liberty and happiness should involve only them and not you.

For a country that was built on differences and struggles endlessly with the rights of those differences, I am always amazed at how extreme our self righteousness can be. Especially in the name of God. Go figure.

MisterWriter

IF PROP 8 WORRIES YOU THEN YOU WILL LOVE WOMB ENGINEERING? NOT!

Is it a boy or a girl? Gay or straight? All of the above? Well a pill may soon end that question by altering a child’s sexuality and orientation all in one while still in the womb.

“The ability to chemically steer a child's sexual orientation has become increasingly possible in recent years, with evidence building that homosexuality has biological roots and with advances in the treatment of babies in utero. Prenatal treatment for congenital adrenal hyperplasia is the first to test — unintentionally or not — that potential,” says a Los Angeles Times’ report which you can read HERE.

As genetics becomes a major player in the shape of the next generation of humans, I envision a world where celebrities are mugged and their mouth swabbed for their DNA so that someone can have a child that is, in essence their clone, or, at the least, a cross match of traits between the bio parents and the assaulted celeb.

As the rise in single parents (ala Jennifer Aniston) offers one sided parenting, why can’t the genes be selected off a menu of choices. Your doctor would simply ask: “Who do you want your child to be?”

Once their master in utero education, or in Obama terms, the “Race to the Pop” is there any reason why children cannot already be born with years of education imbedded, burned into their genes like code on a BIOS chip?

And not unlike Hitler’s quest for the Aryan perfection, the dangers of such technology, outweigh the benefits. Soldiers bred. Intellectuals cloned. And is it live or is it Memorex? 

René Descartes’ “I think therefore I am” does not discern whether the original or the copy is thinking.

Then again, the whole womb thing won’t be around for too much longer either.  I suspect sexual orientation will be the least of the worries as we take the next step.

MisterWriter

POLITICAL CURRENCY I GUESS – A PIECE OF HISTORY

While browsing the Net, I came across this little item for sale that caught my eye. Who says there wasn’t creative currency for the times. And for $3 what a steal! Click the coin to visit the site. Here is what they had to say: “Once upon a Time in the Old West, when there was no cable TV, radio or computers, there was very little but whiskey and loose rentable girls to keep a man from going stir crazy. In those days patrons of the most infamous Silver Dollar Hotel could earn or purchase solid brass brothel coins that would entitle them to an entire night of debauchery with their favorite prostitute.”

Of course coins for sex was nothing new – you can GOOGLE “spintria” to see what the Romans were up to with their coinage. A spintria (plural, spintriae ) is a Roman token, possibly for brothels, usually depicting sexual acts or symbols.They were used in ancient Rome to request and pay for different “services” in brothels and from prostitutes on the street. Since there were a lot of foreigners coming to the city that did not speak the language and most of the prostitutes were slaves captured from other places the coins made the transactions easy and efficient. One side of these coins showed what the buyer wanted and the other showed the amount of money to be paid for the act.

Interestingly, monetary terminology had fun origins. A Buck which we say referring to one dollar originated from early settlers trading deer skins. Each skin was referred to as a buck. To “shell out” your money originated from Native Americans using shells as currency which later also involved the European colonists. And finally, getting paid your “salary” came from the Romans who paid soldiers in part with salt. The Latin word for salt is “salarium” from which our “salary” derives.

MisterWriter

Dr. Laura's N-Word Rant: Radio Host Apologizes For Offensive Language (AUDIO)

When is the "N" word, not offensive? And while Dr. Laura could well have articulated the point without the use of the word, especially on air which surely causes tsunami like effects; her point was correct - it is a DOUBLE STANDARD when one hears the word used freely by African Americans and yet verboten for anyone else. It is an offensive word and should be banned by everyone alike - there are no exceptions. Race has become so sensitive an issue (as has language in general) that anyone contradicting what is readily heard is considered a racist. Even worse, this country will never surpass the race issue so long as we are busy sticking labels on everything to identify some uniqueness rather than our homogeneous nationality. Why are there any XXXX-Americans at all? Isn't this supposed to be "ONE Country under...INDIVISIBLE..."? It is not about heritage. As for the radio and television, I am tired of hearing half the language that now passes as a norm, let alone anything like the "N" bomb that will now generate a public whipping of Dr. Laura to satisfy the vastly offended.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

FORGET H1N1: THIS IS THE BUG TO WATCH – THE END IS NEAR

Despite some vocal critics of my assessment of the H1N1 virus as nothing more than a well-hyped bug lacking the statistical punch to KO the human population; now comes something more relevant. New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase, or NDM-1 is the bug of the future, not in and of itself since it is a gene, but in its ability to allow common bugs to become supersized.

Originating in India, it has already surfaced through large chunks of the world. Even though it is currently on a small scale of infection, here is the best part… “NDM-1 makes bacteria highly resistant to almost all antibiotics, including the most powerful class called carbapenems. Experts say there are no new drugs on the horizon to tackle it.”  Now that is something to look forward to.

Forget the national debt; this gene cane ensure that no one will be around to care about paying it off and, like the H1N1 demonstrated, the ebb and tide of viral transmissions in the modern jet age, makes transmission a certainty.

Some cases have emerged here, and the news has not been great. Did we learn ANYTHING from H1N1?  Are we recognizing that like those sci-fi movies where total annihilation is avoided by the bugs we safely carry that aliens would not be immune to, that the same fate awaits us – we sure love to share pain and misery on a global scale. Not that alien intelligences will come here; the very term ‘intelligence’ implies a vastly superior intellect that recognizes an orbital trash can when it sees one.

You can read the REUTER’S report HERE and see for yourself. Wash your hands afterwards and stop kissing those European visitors on both cheeks.

MisterWriter

DISPOSABLE CHILDREN:WHY DON'T SCHOOL BUSES HAVE SEATBELTS?

Despite endless legislation governing the protection of children from rules at school right down to the ongoing and contentious legal wrangling over a parent’s right to discipline a child, it seems to me that a HUGE gap exists in the issue of child protection; why are children in school buses not required to be seat belted?

There have been many arguments whether or not a seat belt would inhibit rescuing a child from a bus, and there are as many differing places where belts are required, yet lacking in the definitive statistical data about safety.

Having been a teacher and accompanying students on buses, it has always been a question that I believed needed more investigation. And the most recent Missouri school bus crash http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/05/missouri-school-bus-crash_n_672391.html raises again the question that I believe parents should be asking. Should school buses have mandatory seat belts?

This question has been raised by others with much data to support the notion that it is a deliberate omission of information rather than a validity with regard to safety. The National Coalition for School Bus Safety has much to say on their site HERE. I encourage a read and link to the relevant National Highway Traffic safety Administration data that they provide.

Australia is one country that has required seat belts for school buses with a data track record of a decade that showed that “there had been several serious bus crashes since then, but none in which a “seat belt wearing occupant has been reported as receiving fatal or disabling injuries. ”” Nonetheless, a visible lack of in depth studies on the topic has limited any definitive conclusions and the primary question is WHY have there been no definitive studies?

A May 2009 crash in Florida following a school bus rollover following a rear ending led the NTSB to report that “According to the NTSB report (attached), the driver and an adult chaperone confirmed that the students were wearing lap belts when the bus first set out.Two students, who said they wore the belts loosely, either slipped out from under the belts or had their belts become unbuckled as the bus overturned. One of the students sustained serious injuries; the other minor bruises. The remaining passengers sustained either minor or no injuries.

None of the passengers was ejected from the bus as it rolled over, a fact the investigators noted when they compared the Florida accident to a similar 1996 Arizona accident involving a school bus without seat belts. In that accident, five of the 31 passengers were ejected from the bus as it rolled over, one suffering a severe head injury requiring long term care, and another sustaining a cervical spine injury resulting in quadriplegia. All told, the bus driver and four passengers sustained serious injuries in the Arizona accident.”

 

School Bus Accident Injures 21 Children

Bus driver involved in 1999 fatal crash

Granted that there are many lawyers just waiting to sue on behalf of school bus victims (HERE), but the simple fact remains that this is an area that needs extensive investigation to determine safety and this has not been done to date.

“Since 1990, 407,000 fatal traffic accidents have occurred in the United States. School bus related accidents account for one third of one percent of these deaths.”

Now the NTSB did do a study and concluded that restraints would have had little bearing on the injuries or survivability in such crashes, however the study seems to be inconsistent in light of the statistics from other countries where the restraints are mandatory. In addition the NTSB concludes that “Overall, statistics show that your child is safer on a school bus, with or without safety belts, than in a car.”

Do you believe that? It seems that what is good for cars is not good for the sardine cans we place our children in. As a parent you have to ask yourself whether you will think twice next time your child gets aboard old yellow.

Here are a few pictures to think about": What do you think? Click the colored links for more…– MisterWriter

MDUSD TRUSTEE WILL NOT SEEK REELECTION

MDUSD trustee Paul Strange has decided to not run for reelection in November. Strange announced this on the MDUSD blog at www.mdusd.net.  Go there for more information.
MisterWriter

I WAS NAKED TODAY, IN EVERY WAY THAT COUNTS

I don’t mean to offer you a cheap thrill, because I’m sure you could live without the sight of my post 0.5C physique baring all to the world; but really that was not how naked I truly was. 

I was naked as a child without language or skill. I was naked as am American in Paris for the first time having failed high school French. I was disconnected from the Net; lost in the stream of Social Media; splayed and bared in my hands free time…

My Android got soaked while fishing, submerged, totally screwed, along with my camera when my waders sprung a leak leaving me with 2 very expensive paperweights. I tried everything – blow drying the appliances, baking out the water, looking up every conceivable way to help this disaster for my one month old appliances.

So no contact. No calls. No emails on my phone, IM's, no Facebook updates, no LinkedIn contacts, no access to check out my pal Claycord.com…do you know what withdrawal symptoms are? I do.

 

Withdrawal is like desperately trying to make an old T-Mobile MyTouch work with a Verizon system it hates. Withdrawal is begging my teen son to borrow his phone because it was just like my old one. It is scouring eBay for a deal, a steal, a bargain on a phone that is the same or better,and finally deciding that Craigslist is not the enemy of mankind as I searched for some shady dealer with a bag full of phones like mine that I could buy at a fraction of the price.

I had been the owner of a Motorola Devour, but now, who knows what crappy phone I would be relegated to, all because I wanted to go fishing.

Worse, it was my own stupid fault. Fishing is great and I enjoy the experience. Thinking how much better it would be avoiding the mosquitoes with some waders that allow you to walk into the river – joy! Not!. First mistake, cheap waders. Second mistake, not reading the instructions; cheap waders need wading boots so the waders don't split. Yep, experienced fishermen everywhere are laughing at me now. No wading boots. But of course, waders or not, why would you bring your phone and camera into the river.  I knew the two and a half foot bass swimming past me the day before giving the fish finger meant something. Payback is hell.

So I realize how we depend on the electronic toys, the little gadgets that run our social life. No Net=no friends. Loser squared. How bad is it when you can’t Facebook someone?  I would have to sit at an actual computer to get my emails, but friends and family texting me would have no idea that I was now a techno-nudist strutting my stuff sans electronics, wondering what to do with that spare hand I now had.  And then people started talking to me – words from mouths without LOL or CUL8TR :) ; God how could I survive? I would miss client calls and worse, miss all those daily problems I, as business owner, would have to solve.

This was a huge loss. But was it?  As I drove around looking for a replacement I was struck by the simplicity of being unreachable. It was….nice.  I had privacy again – no one knew where I was. It was unnerving and yet…nice. This was how it used to be, before cell phones and pagers, before deadlines and obligations that killed those lazy day summers I enjoyed as a kid. Great and…. naked.

So I made sure to find a small backroom place that specialized in cell phones where I could replace my Android with a working phone and leave happy in the knowledge that somewhere, somehow, this purchase would pay off. So long as I stop fishing.

 

MisterWriter

FULL MDUSD POLL RELEASED BY CUES

If you are not tired of the whole poll story you can go to the link and download the entire poll.It should be posted there today.

As you can see from the poll scripting - there was no secrecy in how this bond works: "This
new bond would allow the District to continue school upgrades and renovations while
homeowners continue to pay the same tax rate they approved in 2002, with no increase.
Approving this measure would renew the voter‐approved annual homeowner tax rate of fifty nine
dollars per one‐hundred‐thousand dollars of assessed value annually." So much for the newspaper reports that this item was avoided... yawn.

Thanks to Kish Rajan for letting me know and for releasing it on  http://protectourlocalschools.org/
Can we change topics now?
MisterWriter