Learn Some Civility

In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve been in blog retirement.  I decided that writing a blog really wasn’t me.  I am more of the loud mouth uncle at the family reunions, than the carefully thought out writer.  But, I am coming out of retirement for one last hurrah.  It seems that my daughter, who is a gifted writer and activist, has decided to quit blogging because of the negative bull shit she has to put up with. 

First I would like to make a confession: I am an atheist.  My daughter is an atheist blogger.  But for the record, she did not become an atheist because of my brainwashing.  Quiet the contrary, her courage to speak out for those who have no religious clout, greatly influenced me in realizing I was an atheist.  I admired her courage to try to fight for the civil rights of this ignored part of society. 

But, she has paid a great price.  She has caught unbelievable shit for speaking out.   People who call her whore, cunt, bitch, etc. need to learn some civility.  Some parents forgot to teach their children how to disagree without being disagreeable.

The Internet has allowed a lot of people to express their thoughts.  But, it has also allowed anonymous people to publish pure hate and filth without any accountability.  If someone has enough balls to call my daughter a slut to her face I would quickly introduce them to some accountability – a quick fist to the mouth.

What we need in our society is a multitude of free thought, not a multitude of foul mouths.  I am sorry that humanity has lost a great voice for advancing atheist civil rights.  But I am extremely proud of the unselfish service she has given to this group -- which includes me.   

Now, I am going back to retirement.

College Help

This country needs more college graduates.  It is a shame on our country that we can not provide a college education to some of our brightest students.  The least we could do is make college more affordable.  Start with student loans.  Paul Ryan's budget would double the interest rate on student loans.  This is the same Paul Ryan who wants to give massive take breaks to our wealthiest one percent.  His plan is basically aimed at increasing the tax burden on our future tax payers.  When I am King I am going to set the interest rate on student loans at two percent.  Furthermore, if you spend five years teaching in low social economic areas, you're entire loan will be forgiven.

Finding Great Teachers

I've been saying for years that we as a country have to find a way to attract the best and brightest into education.  Currently most of our teachers come from the bottom half of our graduation classes.  Why?  Money!  Who the hell wants to make $30,000 a year when they could make ten times that at some hedge fund. Now, I am smart enough to know that we probably can't find enough money to make every great teacher rich.  But you could give some incentives to encourage people to go into the profession.  My good buddy, FDR Murphy, came up with a winner --- eliminate income tax for teachers.  Wow FDR, that's a great idea.

I know, I know.  I can here you all now.  Hey King, won't that just increase the deficit?  NOOOOOO -- because when I am King I am going to tax all churches as corporations or small business.  I never figured out why they should be tax exempt,  since religion in general tends to do more harm that good.  If that doesn't prove to be enough revenue, eliminate all the tax breaks given to the oil companies. 

Go Get Him Dad

Much attention has been given to Rush Limbaugh's comment where he referred to Sandra Fluke as a slut.  Having a daughter of my own, you can imagine how pissed off this made me.  I've decided, When I am King, I am going to grant permission to Sandra's father to punch that loud mouth dope addict in the mouth, followed by a swift kick to his balls.  I know that's what I would do if it was my daughter he was talking about.

Emails For Dumb Asses

I live in a retirement city in Florida.  As you can imagine, health care is big concern.  It is also a hot bet for conservatives.  Put the two together and you have a fertile field for bashing Obama Care.

While playing golf yesterday, one of my playing partners started to read an email from his I-Phone about the future of Medicare when Obama Care starts in 2014.  Tell old people their payments are going double of triple and you,ve got some wound up old fucks.

I told my friend that you can’t believe everything you read on the Internet.  He replied that the email had been verified by Snopes.com.  I told him to click on the link and he was surprised to see the word FALSE pop up on his screen.

This is a great trick.  The haters who write the emails know the average person is too lazy or dumb to check out the source or truth of the information.  So, the writer says it has already been verified and the dumb asses just believe it.

My golf partner said that Snopes.com thing is just a bunch of bull shit and he’s heard similar information elsewhere --- can you say Fox News.  Oh well, there’s none so blind as those who won’t see.

When I am King I have no intention of censuring the Internet.  But, I certainly want schools to spend more time teaching kids how to fact check.  Maybe we won’t end up with so many dumb people later on.

Sorry Mitt

I was watching a Mitt Romney campaign commercial the other day and I found it a little unsettling.  Romney was trying to make the point that he has been loyal to his wife, his religion, and his country and under no circumstances would he ever apologize for the United States of America.

I started to think about the apologizing part.  First as a student of history, I can think of plenty of things this country should apologize for.  The genocide of Native Americans, the interment of Japanese Americans, and the Spanish American war would serve as good examples. 

But then I pondered it from another perspective.  Isn’t this the party of “Family Values”, aka, just act like us rich white folks.  Do you really want to teach your children to NEVER say sorry.  My mom and dad taught me at a very young age to apologize when I hurt someone’s feelings.  They spent considerable time teaching me right from wrong. 

Apparently Romney doesn’t believe the “right” is ever wrong.  But, give him a little time; he’ll probably change his mind.

Constitution Test

Now that the Presidential election season is in full swing, I would like to take a moment to debunk two themes of the Republican candidates.  One concerns the constitutionality of “Obama Care”.  People, who claim they are big proponents of following the constitution, should take time to read it every now and then.  If they go to Article 1, section 8 they’ll be surprised to find “Congress shall have the power to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper…”, also known as the Elastic Clause.  The founders put this in because they realized things would come up that they hadn’t thought about.

My other pet peeve is Republicans complaining about the deficit being ran up by Obama.  Hey knuckle heads, the president can’t spend a dime without Congress’s approval.  In fact, every spending bill starts in the House of Representatives.  Last time I checked the Republicans were the majority party in the House.

When I am King, every member of the government will be required to pass a test on the Constitution.  They’ll need a score of 90%.  They won’t be allowed to vote on legislation until they pass.  Finally, a standardize test I can support.

Golf & Politics

I played golf on New Year’s Eve with a former Army intelligence officer.  We were stacked up behind several foursomes and so we naturally passed the time by bull shitting.  I was rewarded with one of the best conversations of the year.  His work in the intelligence field was truly fascinating – especially how they discovered Pakistan had nuclear weapons.  Eventually we started talking politics.  My fellow competitor was careful to mention he was a registered Republican.  I quickly confessed that I was a registered Democrat.  From that moment on we had the best give and take conversation about what needs to be done to solve our country’s problems.

 We both agreed that the election procedure is crazy.  Our politicians spend all their time getting elected.  We decided to make the presidential primary election season last only two months.  Every candidate would get free TV advertising, but it would be on C-SPAN.  We would also have a national primary election day at the end of the two month.  On other subjects we agreed to end the war in Afghanistan immediately, solved the budget problem with both spending cuts and tax increases and created jobs by repairing our infrastructure.  And this was all accomplished in the last five holes of play.  Just think what we could have done if we had decided to play another nine.  It was really refreshing to see there are still some moderate Republicans left. 

When I am King, that Army intelligence officer is going to be my Vice-King.  Were going to send the government on a two month vacation and when they get back all major problems will be solved.  Of course, we’ll accomplish this while playing more golf.