Political Ads

These are getting really vicious.  I watched one last night by the O'Malley camp, aimed at Bob Erlich - accusing him of things not germane to being a governor.

He stands accused of making money by working for a lobbying firm.  He's a lawyer; that's what they do, and there is no dishonor inherent in doing this. Were O'Malley not the governor, he's a lawyer too and lawyers need to make money - does anyone have any doubt that he'd take the opportunity that offered him the most?

An issue is made of how much Erlich is alleged to have made - this is nobody's business, and has no relationship to how he would govern - it is a blatant appeal to class warfare. O'Malleys wife is a judge - has anyone aked what she makes?

O'Malley tries to take credit for a reduction in crime - actually the reduction occurred because of excellent police work.  When O'Malley was mayor, he was constantly interfering in the running of the police department - even to the point of putting his own people in office within the department to report to him via a back channel about what was going on.

I don't know what Ehrlich would do - I do know that O'Malley's campaign is getting muddier by the minute, only serving to reinforce my conviction that, in the next election, if it is an incumbent, throw it out!

Wikileaks

Frankly, I think that this is not a really appropriate thing to be doing - some things are secret for a good reason.

It is interesting to note that WikiLeaks, by exposig the latest bunch of documents, has shown that many of the lies that George Bush was accused of telling turned out to be truths.

I wonder how long it'll take the media to report on THAT little item....

New Motorcycles

Well, my Kawasaki spit me off one a few weeks back (actually, I ran out of road, truth be known) and hurt me a bit - and while I was off it a friend bought a BMW K1200 (at which time I turned green with envy of course) - but his wife apparently thought they needed only one motorcycle, so his Suzuki Cruiser went up for sale, and I bought it - and sold the Kawasaki within 48 hours, which tells me that I probably should have asked more money for it.

Cruisers are nominally V-twins, large, heavy, not terribly nimble but comfortable.  It is amazing just how much difference can appear within those specs without making the appearance different.  From a distance, any cruiser looks like any other cruiser - the engine is in the same place, etc.  A V-twin is a V-Twin - the V angle may differ, but you wouldn't think it would change the character of a motorcycle that much.

I learned something - it can make a big difference.  I'm still getting used to the big Suzuki (but loving it all the same) and finding that there are lots of ways to make an engine.  The Kawasaki and the Suzuki are both 1500's - but that's about all that is the same.  The Kawasaki was a 60 degree V-twin with a balance shaft to smooth it out.  The Suzki is a 45 degree V-twin with offset crankpins, so both pistons are at TDC at the same time - making it fire like an old vertical twin Triumph. Different sound, different vibration - and without balance shafts, it does vibrate, but not terribly - not enough for me to wish I had the Kawasaki back.

Other differences include where the gas tank really is as opposed to where it looks like it is, among others - much different balance because of weight location, etc.

I'm loving the Suzuki, but it will be a while before I am as at home on it as I was on the Kawasaki.

Maybe that's a good thing - maybe it'll take a while before I get so used to it that I fall off.

LOVE those motorcycles!

"Illegal Immigrants"

First of all, these two words ought never to appear together - the create noise, because an immigrant is someone who comes here legally, goes through all the paperwork and testing.  Anything else is not an immigrant, it is an invader.  I don't know why this is so hard to understand.


Most of us have ancestors who came from elsewhere and did what was required to stay here legally. After doing that, they became a part of the nation - they did not insist upon recreating that from which they came - if what they left was what they wanted, why did they leave?

Believe it or not, we here in the USA have a culture of our own - and folks that come here should come prepared to become a part of the culture - bringing things from their own culture to add in, but not expecting to lift their culture whole and bring it along. 

Start with learning the language - American English is what is used here, and it is not reasonable to expect others to accommodate to new arrivals.  We can try, to be nice - but to expect forms and such to be made available in any language besides English is to expect them to be made available in all 170 or so languages that folks from else where may have arrived speaking - and that is just not a reasonable expectation.

I hear about folks who oppose Arizona's attempt to enforce what is already federal law - how evil and inhumane it is.  Has anyone bothered to see how Mexico treats illegals?  Has anyone read the requirements to enter Mexico with an expectation of staying?  We are in the process of relearning lessons Germany learned in the 60's with its Gastarbeiter program, which lessons include just how much of a drain it can be for folks to send money out of the country.

Anyhow, whatthehell's the point of being a citizen when anyone can walk across a border and get all the benefits of citizenship at the expense of those who belong here?  I have no plan to adapt to folks who don't belong here.  I'd like to help them if they actually want to be here - but if the reason to come here is to send money out of the country and to try to make it into a mirror of what they left, then include me out.  I've loved other places, and am here because those other places could not hold me.

And now I hear some states want aliens to be able to vote!  What's up with that?  I couldn't vote when I lived in Germany, I wouldn't be able to vote in Mexico, I doubt they'd even let me into Saudi Arabia - I don't think we owe anyone who won't even observe convention anything.

Call me islamophobic if it pleases you.

Mosques at Ground Zero redux...

I can think of a way that I could support the mosque at Ground Zero.

Since the primary source of funds for this endeavor is Saudi Arabia, it seems to be that building a synagogue in Saudi Arabia's capital city, along with a Catholic cathedral and a Christian megachurch, and disavowing harrassment thereof would be a start.

But what would really convince me would be Teheran signing up for the same three religious edifices and the same disavowal.

What's that you say, don't hold my breath?

I won't, and I don't expect any of it to happen - which is why I say that I might support the mosque at Ground Zero - when pigs fly out of my arse!

Motorcycles

Just heard a guy on TeeVee say "Motorcycling is the most fun you'll ever have" - and he didn't even add "with your clothes on."

And I agree with him.  I rode to work today - and grinned all the way in!  I can see so much more, have what feels like so much more space to maneuver, and it seems like I'm less rushed.  I don't mind moving over to let a nose-to-tail string of cagers (people who travel inside steel cages) pass me at illegal velocities - I just chug along and enjoy the view. It's far less stressful than being in the car, although it might well have been cooler in the car.

The bike I ride is a good commute vehicle - stable, a little heavy but not bad, smooth and has power and torque enough to pass just about anything I want to pass.  It isn't a crotch rocket - it's more a cruiser - slow-turning V-twin, single carb, shaft drive - as close to maintenance-free as it gets.  It always starts, and doesn't stall easily.

My daily ride to work is 50 miles the round trip.  I have route choices, but none has any advantage in terms of time - it takes as long as it takes, and in the morning I stop a few minutes shy of the office for a giant cup of 7-11 coffee with amaretto creamer, a sandwich and a yogurt - which is what gets me through a work day.  If I do everything right, the coffee stays upright until I get parked at work - if I don't do everything right, instead of a big cup of coffee I have a plastic bag of coffee - not my favorite thing!

At the end of the day, I go back outside, start the bike, and reverse the process, with a little less pressure as regards time since nobody at home looks at what time I get back in.  In the evening I am likely to take short detours and try different heretofore untried routes - mornings are pretty much set on one of three routes, because of the need to be on time.

But the days I ride are typically easier days for me - I arrive more relaxed than on other days, and generally concentrate better.  I seem to have more time to think about things before I arrive when I ride in - in the car, more of me is occupied with traffic, planning when I want to make a lane change, looking ahead for traffic chokepoints and such.

Of course, I'm not fond of riding in the rain.  Cold is not as bad as rain, and I ride pretty late into the year.  Snow is a nono - that should go without saying, although if I were to add a side car, I'd probably ride year-round.  I am healthier when I ride when it is cold, and generally don't mind a cold run if it doesn't get to be more than 50 miles or so.

I have been riding now more than 50 years, and don't think I'm likely to give it up any time soon.  It's a cheap pleasure, a good mood freshener, and even cheaper than driving the car!

Anyone who wants to sample it should find a Motorcycle Safety Foundation course to take.  The courses have motorcycles so you don't have to spend a bunch of money that you might later regret, the instructors are pros who don't have the bad habits that folks like me may have who learned to ride by doing - and you can start on a bike that is a good size for learning, well maintained and not at all finicky.

Motorcycling is fun, it is only dangerous if you let it be, and will make you cheerful.

Try it - you'll like it!

Hyphenated Americans

Understand something - I am an American - a citizen of these United States.

My ancestors came from Germany, Scotland, Ireland, and several other places.  They became part of the Great American Dream, and ceased to be German, Scottish or Irish. They became American.

They did not relinquish their various foods, languages, literature, or anything else - all of that continued to live on in their homes, but they became a part of something bigger - and when outside their homes, conversed in English and generally assimilated into the culture of this nation - becoming tolerant of others otherness, and gaining in understanding that there is much to be learned from people not like us - and that valuable things that are learned from such folks can become part of our constantly moving and growing culture.  At no time did someone take that American culture, nail it to a wall and say "This is how it is and it cannot change."

I tend to look askance at folks who are hyphenated Americans - German-Americans, Italian-Americans, African-Americans, and suchlike - they place something before the American in what they claim to be - which makes me wonder how anything about their citizenship could be more important than the American part.

We tend to be pretty tolerant - we tend to help new arrivals, show our best faces to folks we do not know, and be rather accepting of others' religious practices.  I know of an area where within a block one can find Christians, Jews, Muslims and a Buddhist family - and none is trying to kill or to convert the other; rather they are respectful of the otherness of others and strive to find common ground in order to be better neighbors to one another.  It's how Americans are - or rather how they used to be when I was growing up.

It seems that here of late we are getting Balkanized - we are being asked to accept a language other than English, asked to adjust our calendars and our laws to suit one group of folks more than the folks who are already here, and we are being asked to give precedence to folks who will not even deign to follow the rules to join us as immigrants.

This is wrong.

We ought not to care what language folk use at home, whether they sit on the floor or on the roof, nor what they will or will not eat - in someone's home that's how it is.  But we ought not to be so prepared to allow someone's home and ancestral culture to be used to tell us that what we have built of a couple of hundred years is no longer valid, and what folks from other places bring is more valid and more useful.  After all, if those other places were all that great, how come people are trying so hard to get away from those places to come here?

In Germany, part of the national tax supports churches.  We don't do that here.

In Mexico, noncitizens cannot own prime property.  We have no such restriction.

In the parts of the Middle East, citizenship is restricted to followers of Muhammed. We have no such rule here.

The USA is a different place from the rest of the world, and the differences are important.  I can see no reason to turn it into France if France already exists - folks could simply go there.  Of course, they'd have to learn French....

The world is full of socialist nations - those in lover with it could go there, but won't - because there are always things there that are different, be it Language, Laws, Climate, Living conditions, or potential for employment.

This great nation is a unique place - why folks would want to turn it into another place that already exists is beyond me.

Some have told me that there's no equality here - but they don't understand that equality cannot guarantee equal outcomes.  We are all born the same way, but we can't all be Ted Kennedy (not that I'd want to be Ted Kennedy.) and we all can't be rich - but the class envy that is being used to justify redistribution of income is obscene.  I've had some lucky breaks; so have some other folks I know.  Sometimes we get bad breaks - and we can either let it defeat us or rise above it.  A lot of our station in life has to do with decisions we ourselves make - and if they are bad decisions, you are not owed the fruits of my labor to bail you out - although I can help if it pleases me to do so.

I've done plenty of stupid things, some of which hurt me rather badly, physically or fiscally.  Nobody owes me a bailout - much as I might have liked to be Malcolm S. Forbes, I wasn't - and there is no set of circumstances that permits me to believe that he (or his estate since he's dead now) owes me a bailout from my own foolishness or anything of that nature.

Lots of what happens we ourselves have to own. Your degree in Albanian Studies probably won't make you rich, or even moderately well off - but that study was your choice, so live with it.  My occupation did not exist when I exited high school trying to imagine what to do if I ever grew up - I had to change, to adapt, to find opportunity and to work to excel to be noticed.  It can be done, but nobody else has to own your errors.

I guess I'm just irritable today - I spent the morning listening to a couple of coworkers harranguing one another about how bad life was, and how much they were owed for having been born.

Americans simply are - they need no excuse, and they need apologize to nobody.  It's OK if you don't like me - but it's not OK to threaten my existence because I have friends who are Jews, because I get paid better or because I will not change my views to yours.  One of the unique things about Americans is that we understand everyone's belief has the potential to be right, so we tolerate all sorts of various beliefs.  This is not easily accepted by those with blinders on who, having seen nothing else cannot conceive of anything being worthwhile that they've not already seen and passed on as good.  But those with blinders on are the ones who'll ultimately suffer for their own ignorance, and their own failure to allow themselves to learn from others.

Enough.  I'll be back another day.

Mosques at Ground Zero

I do not want to see one built, not now, not ever.  It is said that Muslims are peace-loving peoples, and that what has been done by angry Muslim men is a travesty. Why do we not hear the highest Muslim authorities disavowing this activity? Our president is apologizing all over the world for our slights real or imagined - why has no Muslim authority or nation apologized for this massive affront?

It was not the Christians, the Jews, the Buddhists, the Taoists, the Hindi or any of thousands of others who so desecrated that place, and I for one am not interested in permitting the glorification on that site of the actions by the heirarchy of the group that created the devastation but has yet to acknowledge any complicity or even the wrongness in the actions.

No mosque at Ground Zero.

Congress

Several years back, a mistake was made by Congress.

Originally, the House of Representatives was intended to be the representation for the people.  Theoretically, it still is, although I believe it's more an old boys club, where the primary purpose of the inhabitants is to stay there by promising whatever folks want to be promised, usually at someone else's expense.

The Senate, however, was intended to be representation for the various states - and Senators were chosen by the legislators of the various states - insuring that the interests of those states were represented, and that no state was more equal than any other state.  Since we are not a pure democracy, but a constitutional representative republic, the states have a responsibility to the voters of their own representatives in whatever bodies the states hold to be legislative - and the state as a body has responsibility to itself and to its inhabitants at the federal level to have the interests of the state represented when legislation is being made that affects the state as a corporate body.  Senators were to be answerable to the state legislatures, not to the states' individual voters.

By making senators popularly elected we have effectively removed from them any responsibility to represent the state as a corporate entity - they now depend on their popularity with Joe SixPax to get elected rather than the works they have done in behalf of the state legislature.  The interests of the states are thereby not being served.

I think that this is wrong, and I think it should be reversed.  What it represents at present is an excuse for states to ignore whatever duties they may have, to defer to the Federal Government in all matters and, ultimately, to create for all of us one huge Federal state, which we will all hate.

My opinion, folks.

Rights

This particular rant is a long time coming, but (IMHO) relevant.

There's a bunch of discussion today about rights, legisation of and about rights, and the granting of rights.

Let's understand one thing - rights aren't granted, they simply are.  Anything a government, organization or person grants to you is at best a privilege, subject to removal.  Rights preexist governments.

Rights cannot be legislated - if they could, they could be legislated away. If what you may do can be legislated away by your government, you are not a citizen, you're a subject whose very life exists at the whim of someone else.

The Constitution does not either create or legislate rights.  What it does is to recognize that rights exist, and they existed before its writing and acceptance.

Congress cannot grant you a right.  The President cannot grant you a right.  Not even the Constitution can grant you a right, although it can and does recognize rights that already exist.

Anything granted is at best a privilege - and they can be taken away.


Pay attention - this is important, because people who want to tell you what to do will try to convince you that they are creating new rights for you, and they're not - they're creating privileged groups - and theise groups can become non-privileged just as soon as they start to become uppity.

Illegal Immigrants

A more meaningless juxtaposition of words I have never seen.

Think about it - Immigrants are people from other nations who get in line, obey the rules, jump through the hoops that this nation requires for immigrant status.  Immigrants are de jure and defacto legal.

Illegal Aliens are folks from other nations who just bust in and take what they want, secure in the knowledge that we'll put up with it.  Well, I know too many who stood in like and are still standing in line that have more potential to be of benefit to this great nation,  Folks who jump the line and don't obey the rules should be run out of town on a rail.  More members of the criminal class we do not need - and an illegal alien, because it refuses to follow the rules is a criminal.

It's pretty simple to me. I'm sorry that Mexico feels that we are being discriminatory by insisting on a set of immigration rules far less draconian than those which Mexico imposes on outsiders who would live there.  Furthermore, I am astounded that the Mexican Government has the stones to complain that our returning their illegals is putting a strain on their infrastructure - that is not our fault!

I'm gonna have more to say, but this is probably enough for tonight.  I have a bunch backed up since February - and some of it ain't pretty!

Arizona

I've been thinking about all the hooraw about Arizona's law with respect to illegal aliens.


I know how to make sure that there can be no charges of profiling.

Just make sure that everyone who interacts with police at any time are asked for papers.  If everyone has to do it, there can be no discrimination.  I am accustomed to being asked for ID in a traffic stop, and I'm a native-born old fat bearded white guy - no profiling there, although I do ride a motorcycle, so maybe I can make a case for profiling after all?  I guess not - more damn trouble than it is worth.

I think Eric Holder needs replaced with someone who can read who doesn't hate white folks.

But that's just my opinion, folks.  Meanwhile, I applaud Arizona, and regret that I work for a city that can't meet its obligation to its inhabitants but does advertise itself as a Sanctuary City - no damn wonder they can't pay their bills!

Spam

I just when through my SPAM email folder, just to see what was taking up all the space.  My email filters work pretty well, and it gets pretty full pretty fast - I emptied it on Monday and there are already over 1500 messages there.

Probably 70% of those messages are adverts for Viagra, Cialis, and various misspellings of those drugs to get by SPAM filters.  Another 20% are for Adderall and similar amphetamines that are available only on 30-day prescription.  Most of the rest invite me either to a porn site or to get something FREE! FREE! FREE! that I neither want nor need.

In a few weeks I'll be 68.  Porn is not exciting.  I already have ADHD and a doctor that takes care of me - I don't need black-market pills to abuse.  Most of the FREE! stuff I would not use.

But why do I get all these ED ads?  Particularly when my most interesting problem is that I occasionally pee into my slippers?

Snow

I've had enough snow.  Where's Global Warming when you need it?

The last time I saw snow up to my knees or above was when I was maybe four years old, and lived off Wilson Point Road near the Martin's plant.

I haven't ever seen such a slow response to streets needing plowed, and have been a bit annoyed by some folks who would have us put the snow only in special places.  I'm old, folks, and if I'm gonna have to throw snow around, I'm not gonna carry it any farther than I have to.  I hear I shouldn't put snow on the street - I don't think the plows ought to negate 5 hours of work on my part by plowing my driveway shut worse than it was before I started clearing it. 

I'll quit throwing it in the street when the plows stop blocking my driveway. 

Last I heard we might get another foot (of snow) tomorrow.  Baltimore City is on liberal leave but essential folks have to report. Yesterday I could not get a car out to the street - this morning I could have, but everything was iced and I could not predict which way it would go after I got it into the street, so it was a no-go for getting in to the office for me.  I took the day off, and was glad that I did.

But when I thought about it, it occurred to me that, had I been essential personnel, I might have got into trouble for failing to report.  Without an all-wheel-drive vehicle, there's no way I could have reported, and I don't own one of those.  Guess I'll have to go and get one if I am deemed essential.

Meanwhile, I guess I'll enjoy the time off - and curse the snow.

Tomorrow, alas, I'll go in to the office, at least until the snow comes again.

Global Warming - gotta love it!

State of the Union

Our President has been with us for a year.

I didn't vote for him, although I had hopes for him.

He has managed to dash all hopes that I had. In its simplest form, he lies.

He apparently thinks we proles have no memory, and that we don't know that he promised to air debate on (among other things) health care.  This did not happen.

He promised bipartisan efforts, then shut out the opposing party, saying "I won!"

He promised that the Constitution would be uppermost - then appointed Czars to do things not constitutional, effectively nationalized industries, gathered up a crew of hangers-on in high offices for which offices the first requisite seemed to be having failed to pay taxes.  You and I would end up in jail for such silliness - his buds get high-visibility well-paid jobs - which pay comes form us proles.

His wife has hired more assistants than the past 20 presidents' wives have found either needed or useful - all of which are paid, you guessed it, by us.

He makes generals wait - not a good thing, and gets troops killed just by doing nothing.

He believes we are all too stupid to breathe unassisted, and that there is not a question that he has not heard so he has all the answers - and all the answers involve growing government.  He fails to understand that Government produces no profit, and sucks the life out of profit-producing organizations by demanding tribute that is used to pay , guess what, more government "workers."

He says no lobbyists will be around to influence anyone, but apparently he meant that no more than all of them will be allowed through the door.

His congress creates libraries of rules for us regarding how health care will be managed, and then exempts itself from those rules. 

It's time to unelect the house of representatives - all of them and get some folks in there who are truly interested in representing the interests of the folks who put them there.

It's also time to return the selection of senators to state legislatures, although I don't think I'll live to see that happen.

I still believe that the Founding Fathers had their heads screwed on straight, and that we tamper with what they devised at our own peril.

/end rant

New Rant(s)

I hate working 7 AM to 3 PM.  I hate even worse getting up at 5 AM to be at work at 7 AM.

I think it's prophetic that a democrat did not get Ted Kennedy's seat - not that it was ever his anyhow, although the folks in Massachusetts were probably shielded from that fact.

I think that the Constitution is not subject to alteration except by the means it established, and I surely am tired of the way so-called czars are being appointed to bypass the constitution.  Someone needs to uncerstand what, historically speaking, czars were.

I think Bull Riding is a great sport, although I have no interest whatever in participating.

I think it is a damn shame that courtesy can't be legislated, because if folks would be courteous we'd have a lot fewer dead and damaged people on the highways.

I think it is not the job of the President to dictate to folks what is good for them.

I think that people need to make their own decisions, and take the heat when the decision is wrong - and learn from it.  It's an old axiom that good judgment comes from experience, much of which comes from bad judgment, and that that axion is important to remember.

I think it is getting late, so I'm going to bed.

Zero dark thirty

When I was in the Air Force, that was the time we had to get up for certain shifts, and I always hated being up before the sun. For many years I have worked 10 to 6, 11 to 7 or similar hours during the day, giving me plenty of time to wake up in the light, have breakfast with my wife, have some extra coffee, and arrive at work reasonably awake.  It even gave the folks around me time to determine which problems were theirs, so I could start right away on real problems, and not misoperations.

Well, I just changed to work 7 to 3 - and I hate getting up around 5 AM. Maybe I can change it back in a couple of months.  I hope so.

It's cold around here right now - global warming seems to have gone into hibernation.  I thought all along it was crap, and some purloined emails (and the fact that the global temperature has been static for almost ten years) only served to underline that belief.

But it is even too cold to think about starting the motorcycles, let alone riding one of them for more than about three minutes, and it is my personal rule (be kind to engines or some such bull) that I never start one up if I am not going to ride it for at least 20 minutes.  Usually I ride to work when I can, but not when it asks for frostbite before even getting on the highway.  We did have one day the weekend before Christmas that it was really nice, and I rode over to visit our then-pregnant daughter, and really enjoyed the ride - it was cool, but not really cold.

I gotta write some emails - I owe one to a friend in Germany, and a couple more.  Maybe I'll do that tomorrow as soon as I get to work; right now I gotta get some sleep - 0 darh 30 approaches!