Hollywood bailout?

In the name of stimulating the economy, Democrats have gone on the largest spending spree on record. It's payback time for votes: unions, ACORN, Hollywood, illegal aliens, sexually-transmitted diseases, you name it.

President Obama had the audacity to look the American people in the eye and say that his economic recovery act had been stripped of earmarks.

Interesting wording.

Dick Morris said that technically, "earmarks" are what Congressional members put in the bill in order to get something back for their states. So with Obama's semantic somersault, does that mean all the pork in this spending bill are his own doing? Perhaps such semantics allow him to feel confident that he could pass a lie detector test. (It's reminiscent of Clinton swearing that he "did not have sexual relations with that woman.") Depends on your definition of a term.

Obama was careful not to use the word "pork" since the alleged stimulus bill is loaded with it. The two most ridiculous pork items: $80 million for ACORN, the same organization being investigated in many states for voter fraud; and $256 million for Hollywood. That's a quarter of a billion dollars! What for?

Didn't Hollywood also receive millions of dollars in the infamous Wall Street bailout last year? Why did they need to be "bailed out" along with banks? Since when has Hollywood helped the national economy?

Now that Obama has placed a cap on all CEOs' salaries if their company received taxpayer money in the bailout, will he also cap actors' multi-million dollar salaries? After all, he should be consistent. Actors get paid more than they're worth regardless of whether the final version of the film is successful or bombs at the box office. Can the President change Hollywood contracts, too?

He won't, of course, since Hollywood is a huge Democratic voting base.

Don't get me wrong: I find it despicable that CEOs can take home millions of dollars when they've run their companies into the ground and have cost many employees their jobs. But as my husband tells me over and over again, that was in the contract that the board of directors agreed to.

What about athletes' high salaries? The team owners are willing to sign a contract guaranteeing top players millions of dollars over a few years time in hopes of a championship, which in turn makes money for the owners. If the athlete gets hurt or doesn't perform as expected, the owner can't renegotiate the contract or put a cap on the salary.

Don't be surprised if franchises start asking for government handouts. If governors and mayors across the country are doing it, why not everyone? The Wall Street bailout was the first in this slippery slope, with no end in sight.

Clearly a bias exists against businesses. I hate golden parachutes, but the government has no business changing contracts. If it chooses to anyway, it should do so consistently with all the companies and organizations receiving government money (aka. pork) - even ACORN and Hollywood.

Moreover, this spending bill demonstrates bias against any religious organizations, which will not see a dime from the government trough. All religious schools are specifically excluded from the huge "investment" in education.

And the government in control of a database of medical information for all Americans? We have no rights, no privacy, and no option to "opt out" of such Orwellian measures. Gee, has a government computer ever been compromised? I don't suppose we can trust our information will be used only by the medical community; if so, wouldn't the medicos be in control of the information instead of the government?

Of course, I'm sure members of Congress will be able to exclude their private information from being listed. After all, they're not required to pay taxes - like we do - to pay for all the pork they want, do they?

Or is tax evasion just for the socialist Democrats?

Random Acts of Kindness

I listen to K-Love for my daily dose of Contemporary Christian music. This radio station focuses on positive news around the world. The other day a news jockey read the following story about a pastor's kind offer and his decision to start the "365 Club" on Facebook:

http://www.christianpost.com/church/General/2009/01/pastor-s-story-of-kindness-sparks-idea-for-365-club-05/index.html

Basically, he wants people who join the club to perform a random act of kindness every day for a year. I found that intriguing, although I don't do Facebook. Anyway, members in this club post their good deeds for others to read. I'm not sure if that's positive or not. On the one hand, some people might provide examples of kind acts that others might not have thought of. It sounds a little too much like tooting your own horn, however, which seems counterintuitive to the point of the movement.

I know the term "random acts of kindness" has been around for years, but I appreciate that this man is bringing it to the forefront of people's minds again. Perhaps hundreds of people who heard this news story will now make a conscious effort to be a more positive force in the world. And those hundreds of people may inspire thousands of others to do the same.

In a similar vein, Liberty Mutual Insurance has a terrific ad campaign using the notions of both "random acts of kindness" and "pay it forward." They have several different commercials showing how one person's small, positive action can have a linear or ripple effect on others.

So how about a non-Facebook challenge? Commit a random act of kindness every day. Don't brag about it. Just do it. And if later in the day you cut someone off in traffic, or commit some other such human frailty, do an extra kindness to offset it.

You never fully know the effect that your life, your words, your actions - positive or negative - have on others, whether they're family, friends, neighbors or strangers.

Stories of violence, injustice, and abuse abound. Let's follow the example of this pastor and try to turn that around. Every day. And in small ways.

A non-holiday?

New Years has never been a big deal for me. That sentiment was cemented last night when my kids wanted to stay up until midnight to "celebrate" New Years. I told them that people just count down the final minute before midnight, then kiss and say, "Happy New Year!"

They didn't believe me. They figured there had to be more to it than that.

So, they counted the seconds to midnight and watched the people on television kiss and yell into the camera that familiar phrase.

Boring! Then they went to bed. Nowhere near as exciting as Christmas or Halloween, that's for sure! The only good thing about it all was that they got to stay up until midnight.

So is New Years strictly an adult holiday? If you're a drinker, then you probably like celebrating it. But if you don't drink, it's not that much fun. Yeah, you get together with friends, but how is it different from getting together with friends any other night of the year? Of course on New Years Eve, you're more likely to share the road with a preponderance of drunks. Oooh, fun!

What about all the people at Times Square who stood in the freezing temperatures for hours? For what? The chance to kiss on television? A million people show up, so the odds that you will be one of the twenty couples they film kissing at midnight are pretty slim. Yet the ones interviewed claim it's "so worth it" to be there at midnight.

Hmmm. Right.

Freezing outside for hours just to say, "Happy New Year," is not my cup of tea. Not to mention using port-a-potties and pushing through a million-strong crowd to use them. (Yuck!) The supposed payoff for these people is to be able to claim that they were in Times Square when the ball dropped. Whoop-dee-doo! How about the folks who did the same thing to ring in 2008? Or 1986? Does it really matter?

I guess I'm too cynical for my own good.

"Happy New Year!"

Merry Christmas!

It's after midnight, the pumpkin pie is in the oven, and the cherubs are asleep. Was that the sound of hoofs on the roof? It must be time for me to do the elf thing before dawn.

Merry Christmas to all my family and friends.

And as Tiny Tim observed, "God bless Us, Every One!"

Drew Peterson is at it again

Drew Peterson is at it again.

You remember him: the ex-policeman whose fourth wife "disappeared" under suspicious circumstances, and whose third wife's death has recently been ruled a homicide. Guess who is the prime suspect in both cases?

And now he's working on acquiring a fifth victim - oops, I mean wife. A dolt is supposedly engaged to this "Most Eligible Bachelor." She denies it, but a police source and her own father have confirmed it.

First of all, why is Drew Peterson still walking the streets, cruising for chicks?

Secondly, does this woman read? Does she watch TV? Maybe she only watches cartoons instead of the news. How can she consider any relationship with this possible serial killer?

Her father claims he will do everything in his power to keep her from Peterson. Too late, sir! You had your chance to instill basic common sense in your daughter all during her childhood.

Imagine what this poor father must be thinking now: Where did I go wrong? How did I manage to raise an idiot for a daughter?

Why do some women gravitate toward such men as Peterson, OJ, and the other Peterson (Scott)? They've been violent toward women in the past - or at least have great suspicion on them of violence toward the women they loved and swore to love "til death do us part." Yet there's always at least one woman willing to date them. How sweet-sounding do they have to be to make a woman ignore those suspicions? How do these guys convince these gullible women of their innocence?

There seems to be a similar pattern of abusive men talking their victims into staying with them. I'll change, baby! I'll never do it again! Maybe they tell future fiancees, "My wife was a whacko who made my life miserable. It's all her fault, if I did anything wrong! She deliberately disappeared [or got herself killed] to ruin my life!"

Some women fall for it over and over again. I'll never understand that.

And poor Drew Peterson claims that "the media has kind of ruined every relationship I've had, so it scares people."

Yeah, right. It's all the media's fault. You're innocent, huh.

Twice - and counting...

darn yard decorations!

As I mentioned before, I love everything about Christmas. Well, almost everything. I hate the commercialism. And I hate detangling lights, or worse yet - trying to figure out why a strand of lights isn't working. That can take hours! The set usually ends up in my trash can.

Patience is not my forte.

And the fact that many light sets are $2 or $3 instead of $15 doesn't hurt. Why is it okay to throw out a $3 set of lights, but if it cost $15, we check each bulb to see which one is the problem? Hmmm...

My current Christmas battle: the outdoor decorations versus the wind.

I guess I pick defective decorations because I don't notice my neighbors' decorations blown over. I have many flat, lighted decorations in the yard; they require stakes to secure them in the ground. The manufacturers always include stakes, but what they provide never seems sufficient to endure the December winds.

I've checked at hardware stores; they're useless in this situation. Why can't someone make stakes that truly secure lawn decor? Maybe the stakes need to be 3 feet long instead of 5 inches!

Poor Snoopy and Frosty are doomed - for now!

This can't be good...

I hate misleading headlines. You know the ones: the wording suggests one thing, but when you read the story it's not the way you took it.

Take this story by Fox News for example: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,461928,00.html

A palm pistol "aimed" at the elderly and disabled?

Turns out it's an ergonomically designed pistol so that the elderly and disabled can use it more easily. Oh.

Poor word choice, people!

I have arthritis, so I can sympathize with people who want to protect themselves but might have difficulty physically pulling a trigger.

I have a few problems with this supposed palm pistol, however:

1. It looks like an asthma inhaler, not a gun. How are police supposed to recognize this as a gun instead of as a toy or simple plastic apparatus?

2. How are grandchildren going to know that this is a gun and not some toy to play with? And if it's easier for the elderly to use, it's certainly going to be easier for kids to just push a button and fire.

3. Why would the gun manufacturer get approval from the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) instead of the ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms)? Is it a food or drug? No, it's a gun! How were they able to go that route and still get approval for a gun design?

4. A doctor just writes a prescription for it? And Medicare (i.e. taxpayers) pay for it?

This is a good thing?