We Are Parents...

... of a few baby birds that have made their home in our garage. Oh! You thought our human baby had been born? Gosh, I can see how the title may be misleading.

A few weeks ago a bird had gotten in our garage. We left the door open, but never saw it fly out. Apparently she was in the process of building a nest in the part of our garage where the roof meets the wall. It's a pretty safe place, but I am worried that she will not be able to feed the babies very well when the garage door is shut. She bolts through the door as soon as it opens. If she does manage to keep the babies healthy, I hope the garage is a big enough area for them to learn to fly. I can't really keep my garage door open for flight lessons. I will keep everyone posted on the bird situation.

We just went to infant CPR class. It was a pretty short class (about 45 minutes). We watched a video and used special baby dolls to try out our techniques. One thing about the video... here is a still image:


Yes, apparently if a meteoric Armageddon is raining fire from the heavens, you can save your baby with CPR (also a helmet of hair, seriously, it didn't move the whole time). I know that if the Decepticons invade the planet from outer space, I can protect my son from choking hazards (I seem to remember Decpticons and Autobots both being choking hazards actually). Why on Earth did the people that made this video choose this background? I know lasers are popular for backgrounds, but fiery rocks from the sky sent to smote the wicked? That is a little over the top for me.

On a serious note...

Also, recently a young man, one year younger than I am, was killed in Afghanistan. His name is Staff Sargent Jason Rogers and he was from Brandon, MS. A hateful church, whose name will never be mentioned by me, protested his funeral. A group called the Patriot Guard Riders, put themselves between the protesters and Sgt. Rogers's grieving family and loved ones. They do this all over the country with no charge to the families. Their creed is "Standing for those who stood for us." With gas prices the way they are and no end in sight to the protests or fallen soldiers, if you have the means and the opportunity go to their website and see if you can help them. I have not been contacted by this group, and I don't know any of its members, but I think their cause is noble.

-J

Government Shutdown

As I work for the United States, people around the office have been buzzing about what they planned to do if there is a shut down. Some people will be knitting, others will be doing yard work, and so on. I have been asked what I plan to do during the shutdown. I proudly state that I will be a malcontent. Here is an example: I do not agree with the potential riders the Republicans plan to add to any budget. While the EPA may need changes and I certainly am supportive of elimiating tax money to pay for abortions, those issues do not belong in a budget. They are always tacked on though, by both parties, but have no business being part of the budget. However, while I certainly don't think the Republicans are not acting right, the blame for this budget situation falls completely on the Democratic party. But, it takes two to tango right? Yeah, it does now, but a year ago, when this buget should have been passed, it didn't. For all of 2010, the Democrats had control of the Senate, the House, and the Presidency. Therefore, the Democrats had every opportunity to pass a budget, but they did not. So, don't act like there is anyone to blame for us being in this situation other than the Democrats themselves. Chuck Schumer blames the Tea Party Republicans for holding up the process, but the Tea Party Candidtates did not even come into office until January 2011. That is four months after the Fiscal year started! Why didn't the Democrats actually do what they were supposed to and pass a budget before the Fiscal Year began? It is because they are cowards. Don't get me wrong. As a general rule of thumb politicians care more about getting elected than they do about actually doing their jobs. There are some who put their jobs first, but they are the exception, not the rule, in both parties. The wind of change last election cycle was palatable. Democrats knew that a wave of smaller government, fiscal responsibility, and social conservatism was growing bigger. Democrats, for being associated with the abomination that is Nancy Pelosi, were "in their sights" (to steal a line from the near equally offensive Sarah Palin). No matter how blue the dog, Democrats knew that big D would be a big problem. But, if they showed some sense, they would obviously lose their hardcore left base. So, they simply did nothing. Take a look at this entry from four years ago. After four years with the reigns of government, the Democrats, still haven't done anything, unless you count paying a lot of foreign banks a bunch of money and passing a disgusting healthcare law. You see all kinds of potential budgets coming from the House, but there has not been one continuing resolution, or full budget that has come from the Senate. Both parties love to point the finger at one another, but at least the Republicans are putting something out there. The Democrats seem to have given up on taxing, but they are still the party of bitching. Neither party is doing the right thing now, but we would not even have gotten to this point if the Democrats had done anything at all in 2010. -J ***Correction: my political information officer has informed me that budgets must orginate in the House. Still, at that time there we no ideas even coming out of the Senate, nor was their any Senate attempt to work up the budget sent by the House. As such, my point remains.

The order is rapidly fadin

In 8th grade I had a science teacher that was a bit peculiar. One day in class he got on to a kid that was one of my friends. It was a minor issue. However, it became a major issue when my friend replied to the teacher and called him buddy. This sent the teacher into a rampage. He yelled, "I am not your buddy, I am your teacher. Do not dare call me your buddy." He then promptly sent the student to the office while the rest of the class sat there stunned.

I kinda had a "I am not your buddy" moment last week. Momar Gadhafi has been a pain in the United States's collective rear end for my entire life time. Recently, he declared Lybia would no longer pursue WMDs and would help apprehend Al Queda. Because of this, western nations, especially the U.S. moved to normalize relations with Lybia. Recently, the people of Lybia realized they had grown beyond his command. When the U.S. made it know that using foreign mercenaries to kill unarmed civilians should not occur, Gadhafi expressed his feeling that he had been "betrayed" by the United States. My response to that, more harshly than the teacher above,was F*ck you! Who does this guy think he is? He is not our buddy. He was directly responsible for blowing up an airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland and blowing up a disco in Germany, all in an attempt to kill American and other western civilians. And we betrayed him? the gall this guy has. Turns out, he is probably crazy. He is not even a funny crazy dictator like Kim Jong Il. Still, he makes me sick. Fortunately, I think Lybia has passed the tipping point and his days are numbered. As revolution and popular uprising spreads across the Middle East and Northern Africa, we should see more of this. For the times, they are a changin.

-J

Some thoughts

Robert Johnson has been widely regarded as one of the greatest blues musicians of all time. He is said to have sold his soul to the devil at the crossroads to receive his talent. When I think of Robert Johnson, I think of someone who lived almost in antiquity. What I find interesting is that he was born in May 1911. That means that Ronald Reagan was actually older than him. For some reason, to me, that is strange to think of. I can remember Ronald Reagan as President, as well as his passing. He is probably more popular across the board today than he ever was when he was alive. So for someone so current to be actually older than someone so ancient is neat, I guess.

Lean Cuisine has a commercial out now for some kind of chicken stir fry dish. One of the selling points is that it has "farm raised broccoli." How is that a selling point? Where else does broccoli come from? Does the Green Giant mowdown herd after herd of innocent free roaming broccoli? I wish George Carlin was still alive, I think he would have a field day with that one.

That's all for now.

-J

The world in which we live

The cost of a barrel of oil has gone up to $100 and OPEC refuses to budge on supply. Therefore, while a number of nations are experiencing a slow recovery from the recent "recession" high gas prices threaten to derail any recent gains.

A congresswoman wanted her constituents to feel like they were playing a part in their government and held a series of events in her district. While holding one such event, she was shot in the head and a number of people were killed including a Federal Judge and a nine-year-old girl.

The Russians are already saying they will back out of the recently announced START treaty if they feel threatened.

But what has been the biggest news of all this week? What story has turned the Internet on it's head? The zodiac signs may be off by a month and a 13th one has been added. People are freaking out about it. It turns out the whole thing may not even apply to western astrology. Further, it is without question, it doesn't really matter anyway. But that was the biggest news story this week. Seems like priorities may be askew.


-J

Hold me closer...

While waiting in a hospital waiting room on Friday night, a kid, not respecting the gravity of being in a hospital, began acting up. Finally, after watching him carry on for about thirty minutes, I decided with actions come consequences. This consequence comes in the form of a video I made with my Blackberry. Enjoy!

-J

Good Old Fashioned Rant

Before you read this in the interest of full disclosure, I am an employee of the United States Government. I can't figure out how to change the time it says I posted a blog entry, but it is currently 9:40 PM central time. I am writing this on my home computer on my own time.

This week President Obama announced to trim the defecit, he planned to freeze the salaries of all employees within the civil service (antiquated term). Below you will find some informational sources:
White House press release
WSJ article
Washington Post Article

The plan is expected to save $28 billion over the next five years. That is a near unfathomable amount of money for anyone other than an economist or billionaire. That is what the President is relying on. Yeah $28 billion sounds like a lot of money. It is. $5.4 billion, the approximate average yearly savings, is also a huge amount of money. But the problem is the budget deficit this year alone was $1.3 trillion. Because math makes my head hurt lets just do some estimates and say the pay freeze will save $30 billion over the next five years. That means that the entire savings is only 2% of the yearly deficit. The $5.4 billion per year is only .4% of the FY2010 deficit (these numbers come from the Congressional Budget Office). But every little bit helps right?

According to Federaljobs.net, the US Government is the nation's largest employer employing approximately 2% of the working men and women in the United States. Let's not forget, these employees are the ones that you file income taxes with, you get social security from, protect our borders, treat our veterans, and perform many other tasks we take for granted. So to save .4% the plan is to essentially cut the salaries of a full 2% of the workforce? What a great idea! Also, if you think that person at the IRS or the Social Security office was a pain to deal with before, how do you think they will act when they know they will not be getting a cost of living adjustment? That is likely what this will affect, by the way. If the President really wanted to minimize the punishment of Federal Employees and save some money, he would have done this for the last two years when inflation was stagnent. In that case the COLA really was just a raise. But it is meant to keep salaries consistent in the face of inflation. With inflation creeping back into the economy, not having the COLA would make the effective salary of each employee lower.

Of course the first sentence of the White House press release blames the past administration for the deficit. There is no question the Bush government could have been more fiscally conservative, but does the President not remember the ARRA or the health bill that nobody wanted and less people read? I guess those didn't add any spending. I know what they did add- extended benefits for people who are unemployed. Intelligent people may disagree over whether this provision was proper. However, everyone should be outraged by the message sent. Unemployed people should be given benefits but let's cut raises for Federal WORKERS. Now, the President did note the first salaries he froze were for Senior White House staff. Logically, this would have been an irrelevant publicity stunt. If it was one of the first things he did, that would mean his senior staff had just started their jobs. So, why would they get raises? You don't hire someone and immediately give them a raise.

So, that brings me to the actual point of this blog entry. I think the President needs to be rewarded (see you thought this was meant negatively! shame!). He already won the Nobel Peace Prize so, his next awards would have to be of equal or higher esteem. First, because the President managed to get the ARRA and Obamacare passed with apparently spending no money, I think he should be awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics (its a shame he missed it this ear). Now, by freezing the salaries of his senior staff, he really jumped on a grenade for all of us. Also, let's not forget, as Commander-in-Chief, he is technically in the military. Therefore, I propose he give himself the Medal of Honor. Who's with me!?!

-J