Hamm’s comment of simply ‘drop out of school’ is a classic response by the anti-gun movement. They do not think, merely respond with emotional statements. How many people died because NO ONE was able to defend themself. You do not hear of crazed gunmen going to a police station to shoot things up. Schools are defenseless.
January 18, 2008
October 25, 2007
October 3, 2007
Honor
Honor. What is it? How is it defined? Honor for one is not the same as for another. Honor between two thieves is not going to be the same as between two law abiding citizens. Per Wikipedia, honor has been defined as such:
“Honor comprises the reputation, self-perception or moral identity of an individual or of a group.”
My plan with this essay is to write about what honor means to me. Part of this essay will attempt to explain honor in a way that is understandable by everyone. Some would say that because my sense of honor is old fashion at times that it clashes with today’s modern society. I however disagree, I say that in today’s modern society old fashion honor is just as important today and is needed even more than in ancient times.
The code of honor I have is not as rigid as the knights of old. Their code of honor was so rigid that there was no room for flexibility. The code of honor I follow is flexible and depending on the situation I am willing to make an exception and bend it if need be.
Some would say that your code of honor should be based on the ancient golden rule, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” and I happen to agree. However in this day and age it is harder to accomplish that than you might think.
The reason for this I believe is because after World War I the soldiers that survived the horrors they saw and went through wanted to enjoy life to the fullest. Society changed and enjoying life was the priority of all. Honor for some took a back seat because of the horrors of the war that was felt by all. War does that though, I am sure that the veterans of the current conflict will change and hopefully they won’t lose their honor because of the war.
In this day and age there is no strict code of honor that all men and women must follow. Sometimes I believe life would be easier if there was. I also believe as a father I can only teach my sons so much about honor and hope they will take the teachings to heart while they create their own code of honor.
There are some basics to creating a code of honor that men and women should know. However in case they do not know what they are here are some examples. Do not lie, do not steal, do not murder and help the unfortunate.
Can you see a trend? Most people do not realize that their every day lives follow a basic code of honor. It is a shame that they do no realize this. Society would be a better place to live in if humanity knew that their day to day lives followed a simplified code of honor.
To some, honor is an old fashion ideal that is no longer useful in our every day lives. I have to strongly disagree! Something as simple as a thank you, is part of being honorable. How you wonder? When you say thank you to someone you are honoring the deed that they have accomplished for you. Whether it is holding a door open for you or picking up something you dropped.
Honor, however can be misused by people. An example of someone that did so can be found only 74 years ago in Germany. Yes I am talking about Adolf Hitler. He twisted honor in such a way, that Germans didn’t even realize that they were being dishonorable.
So be careful of your own personal honor. Do not let anyone misuse your own honor to further their own goals. If these people manage to do that, it would leave a stain on your honor that you may never be able to remove or recover from.
September 28, 2007
No Knowledge of History
09/25/07
On Sundays we get three newspapers because my wife is a coupon clipper. Why three you ask? Well that is a whole other essay in its self. Just suffice it to say she saves us a lot of Money with it.
That’s not what I am going to talk about though. An article caught my eye because of a quote from one of the students they had interviewed in it. This article was about how colleges and Universities are now providing classes on Gay and Lesbian studies.
Now the fact schools are doing this doesn’t really surprise me. However I was shocked by the students quote. To paraphrase:
“he did not realize there homosexuals before the 1970’s”
I don’t know why I was really surprised by this, but I was. It was obvious to me that this student has not read much history.
If he had read history he would have known about the Greeks and their man love, Richard the Lion Heart was said to have preferred the company of men over women which to some, seems to indicate he was gay. How they have come up with that I have not read, though one day I will. Oscar Wilde a writer of the late 1800’s was known to be at least bisexual if not completely homosexual. These references don’t even include the bibles references to homosexuality, and that was written thousands of years ago.
Oscar Wilde was more of a literary reference, which however should not make a difference. If he had been paying attention during English in high school I am sure the teacher would have mentioned Mr. Wilde’s proclivities even if only in passing.
I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that this student doesn’t know more about homosexuals in history. Homosexuality has only recently in the last few years started to be discussed openly in public. Homosexuals have been persecuted through out history mostly for religious reason. So anything we know of men and women being homosexuals with out an indepth study, some might consider hearsay.
I will have to read the article so I can see exactly what these studies are all about. I mean with out having read the article I don’t know what there is to study. I will pick up this essay after having read the article.
09/26/07
After re-reading the article which is written by Lisa Leff of the Associated Press and is titled “Gay-Studies classes find acceptance” The quote I paraphrased yesterday is from Emo Loredo a student at San Francisco State University. His exact words are as follows:
“One of the things I’ve learned is that homosexuality was around way back in ancient times, before I thought Homosexuality was started in the 1970’s.”
Mr. Loredo’s quote, as I have said is sad and surprising. Not because he didn’t know homosexuality has been around for a long time. It’s sad because the information has been suppressed by society for so long.
The article goes on to state that current issues such as same sex marriage and gays in the military are the driving interests in these programs. I think it is sad that the accomplishments of indivuals that happen to be homosexual have to have their own studies group in order to be recognized for what they have accomplished in life.
This is what happens when religion is a major driving force in our society. It makes me wonder what our society would have been like if we have remained pagan.
July 22, 2007
Writing
It is something I would like to do on a regular basis. Whether it be an opinion article, short stories or novels. In this day and age of the Internet, You Tube or any other form of instant media gratification; writing is coming in last if you were to believe some of the media giants and news people out there.
They forget though that most ideas for their stories or companies started with writing. Writing is never going to go away! Writing is the most inexpensive way for someone like myself to get our idea and point across.
Look how writing has effected politics. Where should you look you ask? I would suggest the blogosphere. How many bloggers out there affected Dan Rather’s decision to step down from CBS. How many helped cause John Kerry’s loss of the 2004 Presidential election.
This was done with the written word! So writing is not going to go away, even though the human race, admittedly a small percentage, is getting lazy at reading the written word, it is not ever going to go away for good.
We write every day, whether it is a note on the back of an envelope (my wife’s favorite place) or writing an email. Writing is never going to go away as I said earlier. I just don’t see it happening. Some day I will write my book and hopefully it will be accepted by the public and enjoyed by all those that love to read!
July 11, 2007
Pope: So, you’re not Catholic? Then you’re not in true Church Benedict ignites holy war of words by stating other groups ‘defective’
I only have one thing to ask about the below story. Is the Pope trying to restart the crusades?
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Pope Benedict XVI has ignited controversy across the world by approving a document saying non-Catholic Christian communities are either defective or not true churches, and the Roman Catholic Church provides the only true path to salvation. (More)
July 5, 2007
State of the Art: IPhone-Free Cellphone News; T-Mobile HotSpot @Home
This the way of the future. I have T-Mobile and this would be a great feature for me. I can’t upgrade my phone now, but according to the article I wouldn’t really want to anyways, so buy the time I am able to upgrade maybe they will have better phones.
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T-Mobile had the misfortune to announce a new product last week that may be as game-changing as Apple’s. But hard to believe though it may be, T-Mobile did make an announcement last week. And even harder to believe, its new product may be as game-changing as Apple’s.
It’s called T-Mobile HotSpot @Home, and it’s absolutely ingenious. It could save you hundreds or thousands of dollars a year, and yet enrich T-Mobile at the same time. In the cellphone world, win-win plays like that are extremely rare. (More)
June 28, 2007
True or False: U.S.’s Broadband Penetration Is Lower Than Even Estonia’s
This is sad. This story describes how the United States is not the top dog when it comes to Broadband Penetration. How we are not even in the top 10!! How is it that one of the wealthiest nations in the world is not even in the top 10! This is just another reason why our government needs to be seriously overhauled. Our country is not even close to the founding fathers thought it might be in the future and that is sad.
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From Newsweek, June 28, 2007
By Steven Levy
Maybe our proud nation is going through some rough spots, but at least we have one shining and perpetual triumph: the Internet. People may refer to it as the World Wide Web, but its capital is Silicon Valley and the United States is the big dog tapping the global keyboard. At least that’s what we thought, until the news broke in April of a report by the international Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development that ranked the high-speed broadband adoption of 30 countries in the developed world. The United States was not first. Or second, or third. It ranked 15th. (More)
The priest with no name
This is a story about a very humble man of God. Larry Elder writes about how he met this man of God while giving the commencement speech at the school of one of his young fans.
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This is an article about a man who did not want me to write it.
A few weeks ago, I gave a commencement speech at a Catholic elementary school. I received the invitation from a 13-year-old young lady, Elisabeth, who began listening to my radio show at 6-and-a-half years of age, who has now finished the eighth grade and prepares, next semester, to enter high school. (more)
New gun control: Shut down shops
I think it’s time that we do as Thomas Jefferson says and fertilize the tree of liberty:
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.” — Thomas Jefferson to William Stephens Smith, 1787. ME 6:373, Papers 12:356
The government is using paperwork errors as small as the abbreviation of a city name to shut down some of the nation’s longest-serving gun shops, and 2nd Amendment advocates fear the right to bear arms will mean little if there’s no way to obtain a gun.
Essay on Prostitution
Prostitution
With Super Bowl 42 coming up our law enforcement community is, instead of, concentrating solely on crimes such as theft, muggings, fraud and the like, they are going to make a concentrated effort to trap prostitutes and their customers. That’s right you heard me, prostitutes and the customers they are servicing.
The police will tell you that prostitution is not a victimless crime. They will give you their list of victims, which include the customer, the family of the customer, the community and of course the prostitute her or his self. Notice they list the prostitute last as if she or he counts the least.
Normally I would praise the police department for going after criminals. In this case I can’t do so because what they are doing is being morality enforcers, not police officers. They are enforcing the codified morality of a few people that say they represent the desires of the majority; I feel that is not known for sure. They think they are doing it for the good of the community. When in fact there are wasting our police forces valuable time on a “crime” that does no real good in helping to keep our community crime free.
Prostitution is another one of those “crimes” that should be legalized and regulated as I believe the use of marijuana should be, but that is for another essay. In the state of Nevada prostitution is legal. However in Las Vegas and Reno it is illegal, I do not know about the rest of the townships in the state.
Here is how I think it should be regulated after legalization. The women or men would need to get a business license just as any other business owner has to do. Because that is what they will be, business owners. The first time purchaser of this license I feel should pay a flat fee and it relatively inexpensive. The license would have to be renewed yearly. The renewal fee would be set percentage of the prostitutes prior year’s earnings. So that the regulatory commission would know how much that was, the prostitutes would have to keep a set of books like any other business owner.
If they were caught operating without a business license they would be heavily fined and they would have their right to operate as a prostitute suspended for a period of time. If they are caught a second time they would face jail time.
They would be required to have a medical certification on file with the regulatory office stating they were drug and disease free, they would also have to have a copy of it on them at all times. The certification would need to be updated once a month. The regulatory commission would have a list of doctors that would have been vetted by them and these would be the doctors that the prostitutes would have to use to receive their certification. This certification process would be paid for by the prostitutes themselves.
If for some reason the prostitute fails their certification, they would not be allowed to work until they are clean, whether it is drugs or disease. If they are unable to get clean for whatever reason, their license will be revoked permanently. If they get caught working with out their business license and with a failed medical certification then they would face a mandatory fine and mandatory jail time.
Along with the fees of licensing and medical certification, they would pay sales tax, state and federal income tax, Medicare and Social Security tax. It would be very advisable for them to have an accountant. Basically they would have to do what any other business owner has to do. Because of the health issues they would have a few other steps to follow besides the basic business ones.
In response to law enforcements concern about the prostitutes being assaulted by their customers, by legalizing prostitution they would actually be safer. By requiring prostitutes to issue a receipt with the customer’s information such as driver’s license numbers this would keep customers from thinking they could use the prostitutes as their own personal punching bag. The taking of the Drivers license number would be for the reason of entering it into a data base that is run by the regulatory commission for the express purpose of tracking down any violent customers. This if they are stupid enough to beat a prostitute then it would be easy to track them down. This information would be gathered before any services are rendered. This would also allow the prostitute to file a complaint against the customer also.
Now of course there will be privacy activists that say this would be an Orwellian intrusion from the government. My response is that it would probably cost less to put this system in to effect than to have law enforcement arrest and prosecute prostitutes and their customers.
To the women and men that are supposedly harmed by their loved ones visiting a prostitute I say this to them, they need to find out why their loved ones are doing this. If it’s something that can be fixed at home by them then fix it, otherwise get rid of them.
If you talk to any prostitute they will tell you that most of their customers come to them because they are not getting what they want at home.
I have no patience for people that claim to be victims in this case. The customers go to the prostitutes for the reason that prostitutes claim. They are receiving something from the prostitute that they are not getting at home. If the issue cannot be resolved at home then there is something deeper that is causing the problem. If the customers are going to prostitutes just because they want to then their significant others need to get rid of them.
Prostitution should be legalized and regulated period. If this is done as I have described or in a way that is similar, I am confident that it would reduce the need by prostitutes to use drugs to cover up their shame at having to sell themselves to make a living; this in itself would reduce the demand for drugs. I am confident that “pimps” would be put out of a job. I am confident that the violence associated with prostitution would drop. I am also confident that our law enforcement officials will be able to concentrate on more important crimes.