Happy Thanksgiving

This morning I got a call from work. I'm off all week, but they have now called me five times. This time it was a problem with a user in Japan. It was eight AM here and Japan is 11 hours ahead of us (I think) so it was nine PM there. He's working after hours. I've dealt with this guy before and he is highly competent. Operations conferenced him in with me and I talked him through what needed to be done. A person here in the United States was supposed to have provided him with the procedures, but didn't. Our Operations lead (and she is fantastic!) listened in and after the call asked if I wanted her to document this stuff so she could handle it the next time. I really love her!

But I'm not pissed. All this stuff is being logged, so hopefully management (now I'm assuming some competency here) realizes that I'm the only one who can handle this stuff since my team lead was called every time before Operations called me. So maybe I'll survive the next resource action (layoffs), that will probably occur in another six months. They've been happening every six months for the last two years.

So that brings me up to thinking about all the things I am thankful for this year.

• I'm thankful for the intelligence I got from my father and the common sense I got from my mother.
• I'm thankful for the work ethic taught to me by my parents.
• I'm thankful for my sister who encourages me in my blogging, laughs at my jokes, and makes the best apple pie in the world.
• I'm thankful for the education I got in the Webster Groves Public School System, in Missouri. When I went to school, there was a dress code and discipline. There were no social promotions. If you flunked, you did the grade over again. There was an emphasis on writing. The faculty at Webster Groves Senior High School assumed everyone was going to college and they taught accordingly. I particularly remember Mrs. Paige, my English teacher in my senior year, who encouraged me and made me write, write, and write. Her husband could read Chaucer as written. He came in one day and read it to us. I didn't understand a single thing he read.
• I'm thankful for surviving the last resource action at TCIDNN(The Company I Dare Not Name).
• I'm thankful for the Operations team lead.
• I'm thankful for good friends.
  • Cindy, who nags me about my health, but supplies nursing care when I screw up. She also goes to the doctor with me to translate and intimidate discuss treatment with the doctor. FMG's (Foreign Medical Graduates) beware!
  • Michael, her husband, who sells me wine and who also brings over good wine when I have him and Cindy for dinner. And serves good wine when they have me for dinner.
  • Wahoo, who took care of me after my accident, finished a crosstie landscaping project I had started, put ramps in my old house to make it accessable until I learned to walk again, and wouldn't let me slack off in rehab.
  • Jeanella, his wife, who used to clean my house and take me shopping. I used to have them both over to dinner reguarly, but since I moved, I'm over thirty miles away and don't see them as much as I would like.
  • Alixe, a good friend in St. Louis. Since I don't go up to St. Louis much, I seldom see her.
  • Ditto for Nancy and Jerry in St. Louis.
  • Cliff, in Lebanon Missouri. Lebanon? Where the heck is that?
  • Brian, whom I used to share an office with and who hates it when I use fuck in a blog.
  • Gwen, In Maryland, whom I never see anymore. When I first met her, I thought she was an airhead, but she speaks three languages and is a hell of a lot smarter than I am.
  • Richard, who reads my stuff, teaches me stuff, and thinks I'm smarter than I am.
  • Uncle Mikey, who teaches me stuff and thinks I'm smarter than I am.
• I'm thankful that I live in the United States. I've been in over 25 different countries and none of them even come close to this country.
• I'm thankful for the blogosphere because:
  • Fred Pruitt at Rantburg. What a sense of humor. He gave me a plug.
  • Bill Quick at DailyPundit saw Fred's plug and gave me a plug. And Bill put me on his blogroll. And I just loved his Most Bloodthirsty Warblogger election.
  • Glenn Reynolds saw Bill Quick's plug and gave me a plug (the only one I've ever received from him dammit)
  • Kim du Toit, my companion grouch. He saw Glenn's plug, read my stuff and sent me an e-mail. We've been friends ever since. He also gave me a plug and put me on his blogroll. My redneck friends love his gratuitous gun pictures.
  • Connie du Toit, Kim's wife, a blogger in her own right. Unfair to have two excellent writers in one family.
  • Toren Smith, whom Kim directed me to. I hope he gets caught up and can start posting again. Another friend.
  • Addison, one of my long term readers whose comments are often better than what I write.
  • Ralph Gizzup, also one of my long term readers who has supplied me with many interesting links. Get off those crutches!
  • Rachel Lucas, whom either Addison or Ralph directed me to. I cannot remember which one. I don't know how she works, goes to school, and writes. She's another good friend whom I hope to meet someday.
  • Andrea Harris, who gave me a plug. I followed the link back to her site and I've been reading her ever since. Another intelligent lady who works, goes to school and writes. I'm anxiously awaiting her first Danielle Steele type novel. I'm not fond of that genre, but if Andrea writes it, I'll read it.
  • Lileks whom we all wish we could write like.
  • Stephen den Beste, who is so damn smart and prolific it drives me crazy. How the heck does he do it?
  • Chris Johnson (WGHS - Class of 74), Midwest Conservative Journal, who put me on his blogroll evern before he knew I was from Webster Groves. He keeps my sister (WGHS - Class of 60) and me (WGHS - Class of 64) up to date as to what is going on in St. Louis and in Webster Groves.
  • Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs.
  • Ooops! Almost forgot my sister's neighbor who's told a lot of his friends about me. Get to meet him next month when I go out to San Francisco for Christmas.
• I'm thankful for TCIDNN which has employed me for almost thirty years. I've had good times and I've had bad times, but I've made a good living, and TCIDNN has provided me with a lot of blogging fodder. And my current job is the best job I've ever had. It's fun being a systems programmer. And now, if I get resource actioned out the door, I can retire.
• I'm thankful for my two cats Doofus and Ashley who graciously allow me to live with them.
• I'm thankful that Maureen's cat, Odell, is doing OK after his operation.
• I'm thankful for my BMW Z3 which is the most fun car I've ever driven.
• I'm thankful for the beautiful house that I moved into four years ago.
• I'm thankful for the Great Patio of Dunwoody. (It will be the subject of a future blog)
• I'm thankful Bill Clinton is no longer president.
• I'm thankful that Algore is not president.
• I'm thankful that Algore and Michael Moore exist since Rachel does such a good job takin' 'em down.
• I'm thankful for Molly Ivins whose columns fisk themselves.
• I'm thankful the Falcons may actually have a winning season.
• And I'm thankful that Cindy's parents are having me for Thanksgiving dinner. And afterwards, Michael and Cindy are coming here for Port, which Michael will supply.

I will probably be in too good of a mood to post tomorrow. We'll see.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Verizon and Zogby

Today was one of those beautiful autumn days in Georgia. It got down in the 40's last night, but during the day it got up in the mid 60's. Beautiful blue sky. Very few clouds. One of those days that you are glad to be alive.

Work called me last night. No problem. I got called three times today. No problem. And, I was offered to participate in a new site about Homeland Security (and the abuses thereof) put up by Kim and Connie du Toit. Now that is an honor! Let's see. I see the usual suspects including two of the smartest women in the blogosphere, Rachel Lucas and Andrea Harris. But where is Michele? After all, she got rated as the most bloodthirsty war blogger at Bill Quick's site. Look for a surprising post by me as soon as I sober up. That would be tomorrow.

So, as I said, it was a beautiful day. What can I do to ruin it? I know. Let's go to the Verizon Wireless store. I've got the top down on my BMW Z3 and I'm wearing a rugby shirt. It's perfect convertible weather.

I have a cell phone from Verizon that will not power on. This is a cell phone I got through AAA for emergencies. Not much good it it won't power on. So, off I go to the Verizon Wireless store in my Z3 with the top down. Beautiful drive.

I walk into the Verizon store and there's no line. I walk up to the rep and tell him my tale of woe. Of course, he needs my cell phone number and name. No problem. He takes my phone and charger and plugs them into an outlet. Hmmmm. Doesn't work. No shit! He gets another charger. No luck. "OK", sez he, "I'll have to turn you over to tech support." He takes my phone and charger over to tech support and points out a chair I can sit in while waiting.

There are two people in front of me. Finally, one person leaves and I can step up to the counter. There is one person working tech support. Her name starts with an S and ends with an A. There are a bunch of letters in between, but I cannot put them together into some sort of a name I can pronounce. She has one speed. Veeerrrrry Sloooow. She is also trying to multiplex.

• She: Did you fill out one of these forms?
• Me: What forms?
• She: This form here.
• Me: No, but that would have been a good idea for me to have done while I was sitting down doing nothing.

So, I filled out the form. Did I mention that Dwayne was there fixing their computers? There was also another Verizon guy walking around doing absolutely nothing.

So after I filled out the form S****A (Starts with an S and ends with an A) asks me what's wrong with my phone.

• S****A: What's wrong with the phone?
• Me: It won't power on. (Can't you read the form I filled out?)

So, since S****A is multiplexing, she goes back to the other person who's been there since before I got there and starts dealing with her. Meanwile, the other Verizon guy who is doing absolutely nothing, keeps walking around the store. I guess he must be in management.

So, S****A gets back to me and starts disassembling my phone. I don't know what she was looking for, since she didn't find it. Then, she turned back to the other person. Meanwhile, the other Verizon employee kept walking around the store doing nothing. Also another counter rep came back with another customer who had a problem, so that person dropped into S****A's queue. Omigawd! Now she has to multiplex with three of us! She finally starts servicing my interrupt (a little computer jargon there) and puts my phone back together and breaks out two boxes of phone batteries.

Now call me stupid (OK. You're stupid), but if I have a cell phone that won't power on and won't take a charge, the first thing I would check would be the battery, but I'm not a highly trained cell phone specialist.

Out of these two boxes of batteries, S****A finds three that are for my phone. None of them work. Hmmm. So now she breaks out her handy dandy Radio Shack voltmeter and meters the batteries. They all show bad. At this time, I would probably throw all the batteries away, since they are bad, but what do I know? She puts them back with the rest of the batteries and disappears. She returns with a brand new battery that works. So now my phone is fixed. I pay for the new battery and leave. Total time spent at the Verizon store: 45 minutes. Oh. The person who was there before me is still there. Also, the other guy (who must be in management) is still walking around the store doing nothing.

Hey Verizon, Can you hear me now? You are a bunch of idiots!

So I need sumpin' besides a couple of Stolys on the rocks and half a bottle of wine. Well, here's just the thing. By golly, the Atlanta Urinal and Constipation has an op-ed by Arab apologist extraordinaire, James Zogby. Unfortunately, they don't have it at their online site, so I found it here.

Arab Americans and American Jews Agree

Well that's just ducky. Unfortunately, they're not the ones fighting in the Middle East so why is this important?

I’ve always maintained that for there to be an effective U.S. policy pressing for a just Middle East peace, there had to be a U.S. constituency that demanded such a policy. The results of a recent poll establishes that such a constituency exists among strong majorities of Arab Americans and American Jews—both of whom agree on the general outlines of a just peace plan.

And I've always maintained for there to be an effective Middle East peace plan there had to be people in the Middle East who wanted peace.

It may be surprising to some that despite more than two years of terrible violence and tragedy and growing polarization in the Middle East, Arab Americans and American Jews remain committed to support for a two state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

And it may be surprising that after two years of terrible violence and tragedy that the Palestinians remain committed to the total annihilation of Israel.

What was most striking about the results were the many points of convergence between the two communities. For example, more than 90% of the respondents in both communities report that they closely follow Middle East news.

No shit!

And majorities in both communities say that they are pessimistic about the prospects for Middle East peace (six in 10 Arabs, and three-quarters of American Jews).

I'm shocked! Shocked, I say!

Neither Arab Americans nor American Jews give U.S. President George W. Bush high ratings for his handling of the Arab-Israeli conflict. In fact, both groups give the President near identical negative ratings—Jews rating Bush’s performance 28% positive and 70% negative and Arab Americans giving the President a 26%/67% net negative score.

Y'know, I don't really give a flying fuck. Sorry, Brian, I almost made it all the way through without saying fuck, but Zogby is so full of shit I cannot help it. Geez. He's an Arab Molly Ivins.

While the negative assessments are the same, it appears from the data in the poll that the reasons behind each communities’ concerns are somewhat different. A significant number of American Jews, it appears, fault the Administration for being too disengaged from the search for peace, while a substantial number of Arab Americans critique the Administration for showing too much support for Israel.

In other words, let the Palestinians drive the Jews out of Israel and create a Palestinian state from "the River to the Sea". By the way, does anyone realize that the PLO has never repealed the article of the PLO charter that calls for the destruction of Israel? That was part of the Oslo accords, but the PLO just never got around to it. "We've been meaning to do it. Honest. But what with all the people blowing up, we just never got around to it."

Where the strongest agreement exists between the two groups is in their mutual support for two “independent and secure states” for Israelis and Palestinians. More than 95% of Arab Americans support a “secure and independent” Palestine and a “secure and independent” Israel. Meanwhile, 87% of American Jews, support such a state for Palestinians, while more than 95% support an “secure and independent Israel.

Wonderful! Glad to hear it. But that's not what counts. How many Palestinians suppport a "secure and independent" Israel? Let's see. The last poll I saw was that about 85% of Palestinians supported the total destruction of Israel. That leaves around 15% who might support a "secure and independent" Israel. Those are the numbers that count. Contrast that with close to 50% of Israelis who are for a "secure and independent" Palestinian state. Israel is not the problem. Israel wants peace. Israel has wanted peace since 1948. America is not the problem. The Palestinians and their leadership are the problem.

After two years of violence that has destroyed lives, shattered hopes and brutally transformed the West Bank and Gaza into a devastated and impoverished land

Who walked away fron the negotiations? Who started the two years of violence?

—it is important that many Arab Americans and American Jews still seek a way forward based on mutual rights and respect.

I beg to differ. It is important that the Palestinians and the rest of the Arab world recognize Israel's right to exist. Only until that happens will there be peace in the Middle East.

What the AAI/APN poll tells us is that while both communities have obvious deep feelings and attachments to different sides in this struggle, and while they may differ in many areas, they can find common agreement and work for peace.

But it is not the American communities that need to work for peace. It is the Middle Eastern communities. The Israelis have been willing to do it since 1948. Maybe some day the Arabs and the Palestinians will be willing to work for peace.

And no amount of polling in America will have any effect on that.

A Lot About Nuttin'

Things are going well. My alma mater, Webster Groves Senior High School is going to the Missouri 5A class championship. This info courtesy of Christopher Johnson at Midwest Conservative Journal. This may affect what is known as the Turkey Day Game with Kirkwood (Boo! Hiss!) Senior High School. The Turkey Day Game is the oldest Thanksgiving football rivalry west of the Mississippi. Growing up, my cousins lived in Kirkwood and we lived in Webster Groves and at Thanksgiving dinner if Kikwood won my cousins were insufferable. Likewise, if Webster won, my sister and I were insufferable.

Speaking of insufferable, JoshMedia and I are still going back and forth in my comments about Stella and the coffee. He told me to do my research about hot liquids. Let's see, when camping, I used to drink coffee made over a campfire. The water was boiling hot. That means 212 degrees. I have spilled coffee on myself. Not the whole cup, but just a little splash. No blisters. I have spilled coffee made from boiling water in a microwave. Once again 212 degrees. No blisters. Now JoshMedia said that I would get third degree burns in 2 to 7 seconds. I'm not soaking my fingers in the hot liquid. I'm not in contact with the hot liquid for 2 to 7 seconds. My point is, after 56 years of spilling hot liquids on myself, I would be careful with them. For one, I would never put something hot between my legs like Stella did. She was an idiot.

Oh, I did some additional research. I was talking to my friend Cindy, who is a rehab nurse, about this, and she pointed out that Stella would be more apt to get a burn (at least above her waist) than I would. Here's why. I'm a paraplegic. Below my level of injury (T12/L1) my blood circulation is poor. Also, since I have no sensation, my body doesn't do a very good job of cooling. These two factors make me more susceptable to sunburn. This was made evident to me when I went on my checkout dive at an Alabama quarry last summer and I got a sunburn on one ankle that turned into a skin sore that turned into cellulitis. Dammit! It was the sun's fault. Who the heck do I sue? Since older people have poorer circulation, Stella would be more likely to burn her hands that I would. But, I still would not put a hot cup of coffee between my legs! Comment all you want JoshMedia, the discussion is over! Stella is still an idiot! And, Addison, feel free to jump in at any time.

Omigawd! I saw this and almost fell outta my chair I was laughing so hard. I knew Rachel was smart, but I didn't know she graduated from high school when she was ten years old. My caption would be, "The girl on the left has a sense of humor. The guy on the left is an asshole". Speaking of assholes, I was driving by one of the malls last week and I saw that there is a movie named Jackass. When did they film Michael Moore's life story?

I'm off work all this week and if my mother was still alive, I would be up in St. Louis. I always drove up the Saturday before Thanksgiving and drove back the Saturday after Thanksgiving. I got to spend the week visiting friends and not doing much of anything else except catching up on my reading. I looked at the weather in St. Louis and it's in the 20's and 30's. I was driving around this afternoon in my Z3 with the top down. It was an incredibly beautiful day.

My PC sagas are almost at an end. I got everything backed up on my old PC and my PC guy came by to pick it up and he's gonna upgrade me to P4-1.8G machine with 256M of RAM, a better hard drive, and an internal Zip drive. He's leaving my old hard drive in the machine so I can easily transfer my programs. I'm hoping to have it back before Thanksgiving.

Here's a surprise. For once, I actually agree with Sumpin' written by Molly Ivins. In this column she goes on about Total Information Awareness.

Total Information Awareness will provide intelligence agencies and law enforcement with instant access to information from e-mail, telephone records, credit cards, banking transactions and travel records, all without a search warrant. It will, said Poindexter, "break down the stovepipes" that separate commercial and government databases. The just-passed Homeland Security Bill undermines the Privacy Act of 1974, which was intended to limit what government agencies can do with personal information.

Like perhaps over 1000 FBI files?

This just shows that even a blind pig can sometimes find an acorn. Somehow, I think that Molly is more concerned that this is being done by Republicans. If Dimocrats were doing it she would probably be saying, "People with nothing to hide shouldn't be concerned about this."

But to expect Molly to make sense during an entire column would be too much to ask. She was doing fine talking about Total Information Awareness, but then off she goes with the following bullshit:

Personally, I still believe internationalism makes more sense than isolationism because our major problems in the future -- global warming,

Hello Kyoto.

overpopulation

The only overpopulation we have to worry about is from our lax immigration policies. As for the rest of the world. Fuck 'em.

and water shortage

Have you seen the oceans? We have the technology to make fresh water from salt water. It's expensive, but can be done.

-- are going to have to be dealt with on a global basis.

And guess who the world wants to foot the bill?

This is an environmental struggle, as well as a civil liberties struggle. I think it is inarguable that this is the most anti-environmental administration since before Teddy Roosevelt.

By inarguable, she means that she doesn't have the facts to support this thesis.

The corporatists in this administration, particularly those from the oil bidness, apparently have some grand imperialist schemes to keep us in cheap oil indefinitely.

And having cheap oil indefinitely is bad because ... ?

As a matter of both foreign and environmental policy, it makes a lot more sense to lay rail,

For trains and mass transit that no one wants to use. Yeah that makes sense.

promote renewable energy

Like ethanol. That's working out, right? Wind? It's pissing off environmentalists because it's killing birds. There's hope for solar some day.

and get serious about conserving oil.

Remember Jimmy Carter and his sweaters?

We subsidize the hell out of the oil bidness with innumerable tax breaks, loopholes and support programs.

Same with the farm bidness.

For heaven's sake, why not support renewable energy, instead?

See ethanol and wind above.

Why should we ask our military to die for cheap oil when the rest of us aren't even being asked to get better mileage?

Maybe they're not being asked to die for cheap oil. It might have sumpin' to do with terrorism. Remember 9/11? Remember, "You're either with us or against us"?

Molly, Colonel Mustard, in the library, with the lead pipe. Now you have three clues.

Alas, it's probably still not enough.

Personal Responsibility

A few days ago, I was bummed out by another 'resource action' (That's the current eupemism for layoffs. Last year it was called 'skill rebalancing') by TCIDNN (The Company I Dare Not Name), so after writing about that, I filled up my post with sumpin' an old Navy buddy had sent me about the Stella Awards. Turns out they were bogus. What a surprise! I had written at the end of my post, that "If it's on the internet, it's gotta be true'', which was meant to be tongue in cheek. Anyway, I got a note from Randy Cassingham who directed me to two of his sites this one and this one.

Also, I got more comments than usual (but still no hate mail) including one from JoshMedia who told me these were ripped off by my Navy buddy from here. Actually, someone else did it because these were forwarded to me from him.

I had a discussion about Stella with my friend Wahoo last year, and he used the same arguments that JoshMedia did, namely, that McDonald's coffee was served too hot and they had been warned about it and refused to lower the temperature. My reply was she was an idiot. You do not put anything hot between your legs. JoshMedia's reply was it was 'not just hot, but so hot as to be unsafe'. My reply again was that Stella was an idiot. I treat any hot liquid the same way. If I spill it, I will get burned. And if I do spill it and get burned, it's my fault.

I have noticed over the last thirty years that we seemed to have lost the concept of taking responsibility for our actions. It's never our fault. It's always someone else's fault. Billy Boy Clinton was a master of this. Remember when he was travelling around the world on all of his Apology Tours? Everywhere he went he was apologizing for sumpin' the United States did. For example, when he was in Africa, he apologized for slavery^TM. That's rather funny, since slavery^TM still exists in Africa and we fought a bloody war here in the United States to abolish it. The descendants of slaves in this country have a higher standard of living than black people anywhere else on this planet.

But did you ever hear Clinton apologize for anything he did? Waco? Janet Reno's fault. Over 1000 FBI files? (Nixon asked for one that he didn't even get, and the press was outraged. What an abuse of power!) It was a 'bureaucratic SNAFU'. Firing the White House Travel office (Nothing wrong with that) and siccing the FBI on them? (Now there is an example of mean spirited behavior) Billy Dale, after great legal expense, was acquited in 45 minutes. No apologies from Bill and Hill. And lying and obstructing justice aand publicly humiliating Hillary (Wait a minute! That's a good thing.) and Chelsea? It was the Republican's fault. I could go on and on about Clinton, but he never apologized for any of his scandalous behavior. Rush Limbaugh had a great line about that. "Harry Truman always said, 'The buck stops here.' Bill Clinton always says, 'The buck never got here'."

According to Dimocrats, like Dickhead Gephardt, the poor didn't win "life's lottery", as if it's not their fault that they are poor. They are victims. They've been held back by the evil rich. It has nothing to do with the fact that they didn't get an education and had children they could not afford. I have said many times in my writings on this site that the only excuses for poverty are catastrophic events like accidents, death, illness or an addiction like drugs or alcohol. Both my sister and I came from poverty. It was not grinding poverty, but my father was an alcoholic and was often out of work and my mother had to work at low paying jobs. We had no medical insurance. But, we both got an education, we both started working at an early age, and we didn't have children we couldn't afford. She has one. I have none, since I am too cranky for a woman to put up with.

Of course, the reason so many blacks are in poverty is racism. That was true at one time, but not anymore. But we have professional RWPP (Race Warlord Poverty Pimps) who spout this line and make excuses for blacks not achieving rather than going after the nonachievement mentality in the black community that doing well in school and learning to read and write proper English is 'acting white'. Gotta get that Confederate flag off the grounds of the South Carolina Statehouse. I get so pissed off at college coaches who say that we need to lower admissiion standards for black student athletes. And the ones who are screaming the loudest for this are black basketball coaches. Don't they realize that by these actions they are telling these black kids that they are dumber than white kids?

Here's a neat one. It's our fault that so many illegal aliens sneaking in our country die in the desert. Can you believe that? What are we supposed to do? Put out water stations for 'em. It's not their fault they're dying of thirst. It's our fault for not opening our borders.

I'm getting so sick of the nanny state philosophy that no one has to take personal responsibility for their actions. Actions have consequences. My parents were good at telling my sister and me that. When I flunked out of college, my mother welcomed me to the real world by telling me I better get a job 'cause I was gonna have to start paying room and board. Ooops! I goofed. And then the draft board was closing in. Joined the Navy instead.

So even though I suspected the Stella awards were bogus, it wouldn't have surprised me if they had been real, because we no longer want to hold people reponsible for their actions.

"I raped and killed them women because I wuz abused when I was a child", said the toothless tatooed rapist/killer. Oh poor baby. He was a product of his environment. Blame the parents. Blame the fact that he grew up poor. And also, since he used a gun, blame the gun manufacturers.

And if I ever get carried away and spout too much bullshit on this site, it's not my fault.

I am:

• A victim of poverty
• A victim of a dysfunctional family
• A victim of an unhappy marriage (I was married once, believe it or not)
• A victim of many rejections by females (How could that be?)
• A victim because I flunked out of college (They insisted I go to class, those bastards!)
• A victim of a hopeless war (Fortunately, I didn't kill any babies in Viet Nam or I'd really be fucked up.)
• A victim of high taxes
• A victim of the Social Security System
• A victim because I'm a cripple (And dammit, I couldn't figger out whom to blame for my stupidity so I wasn't able to sue anyone.)
• A victim of eight years of Bill Clinton

See? It ain't my fault.

Those Poor Palestinians

Have I ever mentioned how much I hate Muslims? It's not because of bigotry or prejudice. I hate them because they are evil. I hate them because their religion of peace^TM is a sham. I hate them because their religion preaches hatred and death in the name of their God. I hate them because they justify and celebrate killing innocent children in their beds. I hate them because of all the vitriol that spews from their 'holy' places in the Middle East every Friday. And I hate them because I see no major Muslim leaders in this country distancing themselves from the hatred and bigotry of their religion. They totally disgust me.

And now to shift gears. How could I go about getting a job as a liberal columnist? I mean it can't be too hard can it? All I would have to do is write meaningless tripe about how the mean evil Republicans are gonna starve old people and outlaw abortion. Or maybe how the poor Palestinians are desperate because of the opppression of Israel. Or maybe how all the problems in the world are caused by the Unitied States. I could do it. I really could. If Molly Ivins, Helen Thomas, and Robert Fisk can get paid for writing drivel surely I could too. Where do I go to apply? I could pretend to be clueless. I would have trouble keeping a straight face, but I know I could do it.

What brings this up is the latest column from Jay Bookman, the assistant liberal, at the Atlanta Urinal and Constipation where he bemoans the plight of the Palestinians.

Palestinian bombers maim a just cause

See, we're only at the title and he's already wrong. They're maiming lots of people, but there is no just cause.

Palestinian suicide bombers continue to blow up Israeli buses, Israeli buildings, Israeli lives. The terrorists no doubt believe they are killing to advance the Palestinian cause, but they are tragically, hopelessly, historically mistaken.

Actually, I think they're just trying to kill as many Jews as possible. And we also need to define the 'Palestinian cause'. What liberals like Bookman do not seem to understand is the Palestinian cause is the total elimination of Israel and a Palestinian State from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. I cannot understand why he and his fellow liberals do not understand this. Arafat and his thugogracy have made no secret of this.

Every time a suicide bomb explodes, the likelihood of a Palestinian state grows smaller.

I was willing to admit that there should be a Palestinian state until Arafat walked away from the best deal he's ever gonna get, emptied the jails, and started the current wave of violence. I now see that the current generation of Palestinians have been turned into crazed, rabid animals who only understand death and destruction. They are animals who should be put into cages.

With every new attack, Palestinian terrorists strengthen the hand of Israeli extremists who hope ultimately to deny statehood to the Palestinians, and someday even to remove them from their land altogether.

Israeli extremists? Israeli extemists? Israeli fucking extremists? How about normal Israelis who only want to live in peace? They only elected Sharon because the generous concessions Barak made to Arafat were interpreted as a sign of weakness. Arafat figgered some more violence would get more concessions. Why not? The world has let him get away with all the terrorism so far. He was even given a Nobel Peace Prize in 1994. Imagine that. The world's most successful terrorist awarded a Nobel Peace Prize. Kinda cheapens the Nobel Prize doesn't it. And as far as I'm concerned, the Palestinians should all be put down into the Gaza Strip. Then build a wall around it. Cage 'em up like the animals they are.

And because the Palestinians lack leadership willing to tell them that truth, they continue to play into the hands of those who plot to destroy them. In their blind anger, the Palestinians are allowing themselves to be outsmarted and played for fools, and risk losing what they are willing to die to achieve.

A whole generation of Palestinians has been brainwashed and instilled with hatred of Jews. Their leadership does not want a Palestinian state as much as they want the total destruction of Israel.

Recent events in Hebron, a historic town in the occupied territories, serve all too well as a microcosm of what's at stake, and what the future may hold in the Middle East.

More bloodshed.

The latest string of events began a week ago with an attack on Israeli settlers and troops by members of Islamic Jihad, a terrorist group. The attack killed 12 soldiers and guards, and in response local Israeli settlers demanded the further expansion of Israeli settlements in Hebron. Two days later, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon publicly endorsed that step.

Yep! Fuck with us and we'll put in more settlements. You don't like it? Tough shit!

And so it has gone, and so it will go.

Yep! Bloodshed begets bloodshed.

Palestinian leaders express great frustration that while Israeli leaders have talked publicly for more than a decade about swapping land for peace, they have meanwhile continued to expand Jewish settlements in occupied areas, implying that they have no intention of ever leaving.It's called negotiating from strength. Look. Back in 1948 the Arabs decided to wipe out Israel. Israel won that war. The Arabs, not satisfied, tried again in 1967. That's when the Israelis acquired the 'occupied territories'. Even then, they were ready to swap land for peace. What the Israelis are telling the Palestinians is that the longer they wait, the less land they're gonna get. Unfortunately, the Palestinians don't want the 'occupied territories'. They want Israel. They want it all. They don't even make a secret of it.

When Palestinians complain about that blatant hypocrisy, they are absolutely correct.

Oh Bullshit!

When they criticize the United States and American media for largely ignoring the underhanded Israeli settlement policy, they are right again.

Oh Bullshit! Jesus H. Christ! Don't you think the Israelis would dismantle the settlements for a real peace? You bet your ass they would. It wasn't the Israelis who walked away from the negotiating table after Clinton had forced incredible concessions from Barak. It was Arafat. OK Jay I'm gonna say this real slow. The.Palestinians.Do.Not.Want.Peace.They.Want.The.Total.Destruction.Of.Israel.

But in a broadcast media world, the suicide bombing of a bus will always get more coverage than the expansion of a settlement.

But Reuters doesn't classify this as terrorism. And to the liberal media these are 'acts of desperation'.

Terrorism against civilians will always be a bigger story than a new Israeli outpost in the West Bank.

Well ... Yeah. What's your point? Blowing up a busload of innocent civilians does pale in comparison to building a new settlement in lands that the Palestinians could have had back in 1948 if they didn't want the total destruction of Israel. What these dickheads are whining about they could have had 50 years ago fer crissakes.

It's a fact of modern life that no amount of complaining will change.

But accepting the fact of Israel's existence and deciding to live in peace might be a good first step.

With their violence, the Palestinians are providing cover for their own disinheritance.

Yep. They're showing that they're nothing more than rabid dogs.

The impact extends to Israeli politics. In a recent poll, 78 percent of Israelis said they would be willing to withdraw from most settlements as a condition of peace. But because of Palestinian terrorism, the Israeli government remains in the hands of the 20 percent who would not.

So is this Israel's fault? Like I said, it was Arafat who walked away from the negotiations. The Israelis are desperate for peace. The Palestinians, and the rest of the Arab world will not be satisfied with anything less than the total destruction of Israel. This is not a secret. Read the Arab press. Listen to Arab radio and TV.

The platform of the ruling Likud Party, headed by Ariel Sharon, states clearly that "the Jewish communities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza are the realization of Zionist values. (Judea and Samaria are the historic Hebrew names for the West Bank.) Settlement of the land is a clear expression of the unassailable right of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel."

So the Israelis elected Ehud Barak of the Labor Party and he made unprecedented concessions to Yasser Arafat and what did it get Israel? More violence. That seems to be all the Palestinians understand: violence, death, and bloodshed. And these people deserve their own state?

In a recent interview, Israeli Ambassador Daniel Ayalon referred directly to the occupied territories as "our land," meaning part of Israel. When I questioned the description, he seemed startled that such a thing could even be disputed. Of course it is Israeli land, he said. It has always been Israeli land.

But, for a real and lasting peace, Isreal would give it up. They were willing to do it two years ago. Who walked away from the negotiating table and started the current wave of suicide bombings? I'll give ya a hint. It wasn't Ehud Barak.

Which, of course, it has not, not since the times of the Old Testament.

Who gives a flying fuck? I repeat. The Palestinians could have had it back in 1948, but the destruction of Israel was more important. To the Palestinians, it still is.

Last month, Jewish settlers fired on Palestinians who were attempting to pick ripened olives from their own trees, in one case killing a harvester.

Oh cry me a fucking river! I'm surprised the settlers haven't started slaughtering Palestinians. Imagine what would happen in Texas or California if Mexicans from predominantely Mexican neighborhoods started entering houses and shooting women and children and this continued to happen no matter what local law enforcement did. How long do you think it would take before Americans retaliated? Can't happen here? Bullshit!.

Armed settlers in other areas began to pick olives themselves, robbing the Palestinians of their last real source of income. In response, a prominent Israeli rabbi, once the nation's chief rabbi, announced that the settlers had been within their rights, since the land and everything that grows on it belongs to the Jews.

I'm crying real tears here. Who walked away from the negotiations?

That is clearly still a minority viewpoint in Israel. But as Jewish settlements multiply and expand in occupied Palestine, hidden from world notice by Palestinian terror attacks, you have to wonder. If the chance for peace ever comes, will the majority of Israelis have the political will to force a withdrawal that a minority of Israelis passionately, fervently and religiously oppose?

The ball is in the Palestinians' court. But as Abba Eban said, "The Palestinians have never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity".

By then, will it even be a minority?

As long as the Palestinians keep exploding, they keep pushing the Israelis further to the right. The violence after Arafat turned down the best offer he'll ever get, got Sharon elected. The continuing violence is gonna get Netanyahu elected.

A while back, Stephen den Beste had a post about the Arab-Israeli conflict and he compared it to World War II. The way we defeated Japan and Germany was by showing them the total futility of continuing to fight. We had to effectively crush them. In Japan's case, this took the atom bomb. Unfortunately, this is what Israel has to do to the Palestinians. And this will only happen, if we do the same to the Arabs. This is why we need to go to war with Iraq. We need to effect a regime change in Iraq. We need to do the same in Syria and Saudi Arabia. It is Iraq, Syria, and Saudi Arabia who are supporting not only Palestinian terrorism, but also world wide terrorism. Only by shutting down Arab support for the Palestinians and convincing them of the utter futility of their dreams of destroying Israel will we be able to bring peace to the Middle East.

Until then, Palestinians will continue to blow up, and Israel will show less and less restraint. They've shown more restraint than we did after 9/11. As a percentage of their population, they've lost far more lives than we have. If we were in their shoes, Arafat would have been dead a long time ago.

I don't understand why he is still alive.

Gloom, Elation, and Stella

Just damn! I feel like getting rip roaring drunk! And I don't know if it's to celebrate or if it's because of sorrow for fellow workers. The Dreaded Dark Angel of Layoffs descended on TCIDNN (The Company I Dare Not Name) again today. Rumors had been circulating that today would be the day. So just in case, I applied lamb's blood to the lintel over my office door before I went home last night. It must of worked because my officemate and I were both spared. Unfortunately, it did hit three people in close proximity: one four doors down and two five doors down. Fortunately, two of them were eligible for retirement, so they'll get to retire and get severance pay on top of it. That's the way I want to go. The other person was within a year so he gets to keep his medical and get full retirement as soon as he hits his eligible date.

One of the hardware guys got visited by the Dreaded Dark Angel of Layoffs and I don't know what his situation is. It was a very gloomy day.

This shit seems to be happening every six months. And every time it happens, I have to walk around on eggshells and be very sensitive. I just can't come right out and ask, "Did you make the cut?" So, everyone makes small talk and waits for someone to volunteer the information, or say, "Did you hear that Bubba got laid off?" I had two co-workers come by my office and tell me they were leaving. It was a very depressing afternoon.

So, since I was thoroughly depressed, I left work early. It was raining. Atlanta traffic sucks when the weather is nice. When it rains, it gets even worse. Geez, all you have to do is spit on the pavement and there's a traffic jam.

I got home and noticed that there were two messages on my answering machine. The first one was from the vet, Dr. MacDonald. I love Dr. MacDonald. She's so sweet. She always gives my cats a big kiss when I take 'em in. Doofus' bloodwork was back. His fructose was normal! That means I can stop giving him insulin shots and we'll see if the diet will keep his diabetes under control. Hooray! After the depressing day at work I have some good news.

The second message was for D. D. Wilson about his Walmart account and 'please call us at this number...'' Listen bitch! I'm D. S. (Is that dumbshit or damn smart?) Wilson. I wonder if this is the same guy who has the high credit card balances. Some guy at a nonprofit debt counseling service keeps leaving me messages about how they can help out with my high credit card balances and "I don't understand why you won't call us back". Because, you booger eatin' moh-ron, I don't have high credit card balances. I live within my means and I pay them off every month. You're calling the wrong person. Cut it out!

Now the freakin' telemarketers are leaving messages or they're having computers call and leave messages. Dude! Why doesn't your machine call my machine and they can do lunch some day?

On the bright side again, I found out that Earthlink can support Moveable Type, so, now I just have to get some additional web space, and work out some other details and I can move off of Blogger.

So let's see. Layoffs. Gloom. Doofus. Elation. Messages on answering machine. Bad. Moving off Blogger. Good. I'm in in between land and can't work up a rant or do sumpin' funny, so I'll post the nominees for this year's Stella Awards sent to me by one of my old Navy buddies.

The Stella's are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who spilled coffee on herself and successfully sued McDonalds.
She put a hot cup of coffee between her legs and scalded herself when it spilled. Duh! Fortunately for her, the jury was just as dumb, which gives rise to the question, would you like to be tried by a bunch of people too dumb to get out of jury duty?
That case inspired the Stella awards for the most frivolous successful lawsuits in the United States. The following are this year's candidates:

1. Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded $780,000 by a jury of her peers after breaking her ankle tripping over a toddler who was running inside a furniture store. The owners of the store were understandably surprised at the verdict, considering the misbehaving little toddler was Ms. Robertson's son.
   
   Obviously a jury of her peers. They're just as freakin' stupid as she is.
   
   
2. A 19-year-old Carl Truman of Los Angeles won $74,000 and medical expenses when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Mr. Truman apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car when he was trying to steal his neighbor's hub caps.
   
   C'mon. This can't be for real. Someone's making this shit up.
   
   
3. Terrence Dickson of Bristol, Pennsylvania, was leaving a house he had just finished robbing by way of the garage. He was not able to get the garage door to go up since the automatic door opener was malfunctioning. He couldn't re-enter the house because the door connecting the house and garage locked when he pulled it shut. The family was on vacation, and Mr.Dickson found himself locked in the garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi he found, and a large bag of dry dog food. He sued the homeowner's insurance claiming the situation caused him undue mental anguish. The jury agreed to the tune of $500,000.
   
   Maybe he preferred Coke to Pepsi
   
   
4. Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas, was awarded $14,500 and medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his next door neighbor's beagle. The beagle was on a chain in its owner's fenced yard. The award was less than sought because the jury felt the dog might have been just a little provoked at the time by Mr. Williams who was shooting it repeatedly with a pellet gun.
   
   Now this I can understand since everyone in Arkansas is related to everyone else so all the people on the jury were his cousins (or aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters, etc.) This is the state that gave us Bill Clinton.
   
   
5. A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, $113,500 after she slipped on a soft drink and broke her coccyx (tailbone). The beverage was on the floor because Ms. Carson had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier during an argument.
   
   Dammit! Where's that busboy? He's been goofing off again.
   
   
6. Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware, successfully sued the owner of a night club in a neighboring city when she fell from the bathroom window to the floor and knocked out her two front teeth. This occurred while Ms. Walton was trying to sneak through the window in the ladies room to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses.
   
   That'll teach them to have a cover charge!
   
   
7. This year's favorite could easily be Mr. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Mr. Grazinski purchased a brand new 32-foot Winnebago motor home. On his first trip home, having driven onto the freeway, he set the cruise control at 70 mph and calmly left the drivers seat to go into the back and make himself a cup of coffee. Not surprisingly, the R.V. left the freeway, crashed and overturned. Mr. Grazinski sued Winnebago for not advising him in the owner's manual that he couldn't actually do this. The jury awarded him $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. The company actually changed their manuals on the basis of this suit, just in case there were any other complete morons buying their recreation vehicles.
   
   Like the complete morons on the jury.

Now, I don't know if these are for real or not, but I got 'em on the internet. And as we all know. If it's on the internet, it's gotta be true. That's where I learned about Lawn Chair Larry.

Up up and away in my beautiful balloon.

Cats, Dogs, Rats, and the Phantom Graveyard

I got an email from my friend Cindy. One of her daughter's cats got run over and broke its hip. He had to have surgery. He's gonna survive, but he'll be an indoor cat from now on. I can relate.

I got another email from a friend and evidentally there are some al Qaeda training sites down here in the South and there's been some foolin' around goin' on.

The governors of Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi announced today that they have made a disturbing discovery in their states. Apparently, a small number of al Qaeda terrorists have become romantically involved with local redneck girls. The result is not pretty; they now have the sad task of reporting the creation of a new sector of the human race: ISLAMABUBBAS.

So far, only a smattering of actual births have been reported, but Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition is hard at work trying to isolate and seal them off.

To date, the Coalition has identified the following children: Mohammed Billy Bob Abba Bubba Mohammed Jethro Bin Thinkin Bout It Mohammed Forrest Gumpa Bubba Mohammed Rubba Dub Dubba Bubba Bobbie Jean Hasbeena Badgurl Linda Sue Bin There Dunthat

Not surprisingly, the Coalition believes they all seem to have sprung from one couple: Mohammed Whoozyadaddy and Yomamma Bin Lovinit.

Those dogs!

A few blogs back, I asked for good names for Dimocrats. I've been meaning to share some of the names readers submitted, but they are in my October archives and alert readers may notice that I have no October archives. When trying to republish, I get a 503 error and am informed that Blogger phantom tech support is working on it. They've been working on it for over a week! But, I'm getting what I am paying for. Beggars can't be choosers.

Anyway, one of the better names was submitted by one of my sister's friends. She suggested Hypocrats, and by golly, the name sure fits. Ol' Patrick 'Leaky' Leahy has been badmouthin' Saxby Chambliss and callin' him a draft dodger. Now the height of hypocrisy is any Dimocrat callin' anybody a draft dodger after we just had a Dimocrat draft dodger spend eight years in the White House. Bubba had Senator Fullbright pull some strings to get him out of the draft and he promised to join ROTC. He reneged on that promise. Bill Clinton was a gen-you-wine draft dodger. Saxby Chambliss had a student deferment. There is a difference.

During the 2000 election, that fat asshole Michael Moore went off on how Bush was a draft dodger. But Bush was in the National Guard, right? Michael Moore, like most liberals, never seems to let facts get in the way. But, he said he went to high school with people who died in Viet Nam. Those guys went instead of Bush. That's funny. I never heard any of that shit when Clinton was president. As far as I'm concerned, after Clinton, there should be no mention of dodging the draft. If it was OK for Bubba, it should be OK for everyone. End of discussion.

But 'Leaky' Leahy said that Cleland was a war hero (Which he wasn't. He didn't lose his legs and an arm in combat. It was an accident. And it may have been carelessness on his part.) and Chambliss was a draft dodger so Cleland should be the senator. OK Dickhead. Bush the elder was a war hero and Bill Clinton was a draft dodger so Bubba should have never been president. Bob Dole was a war hero and Clinton was a draft dodger so Bubba should have never been president.

And what the Dimocrats in Georgia are whining about is that Chambliss implied that Cleland, the war hero (who wasn't) wasn't patriotic after giving his legs and an arm in a war for his country. Dammit! That argument doesn't have a leg to stand on! (sorry) All Chambliss did was point out Cleland's voting record. He voted against the Homeland Security Bill because he put unionized gummint employees before national security. He also had a very liberal voting record. Georgia, outside of Atlanta, is a conservative state and the people in rural Georgia have not left the Dimocratic Party. The Dimocratic Party has left them. And now the Dimocrats are moving even further to the left.

Another reader suggested DemoRats and that name fits. Those rats!

Last year around this time, actually it was late September, my sister had me drive her around southern Illinois and southern Missouri so she could do some genealogical research. Actually, it started out that I was gonna go up to St. Louis to see some family and friends and then down to Lebanon Missouri to see my friend Cliff. This was also gonna be an opportunity to get my BMW Z3 out on the open road. She asked if she could go along. We wound up going to many small towns in Illinois like Carbondale, Grand Tower, Chester, Murphysboro, Greenville, and Sorrento. In Missouri we hit Cape Girardeau, Pocohantas, Scott City, and Perryville. I called this the Roots 2001 Tour. I even had t-shirts made.

Our great-great grandparents, Charles and Mary Dreiling (I better have this right or I'll get blasted by my sister in the comments) lived in Sorrento, Illinois and were buried in Gum Cemetery. Now ya gotta understand, when going on a roots tour, you have to go through probate records, get birth and death certificates, find houses, and find gravestones. We found our great grandfather, Cyrus Freeman's grave real easy. His was the biggest marker in the grave yard. It shoulda been. That randy old goat had 19 children. He had 12 by his first wife and wore her out. He remarried and had 7 by that wife. Both of his wives were teenagers when he married 'em. An inspiration to us all.

So we were in Sorrento, well, actually, near Sorrento and we were trying to find the Gum Cemetery. My sister is real good with maps. When we were growing up, our parents took us around the country on camping trips. That's all we could afford. By the time I was 17, I had been in 47 states, Mexico, and three Canadian Provinces. My sister was always the navigator. She's good. We went up and down roads for over an hour looking for the bloody Gum Cemetery. Never found it. This was farm country and the roads were laid out straight and at right angles. I bet everyone knows one another. We passed a bunch of farms and a big bunch of pickup trucks. I could just hear them the next time they all got together.

"Hey Zeke! Did you see them damfools in that little blue sports car with the Georgia plates driving around all afternoon?"

"Yeah, Jake. Whaddya think they wuz doing?"

"Beats me."

Not to be deterred, we went back the next day and tried again with no luck and once again, I'm sure, providing more conversational fodder for Zeke and Jake. So, I now call the Gum Cemetery the Phantom Cemetery. It's on the t-shirt.

Well, no more. This year, the Roots 2002 Tour consists of my sister and her husband. It's going on now. They drove out from California and, by gum, they found the Gum Cemetery. My sister sent me an email to that effect and said it was on a road we did not go down. Bullshit! We went down every road there was. And we did it more than once. They hadda put in a new road since last year.

Speaking of my sister, she's pissed off at me. It seems she didn't like the way I ended yesterday's blog. First let me say that my sister is smarter than I am. She won a full four year scholarship to Washington University in St. Louis. I flunked out of a junior college before I went into the Navy, which is why I joined the Navy a few steps ahead of a draft notice from the Army. And I flunked out of Washington University, when I burned out in my Junior year. And I do make more money than she does now. She attributes that to male engineers making more than female engineers. What actually happened is after I returned to TCIDNN (The Company I Dare Not Name) after breaking my back, I worked my butt off because I didn't want anyone to say that the only reason I had my job was because of diversity. The manager I worked for at the time gave me some opportunities and I taught myself how to be a systems programmer since the people who were supposed to support us wouldn't. It was bureaucratic bullshit. He rewarded me for hard work and I worked hard. I got good raises. He retired. I no longer get rewarded for hard work and I no longer work hard. I don't expect any more raises. If my sister doesn't retire, she'll pass me.

But until then, I make more money than she does.

So there!

A Piece of Paper

So, I'm sitting in my office today doing my systems programming stuff and the phone rings.

• Me: This is Denny. (That's how I always answer)
• BFB: Hello, Mr. Wilson? This is Billie from Belkin. I'm calling about your cable. (What alliteration. Billie from Belkin. Has a ring to it. Kinda like Henry from Hoboken.)
• Me: The cable problem is fixed. Microcenter removed it and gave me my money back. And I will never buy another Belkin product.
• BFB: (silence ... then) Uh ... I'm sorry you feel that way.
• Me: No, if you were sorry you would have addressed the problem last Monday or the other days I called. Goodbye.

Back to work. And yes, I do do work. Not as much as I could, but some of that is due to lack of motivation. After all, my manager told the department that appraisal ratings will be skewed down this year. What that means is it doesn't matter if you performed at the same level as you did last year, you may get a lower rating this year because times are bad. Then he says that being rated as a 3 this year is actually the same as being rated a 2 in previous years. Well, no, it isn't. It means when they give us our bonus in March it will be less as a 3 than it would be as a 2 since it is based on our rating. Do they really think we believe this bullshit?

My problem is I work down to the level that I am rated. My rating was dropped this year, not because of performance, but because of the economy. And, I imagine I'll keep the same rating for the rest of my career. My manager knows I'm only planning on working two more years, so he's not going to invest any money in raises for me. So, I come in and am productive, but I no longer bust my butt because there's no reason to. And who knows? There are rumors of more skills rebalancings (layoffs) and I may be one of the folks skill rebalanced out the door. I wonder if that job at the other company I won't name is still open?

But enough about that. Let's talk about education. Rachel Lucas was griping (and with good cause) about how her college tuition was going up while the quality of her education was going down. I can relate. I ran into the same problem when I went to college.

I got out of the Navy in October of 1969 and started back to college in 1970. I went four semesters at a junior college at about $120 per semester (This was 1970) and was impressed with the teachers and the quality of education. I was going for a degree in electrical engineering and was able to get almost all my math, my basic science (physics and chemistry), and humanities out of the way before going to the big school. I enrolled at Washington University in St. Louis which had (and still has I imagine) a very reputable engineering school. The tuition was $1250 a semester. Remember this was 1971 and that was a lot of money back then. Was I shocked! I could not believe how incredibly bad the teachers were compared to the ones I had at the junior college. And to pay for this I had taken out a student loan and was working three jobs: I delivered flowers in the afternoons and on Saturday. I delivered Where Magazine to hotels over the weekend. And I went active in the Naval reserve and went to a meeting once a week. And I was getting ripped off by Wash U.

My big problem was I did not realize why you go to college. You do not go to learn. You go to get a piece of paper. Had I known that, I might have been able to stick it out. But, since I was pissed about the education I was getting for my money, and I was totally burned out, I dropped out of school and got a job with TCIDNN (The Company I Dare Not Name).

I was able to do well and am now a software engineer (self taught) and have succeeded with nothing more than an associate's degree from a junior college. Stephen Den Beste didn't finish college and he is a software engineer and one of the most prolific bloggers in the blogosphere. Kim du Toit weighed in on this topic also.

I have written many posts on poverty and how to avoid it and one of the ways is to get an education. But, that doesn't have to be college. I joined the Navy to avoid getting drafted by the Army and to learn electronics. It was my knowledge of electronics that enabled me to get a job with TCIDNN. Having three years of college didn't hurt, but it was my Navy background that was most important.

Andrea Harris (Lots of plugs tonight) commented on Kim's site and has commented on my site that her degree is not in a field that will get her a guaranteed job, but she will have that piece of paper and that piece of paper is what is important.

I'm a mainframe (ooops ... I mean high end server) programmer and the operating systems I work with are MVS (yeah ... it's now z/OS but the kernel which is OS 3.8 hasn't changed in 15 years) and VM. You can give me someone with a BS in Computer Science and he will be totally worthless for at least six months. I can take a sharp operator and train him just as fast. I've met many systems programmers that started as operators. The piece of paper can get the BSCS guy in the door, but if he doesn't have much of a brain he's gone.

So that brings us back to Rachel's rant. My friend Cindy couldn't believe I didn't know the scam about going to college was not about learning but getting a diploma. And, Rachel, in case you never knew this, I'm passing this knowledge on to you. So, don't sweat the shitty professors. Stick it out and get that piece of paper. Learning is secondary. The diploma is what counts.

And it looks good hanging on the wall. I know. My sister has one. I don't.

But I make more money than she does.

No Grouchy Today

Dammit! It's hard to be a grouch when things go well.

Regular readers (all 100 of you) may recall all the problems I have been having with a PC locking cord. This all started the week before last. I bought a cord from Microcenter and it didn't work. It wouldn't unlock. So, I returned it. No problem. They didn't even try it. They just gave me my money back. So, I bought another one. This time I messed up. To test the lock, I put it in the locking slot in my laptop and pushed the locking mechanism. So far, so good. Then, I tried to unlock it. The dadgummed key would not work. Like I said, this is just a review.

I took it back to Microcenter last Monday and they tried to get it off. They called the company that made it, Belkin, and we finally wound up with a secretary, who said her boss was not available and give her my name and number and he'd call me back. She also gave me her direct extension and her name. During the week, whenever I would call her, her boss was 'always in a meeting, but he would call me as soon as the meeting was over.' Yeah. Right. I never heard from him. As a result, I will never, ever buy another Belkin product.

I was off last Friday, so I took my laptop back to Microcenter. They got one of their tech guys to look at it and he said he could get it out. They gave me my money back for the cord.

On Saturday, I went back to Microcenter and got my PC. No charge. No problem. It's nice to deal with people who believe in customer service. Too bad Belkin doesn't. Did I say I'd never buy another product made by Belkin?

Saturday morning, Cindy came by and we took my 14 year old black cat Doofus to the vet. When I get my own site and move to Moveable Type, I should be able to post some pictures. Anyway, Doofus has type 2 diabetes and I'd been feeding him special cat food and giving him daily insulin shots. Docter GOC hard at work. I got good news at the vet. His glucose dropped from 386 to 190, whatever that means. Cindy is a nurse and knows what it means and she was ecstatic. So was the vet. He'd also lost 8 ounces. We're gonna wait until we get the fructose level and decide where to go from there. So that was good news.

Georgia beat Auburn on an incredible 4th and 15 touchdown pass with less than two minutes to go. That means they get to go to the SEC championship game.

I tried to make an apple pie Saturday. My sister makes the best apple pie in the world. I never can get the crust right. This time it rolled out nice, but when trying to get it to the pie plate, it came apart. Screw it! I got it into the pie plate. It wasn't pretty. Got the filling in OK. I did better on the top crust. Had it for dessert. Like I said, it wasn't pretty but it tasted just fine.

This morning, the guy who was working on my personal PC called and said he had it fixed and would bring it over in about an hour. He had to give me a new case to get the power supply in and the new case was too tall to fit in my desk. He had to move a shelf and now it fits. When we powered it on, the modem wouldn't work. He got that to work and then we were back to my network problems. I told him not to worry about that since I was gonna get an external hard drive and copy everything to it and then upgrade to XP. He said he hadn't had good luck with XP and suggested he put in an internal hard drive and copy everything there, format my hard drive and reload 98 or upgrade to 2000. He told me he could take my PC and go ahead and do that, but I'd been without my baby for a week and had to get all my financial stuff into Quicken. Maybe we'd do it over Thanksgiving.

The Falcons won!

The Dimocrats elected Nancy Pelosi to be their leader in the House. It just doesn't get any better. Dickhead Gephardt originally started out as a moderate Dimocrat until he got aspirations for a national office and moved left. When I lived in St. Louis, he was my Congressman so I know a little about him. Pelosi, on the other hand, makes Gephardt look like a Republican. I just love it! Go left Dimocrats, go left. Pelosi oughta be good for us bloggers. Talk about blogging fodder.

And howza 'bout Algore coming out in favor of single payer health insurance? The return of Hillary care. We oughtta be able to have some fun with that.

Does Michael Jackson have leprosy? It looks like his nose is fallin off.

So, I apologize for not ranting and raving today. I'm going back to work tomorrow after a three day weekend. I've got every Friday off for the rest of the year so every weekend is gonna be at least three days. Maybe when I go in to work tomorrow, someone will piss me off and I'll have sumpin' to grouch about. Or, I could go over to the Democratic Unerground or Democrats.com and fisk sumpin'.

I alos got a new locking cord. I'm gonna see if it will work. Fortunately, it's not made by Belkin.

Wish me luck.

Dead White Guys

One of the top items on the agenda of the multiculturists is to discredit Western Civilization as a bunch of oppressive colonialists. I mean, look what we have done in Africa. All the countries that Europeans ruled, with the exception of South Africa, are now basket cases. Of course, all this shit happened after the Europeans left and turned over the gummints to the aboriginal peoples. The Congo? Disaster. Zimbabwe? Once a net exporter of food. Now suffering from famine. As we all know, it is the fault of Europeans and Western Civilization.

Here in the United States, there are movements at our centers of higher learning (liberal colleges) to discredit Western Civilization. It used to be a requirement to take a History of Western Civilization class. No more.

The politically correct among us have taken to renaming schools that were named after people like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson because they (Shudder! Gasp!) owned slaves. And the contributions of these men are being glossed over in favor of more politically correct men and ideas.

Now the multiculturists among us will have us believe that all cultures are valuable and have something to offer. On the one hand they condemn men like Washington and Jefferson for owning slaves while on the other hand, they excuse Muslim culture for enslaving half their population. What else would you call a culture that gives a father total control over his daughter until he gives (sells) her into marriage with another man, who now has total control over her life?

I am getting sick of this cultural relativism! Slavery^TM, which the blacks think is their franchise, has been with us since the dawn of civilization. The Egyptians had slaves. The Babylonians had slaves. The Greeks had slaves. The Romans had slaves. And today, slavery^TM exists in Africa. Black Africans are enslaving other black Africans. And guess who sold the slaves to the slave traders during the slave trade with the New World? Why it was black Africans selling other black Africans. I'm sorry. Roots was wrong. Whites did not go into the interior of Africa to capture slaves. They didn't have to. The coastal tribes sold captives from the interior to the traders.

The idea that slavery^TM is wrong has only existed for the last 250 years. Guess where this idea originated? Would you believe western Europe and the United States. It was a bunch of dead white guys.

Another thing that pisses me off is when people judge what happened 200 years ago by the standards of today. By our standards, slavery^TM is wrong. But in the days of Jefferson and Washington it was acceptable, as it had been for the previous 5000 years.

Let's not forget, that it was Jefferson and Washington, along with a bunch of other dead white guys who created this country. And this country is the most free and tolerant country in the history of this planet. I defy anyone to name another country with our religious tolerance. I defy anyone to name another country where blacks, the descendants of slaves, have a higher standard of living. Yes, slavery^TM was wrong, but, descendants of slaves in the United States have a better life and a higher standard of living than their cousins in Africa. And it was a bunch of dead white guys who fought a war that resulted in the abolition of slavery in this country.

And now we have the politically correct among us who are looking to be offended. An example of this was the white gummint official in Washington DC who was carping about the niggardly budget. Outrage! He's a racist! Niggardly has absolutely nothing to do with the word nigger, but we have thin skinned people just wanting to be offended. What brought this up was a series of essays that I read over at Mrs. Dutoit's site called finding Mark Twain. Read Conclusion: The Epiphany. Go ahead. Read it now. I'll wait.

I consider Mark Twain to be the best American writer who ever lived. Yeah, we have Steinbeck, Faulkner, Hemingway, and others, but they don't hold a candle to Mark Twain. And, had I lived back then, I would have probably considered him to have been a flaming liberal, 'cause he was. This is where Mrs. Dutoit nailed it:

How Huckleberry Finn changed the entire country’s attitudes about slavery and how this man was more responsible for this consciousness raising than another other (sic) man alive or dead

How he’d revisited the issue again with Puddin’head Wilson and reshaped America’s views about race relations

How incredibly ironic it was that this change-agent, story teller, who’d done more for race relations than any other single person, was being banned from school libraries because the books contained the word nigger.

But, after all, Mark Twain is just another dead white guy.

Babies Having Babies

For those of you who have been following my computer episodes, my TCIDNN (The Company I Dare Not Name) laptop still has a tail and my personal PC has a blown power supply. The guy I work with who is fixing it is gonna get a power supply and I should have it back by the weekend. It's amazing how much that PC means to me. All my financial data is on it. Fortunately, I have a current backup and could reinstall Quicken, but in the meantime, I have to keep track of every financial transaction I do until I get my PC back. Normally, it's pay the bill and enter it in Quicken. Check register? Nope. It's in Quicken. I just got my credit union statement and it's begging to be reconciled. Arrrggghh!

I often find it strange that we have to get a license to get married, but not to have children. The libertarian in me says having children is none of the gummint's business, but, since one of the main causes of poverty is poor (or stupid) people having children they cannot afford (or care for) and the gummint winds up taking care of them with my money, it turns out to be the gummint's business.

We had another case of a baby dying here in Atlanta. The complete story is in Wednesday's Atlanta Urinal and Constipation.

The 11-month-old boy who died in state care last week wasn't in his approved foster home when he died strapped in a car seat while an adult in the house slept nearby.

What? This is already starting off strange.

The state is trying to determine whether the baby's foster mother was allowed to leave him with anyone else, said Renee Huie, spokeswoman for the state Division of Family and Children Services.

"It depends on the situation," she said.

It depends on the situation? The baby is dead! Someone fucked up big time here!

Five adults, ages 19 through 23, and three other children, ages 2, 4 and 10, were in the apartment when the baby choked to death on piece of hot dog Nov. 7, the report said.

This was the apartment of one of the foster mother's daughters.

None of the adults in the house could tell police how the baby got the hot dog, the report said.

He was strapped in a car seat next to a bed while one of the daughters was sleeping when he died, the report said.

So let me get this straight. We have an 11 month old baby strapped in a car seat and a hot dog just walks into the daughter's bedroom and jumps in his mouth?

This is getting ridiculous. I wrote a while back about a mother who had left her child strapped in a car seat, in a hot car, while she went to work and the child died from the heat. Here we have an example of another child dying, in a car seat, (Car seats are getting dangerous) in an apartment with five adults and three other children and no one knows what happened? And this is under the care of a foster mother? Who isn't even there. And two of the other three children were also foster children, although no one knows yet if they were under the care of the same foster mother. The state has taken them back into custody. Good move.

We've been having big problems with the foster care program here in Georgia. During the gubernatorial debates, Sonny Perdue (Man, I just love living in the South. Our governor is named Sonny and our two senators are Saxby and Zell), brought up the state's foster care program and Roy Barnes said sumpin' about how some children were bound to die. Bet he wishes he could take those words back.

Anyway, what's up with the dead child's real mother?

The baby's mother is 16 years old. His father, 18-year-old George McClain, was gunned down at a Jonesboro Road gas station on Thanksgiving 2001, a few weeks before the baby was born.

Let's see we have a 16 year old girl with an 11 month old baby. Let's do some math. 11+ 9 = 20. Subtract from sixteen. There's a good chance the mother got knocked up at 14. So, do you paragons of moral virtue think that condoms shouldn't be handed out in schools? This is ridiculous!

The gunned down father's family had been fighting to get custody of the baby. Let's check them out.

(The father's mother, Pamela) Surry, 41, her daughter Shawnya, 25, and her sister, Benita Stringfellow, 40, had been trying to get the child returned since then.

Let's do some more math. 41 - 25 = 16. So Pamela had Shawnya when she was 16, and we don't even know if that was her first child.

In separate visits to the child after his foster placement, both Surry and the child's teenage mother found him ill clad and ill, they said.

But, obviously nothing was done and we have yet another death in Georgia's foster care program. I would guess that these people were black, which people would say makes me a racist, but all of these senseless deaths seem to take place in the black community. And, I happen to be right. They have a picture of the granmother and great grandmother in the paper, along with the story.

My friend Cindy, used to be a social worker back in her youthful, liberal days. Remember, Winston Churchill said, "If you're not a liberal in your twenties, you have no heart. If you're not a conservative in your thirties, you have no brain." Anyway, she told me the average age for a grandmother in the projects was mid thirties. And this is what the Great Society has wrought. We have babies having babies. If that isn't a super highway to poverty I don't know what is.

The problem is not the foster care program in Georgia. The problem is we have children having children without the emotional or financial wherewithal to take care of them. And, the only male mentioned in this article is the gunned down father. What is wrong with this picture? And where is the call from the black community about this? Oh, right. The NAACP is worried about a flag. That's more important, than poverty, crime, drugs, education, and children having children.

This just drives me up the wall. I don't like to see children dying. I don't care if they're black, white, yellow, or red. And this is preventable. Where are the black leaders on this? They're out crying racism. They're out railing against the Confederate flag. They're screaming for reparations. Meanwhile we have fourteen year old girls getting pregnant. Racism has absolutely nothing to do with that. Yes I know, we have that happening to while girls and I actually know some of them, but it is much more prevalent in the black community and that along with education are the two main reasons that we have so much black poverty.

And here is what is really sad. There are actually some black people who say this. Who speak out on personal responsiblity. Who speak out on getting an education. Who speak out on overcoming racism by working hard. Ya know what those people are called?

Uncle Toms.

Toiling on The Plantation

Just damn! I should be grouchy, but for some reason the bile ain't there.

One of the guys I work with builds and fixes PC's in his spare time and he came by and picked up my personal PC that won't power up. Also, I haven't been able to get any networking stuff to work on it for over three weeks. I tried to do a favor for my friends Michael and Cindy and screwed up my networking capability. Every time I'd fire up Mindspring, I'd get the dreaded Blue Screen of Death. My PC guy said that was drivers and he'd fix that also. I used to fix multimillion dollar mainframes and I can't fix a simple little PC.

My laptop still has its tail. Faithful reader Carl, suggested a sledgehammer. He also told me comments were 404'ing. Just checked and they've disappeared again. Arggggghh! Plus, all my October archives are gone. I try to republish and get a 503 error and 'We're working on it'. Hey Blogger! Get some tech support. You've been working on it for the past three days. I'm moving to Moveable Type. I hope to be there before the end of the year.

All right. I'm getting grouchier. I hit the wrong key on my keyboard and Blogger just lost an hillarious account of my Waste Fifteen Minutes Every Other Tuesday Conference Call. It used to be the Waste Ten Minutes Every Tuesday Call. On this call the various teams of I/T Support of the organization of TCIDNN (The Company I Dare Not Name) updates all the other teams of projects that we're doing. Since the AIX folks do not have a clue as to what the MVS folks are talking about and the MVS folks don't have a clue as to what the AS/400 folks are talking about it's a total waste of time. But, it does give our manager an opportunity to rally the troops.

So, today, after we all finished boring everyone else, or said that there was nothing new going on, our manager did his thing. It was announced three weeks ago that we were gonna have another reorganization. That is our core business. When in doubt, reorganize. Also, usually when we reorganize, we also trim jobs. So, many of us are worried that we might lose our jobs. Our manager, in true form, made us all feel better by saying that there might be workforce reductions. Way to boost morale!

And then he said that appraisals would be skewed downward again this year. Now this is a sore spot with me. If you work at the same level and one year you get one rating and the next year you get a lower rating that's bullshit. That's what happened to me this year. My rating was dropped but he said that since the ratings were skewed down because we didn't do well it wasn't really a drop. Hello! Do I have a big ol' STUPID sign on my forehead? I did the same job and you dropped my rating? But that's not really a drop? How freaking dumb do you think I am? During the whole interview I just had a shit eating grin plastered on my face and said to myself, 'Self, you can just work at the level he rated you'. Which I do. He knows I can retire any time I like so I don't think I'm gonna get anymore raises. Of course, I don't knock myself out anymore. It's a shame really, 'cause I'm really good at what I do. I'm not bragging. That's a fact. Give me some incentive and I can be real productive. The manager I worked for two managers back understood that. He took care of me and I busted my butt. It's a shame that so many managers do not know how to manage.

But enough about work. Let's do some politics. Do you remember a few weeks back when Harry Belafonte called Colin Powell a house slave? Well, here's an op-ed by someone who gets it. As usual, excerpts and comments follow. Most of it is well reasoned, but occasionally he strays over to Wackoville.

When Maynard Jackson, Atlanta's first black mayor, sought the chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee two years ago, ''the Dems shoved him to the back of the bus so fast --- in favor of [Bill Clinton's top money-raiser, Terry] McAuliffe --- that the poor guy didn't even have a chance to put in a call to Johnnie Cochran. '' That dig came from an admittedly acerbic source. But it was close to the truth.

At least Colin Powell is a house slave. The blacks in the Dimocratic Party are still toiling in the fields.

Now look at DNC Chairman McAuliffe's record in his first midterm election: The Republicans recaptured the Senate, expanded their majority in the House, won more seats in state legislatures than Democrats did for the first time in a half-century and, in the final blow, elected the first Republican governor of Georgia since Reconstruction. Could Jackson have done any worse?

Aw ... C'mon. Can't ya give Terry one more chance?

Despite his sterling party credentials and record of political achievement, Jackson had one problem: the unmitigated gall to reach too high. Some things are just too precious to share, such as party leadership and control of the money that comes with the job. Running for president is another, but more about that later.

See Dimocrats with all their race baiting want to keep blacks on the plantation. Isn't it ironic that it was a Republican president who appointed a black Secretary of State and a black National Security Advisor? And a black useful idiot has the gall to call them house slaves.

So McAuliffe expects to stay right where he is.

Be still my beating heart!

And if Democratic politics run true to form, two years from now --- after the labor-dominated primaries winnow the current field of singularly unexceptional presidential candidates to a Democratic ticket bearing a vanilla message for independents and swing voters --- McAuliffe and top party leaders will turn their attention back to urban America. Its legions of preachers, pols and party loyalists will be exhorted to get out the African-American vote in time for November 2004.

Remember, you black folks are too stupid to make it on your own. The reason you're failing is due to white racism. Vote for us and we'll make sure your schools continue to suck. We'll reinforce the anti-achievement mentality that permeates the inner city culture. After all, Ebonics is a separate language and learning to read and write English and doing well in school is acting white.

If that happens and African-American Democrats, the party's most loyal constituency, are once again taken for granted, who really deserves the blame?

A question in search of an answer.

The days of settling for second string in the country's electoral process must end --- now. There are choices: African-Americans can join another party,

As blacks move into the middle class they have the same concerns as middle class whites: crime, education, and high taxes. Hmmmm. What party does that sound like?

form another party, become independents or stay Democrats. But if switching's not in the cards, then at least leave the fields and fight for something.

Al Sharpton for president!

The first target should be McAuliffe, who blew money that Carl McCall could have used in his historic bid to become New York's first black governor. But McAuliffe said that he didn't think McCall could win and that he would spend the money elsewhere --- like in Florida.

Trying to avenge the 'stolen election'. Thanks Terry.

Get this: The outpoliticked and underfunded McCall lost his bid by 16 points. But Jeb Bush also buried McAuliffe's guy in a 13-point landslide.

BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

So on to step two. African-American Democrats should assume a larger role in the selection of the party's presidential nominees.

Al Sharpton for President! Oh, I already said that. This guy's been making a lot of sense so far, and the Dimocrats would be wise to listen to him, but now he's headin' off to Wackoville.

No more days of white Democratic presidential candidates breezing into the African-American community toward election time --- or worse still, sending in black surrogates or a Bill Clinton

Our first black president

--- to make all sorts of promises that won't be kept.

But that's what Dimocrats do to black people. But, in all fairness, they also do it to white people.

When candidates come calling in the 2004 presidential primaries, they should be greeted by a local African-American favorite son or daughter who has also declared for the presidency.

Al Sharpton for president! Any other people you got in mind?

For example, a popular Democrat such as District of Columbia Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton should declare in 2004, field a delegate slate and prepare to do battle with any outside candidate who comes to the city hunting supporters for the next convention. If the candidates aren't prepared to compete with Norton on issues of importance to district voters, then Norton wins the primary and goes to the convention with delegates committed to her values and causes.

How many delegates does Washington DC have? As the TV ads say, but wait, it gets better!

Why shouldn't Rep. James Clyburn adopt a similar strategy in the South Carolina primary?

Never heard of him.

Or Rep. Charlie Rangel in New York?

Seen him on TV a lot. He's a RWPP (Race Warlord Poverty Pimp)

Rep. John Conyers in Michigan?

Another RWPP. Also for reparations.

Rep. Maxine Waters in California?

A dream candidate. She thinks crack cocaine in the inner city is a CIA plot.

Rep. John Lewis in Georgia?

The spitting candidate. A genuinely nice man, but a useful idiot for the Dimocrats. He thinks the way you eliminate poverty is by throwing money at it.

Rep. Bobby Scott in Virginia?

Never heard of him.

And please don't hand me that stuff about African-Americans not being qualified to run for the big one. For goodness' sake, look at who's running now: John Edwards, a North Carolina newcomer to the Senate whose claim to fame is that he made loads of money as a trial lawyer. John Kerry, a Massachusetts senator and decorated veteran with a Dudley Do-Right persona. Joe Lieberman, a Connecticut senator and nice guy who doesn't have half the legislative and public policy experience or war record of Rangel,

What can I say? He's got a point.

or history of advocacy for women, children, the poor and people of color of Waters,

She is a first rate wacko. But ya gotta admit it would add some comic relief to the primaries.

or grounding in the Constitution, the law and social policy of Norton.

But the Dimocrats don't give a shit about the Constitution.

The days of playing supplicant are over. It's time for self-respecting black Democrats to get it on with their party --- or look for another home.

But sadly, they will stay on the plantation and continue giving votes to the Dimocrats who take them for granted and leave them in poverty.

And somebody please alert Johnnie Cochran.

If you don't pay, we ain't gonna stay.