Monday, February 27, 2006

Monday musings and ramblings

Yet another pedophile teacher let go without punishment. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t exactly see how setting them free with little or no jail time helps to deter other drooling predators from getting jobs in the school systems in order to prey on young children. Meanwhile, another teacher is held without bond for admitting to having sex with an 11 year old student. Are they going to let her go as well? Maybe she can marry the student and have his child, and they can live happy ever after, just like Mary Kay Latourneau. Here is another story and another one. When do we as parents put an end to these degenerates abusing our children? To hell with tenure, damn second chances, don’t give me that junk about “you can’t rape a boy”. We as a country are condoning rape and abuse.

If you're too open minded, your brains will fall out.

Oh boy, look out for the fallout on this one. There is a report that has come out detailing how the White House has obstructed justice during a probe of wrongdoing by the administration. The headlines should be screaming any time now. Ummm, strange, the silence that permeates the air. Oh, wait, here’s why. The report says it was the Clinton administration doing the obstructing. Never mind, return your attention to American Idol.

Going to church doesn't make you a Christian any more than going to a garage makes you a mechanic.

He’s 16 years old. His mother is in prison for cocaine. His father is in prison for manslaughter. He beats his grandmother (his legal guardian) with a 2x4 because she won’t give him beer money.

Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.

You won’t hear about it from any of the leftie media outlets, but one of Saddam’s top generals has written a new book in which he claims to have seen bin Laden in Baghdad meeting with Saddam and also says that chemical weapons were shipped to Syria just before the Americans arrived to kick terrorist booty.

My idea of housework is to sweep the room with a glance.

A prominent leftie from the media has finally admitted what millions of us could see all along – he does not support American troops. I wonder how many others of his ilk will come out of the US-hating closet.

Monday Funny

A man living in Newton, Massachusetts received a bill on his as yet unused credit card stating that he owed $0.00. He threw it away. In April he received another and tossed that one, too. The following month the credit card company sent him a nasty note stating they were going to cancel his card if he didn't send them $0.00.

In retrospect, he probably should have let them do that. Instead he called the company and was informed that the problem was the result of a computer error. They told him they'd take care of it.

The following month he reasoned that, if other charges appeared on the card, then it would put an end to his ridiculous predicament Besides, they assured him the problem would be resolved. So he presented his card for a purchase. It was declined.

Once again he called. He learned that the credit card had been canceled for lack of payment. They apologized for another computer error and promised they would rectify the situation.

The next day he got a bill for $0.00 stating that payment was now overdue. Assuming that this bill was yet another mistake, he ignored it. But the following month he received yet another bill for $0.00 stating that he had ten days to pay his account in full or the company would take necessary steps to recover the debt.

He gave in. He mailed in a check for $0.00. The computer duly processed it and returned a statement to the effect that his account was paid in full.

A week later, the man's bank called him asking him why he wrote a check for $0.00. He explained the problem at length. The bank replied that the $0.00 check had caused their check processing software to fail. The bank could not now process ANY checks from ANY of their customers that day because the check for $0.00 caused a computer crash.

The following month the man received a letter from the credit card company claiming that his check had bounced, that he still owed $0.00, and unless payment was sent immediately, they would institute procedures to collect his debt.

This man, who had been considering buying his wife a computer for her birthday, bought her a typewriter instead.

Sunday, February 26, 2006

It's not my fault

Wouldn’t it be nice if you had a ready made excuse that you could whip out anytime something annoyed you? Something that would absolve you of all responsibility in any situation, your own personal “get out of jail free” card for life and its little hardships?

We have all known for years about the policy of most airlines to require that a person who is too large to occupy one seat to purchase a second seat.

Now along comes a lawsuit where the alleged victim claims she was informed she would need to purchase another seat not because she was over 300 pounds, but because she was…(drumroll please)…black, or maybe because she was a woman. I suppose whether it was because she was black or a woman depends on which will get her more money.

According to court records, she asked them, ““Did you ask me to purchase another ticket because I’m too fat to sit in the seat? Did you ask me to purchase another ticket because I’m a black woman?”

Ooh, ooh, I want to take a stab at answering that one.

Returning to my original point, this woman does not want to discuss the fact that she is seriously obese. She ignores the health warnings that are everywhere. She may be the size of two healthy people, but when the airline requests she pay extra money, she dips into the ready-made handbag of responsibility avoidance and whips out the old racist card. Just to make sure she has a better chance at hitting the lawsuit lottery (the goal of so many people in this society), she grabs the gender card while her chubby hand is in the bag as well. If only she had been left-handed and gay as well…

A similar case results in no lawsuit, just a wordy treatise on exactly why it’s not her fault. It’s everyone else’s fault if they don’t want to be intruded on by her size (and yet she spends part of the time complaining about others intruding on her space). It’s the airline’s fault for making planes so gosh darned small. It’s the fault of reproductive humans everywhere when babies cry, which again intrudes on her aural space. It’s the fault again of the airlines that she is singled out for such harassment, even though she mentions in passing that she has to obtain a seat-belt extender. It’s the fault of the seat for being too small that she can’t recline and get comfortable (“the seat back doesn’t support my back properly; the rounded edges dig in uncomfortably”). It’s the fault of the tray table that she can’t use it, and it’s also the fault of the bag of peanuts being tough to open and the cup of soda for being flimsy when she has trouble juggling them both because of having no tray.

She continues. It’s the fault of space, not her body, that there is not enough of it (the space that is). People who dare complain or feel put out by someone intruding into their space are fatophobic, or egotistical, or something like that. She actually enjoys the fact that her size will usually make people in a public setting, like a bus or movie theater, leave seats next to her empty.

The self admitted “fat lesbian separatist feminist” brings up the case of a pregnant woman who tried to use the HOV lane to support her case (again, I really don’t see the connection, but she tries anyway). She fails to mention that the attempt failed and the woman received a ticket for $367.

She then tries to sum up her experience, saying this could lead to a world where everyone is only concerned with themselves and not with others. She compares this policy with people who drive to the very end of the merge lane and then force people to let them in, and with people who won’t help you when your car breaks down, or with women who are “forced to put their kids in daycare and work at boring jobs for pathetic wages.”

Frankly, I see no correlation. Those people sound like they have more in common with her (I don’t care about others, only about my own self) than with the airlines.

She ends her lament with “This sounds okay to conservatives, libertarians and even some liberals--until they’re the ones in need.”

Amazing that she knows that all conservatives, all libertarians, and even some liberals are out to get her, and everyone else. I had no idea that my libertarian views that a smaller government is better, and personal responsibility is a good thing, would allow me to blow past all the cars in traffic. All these years I’ve been doing it backwards from my beliefs! I have got to read the manuals more closely.

The fat lesbian (her words) goes on, but I had lost interest and the words began swimming on the page. Was there no end to her blaming everyone else in the world for her problems?

Bad things happen to all of us. Just because you are a minority does not exclude you from having fate squash your day now and then.

Sometimes things do not happen to you because you are black, or gay, or a woman, or because everyone else is phobic and out to get you. Sometimes they happen because you are fat, and sometimes they happen because it was your turn to get rained on.

Thursday, February 23, 2006

Want to pet my peeve?

I have a few pet peeves and thought it might make a column to list a few. So here we go.

I do not like singers who butcher a melody by trying to showing off their vocal range. I can understand making a song yours, but in order for you to be credited with singing a song, don’t you at least have to hit some of the right notes? If they change the words, it gets noticed. The melody is just as important as the words of a song. The absolute worst example of this is when someone sings the National Anthem and turns an extended single note into their version of a cat running across a keyboard. Advice to those people who think this is “musical” – if you want to show off your vocal range that badly, just sing scales. Stop murdering the melodies.

I do not like the phrase “giving 110%”. It’s obvious why this is a goofy phrase, even to the most unenlightened. By using this, now people have gotten used to 110% equaling your best effort, so now some among us feel compelled to go to further lengths, such as 150% and 200%. If you want to see the progression, watch American Idol. If they keep up their pace, they’ll eventually be giving someone a “12,495% yes.”

One of my biggest pet peeves involves incorrect usage of language. In a completely unscientific sampling, I had the opportunity to watch some TV recently while laid up recovering from walking pneumonia and a sinus infection. Listed below are some of the more egregious examples of language abuse.

“Me and my friend went to the store” – This phrase is commonplace now. For those of you who can’t remember the usage of me and I, here is a great device. Remove the “and my friend” part and see how it sounds – “me went to the store.” Doesn’t work, never will. Some will even make a double mistake and say, “me and him went shopping.”

“I seen her do it” – arggh. Incorrect usage of tense just makes me, well, tense. I saw, you saw, we saw, I have seen, etc.

“I had real good intentions of her.” It doesn’t work to just take big words that you hear others use and simply insert them in a sentence of your own to impress people. You have to know the usage of the word.

“Me and my father had a sentimental value towards this vehicle, that he had one duplicate just like the one my father had.” Whaaa? Can you find a single thing that is correct with this statement? How do you have sentimental value towards something?

I don’t want to go on for too long on this topic, so I’ll save some for a later time. In other words, me no want to not speak ad insanitarium, so my close will now mouth.

Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Monday musings and ramblings

(The regular Monday edition is a couple of days late this week)

It would be hilarious were it not so tragic watching the White House press corps parade their feeling of self-importance for the world to see. They are upset that the administration does not act like they are best friends? Perhaps that is the fruit you sow after five years of adversarial conduct. Maybe the White House is not going to bend over backwards to do favors after years of Inquisition-style press conferences. After all, no one ever accused Ivy League graduates of being idiots. Oh, wait…

Another case of rapists being treated kindly in Vermont – why don’t they go ahead and make the state slogan “Live Free and Rape” (apologies to those in New Hampshire)

Shouting to make your children obey is like using the horn to steer your car, and you get about the same results.

I understand we are going to hand Italy and France back over to Germany, because someone has unearthed the shocking news that we intercepted communications from the Germans during World War II…and we never went to court to ask permission.

If white wine goes with fish, do white grapes go with sushi?

A leading Republican Senator called the House of Representatives a “plantation”. Leading Civil Rights experts such as Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have quickly condemned what they termed “hate speech”, calling for the immediate censure and resignation of the offending Senator. Oh, wait, my bad. It was actually Hillary who said it, and no one even raised an eyebrow in reaction. In fact, Sharpton, who was present, praised the soon-to-be ex-senator from leftieland.

If you can't drink and drive, why do bars have parking lots?

If you do not laugh at the irony of Ted “Chappaquiddick” Kennedy having to quit his membership in a males only club after trying to burn Justice Alito about his, you are a somber leftie.

If you jog backwards, will you gain weight?

You can actually see the picture the NY Times ran, claiming it to be of a ‘missile’ fired by the US. Turns out it was just another anti-Bush lie by the supposedly unbiased newspaper, now known for lying to promote their cause.

Monday Funny

Great Truths about life that little children have learned:

1) No matter how hard you try, you can't baptize cats.
2) When your Mom is mad at your Dad, don't let her brush your hair.
3) If your sister hits you, don't hit her back. They always catch the second person.
4) Never ask your 3-year old brother to hold a tomato.
5) You can't trust dogs to watch your food.
6) Don't sneeze when someone is cutting your hair.
7) Never hold a Dust-Buster and a cat at the same time.
8) You can't hide a piece of broccoli in a glass of milk.
9) Don't wear polka-dot underwear under white shorts.
10) The best place to be when you're sad is Grandpa's lap.

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

It began so long ago

I would be completely remiss if I did not take this opportunity to tell my wife that I love her on the day 19 years after she took that incredible step of marrying me.

You have brought me joy and happiness.
You have blessed me with wonderful children.
You have put up with everything I have done.

For that, and for so much more, I am eternally grateful.

Happy Anniversary.

Monday, February 13, 2006

Monday Musings and Ramblings

Why doesn't Tarzan have a beard?

According to NBC, a man from Long Island took a note last August, stuck it in a plastic bottle, and flung it into the Atlantic. Recently, he received a letter from Mr. Henry Bigglesworth from England. The letter basically said, you may think you were doing a scientific experiment, but all you did was litter. Sheesh.

Why is lemonade made with artificial flavor, and dishwashing liquid made with real lemons?

Please, please, please…if you are considering joining AARP, look over this group before you take action. If you don’t agree with the extreme liberal views of the AARP leadership, this may be a better way to get senior discounts.

Junk is something you've kept for years and throw away three weeks before you need it.

Even the lefties don’t want Cindy Sheehan running for the Senate. In the immortal words of Bugs Bunny, “What a maroon.”

How do you get off a non-stop flight?

Oprah did not get what she deserved when she was hoodwinked by a liar, only to foist the liar on those who worship her and her ‘book club’. Still, in an age where network news anchors and byline reporters for major newspapers can admittedly throw truth out the window in order to spruce up their sad pathetic lives, why should we expect a non-fiction book to be actually true?

Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.

LA Governor Blanco blasted the President’s State of the Union speech because he did not dedicate more time to Katrina. Has anyone informed this person that Katrina was NOT the first hurricane in history to hit America?

If a jogger runs at the speed of sound, can he still hear his MP3 player?

Jimmy Carter used to be President. These days, he keeps occupied by attacking America and defending her enemies. First, he comes out at a funeral of all places and makes a lot of noise accusing President Bush of illegal wiretapping. The press had a field day. Now, it comes out that Carter authorized the exact same type of warrantless eavesdropping. Hello, press? Where are you?

Monday Funny

A young teenage girl was about to finish her first year of college. She considered herself to be a very liberal Democrat but her father to be a rather staunch Republican.

One day she was challenging her father on his beliefs and his opposition to taxes and welfare programs. He stopped her and asked her how she was doing in school.

She answered that she had a 4.0 GPA but it was really tough. She had to study all the time, never had time to go out and party. She didn't have time for a boyfriend and didn't really have many college friends because of spending all her time studying.

He asked, "How is your friend Mary." She replied that Mary was barely getting by. She had a 2.0 GPA, never studied, but was very popular on campus, went to all the parties all the time. Why, she often didn't show up for classes, because she was hung over.

Dad then asked his daughter why she didn't go to the Dean's office and ask why she couldn't take 1.0 off her 4.0 and give it to her friend who only had a 2.0. That way they would both have a 3.0 GPA.

The daughter angrily fired back, "That wouldn't be fair, I worked really hard for mine and Mary has done nothing at all".

The father slowly smiled and said, "Welcome to the Republican Party".

Friday, February 10, 2006

It's All In The Name


It’s time to do a topic on something near and dear to my heart. I have been putting this off for some time. Why, you ask? I think I wanted to make sure I had proper time to write the best article I could about the subject. After awhile, I realized it has been on the back burner way too long. So here we go.

The subject today is the tax code. It’s broken. It does not work very well. Find someone to disagree.

If you do want disagreement, ask ten people for the answer to the problem. I have researched many proposed solutions, and there is only one truly sufficient answer. That is the Fair Tax.

Don’t take my word for it. Read about it yourself. If you want to know even more, get the book and read it. Or visit Neal Boortz’s website (he co-authored the book).

You will hear, or you have already heard, all sorts of lies concerning the Fair Tax. I don’t know why, other than to think that the Fair Tax will remove power from a lot of people, and there are lots of people who enjoy being in power and don’t relish the thought of relinquishing the power they hold, even if it means harming countless others.

Basically, under the Fair Tax, all current federal income taxes are abolished. No withholding from your paycheck, no social security taxes, no medicare taxes, no capital gains, no estate taxes, etc. By eliminating all of these taxes, all the loopholes that go along with the taxes are eliminated. Gone are all of the headaches associated with filing taxes. Goodbye to almost all, if not all, of the IRS. Creative tax cheating would become nearly extinct.

Replacing all of this would be one single rate federal sales tax, collected one time. You don’t get taxed on money you’ve already paid taxes on. You don’t pay more for items because the payroll taxes, self-employment taxes, social security taxes and others are tacked onto the price of goods.

This already sounds like a great idea, but they went out and improved it even more.

This is when you’ll hear someone (who does not want to lose that power we were discussing) warn that the poor will be unfairly taxed on goods they have to have. Lo and behold, there is a rebate for each family to cover necessities. On the fairtax.org website, there are charts to show how much, but know that a family of 4 would receive a monthly rebate of just under $500.

Okay, following this? First, you take home 100% of your pay, no taxes. Your paycheck jumps, giving you more money to spend. Then, on top of this, the government sends you a check each month to refund your family for spending for essential items such as food. More money for you to spend.

Here those power grabbers will get hysterical and begin to shout about prices going through the roof for all items, proclaiming that tacking on a 23% sales tax will drive the cost of everything beyond the ability of poor people to purchase.

Wrong. Anyone who says this is guilty of either a) not reading about the Fair Tax and trying to rely on others or just make it up as they go, or b) deliberately lying to mislead people into not supporting the Fair Tax. Why? See power hungry, above.

Quick and oversimplified lesson time. The price you pay for an item has all sorts of taxes built into it right now. It’s not just the cost of production and labor built in, it’s all built in. When you eat a steak, you are paying for the lease on the restaurant, the cost of the furnishings, the salaries of the cook, waitress and manager, the health tax the owner pays for the staff, the insurance the owner pays for, the utilities for running the restaurant, etc. When you remove a good portion of this, the price will drop accordingly. Most of the research shows that after the dust has settled, prices overall will actually be lower than what they are today for most items.

Think of this – you get 100% of your paycheck (more money to spend), you get rebated for essential items, basically removing a lot of burden on those at or near the poverty level (more money to spend), and you pay less for items (money goes further). Yep, now I see why liberals are so against this idea. People would be empowered by this Fair Tax, which would remove the economic shackles the liberals use to enslave the poor and keep them under their collective thumbs.

There are other benefits to the Fair Tax, such as interest rates coming down. There are too many advantages for me to go over here.

Tell you what. Don’t take my word for any of this, and don’t take the word of your power hungry politician who will send you a letter (at your expense) spreading lies about the Fair Tax.

Simply do this. Go to the website. Read the book Make up your own mind. That is not too much to ask for a topic that could redefine our entire economic structure.

I had the great fortune to attend a lecture by the co-author of the book, Neal Boortz, in Fairhope AL on 12 August 2005. For those of you unfamiliar with Mr. Boortz, he has a nationally syndicated radio talk show that began in the Atlanta market in the late 1960’s. I listened to him when I went to high school in the area in the mid 1970’s. He is a great American with some wonderful ideas on any topic available.

It was my distinct pleasure to listen to Mr. Boortz live. My children and my wife were as excited as I was about meeting him. I was so excited I forgot my camera at home and was forced to use my wife’s camera. We only got three pictures before the battery died on us. Oh, well. I missed the chance to take a picture of my daughter showing her T Shirt to Mr. Boortz. It was a list of things you learn by playing video games (No matter how long you fight, you can always fight again; Shoot everything, if it blows up or dies, it was bad; You can overcome most adversaries simply by having enough quarters; etc) He enjoyed the shirt and my daughter enjoyed meeting the Talkmaster.

Here are the pictures I was able to take before the battery death


Wednesday, February 08, 2006

What goes around...

A 10 year old boy goes into cardiac arrest at a little league baseball game and is saved when a nurse comes down from the stands and administers CPR. Seven years later, the boy is working as a dishwasher in a diner when a patron begins to choke. He rushes over and performs the Heimlich maneuver and saves the patron’s life. After everything calms down, the boy’s mother recognizes the patron as the life-saving nurse. Call it what you will – Divine Intervention, Kismet, Fate…but that is a serious case of “what goes around comes around”.

I have my own similar stories of karma, and I suppose most other people do as well. Here is one of my favorites.

It was pre-dawn on a Christmas morning. My plans called for me to make the drive from Tampa to my Grandmother’s house in south Georgia for the family gathering. As I drove onto the interstate, my groggy mind screamed at the prospect of driving for several hours on Christmas morning. At least I should have smooth sailing and very little traffic on I-75.

I had driven less than two miles on I-4 (I was not even at the I-75 interchange yet) when the car in the emergency lane caught my eye. The blinking lights illuminated the young man standing beside the car. The debate in my mind was fast and furious.

“Don’t stop.”

“They need help.”

“You have a long ways to go.”

“It’s the Christian thing to do.”

“This will only delay you more.”

“What if you were stranded?”

In truth, it took about three seconds for me to slow down and pull over, coming to a stop behind the car. A young girl got out of the passenger side of the car. The teenagers began babbling quickly. They were high school sweethearts. Her family had moved over the summer to Daytona. He had borrowed his mother’s car to drive all night and pick her up to spend Christmas with his family. They were only a few miles from making it when they had run out of gas. He had no cash but did have his mom’s ATM card for emergencies.

I told him to hop in and we would go get some gas. He told the girl to remain in the car and bundle up (yes it even gets a bit chilly in Tampa at times). We drove to the first exit – no gas. We continued to the second exit where there was a gas station but no ATM to be found. Back then, there were no pumps where you could pay with a card. We drove on for a couple of exits and finally found a bank with an ATM machine.

The boy pulled out some money, we bought a gas can and some gas at the open station we had found, and we soon arrived back at the stranded car. I cautioned the boy to save a few drops of gas to prime the carburetor. As the engine roared to life finally, the couple’s faces lit up. The boy tried to give me money for my time. I politely refused every offer, saying that what goes around comes around, and that one day I would be repaid in kind.

The sun had risen as I resumed my journey. I had lost almost an hour and might not make it in time for lunch but I was going to try. I guided the Chrysler north and settled in for a long trip.

Somewhere along the way, in that stretch of north Florida where you can drive for a couple of miles between exits, I suffered a blowout on one of my tires. I pulled over and found that I had forgotten to replace the spare tire I had removed the week before when I was making room for my bicycle in the trunk.

Great.

Now here I was, stuck in the middle of pretty much nowhere and it was nearing dinnertime on Christmas day. I hiked to the next exit, looking for an open service station. The only thing at the exit was a house with a fruit stand out front. Of course they were not open, but I knocked on the front door of the house, asking to use the phone. They knew of an open station about 3 miles up the interstate.

When the man answered the phone, he was just about to sit down to Christmas dinner with his family. He said he would come get me with his tow truck and could eat later. Sure enough, he showed up less than ten minutes later.

After towing me to his station, we looked around for a tire. Of course the only one in stock that would fit on my large Chrysler was very expensive. I explained I did not have that kind of money. The man took one look at me, and sold me the spare from his personal vehicle for ten dollars. He would not even charge me for the towing. In half an hour, I was back on the road. I did make it to my Grandmother’s and we all enjoyed a great day together as a family.

So, if anyone ever asks me about karma, or if they ever start talking about serendipity, I smile and remember the joy in the face of those two teenagers that early Christmas morning, and then I think of the gratitude I felt when a complete stranger left his Christmas dinner table to give me a free tow and sell me his own tire.

Monday, February 06, 2006

Monday musings and ramblings

It’s been said that the worst thing a woman can get on her 20th wedding anniversary is morning sickness.

An 18 year old former cheerleader at East Tennessee State University claims she was kicked off the squad because she worked at Hooters. Now I think the cheerleading squad can make their own decisions on who they want and don’t want, just as I think it’s quite fair for any club or organization to have standards. But I must put this in the file marked Hypocrisy, since the cheerleading outfits are at least as skimpy as those of a Hooters girl (thank goodness the guy who filed a lawsuit for not being hired by Hooters years ago fell through). In fact, the freshman points out that at least with her Hooters uniform, they wear pantyhose.

Why are wrong numbers never busy?

Wait for it…wait…here it comes….there. Did you hear that? The deafening roar of silence you just heard was the upswell of indignation and anger over the burning of several churches in one night last week in Alabama. Oh wait, never mind, there was no uproar. Why was that? Is it no longer hip to be angry over churches being attacked? Or could it be that these were Southern Baptist churches? Either way, I sure did not see the former president getting all bent out of shape about what he once called a “national crisis”. And media coverage? Forget it.

Do people in Australia call the rest of the world up over?

Speaking of media coverage, isn’t it nice that the loon known as Cindy Sheehan has used up her fifteen minutes? Even though she got a lot more coverage than the burning churches, it only amounted to a blip on the screen. Of course that was about two and one half blips more than she deserves.

Does that screwdriver belong to Phillip?

Thursday, February 02, 2006

Maybe with sprinkles?

If a white mayor of a major city stood in front of cameras and pronounced that God wanted that city to be a “Vanilla City”, the lefties would be howling for days. Angry demands for congressional committees would be followed by rants from the Jesse Jackson/Al Sharpton crowd demanding the mayor’s resignation.

Speaking of Al Sharpton, he recently made an appearance in a southern town for a speaking engagement at a predominately black college. He was presented the key to the city by the new mayor, the first black mayor in the city’s history.

The fact that tacit approval was given to a known liar -- whose words had helped incite violence against innocent people and anger towards many other innocent people, a liar who has yet to apologize for slandering and besmirching the good names of many people in the attempt to inflame racial tensions (which served to increase his own worth and power), was met with more than a bit of opposition.

Predictably, those who would rather not honor a race pimp were called racist. The mayor, when questioned about the fiasco, responded with quite the dodge. He swears he doesn’t know that much about Sharpton so he felt unqualified to “judge” him, but if he ran for President, he obviously was a great man.

Two questions arise from this response.

One – would Pat Paulsen (assuming he were still alive) get a key to the city if he were to visit?

Two – what does it say about a politician who admits to being ignorant of one of the most well-known people in race relations and politics in the last twenty years?