GUI Life

JustUsLeeg

2009-06-01T20:14:00.002-04:00

A couple of friends and I have thrown together a new site. We are really proud of it. It is an IT based site. We do tutorials, freeware, geek humor etc... Given the chance, check it out at the JustUsLeeg.

Bus ban is the answer to atheists’ prayers

2009-04-05T10:57:00.000-04:00

On behalf of atheists everywhere, I would like to extend congratulations and warmest regards to Ottawa city councillors Marianne Wilkinson, Rainer Bloess, and Doug Thompson.

On Thursday, the city’s transit committee deadlocked on a motion to overturn OC Transpo’s bizarre refusal to run bus ads bearing the bland statement: “There’s probably no god. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” Only the steadfast opposition of the Sensitive Three stood between the citizens of Ottawa and the psychological shock of being exposed to an unremarkable and politely expressed idea.

The matter will now be considered by the full city council.

I urge the councillors to fight on. Stop those ads. Nothing could be better for atheism.

Just look at what the Sensitive Three have already accomplished. Ads by religious organizations are permitted on city buses, within certain guidelines, and some of those ads explicitly or implicitly assert the existence of god. By refusing to run ads that claim the opposite, the councillors have exposed the double-standard that rings religion like an electrified fence.

“I don’t think we should be demeaning people in advertising on OC Transpo,” Ms. Wilkinson argues. “I think the words are offensive to everyone who believes in God, regardless of what religion they are. To me, as a Christian, it is demeaning. It grates on me.”

Please, Ms. Wilkinson. Keep talking. You’re making the case better than I ever could.

Look at precisely what the ad says. First, god probably does not exist. Then it expresses a sentiment very close to “Have a Nice Day!”

That’s it. That’s all there is to it. Analyze it with an electron microscope if you wish, but you will not find anything in that statement that “demeans” those who believe in god. It is simply a claim followed by a platitude.

What really grates on Ms. Wilkinson and the very sensitive people she speaks for is that the ad’s claim is contrary to what she believes to be true. There’s nothing more to it because there’s nothing more to the ad.

Now, advertising routinely makes claims that some people do not accept. Pepsi tastes better than Coke. Fox News is fair and balanced. Marianne Wilkinson should be re-elected. God exists.

No reasonable person would think for a moment that these claims are demeaning to those who disagree with them, nor would they think twice before admitting them to the public forum. I, for one, disagree with all these statements and yet I feel not the slightest urge to suppress them.

But a claim that “god probably does not exist” is nothing less than a linguistic assault on those who disagree and thus must not be permitted to besmirch city buses.

“I don’t follow the logic,” David Harrison, founder of Bus Stop Bible Study, told the Citizen. “Why would they approve our (ads) and not theirs?”

Allow me to answer that.

Mr. Harrison expects people to apply one standard to all. That’s only reasonable. But far too many people believe the standards that apply to all other subjects under the sun do not apply to religion.

If I say “Stephen Harper is Canada’s greatest prime minister,” you are entitled to disagree with considerable vigour. But if I say “God exists” and you disagree with the same vigour, you are an unconscionable bigot.

This double standard is how we got to the absurd situation where city buses carry ads asserting the existence of god without the slightest controversy but ads claiming god probably does not exist are offensive and forbidden. It also explains why otherwise intelligent people can’t see just how absurd that is.

For laying bare this illogical and indefensible double-standard, we atheists thank the Sensitive Three.

But that’s not the end of the gratitude we must express. Not at all. Every person who agrees with the statement “there’s probably no god” is further indebted to three councillors and the OC Traspo officials whose blinkered stupidity got this bus rolling in the first place.

Look at the paragraph above. See the statement “there’s probably no god”?

The Freethought Association of Canada wants to pay a great deal of money to put that on the side of buses so it can be splattered with slush and ignored by people shivering at bus stops across the city. By stopping them from doing so, the Sensitive Three turned the ad into news. And now that very same statement is popping up in reports and commentaries across the country.

It makes half a dozen appearances in this very column. And the Freethought Association didn’t pay a penny. Marketers call this “earned media,” as opposed to the paid variety. They love earned media for two reasons. One, it’s free. Free is good.

Earned media also has special value because people tend to screen out ads, or at least filter them. But news is not advertising. Get your message in the news and people won’t filter it, at least not the same way they would in an ad.

The conclusion for anyone with a message to spread is, don’t fear censorship. Embrace it. Hope to hell it happens. Pray for it, if you are so inclined.

And yes, this does make Marianne Wilkinson and her colleagues the answer to atheists’ prayers. Or it would if atheists prayed.

Oklahoma Legislature Investigates Richard Dawkins' Free Speech

2009-03-30T09:35:00.000-04:00

Well, it's official: Oklahoma's state legislature is investigating the University of Oklahoma for hosting a speech by evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins.

As I noted in a post over the weekend at Dawkins' website, the legislature first considered two resolutions condemning both Dawkins and the theory of evolution as "an unproven and unpopular theory." (I highly recommend reading both of the proposed resolutions.) Despite their efforts, the legislature failed to prevent Dawkins from speaking on March 6 to an audience of thousands at the University of Oklahoma.

Last week, however, I received multiple reports that the legislature was now investigating the speech, and I wrote the University of Oklahoma President David Boren directly asking to know if this was true.

Sure enough, I just received confirmation today in a letter from the Open Records Office at the University of Oklahoma. The letter confirms that on the day of Dawkins' speech, Oklahoma State Representative Rebecca Hamilton requested substantial information relating to the speech from Vice President for Governmental Relations Danny Hilliard. Representative Hamilton's exhaustive request included demands for all e-mails and correspondence relating to the speech; a list of all money paid to Dawkins and the entities, public or private, responsible for this funding; and the total cost to the university, including, among other things, security fees, advertising, and even "faculty time spent promoting this event."

Rick Farmer, the director of committee staff for the Oklahoma House of Representatives, also wrote the University on March 12, requesting confirmation that Dawkins had indeed waived all compensation for the speech.

Now some of you--though I hope not too many--may wonder: "What's wrong with the legislature investigating a speech by a famous evolutionary biologist at a public university?" Well, a lot of things, actually. As I wrote in my post on Dawkins' website:

If this investigation is indeed taking place, what the state legislature needs to understand is that in court cases dating back to the days of the House Committee on Un-American Activities, even investigating clearly protected speech on the basis of its viewpoint violates the First Amendment.

Think about it: If every time a student or faculty member invited, say, Rick Warren to speak on campus, they knew they would be subjected to a thorough and time-consuming investigation by state officials, you can all but guarantee that schools across the country would think twice before inviting Rick Warren. This would be a great way for state legislatures to chill speech they dislike without ever having to find the speaker guilty of a single thing. Talk about your un-American activities.

Given the fact the legislature clearly is concerned with nothing other than Dawkins' viewpoint, such an investigation is improper and should end immediately.

Now that we know this investigation is going on, many questions still need to be answered: What does the state legislature plan to do with this information? Does this mean that any time Richard Dawkins or other evolutionary scientists give speeches about evolution in Oklahoma, they too will be investigated? And perhaps most importantly: Doesn't the Oklahoma legislature have anything better to do?

I think I know the answer to the last question, but I think it's time the Oklahoma Legislature answered the first two. Stay tuned.

By Greg Lukianoff
For the Huffington Post

"The United States was founded on Christianity?"

2009-03-26T14:59:00.001-04:00

It is hard to believe that George W. Bush has ever read the works of George Orwell, but he seems, somehow, to have grasped a few Orwellian precepts. The lesson the President has learned best--and certainly the one that has been the most useful to him--is the axiom that if you repeat a lie often enough, people will believe it. One of his Administration's current favorites is the whopper about America having been founded on Christian principles. Our nation was founded not on Christian principles but on Enlightenment ones. God only entered the picture as a very minor player, and Jesus Christ was conspicuously absent.

The Constitution of the United States of America makes no mention whatever of God. The omission was too obvious to have been anything but deliberate, in spite of Alexander Hamilton's flippant responses when asked about it: According to one account, he said that the new nation was not in need of "foreign aid"; according to another, he simply said "we forgot." But as Hamilton's biographer Ron Chernow points out, Hamilton never forgot anything important.

In the eighty-five essays that make up The Federalist, God is mentioned only twice (both times by Madison, who uses the word, as Gore Vidal has remarked, in the "only Heaven knows" sense). In the Declaration of Independence, He gets two brief nods: a reference to "the Laws of Nature and Nature's God," and the famous line about men being "endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights." More blatant official references to a deity date from long after the founding period: "In God We Trust" did not appear on our coinage until the Civil War, and "One Nation Under God" was introduced into the Pledge of Allegiance during the McCarthy hysteria in 1954.[1]

In 1797 our government concluded a "Treaty of Peace and Friendship between the United States of America and the Bey and Subjects of Tripoli, or Barbary," now known simply as the Treaty of Tripoli. Article 11 of the treaty contains these words:
As the Government of the United States...is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion--as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity of Musselmen--and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

This document was endorsed by Secretary of State Timothy Pickering and President John Adams. It was then sent to the Senate for ratification; the vote was unanimous. It is worth pointing out that although this was the 339th time a recorded vote had been required by the Senate, it was only the third unanimous vote in the Senate's history. There is no record of debate or dissent. The text of the treaty was printed in full in the Philadelphia Gazette and in two New York papers, but there were no screams of outrage, as one might expect today.

The Founding Fathers were not religious men, and they fought hard to erect, in Thomas Jefferson's words, "a wall of separation between church and state." John Adams opined that if they were not restrained by legal measures, Puritans--the fundamentalists of their day--would "whip and crop, and pillory and roast." The historical epoch had afforded these men ample opportunity to observe the corruption to which established priesthoods were liable, as well as "the impious presumption of legislators and rulers," as Jefferson wrote, "civil as well as ecclesiastical, who, being themselves but fallible and uninspired men, have assumed dominion over the faith of others, setting up their own opinions and modes of thinking as the only true and infallible, and as such endeavoring to impose them on others, hath established and maintained false religions over the greatest part of the world and through all time."

If we define a Christian as a person who believes in the divinity of Jesus Christ, then it is safe to say that some of the key Founding Fathers were not Christians at all. Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Tom Paine were deists--that is, they believed in one Supreme Being but rejected revelation and all the supernatural elements of the Christian Church; the word of the Creator, they believed, could best be read in Nature. John Adams was a professed liberal Unitarian, but he, too, in his private correspondence seems more deist than Christian.

George Washington and James Madison also leaned toward deism, although neither took much interest in religious matters. Madison believed that "religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprize." He spoke of the "almost fifteen centuries" during which Christianity had been on trial: "What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution." If Washington mentioned the Almighty in a public address, as he occasionally did, he was careful to refer to Him not as "God" but with some nondenominational moniker like "Great Author" or "Almighty Being." It is interesting to note that the Father of our Country spoke no words of a religious nature on his deathbed, although fully aware that he was dying, and did not ask for a man of God to be present; his last act was to take his own pulse, the consummate gesture of a creature of the age of scientific rationalism.

Tom Paine, a polemicist rather than a politician, could afford to be perfectly honest about his religious beliefs, which were baldly deist in the tradition of Voltaire: "I believe in one God, and no more; and I hope for happiness beyond this life.... I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church." This is how he opened The Age of Reason, his virulent attack on Christianity. In it he railed against the "obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness" of the Old Testament, "a history of wickedness, that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind." The New Testament is less brutalizing but more absurd, the story of Christ's divine genesis a "fable, which for absurdity and extravagance is not exceeded by any thing that is to be found in the mythology of the ancients." He held the idea of the Resurrection in especial ridicule: Indeed, "the wretched contrivance with which this latter part is told, exceeds every thing that went before it." Paine was careful to contrast the tortuous twists of theology with the pure clarity of deism. "The true deist has but one Deity; and his religion consists in contemplating the power, wisdom, and benignity of the Deity in his works, and in endeavoring to imitate him in every thing moral, scientifical, and mechanical."

Paine's rhetoric was so fervent that he was inevitably branded an atheist. Men like Franklin, Adams and Jefferson could not risk being tarred with that brush, and in fact Jefferson got into a good deal of trouble for continuing his friendship with Paine and entertaining him at Monticello. These statesmen had to be far more circumspect than the turbulent Paine, yet if we examine their beliefs it is all but impossible to see just how theirs differed from his.

Franklin was the oldest of the Founding Fathers. He was also the most worldly and sophisticated, and was well aware of the Machiavellian principle that if one aspires to influence the masses, one must at least profess religious sentiments. By his own definition he was a deist, although one French acquaintance claimed that "our free-thinkers have adroitly sounded him on his religion, and they maintain that they have discovered he is one of their own, that is that he has none at all." If he did have a religion, it was strictly utilitarian: As his biographer Gordon Wood has said, "He praised religion for whatever moral effects it had, but for little else." Divine revelation, Franklin freely admitted, had "no weight with me," and the covenant of grace seemed "unintelligible" and "not beneficial." As for the pious hypocrites who have ever controlled nations, "A man compounded of law and gospel is able to cheat a whole country with his religion and then destroy them under color of law"--a comment we should carefully consider at this turning point in the history of our Republic.

Here is Franklin's considered summary of his own beliefs, in response to a query by Ezra Stiles, the president of Yale. He wrote it just six weeks before his death at the age of 84.

Here is my creed. I believe in one God, Creator of the universe. That he governs it by his providence. That he ought to be worshipped. That the most acceptable service we render to him is doing good to his other children. That the soul of Man is immortal, and will be treated with justice in another life respecting its conduct in this. These I take to be the fundamental points in all sound religion, and I regard them as you do in whatever sect I meet with them.
As for Jesus of Nazareth, my opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think his system of morals and his religion, as he left them to us, the best the world ever saw or is likely to see; but I apprehend it has received various corrupting changes, and I have, with most of the present dissenters in England, some doubts as to his divinity; though it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and think it needless to busy myself with now, when I expect soon an opportunity of knowing the truth with less trouble. I see no harm, however, in its being believed, if that belief has the good consequence, as it probably has, of making his doctrines more respected and better observed, especially as I do not perceive that the Supreme takes it amiss, by distinguishing the unbelievers in his government of the world with any particular marks of his displeasure.

Jefferson thoroughly agreed with Franklin on the corruptions the teachings of Jesus had undergone. "The metaphysical abstractions of Athanasius, and the maniacal ravings of Calvin, tinctured plentifully with the foggy dreams of Plato, have so loaded [Christianity] with absurdities and incomprehensibilities" that it was almost impossible to recapture "its native simplicity and purity." Like Paine, Jefferson felt that the miracles claimed by the New Testament put an intolerable strain on credulity. "The day will come," he predicted (wrongly, so far), "when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter." The Revelation of St. John he dismissed as "the ravings of a maniac."

Jefferson edited his own version of the New Testament, "The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth," in which he carefully deleted all the miraculous passages from the works of the Evangelists. He intended it, he said, as "a document in proof that I am a real Christian, that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus." This was clearly a defense against his many enemies, who hoped to blacken his reputation by comparing him with the vile atheist Paine. His biographer Joseph Ellis is undoubtedly correct, though, in seeing disingenuousness here: "If [Jefferson] had been completely scrupulous, he would have described himself as a deist who admired the ethical teachings of Jesus as a man rather than as the son of God. (In modern-day parlance, he was a secular humanist.)" In short, not a Christian at all.

The three accomplishments Jefferson was proudest of--those that he requested be put on his tombstone--were the founding of the University of Virginia and the authorship of the Declaration of Independence and the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom. The latter was a truly radical document that would eventually influence the separation of church and state in the US Constitution; when it was passed by the Virginia legislature in 1786, Jefferson rejoiced that there was finally "freedom for the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and the Mohammeden, the Hindu and infidel of every denomination"--note his respect, still unusual today, for the sensibilities of the "infidel." The University of Virginia was notable among early-American seats of higher education in that it had no religious affiliation whatever. Jefferson even banned the teaching of theology at the school.

If we were to speak of Jefferson in modern political categories, we would have to admit that he was a pure libertarian, in religious as in other matters. His real commitment (or lack thereof) to the teachings of Jesus Christ is plain from a famous throwaway comment he made: "It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg." This raised plenty of hackles when it got about, and Jefferson had to go to some pains to restore his reputation as a good Christian. But one can only conclude, with Ellis, that he was no Christian at all.

John Adams, though no more religious than Jefferson, had inherited the fatalistic mindset of the Puritan culture in which he had grown up. He personally endorsed the Enlightenment commitment to Reason but did not share Jefferson's optimism about its future, writing to him, "I wish that Superstition in Religion exciting Superstition in Polliticks...may never blow up all your benevolent and phylanthropic Lucubrations," but that "the History of all Ages is against you." As an old man he observed, "Twenty times in the course of my late reading have I been upon the point of breaking out, 'This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it!'" Speaking ex cathedra, as a relic of the founding generation, he expressed his admiration for the Roman system whereby every man could worship whom, what and how he pleased. When his young listeners objected that this was paganism, Adams replied that it was indeed, and laughed.

In their fascinating and eloquent valetudinarian correspondence, Adams and Jefferson had a great deal to say about religion. Pressed by Jefferson to define his personal creed, Adams replied that it was "contained in four short words, 'Be just and good.'" Jefferson replied, "The result of our fifty or sixty years of religious reading, in the four words, 'Be just and good,' is that in which all our inquiries must end; as the riddles of all priesthoods end in four more, 'ubi panis, ibi deus.' What all agree in, is probably right. What no two agree in, most probably wrong."

This was a clear reference to Voltaire's Reflections on Religion. As Voltaire put it:
There are no sects in geometry. One does not speak of a Euclidean, an Archimedean. When the truth is evident, it is impossible for parties and factions to arise.... Well, to what dogma do all minds agree? To the worship of a God, and to honesty. All the philosophers of the world who have had a religion have said in all ages: "There is a God, and one must be just." There, then, is the universal religion established in all ages and throughout mankind. The point in which they all agree is therefore true, and the systems through which they differ are therefore false.

Of course all these men knew, as all modern presidential candidates know, that to admit to theological skepticism is political suicide. During Jefferson's presidency a friend observed him on his way to church, carrying a large prayer book. "You going to church, Mr. J," remarked the friend. "You do not believe a word in it." Jefferson didn't exactly deny the charge. "Sir," he replied, "no nation has ever yet existed or been governed without religion. Nor can be. The Christian religion is the best religion that has been given to man and I as chief Magistrate of this nation am bound to give it the sanction of my example. Good morning Sir."

Like Jefferson, every recent President has understood the necessity of at least paying lip service to the piety of most American voters. All of our leaders, Democrat and Republican, have attended church, and have made very sure they are seen to do so. But there is a difference between offering this gesture of respect for majority beliefs and manipulating and pandering to the bigotry, prejudice and millennial fantasies of Christian extremists. Though for public consumption the Founding Fathers identified themselves as Christians, they were, at least by today's standards, remarkably honest about their misgivings when it came to theological doctrine, and religion in general came very low on the list of their concerns and priorities--always excepting, that is, their determination to keep the new nation free from bondage to its rule.

By Brook Allen, from the February 21, 2005 issue of The Nation

One Day for Human Rights

2008-12-09T21:41:00.006-05:00

It is Dec 10. It is human rights day. Some of us are acquainted with the One Day for Human Rights web site. More of us need to be. The powers that be decided that for Human Rights Day, all the bloggers that would agree, shall write a post about their thoughts on human rights. I agreed. Now, what to blog about? There are so many aspects of this topic in this world right now. Millions of people on this planet, every day are being treated inhumanely, from rape, and beatings, to a simple dismissal of rights based upon gender, or sexual orientation. From Proposition 8 to Darfur there are uncountable variations of reasons that people and governments maintain to justify their actions. All these variations, however stem from one main reason, power. The human/animal drive to exert power and control over another individual. What human rights infringement really gets to you? We all have at least one. What about Bosnia, piracy in the Atlantic, slavery, or child porn? All of these things have one thing in common. A madman, or madwoman, who must feel powerful over another. They seem to find their personal worth in the subjugation of others. Like the U.S. "War on Terror" purports to be, we, as moral citizens of this world, no matter what your culture, must rise above this filth that stains our beautiful Mother Earth. We human beings, must hold all who victimize others, one hundred percent accountable.

I could not write about any one instance of injustice. For me, to speak of one down plays the others. No cross borne is any heavier than any other, for the weight is felt equally by the one made to bear it.

Please sign the petition to include the universal declaration of human rights in your passport.

If we change our outlook...

2008-11-13T09:23:00.006-05:00

Why did people get so up in arms about this speech? We have never been a Christian nation, but a nation of many faiths. The fact is President-Elect Obama speaks the truth. Maybe this scares people. We are no longer safe in our warm cocoons. The reality of our differences can no longer be ignored. To survive as a nation we need to strive to be accepting. The refusal to do so will leave us to stagnate. This nation used to be a place that other people saved their money to immigrate to. They would save their pennies to come here on vacation. Not any more. This country of ours can be great again, but only if we realize, as President-Elect Obama has,our absolute need to change the way we view the world. The other countries of the world are not us, and that is ok. They do not need to be us, nor do they need to be forced by us to be like us. If we change our outlook on those around us, both inside and outside our borders, we will be able to peacefully change how we are viewed, dealt with, and valued, by those who's input we value. Please listen to this speech with an open mind.

Happy Birthday Carl Sagan

2008-11-11T20:24:00.002-05:00

If You Do Not Learn From History

2008-10-08T22:41:00.005-04:00

In light of the state of this country, I offer commentary written over 200 years ago, by the fathers of this nation.

America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.
John Quincy Adams

Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There was never a democracy that did not commit suicide.
John Adams

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.
Thomas Jefferson

I have the consolation of having added nothing to my private fortune during my public service, and of retiring with hands clean as they are empty.
Thomas Jefferson

It has been observed that a pure democracy if it were practicable would be the most perfect government. Experience has proved that no position is more false than this. The ancient democracies in which the people themselves deliberated never possessed one good feature of government. Their very character was tyranny; their figure deformity.
Alexander Hamilton

I believe, and I say it is true Democratic feeling, that all the measures of the government are directed to the purpose of making the rich richer and the poor poorer.
William Henry Harrison

I have a sneaking suspicion that what we have become is not what was intended. In reading some of the transcripts of "our forefathers" leading us from the Articles of the Confederation, to the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights, never intended us to enforce our democratic values on other countries against their will as had been done to us by the British Monarchy. They never intended that all citizens have the right to bear arms, and most never wanted a democratic state bur rather a democratic socialistic state. The wanted a government that takes care of it's people, and not put it's own affairs first.
Are we really living up to the standard put forth by those men?

Soccer

2008-09-26T11:27:00.003-04:00

Soccer has been a big part of my life since I was young. I played from 10 till about 19. That's all I wanted to do. Made varsity team in High School all 4 years, and even got named to the All State team. That was a long time ago. Today I enjoy coaching children. The game has so much more to teach than just a sport. I find it to be so amazingly beautiful to watch when done right. So very funny when 8, 9, and 10 yr. olds get it wrong as they will do more often than not. But when they get that one shot, that one trick, or that new fake that they have practiced for so long, right. When it's perfect for the very first time, man.... no words can describe it. That "I knew it would work" look on their face is all I need.

The former statements hold true for FC Liverpool as well. Go Reds.

No McCain No Way

2008-09-17T10:04:00.008-04:00

Sen. John McCain does not care about the people of this nation. He obviously does not care how many lives are lost, how much sorrow an American wife, child, or parent will feel as long as he is winning. He lost in Vietnam and now by God, he's gonna win. Wake up people! We have been living under fascist rule wrapped in the guise of patriotism. Our people, and our economy can not stand another four to eight years of people who are out for the swelling of their own wallets. How can you watch innocents die while reaping the financial benefits, and say that you are morally justified in your actions. I am always wary of those who do what "God" called them to do. Their calling is usually wrapped up in their own agendas. This nation was founded on the principal of "By the people, for the people". Not, by the one for the one. I say that if you are truly a moral person then there is no way that you can place your vote behind Sen. John McCain. We are expected to be lemmings, following in line, one after the other, even though it may lead us off a cliff. I will not jump. Not for him, not for anyone.

2008-09-17T10:04:00.002-04:00

For My Wife

2008-09-13T10:56:00.001-04:00

If any man was ever blessed,
Then surely it be me,
By you.

Not All Silver Linings

2008-08-27T21:55:00.003-04:00

It seems to me that a lot of the blogs I see always have a happy outcome. Always a "silver lining". In looking back at my few entries, I look like I'm falling into the same pattern. In my header I promised you "life", my life. Not everything, not even half, of the things in my life are hunky dory. Most have pluses and minuses. My kids are a constant source of joy, and utter frustration. Though I love school, it is very hard for me to comprehend many of the concepts we are taught. The list goes on. These things I have no trouble finding my silver lining with. Plenty of other items I deal with on a daily basis, just flat out suck. My children go to one of the worst school systems in the country. My eldest actually has texting as part of his curriculum. No kidding texting, on a phone. I live in a highly conservative part of the country. Child support payments (Which are made on time, no matter what). Again, the list goes on. Let's face it, many aspects of life blow, no sliver lining. Plenty of things piss me off. So in respect to what I have promised you, i.e. Life, not all posts will be happy-go-lucky entries. Not all will end on the bright side of life. Hopefully not even most, but at least some. It's my life. No way would I ever change it. I am who I am because of, or in spite of, it. I promised you my life, so now the kid gloves are off. Welcome to it.

Living the Dream

2008-08-19T22:00:00.003-04:00

I always hated that reply to "How you doin'?". Of course, I've been known to say it when I was working yet another dead end job. I think it makes us feel somewhat better about our present "station" in life. That being said, I don't have a job right now. I haven't had a computer for the last ten years. No-can-afford when you have all these mouths under one roof. So When I started IT school it was a helluva shock. Too many new things. People don't realize just how much the Internet has exploded. So, I gotta' catch up. I sit in front of my computer for almost 14 hours a day now. Learning, exploring, flat out soaking in it. I study constantly. My wife is starting to hate my new "girlfriend". You'd like her. Her name is Dell.
So, in the last two days, I have added five new toolbars to FireFox, started this Blog, completed four chapters in my Beginning Linux class, listed to too many hours of Pandora.com, and looked at countless web pages. Not to mention, I'm a delicious blogger who likes to tweet his diggs, diggs his diigos, and still just doesn't see the fascination with facebook.
My wife and I know that all this will pay off in the end. So, bless her heart, she quietly deals with my sitting in front of the computer for long hours, when I know she'd like some of my time. God, I love her. She works extra hours so we can succeed together. She's a rare find these days.
This time, I guess, we really are living the dream.

My Son the Hero

2008-08-18T19:45:00.000-04:00

I played Guitar Hero for the first time this past weekend. I learned that one, I have no rhythm, and two, video games have far surpassed my level of expertise. Insult to injury, my oldest son, Brennan, said "Don't worry Dad, it took me a while too." Thanks son......thanks a lot. He, by the way, rocks at it. He's had it for only two days. This is a time in my life not very unlike listening to my favorite song from high school on the radio, and realizing I'm tuned into the oldies station.

Here We Go

2008-08-18T19:15:00.000-04:00

Welcome to my very first blog. As you can see I am a 38 yr. old father of five, going back to school to find a new career. 20+ years in the restaurant business was enough. I've served enough steaks, ribs, chicken, and alcohol, and I've certainly spent enough nights, weekends, and holidays away from my family. It's their time now.
I started this blog to chronicle what fatherhood, college,and life in my late 30's is like. So let's see where it takes us.