apple juice

If I have any readers left after the past couple weeks of very few updates, here’s what I’m thinking…

I’m tired.

I’m just worn out from the past month of nonsensical political madness. And I don’t want to get drawn into the stupid bickering about Kerry’s Vietnam Service, who’s more rich, etc.

When we’re talking about that, we’re not talking about real issues. And from where I stand, we have some real issues in this country.

Undeniable issues that both sides should see. They should matter to everyone.

Here’s what matters:

• Fixing Health Care
• Making sure kids are fully educated, and can get to college if they want to
• Making sure we have a clean environment
• Bringing fiscal responsibility to government
• Keeping the economy stable and growing

Here’s what “does not matter”:

• Gay Marriage. True conservatives (in the political sense of the word) would not want more governmental regulation in your personal lives. Marriage itself (the definition) should be defined by those who preside over it, the Churches. A civil union is the legal matter that the state needs to concern itself with.
• Gun control. It is sensible to try to prevent criminals from owning weapons. Hunters, your guns will not be taken away.
• Missile defense. Seriously, who are they kidding? Who is going to attack us with missiles? (I’m talking about the large ICBM types here)

In a broad sense, one can think of every issue in terms of economic value. Healthy people work more productively. Well educated, healthy kids contribute more to society. Striving for a cleaner enviornment is good for the economy.

Issues like Gay Marriage, Gun Control and Missile Defense are for narrow-minded people who have a black and white world view, and aren’t seeing the big picture.

Unfortunately, the “Republicans” who fit this description are the Republicans running the party these days.

Don’t look now, but your party has been hijacked, and no one is strong enough to stand up and take a stand. (John McCain, Colin Powell? Where did you go?)

John Kerry on The Daily Show was not bad like they made it out in Slate. For a much more even-handed review, see this article in the Washington Post.

I have a new theory to put forward. (Or is it hypothesis? Anyway.)

People with exceptionally loud ring tones also talk far louder on their phones than they need to.

I have only anecdotal eveidence at this point, but further research will be necessary.

What do you think?

I have been severly slacking on my posting as of late…

I rode the bus this morning to work. Inspired by the movie that Sonja and I saw over the weekend, Super Size Me.

Super Size Me was an excellent movie. I’ve heard more than once that, “Well, duh! Of course if you eat McDonalds all the time, it will be unhealthy.” He addresses that in the movie. It may seem like common sense, but there is a significant number of people that eat McDonalds (or “fast food”) everyday. I can think of three people off hand that eat it everyday. Ironically enough, those three aren’t overweight. (Don’t know about their general health).

Anyways, about the bus ride. I was inspired, because, although I’ve been running fairly regularily, I could throw in some extra walking and it wouldn’t be a bad idea.

So out to the bus this morning. Lesson 1: I need to learn to read a bus schedule. I missed this first bus by about 2 minutes, and then had to wait 25 minutes for the next one. Luckily, I started off way early this morning so I would be sure to get to work on time, and I got there at 7:50, not too bad.

The bus drops me off on the far side of Southdale from where I work, so it’s about a 6 block walk to work, and it’s 3 blocks from home to the bus stop. So that adds about 2 miles of walking into my day.

In the movie, he quotes a statistic that says the average New Yorker walks 5 miles a day. I thought I could have a bit of the NY lifestyle without all the people and crazyness. So far so good…

Remember the “Boy who cried wolf”?

Article from the Washington Post: Pre-9/11 Acts Led To Alerts

More than half a dozen government officials interviewed yesterday, who declined to be identified because classified information is involved, said that most, if not all, of the information about the buildings seized by authorities in a raid in Pakistan last week was about three years old, and possibly older.

“It’s serious business,” Bush said. “I mean, we wouldn’t be, you know, contacting authorities at the local level unless something was real.”

New York Times: Reports That Led to Terror Alert Were Years Old, Officials Say

Much of the information that led the authorities to raise the terror alert at several large financial institutions in the New York City and Washington areas was three or four years old, intelligence and law enforcement officials said on Monday. They reported that they had not yet found concrete evidence that a terrorist plot or preparatory surveillance operations were still under way.

Remember also that the announcement of the capture of these latest Al-Qaeda suspects was delayed for a week so that it would have the maximum political impact.

When there really was a wolf at the door, no one believed the boy anymore…

‚ÄúThere’s an old saying in Tennessee — I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.

-President Bush

Via Popdex I found this article written by Ron Reagan. I didn’t see his speech at the Democratic National Convention, except for the clip on The Daily Show which made it out to be a bit of a bore.

This article, however is an excellent, point-by-point disection of Bush’s presidency. If you can come with an open mind to this, it will give you some things to think about.