Friday, August 24, 2007

Politico

I recently found a new playground. A place where one of my loves, politics can be discussed, argued and at times thrown right into your face. Essentially, Politico is a blog where a gaggle of average reporters that keep an eye (half open I might add) on the political scene. The writers or reporters post several stories per day, then open the venue to comments.

The comments is where the fun exists. An array of folks assume a moniker and hide behind an icon of their choosing and then chime in. If you are a smart ass like the Pirate, sandboxes like Politico are excellent places to play. You can do all kinds of things in the sandbox. You can build castles, dig tunnels, or which seems to be some people's favorite throw sand in each other's face. I have tried several of these depending on the subject, my mood or the mood of those participating that day.

Politico is also a great place to meet some real intelligent folks from both sides of an argument but you should be warned if you visit there are many that will tear your heart out. If you are not thick skinned it might be a good place to participate as a reader only and not wade in with your opinion.

Politico tends to use a few magnet characters to generate long threads of debate, discussion or mud slinging. Obviously Hillary and Obama tend to generate a lot of debate as does newly retiring Karl Rove. Interestingly Fred Thompson seems to generate long threads where Rudy and Mitt's tend to be less interesting. I have no idea if this means anything or not.

I think Fred Thompson's stories attract so many comments because the Republicans are in search of someone that can hand Hillary her head this next year and the Democrats are worried that might be the case.

If you are ever in the Politico sandbox feel welcome to badmouth or chime in with support for that guy "Right-minded Frank". He seems to know his stuff if the Pirate has to say so himself.

If you do find Politico to be the place to stop by on occassion let me know so I can add you to my friends or don't let me know and pick a fight with me and see if I can figure out who you are.

I better get some work done today or Mrs. Pirate is going to make me go shopping with her. I hate shopping unless I am gettging a new toy.

By the way Can O' Corn gave me a new Jolly Roger's flag that proudly flies over my desk. Arrrghhh.

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

How does one defend Vick?

Last night I was watching the Fair and Balanced network's version of point/counterpoint and they had a Professor Jeffrey Standen of Willamette University in Salem, Oregon discuss his defense of Michael Vick's dog fighting. So I immediately went to his blog at thesportslawprofessor.blogspot.com to see what it takes to be invited on the Hannity and Combs show to discuss such innane topics as Vick and his homies conducting dog fights.

To my amazement Professor Standen wrote the post prior to Vick pleading guilty, so much of the post is irrelevent today, but Standen "really" did not defend Vick for his actions. He just demoted the action of dog fighting to a "Boys will be boys" fiasco.

Professor Standen actually tried to equate dog fighting with cock-fighting, bullfighting and bird hunting as well as cage fighting. He contended that when the facts came out, the truth will be all about nothing. That what Vick did was not illegal and his cohorts (homies) were bribed by the prosecutors to turn on their money man, Vick. Vick was simply involved in nothing more then seedy behavoir. He's just a bad boy, nothing more.

Why should Vick lose his career over the rest of us being so prudish? He also nodded toward Kobe Bryant for his climb back to icon status after the accussations of rape. You know as soon as the legal system and the applied pressure is done with the story it always comes out that there was really nothing to it.

Professor Standen appeared to be a nice enough sort and since many of my attorney friends here in Salem attended college at Willamette it might turn out that Standen and I have mutual friends. But his interview on Hannity and Combs botherd me on several levels aside from Combs not letting him speak or clarify himself, he also seem to think there should be some tolerance in these types of perdicaments the athletes find themselves in.

First and foremost does such a terrible behavior, as dog fighting, have to be illegal before you are disgusted with it? To think a man that has many young children looking up at him and fantasizing of being Michael Vick on the gridiron, would involve himself of such barbaric behavoir. To think he could keep a smug smile on his face as he walked past a horde of cameras knowing darn good and well it was all true. To think he was never outwardly bothered about his actions, amazes me of what type of human being Vick must really be. What kind of man could be like this? A sick one if you ask me.

Secondly, if Vick is involved in an illegal gambling circuit, that is all that is needed to remove him from professional sports. The gambling alone puts Vick in a position to taint the game of professional football where its paying customers deserve much better. We football fans that spend "our" dollars on the entertainment, have a right to be disgusted, when we find out one of those we are filling the pockets with millions of dollars is a sick, ill-adjusted excuse of a human being. We also have the right to express our disgust to the NFL and demand they either put up with our discontent for keeping the guy around or get rid of him.

I am not saying he participated in gambling on football but to put himself in the arena of betting on dog fighting only seperates him from being influenced by outside interests by a micro-thin veneer of false-intigrity.

So Professor, what Vick did might equate to bullfighting or cage fighting in many peoples minds but it is more disgusting then eating your neighbor's cat. Of which I am sure may not be illegal either but might get your butt ran out of the neighborhood.

Lastly, how does a blog that only gets maybe 5 hits per week get the author on Hannity and Combs?

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

New house is not like the old house


The Pirate family has been trying to sale our house for the last two months and no one seems to like it as much as we do. It has four bedrooms of which two are still possessed by teenagers.

There are two bathrooms that both are usually possessed by teenagers early every morning before school and mid-day on weekends and summer months.

There is a double car garage that has been doubling as a storage unit from the day we moved in.

There is a large in-ground pool in the back that is fully fenced in and will take any money you want to throw at it.

There is a nice large covered deck in the back where our lab calls home. It is great for coffee drinking, blogging, bar-be-quing and a shooting range for BBs where you can shoot cans off the fence. I'll throw in the lab, she actually retrieves the cans for some dumb reason.

I will also throw in the two cats, they do absolutely nothing. They won't retrieve anything and they look at the Pirate family as staff or domestics.
There is a large family room that is also my den, my office, my napping place and my football watching venue. A good many posts have been written there.

There are other anemities as well. Two fire places, one in the living room where the Pirate wife makes me take off my shoes if I want to enter. When she is at work I walk across the living room in my boots just to get back at her. The other fireplace is in the napping place.

There is a shed out back that at one time was my smoke shed. A lot of stewing and Marlboros have been consumed out there as well as cold beers. Now we store yard tools there, which is where all yard tools should be. Stored away.

Now we have our new house all built and awaiting our arrival.


Wednesday, August 08, 2007

Three months in the slammer?

I wish it had been as easy. As you all know the pirate has had a rash of bad luck with diabetes and several loved ones passing away. Right after my last post my father's prostate cancer had came back and as of August 6, 2007 he is no longer with us.

In the very short time one of my best friends and the man that set me on my path of life has died and went to a better place.

A couple of days after my last post i was sitting in my dad's living room and he told me he was feeling awfully sick. He was so sick he took himself to the emergency room the night before. If you knew my dad that was all I needed to know that this man was hurting and sick.

My dad was the kind of guy that never complained about pain or discomfort. You would never know he had an arrow in his back until he turned around and walked away.

Shortly after that day he had an appointment with his doctor and it was determined from their tests that he had cancerous tumors throughout his organs and spine. As of this last Monday he no longer as to quietly have to suffer of his pain.

I will miss his calling me every Sunday and asking me how my "Famn Damily" was doing. He would always get the update on the family and then end the talk with a "Give em all a whuppin for me".

I will miss him calling me on my birthday no matter where I am on that day or where he is.

I will miss his tight wad Christmas gifts of a pair of socks and $5.

I will miss his keen sense of humor and his ever lasting love.

Shortly after I was notified of his plight to come, I was driving from a project when the song, "Night Moves" came on the radio. My dad was always a country western fan but loved that song because he thought it said "Nice Boobs". I have never since that day in early 1970s been able to hear anything n that song other then "Nice Boobs".

Now you know what I have been up to.

Love you dad.