I was in a clothing store today and happened by the ladies' undergarments section. There were lots of teenybopper-type underpants on display. I caught sight of one that had cartoon speech bubbles all over it, with phrases like "pizza," "BFF," and "me likey." But there was also a bubble with "2+2=5."

I find it so horrifying that our culture encourages girls to be airheads.

Posted by: Sarah at 09:56 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 68 words, total size 1 kb.

AWTM wrote a post last week about a parent at the school who asked if they're supposed to read to their kids every night.

Today I was at work and this lady wanted to buy foam letters. It sounded like she was buying them for her teacher husband to hang in his classroom. She couldn't find the right size. She wanted the big letters of the alphabet, but they were $1 each, and she said, "I don't want to get those; I'd have to spend like $27 or something."

For heaven's sake.

Posted by: Sarah at 01:21 PM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
Post contains 96 words, total size 1 kb.

I'm re-reading Larry Elder's The Ten Things You Can't Say In America, and I came across a timely point:

An economics major in college, Reagan further argued that lowering taxes would increase money coming into federal coffers because it kick starts people into working harder, smarter, and with less need to conceal income.

But guess who else felt that way? JFK. That's right, JFK. In the December 24, 1962, issue of US News and World Report, "Kennedy's Latest Word on Tax Cuts, Plans for Business," in urging a tax cut, Kennedy said that "it is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high today and tax revenues are too low -- and the soundest way to raise revenues in the long run is to cut rates now.

"The experience of a number of European countries has borne this out. This country's own experience with tax reductions in 1954 has borne this out, and the reason is that only full employment can balance the budget -- and tax reduction can pave the way to full employment. The purpose of cutting taxes now is not to incur a budgetary deficit, but to achieve the more prosperous expanding economy which will bring a budgetary surplus."

Somehow I don't think Obama is the new Kennedy.

Posted by: Sarah at 06:45 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 218 words, total size 1 kb.

Obama and the Tax Tipping Point:

What happens when the voter in the exact middle of the earnings spectrum receives more in benefits from Washington than he pays in taxes? Economists Allan Meltzer and Scott Richard posed this question 27 years ago. We may soon enough know the answer.

Barack Obama is offering voters strong incentives to support higher taxes and bigger government. This could be the magic income-redistribution formula Democrats have long sought.

Sen. Obama is promising $500 and $1,000 gift-wrapped packets of money in the form of refundable tax credits. These will shift the tax demographics to the tipping point where half of all voters will receive a cash windfall from Washington and an overwhelming majority will gain from tax hikes and more government spending.

In 2006, the latest year for which we have Census data, 220 million Americans were eligible to vote and 89 million -- 40% -- paid no income taxes. According to the Tax Policy Center (a joint venture of the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute), this will jump to 49% when Mr. Obama's cash credits remove 18 million more voters from the tax rolls. What's more, there are an additional 24 million taxpayers (11% of the electorate) who will pay a minimal amount of income taxes -- less than 5% of their income and less than $1,000 annually.

In all, three out of every five voters will pay little or nothing in income taxes under Mr. Obama's plans and gain when taxes rise on the 40% that already pays 95% of income tax revenues.

And we have Barney Frank saying outrageous things like this:

I believe later on there should be tax increases. Speaking personally, I think there are a lot of very rich people out there whom we can tax at a point down the road and recover some of the money.

I put up a quote from Neal Boortz's piece To the Undecided Voter about how democracy fails when the scales tip and people can vote themselves more money. Andy McCarthy received a similar quote from this blog's namesake, Robert Heinlein.

A perfect democracy, a "warm body" democracy in which every adult may vote and all votes count equally, has no internal feedback for self-correction.... [O]nce a state extends the franchise to every warm body, be he producer or parasite, that day marks the beginning of the end of the state. For when the plebs discover that they can vote themselves bread and circuses without limit and that the productive members of the body politic cannot stop them, they will do so, until the state bleeds to death, or in its weakened condition the state succumbs to an invader — the barbarians enter Rome.

I think our country is in serious trouble.

But apparently Sarah Palin's clothes matter more than massive voter fraud and Democrat donation fraud.

"I love mankind; it's people I can't stand."

Posted by: Sarah at 04:55 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 490 words, total size 3 kb.

There's a story going on here in town that I simply do not understand. I thought maybe you could help me see what I'm missing.

A gas station owner has been fined $5000 for price gouging during hurricane season last month, when all the gas jumped. Most gas in town went to around $4.00, but apparently this guy was charging $5.50. And apparently he was the only one who raised his this high.

I don't see why this is illegal.

Gas is the most advertised commodity we buy. Ask anyone to tell you the price of milk or detergent, and I bet few people could do it. But everyone knows what gas costs. It's advertised on every street corner. If someone sold gas that day for $5.50, I would've had so much sticker shock that I would've kept going to the next gas station. Problem solved. If I did buy it there, well, I'm a sucker if it was $1.50 cheaper down the street.

But here's what I don't get. Let's say I own a store. I decide I want to sell a two-liter of Pepsi for $45. Is that illegal? It's stupid, but is it illegal? Is it price gouging? Is it only price gouging if there's a natural disaster?

I don't understand why this gas station owner couldn't set the price of gas at whatever he felt like. Is it because other gas stations would see his price and raise theirs? I know gas stations have price wars. Is there some regulating body that decides a price range for gas on any given day?

I really don't get this. What am I missing?

Posted by: Sarah at 01:10 PM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
Post contains 279 words, total size 1 kb.

Oh yeah, are we getting another stimulus check? Really?

Can we refuse it?

Because last week my husband bought me a Garmin for my birthday, I bought a handgun, I dropped some money buying clothes for my new job, and I had to pay for a fertility treatment.

We're doing a plenty good job of spending our own money right now. I don't need to spend someone else's.

Stop taking money from a taxpayer and handing it to me to spend. Cuz I'd just buy a Glock.

Oh wait, on second thought...free Glock. Hand it over.

Some rich guy is out his hard-earned money and I get a free gun. Sounds totally fair to me, right? Sigh.

Posted by: Sarah at 03:58 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
Post contains 119 words, total size 1 kb.

Some Soldier's Mom left a comment at AWTM, and this part caught my eye:

... and you just want to ask Barrack Obama, "Since when did it become acceptable in America to punish hard working people by taking their money and giving it to others because you think that's "fairer"? and that you can't imagine how he justifies giving tax "refunds" to people who don't even pay taxes! You see this as taking your "A" grades in school and giving them to people who got lower grades to make it "fairer".

Did I ever tell you that this is exactly what happened to me in France? I took a literature class, and we had some paper to write. After they were all turned in, the teacher reprimanded the class for missing the point of the paper. She explained what a good paper would've looked like. I felt pretty sure that what I had written was close to what she was looking for, so I was in the catbird seat. But then she laid this kicker on us: She had decided to go ahead and average all the grades and give us the average. I ended up with a C.

I wish I were making that story up. Or I wish it had been like a trick on the teacher's part, a way to teach us a lesson. Nope. It was real and the grade stuck.

I had done the assignment correctly and I got a C. Someone else who had turned in an F was feeling pretty awesome at this point.

I don't see how that's even remotely fair.

And Some Soldier's Mom is right that it's a good analogy for the taxes.

Posted by: Sarah at 04:06 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
Post contains 289 words, total size 2 kb.

Lest anyone continue to say that the Republicans are the party of the rich...

Soros, Lewis, and the Sandlers form a core group of billionaire activists and Democrat partisans who have formed a group called The Democracy Alliance. They realized that they could magnify their power by working in unison and tapping other wealthy donors to further their agenda (the superb Boston Globe article “Follow the money” is a good primer on how money and 527 groups have come together to have a huge impact on politics in America).

The Democracy Alliance is a major avenue to help them achieve their goals. The roster of its growing membership consists of a list of billionaires and mere multi-millionaires who collectively hope to give upwards of 500 million dollars each year to further promote a left-wing agenda.

Posted by: Sarah at 02:40 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 139 words, total size 1 kb.

I've been watching and thoroughly enjoying When We Left Earth. I didn't know as much about Mercury and Gemini as I do about Apollo, and I know hardly anything about the subsequent missions. It's been wonderful to see the original footage and relive those Apollo moments.

There are a couple tidbits I did learn that have made me smile. First, I didn't know that the LM on Apollo 10 was sent to orbit the moon without enough fuel to power itself off the moon. The men in charge of the space program knew that if they sent astronauts that close to the moon with the means to land, they would certainly land! To prevent them from jumping ahead in the program, they didn't give them enough gas to leave. And the crew joked that they totally would've tried to land on the moon if they'd been able to.

Second, Neil Armstrong left the LM a full 15 minutes before Buzz Aldrin did. You think that was the longest 15 minutes of anyone's life? Heh. Can you imagine sitting on the moon, waiting your turn?

I always am fascinated by the what-ifs of the space program. What if Ed White's first EVA had failed and he floated away from his Gemini shuttle? What if Apollo 8 failed to break the orbit of the moon and the crew was left to circle the moon for eternity? What if the LM of Apollo 11 crashed and Armstrong and Aldrin had to slowly die on the moon? Would there be a rescue mission to retrieve their bodies? So many what-ifs, and such a marriage of good furtune plus hard work to make it all a success.

I am looking forward to watching the final installment of the show to learn about the more recent missions.

Posted by: Sarah at 04:09 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 309 words, total size 2 kb.

If I have to hear the phrase "find bin Laden" one more time, I will flip my lid.

Posted by: Sarah at 05:04 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 22 words, total size 1 kb.

A certain pinko commie emailed and asked what I think of the bailout. At the risk of making an Obama joke, it's really above my pay grade. I have been watching TV, listening to the radio, and reading articles about it to try to wrap my brain around the situation, but I'm just not so good at thinking in terms of hundreds of billions of dollars.

Here's one thing I do understand: money doesn't grow on trees. Our government doesn't have the money for the things it's already promised, like Medicare and Social Security. Now some want to add health care, and then there's this bailout.

I think we're boned. But I'm a housewife who knits during the Glenn Beck program, so what do I know?

CavX wrote a good summary of the situation, which fits my understanding of the problem. And I've read enough Thomas Sowell to know that there were dire consequences to lending money to people who simply couldn't afford it. Those chickennnnnns came home to roost, at the risk of making a Jeremiah Wright joke.

I heard a guy last night on the radio say that he makes $50,000 a year and bought a $400,000 house on an ARM. And this was touted as a good choice. I guess I just live on a different planet than some of these people, because my husband makes more than that and our house is less than half of this guy's. And we already own a good chunk of it.

But what do I know: I missed the Penthouse Party because I was too cheap to pay the cover charge...

Posted by: Sarah at 08:11 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 287 words, total size 2 kb.

Read Jonah Goldberg's Very Different Visions. Yes, who indeed is speaking for the "indispensable left-handed Samoans living on fixed incomes in the increasingly gay suburbs around Cleveland?" Heh.

Best Mike Huckabee quote ever: "I'm not a Republican because I grew up rich," he proclaimed, "I'm a Republican because I didn't want to spend the rest of my life poor, waiting for the government to rescue me."

I didn't grow up rich and neither did my husband. We started our marriage with no income for four months and $200 to our name. But every day since we've come a little bit closer to our goal of being fat, rich, white Republicans.

And our vision is the winner vision.

UPDATE:

Dang, we lost like eight grand overnight. Stupid Lehman jerks.

Posted by: Sarah at 03:53 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 130 words, total size 1 kb.

Yeah, so I drunk snail-mailed my husband tonight.
It's like drunk-dialing, only it won't get to him for two weeks.
I pent up four months of dead babies and deployment and unleashed it all on 9/11 coverage. Not good.

UPDATE:

I hadn't mailed the letter yet, so I got up this morning and read it. Ha. Don't worry, I didn't write the letter about depressing stuff; that's just what prompted me to grab a pen. It seems I wrote about T. Boone Pickens and Band of Brothers. It's very rambling and ridiculous.

Oh, and I feel fine this morning, and really...could a super-drunk person have cleared through Level 23 on Dr. Mario? I think not. I can handle my wine.

Posted by: Sarah at 05:15 PM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
Post contains 122 words, total size 1 kb.

1 I really can't imagine sending anything BACK from a war zone--I would anticipate letters for WEEKS, which is how long they took to get to me when I was in the field. Warning him about the content would not be a bad thing, though. Sig

Posted by: Sig at September 11, 2008 06:14 PM (7CjcP)

2 "drunk snail-mail" Not a phrase I ever thought about before - but truly fitting.

Posted by: airforcewife at September 11, 2008 06:17 PM (mIbWn)

3 Oh wait...I guess I drunk-blogged that post too. I didn't write about all that depressing stuff; it just prompted me to write a long mushy and rambling letter.

Posted by: Sarah at September 12, 2008 02:42 AM (TWet1)

4 Sarah, I hope this means that you have recovered from your drunk-chatting session last night, too!

Posted by: Butterfly Wife at September 12, 2008 02:56 AM (p8HAO)

5 Well, you know, the Army really CAN take the fun out of things...no drunk-dialing. Hmmm. You can always assure your hubby that you have cyber cronies who keep you company (and actively participate) when you feel like getting your drink on. Love you!

Posted by: Guard Wife at September 12, 2008 03:43 AM (F5iCn)

6 Wow. Sounds like a fun night. Have a good weekend!

Posted by: T at September 12, 2008 04:45 AM (KV0YP)

7 S. You drunk snail mailed your husband a letter about T. Boone Pickens!! I love it, I bet T. Boones ears are still burning!!! Have a wonderful weekend.

Posted by: Pamela at September 12, 2008 08:48 AM (vsnFT)

8 holla! I always knew we were kindred spirits!

Posted by: Lane at September 12, 2008 07:42 PM (/Tmo8)

9 I've drunk emailed (after the NC SBL) but never drunk snail mailed. Interesting. Glad you can handle your wine though it doesn't surprise me.

Posted by: HomefrontSix at September 12, 2008 11:16 PM (4Es1w)

10 HAHAHA!!! Right there with you. I was at an Advanced Estate Planning Class in Newport, Rhode Island at the Naval Justice School. (Boy, did I join the wrong service!) I was designated driver most of the week, but Thursday they talked me into letting loose and walking to the Officers Club for lobster and wine, then walking back to my room. Yes, I did not eat lobster, but I drank a lot of wine. Woke up at 0400 completely dizzy after having a radical dream about drinking four quarts of orange juice. When I arrived at class - five minutes past the start time of 0730, how embarrassing - my compadre in crime whispered how dizzy she'd been when she got out of bed. "It must have been those cigars we smoked with the guys." Say what? I also ordered a pizza when I got back to the room - as you do - and I must have spoken intelligibly, because I got what I wanted. I have a horrible feeling the pizza guys totally mocked me afterwards. SLOOOWW talker.

Posted by: Oda Mae at September 13, 2008 07:11 AM (YE92c)

11 She plays Dr. Mario. We should totally hang out next time I'm in Carolina. Or, you know, visit Portland. It's pretty, if you can overlook all the anti-Bush stickers.

Posted by: Anwyn at September 13, 2008 07:41 PM (dzxw9)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

I tried to log in this morning to put up something about 9/11, but my blog was not cooperating. (And yes, I know that many of you try to comment and have your comments disappear into spam land. I promise to work on that soon.)

The beginning of my day was taken up with mundane chores -- taking the car to the windshield shop, grocery shopping, etc -- and I returned home, turned on the TV while I was waiting to go pick the car back up, and that's when it hit.

I watched a show on the History Channel called The Rise and Fall of the WTC. At the risk of sounding crass, I learned today to mourn the loss of that building along with the loss of the lives inside of it. I learned about Minoru Yamasaki and his innovative new construction. I learned about the technology needed to build such a heavy structure on soggy Manhattan. I learned that Battery Park was built with the land dug from the WTC site. And I learned about the creative minds who helped efficiently move debris once the buildings were felled, and the laser imaging that helped map the site for disaster workers.

In short, I learned about all the brilliant minds that came together to both build and clean up the WTC.

And I got mad, mad at the backward-assed culture that's never created a damn thing, only destroyed.

AWTM called me, wondering if I was OK, wondering why I hadn't blogged yet. Although I had tried earlier in the morning, 9/11 hadn't seeped into my brain yet at that point.

It has now.

We talked about our anger, about the laser beam, about how she had to explain to her children today that evil men flew planes into buildings and that's why daddy has to be away from the family so often.

And then I listened to Todd Beamer's dad on the radio, thanking our troops for continuing the fight. I cried as I put together my meatloaf.

I'm mad. And drunk. And there's a SpouseBUZZ radio show tonight about 9/11, and it ain't gonna be pretty.

So I didn't blog. But it's not because I forgot.

Posted by: Sarah at 01:35 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 377 words, total size 2 kb.

I thought I'd weigh in on Lipstickgate.

Obama said, "You can put lipstick on a pig. It's still a pig." He was referring to how McCain is now also running as the candidate for change. Many folks are upset that Obama seemingly called Palin a pig.

Let me say, I thought it was the funniest, most clever thing to ever come out of Obama's mouth.

I mean, come on: that's a great comeback. I personally don't think it has to be taken as sexist. Palin used lipstick to get a laugh line and a round of applause; Obama turned the tables back at her with a well-known idiom.

I honestly thought it was the funniest thing Obama's ever said. But I'm nutty like that. People really seem to be freaking out about this and saying that it will cost Obama support. Hey, whatever makes people not vote for him...

But you know what's way more offensive than what Obama said? What Juan Cole said: "What's the difference between Palin and Muslim fundamentalists? Lipstick." That article is just sick.

Posted by: Sarah at 04:10 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
Post contains 180 words, total size 1 kb.

About ten minutes into my trip towards Chicago yesterday, I was on the phone with CaliValleyGirl and winced as a rock hit my windshield. Thirty seconds later, a 10-inch crack made its way across the glass. Son of a. The last time we drove home, we hit a crow. This time I will need a new windshield when I get back. It's too expensive to travel.

Posted by: Sarah at 06:31 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 72 words, total size 1 kb.

The dog and I spent 15 hours in the car over the weekend, so we settled in with a book on tape. Michael Crichton's Next didn't get spectacular reviews, but I found it unabridged at the library and thought that it would be good for the car.

After about eight hours of listening, I was starting to get really uneasy.

What I love about Crichton is that he always takes something we can do scientifically and then extrapolates it into the future to the ethical concerns. And yes, I am seriously nervewracked by some of the issues he raised. How about a woman who tracks down her biological father, a man who donated sperm 30 years prior, and says she's suing him because he knew at the time he donated sperm that he was addicted to cocaine, so he passed on his genes for addiction to her? Or what about a scientist getting sued because the meds he gave a woman didn't work, because he couldn't provide documentation that he gave her a placebo?

I have no problem with the technology. I have no problem with people profiting from creating the technology. I do have a serious problem with out litigious society and the ethics dilemmas this stuff will create. We're already sue-happy; just wait until you can sue your parents for procreating and passing along "faulty" genes.

I still have a couple more hours of listening to do, but as usual, Crichton is making me queasy. He's good at that.

Posted by: Sarah at 10:00 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 253 words, total size 2 kb.

I finally got around to watching this week's Army Wives. There's the obligatory TV scene where the daughter wants to date a boy, so she has to bring him home to get the third degree from her parents. My parents never behaved this way. Maybe it was because they already knew all my friends from sports and stuff at school, but we never had to have one of those TV dinners that sounds like an interview: "So, what are your plans after high school?" Did you? Is this really what normal families do, or just families on TV?

Oh, and the boyfriend starts talking about Jack Kerouac. Can I just tell you how overrated I think On the Road is? Gag me. Thus I loved the scene in Freaks and Geeks when Kim Kelly said, "I hated the book, alright? I have no idea what it's about, and the writer was clearly on drugs when he wrote it. I mean, it just went on and on and on like it was written in a total hurry. If I handed in something like this, there's no way I'd get a good grade on it, I mean, it's boring and it's unorganized, and I only read 30 pages of it anyway." (Found at 5:47 in this youtube.) Perfect summary of that crappy book.

I don't know how parents keep from rolling their eyes when high schoolers try to act mature. I don't think I'll be very good at it. I have told my mother recently that she was a good mom for not belittling me when I thought something was The Biggest Drama Ever. I'm afraid I'm gonna laugh at my kid someday.

Posted by: Sarah at 12:18 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
Post contains 285 words, total size 2 kb.

When I was visiting my grandparents, my dad's brothers were going on and on about Bruce Dern. I think it's funny when my dad's brothers get a hair up their butts about something. So one uncle lent me The Cowboys to watch. Best John Wayne movie I've ever seen. And my uncles were right: Bruce Dern is the Ultimate Bad Guy. Heaven help the boy who encounters Bruce Dern.

I couldn't help but think about the responsibilities and rewards given to these boys. They were all 12-15 years old and were gone from home all summer to drive cattle 400 miles. How many parents let their sons go four miles from their house these days without knowing exactly where they are? Heck, the first thing John Wayne did to test their courage was to make them all ride an untamed bucking horse. Imagine sending your 13-year-old son off for summer work with your family's best horse and pistol.

I also couldn't help but imagine my uncles watching this movie. They all would've been a little younger than the boys on the cattle drive when the movie came out. I wonder how it shaped them. Goodness knows their family followed the John Wayne School of Parenting.

A long trailer to the movie can be found here. Highly recommended.

Posted by: Sarah at 04:14 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 221 words, total size 1 kb.

John Hawkins found a study about honesty among liberals and conservatives. Excerpt:

When the World Values Survey asked a similar question, the results were largely the same: Those who were very liberal were much more likely to say it was all right to get welfare benefits you didn't deserve.

The World Values Survey found that those on the left were also much more likely to say it is OK to buy goods that you know are stolen. Studies have also found that those on the left were more likely to say it was OK to drink a can of soda in a store without paying for it and to avoid the truth while negotiating the price of a car.

This reminded me of someone from my past. My husband and I were friends with a guy in college who is a staunch Democrat. He got a job at Walmart while we were in school, and he routinely stole from the store while working there. He said it was OK to steal from corporations but not from mom-and-pop stores. He took all kinds of things while working there, from a winter hat to a beautiful pipe. It was pretty appalling.

The fact that he made a distinction -- that stealing from Walmart specifically was OK -- makes me think that his stealing was related to his worldview and political affiliation. I found the whole thing shocking and toyed with the idea of calling his boss and reporting him. Luckily, he quit the job before I had to make that hard decision.

UPDATE:

CaliValleyGirl writes about her opposite experience.

For the record, I agree with John Hawkins that it's a slippery slope to saying that all liberals are less honest. But in this one situation with the person I knew, he really thought it was OK to steal from Walmart because they were a big corporation. That's a messed up relativistic attitude: the act of "stealing" doesn't change depending on who you're stealing from.

Posted by: Sarah at 10:30 AM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
Post contains 334 words, total size 2 kb.

1 Good grief. I mean, I'm not saying everyone has to be like me--the crazy girl who drives back to the bank to return a pen if I walk off with it--but for cripe's sake, stealing is stealing no matter WHAT or from WHOM you're stealing. Kind of like, "well, you have a right to an opinion" (um, thanks)..."unless you disagree with me & then you're just stoooopid." Socrates and Aristotle would be so proud of the reasoning.

Posted by: Guard Wife at June 02, 2008 10:36 AM (BslEQ)

2 My mother was a jury foreperson on a civil case - a lady slipped on a step and sued the grocery store. The step was painted bright yellow and there were warning signs everywhere. The other jury members wanted to award her money, even though the store wasn't at fault, because 'the store had enough money to give some away.' Puke.

Posted by: Oda Mae at June 02, 2008 10:37 AM (tBGZb)

3 As a "staunch Democrat" I have to say this is a bunch of twaddle. And an insult. LAW

Posted by: liberal army wife at June 02, 2008 10:44 AM (tqDBA)

4 oda mae...I was on a jury for a case that was somewhat similar, except some facts were in dispute. Two things were kind of depressing: 1)The people wearing suits all seemed to want to find in favor of the store, those not wearing suits, in favor of the plaintiff. 2)Every time we started to get into a good discussion, the idiot forewoman said something like "Now, now, everyone's entitled to their opinion." She didn't seem to grasp that the whole point of the process was to arrive at a common understanding.

Posted by: david foster at June 02, 2008 10:45 AM (ke+yX)

5 That's the funny thing about juries, isn't it, David? Everyone IS entitled to an opinion, but just not in the jury room. As you said, it was to reach some common understanding of the facts so that the law the judge instructed youto apply could be so applied & a decision could be made accordingly.

Posted by: Guard Wife at June 02, 2008 12:56 PM (BslEQ)

6 I think any one who steals will use anything from politics to religion (and lets not forget "it's my parent's fault) to justify it. I mean... how else are they going to go to sleep at night? I don't think it's a reflection on "liberals" as much as it is a reflection on thieves. That's what thieves do- lie and excuse their behavior to cover up their deeds. Good grief.

Posted by: Crys at June 02, 2008 01:19 PM (dqGUK)

7 Somewhat different note - My brother went through an anti-establishment phase. He was talking about big corporations and how they make the world awful. My husband pointed out that a big corporation made the walkman he enjoyed.

Posted by: Amy at June 02, 2008 04:29 PM (QRbmz)

8 A thief is a thief, a liar is a liar. and some of the biggest liars I have ever met are staunch Republican, Born Again Christians. There - another sweeping statement. To maintain that because one is a certain colour, certain political affiliation, or a certain sex, then one will be a thief, a liar or less than honest, is foolishness. LAW

Posted by: liberal army wife at June 03, 2008 02:04 AM (A7iUf)

9 I'm not making any sweeping generalizations. I told a story about one person I know who hated evil Walmart so much that he stole from them. And I quoted an article about studies in which liberals themselves said that they steal and cheat and lie. I didn't make this up or make a blanket statement based on the one guy I knew in college that all liberals steal from Walmart.

Posted by: Sarah at June 03, 2008 02:57 AM (TWet1)

10 I'm a Democrat and i find this offensive. I find it even more ridiculous that the article makes it sound like such giant statistics when they only interviewed 156 people. 156 people of both political points. thats not even 1 percent of Americans. I also doubt that the conservatives were completely honest in answering these questions, bc they do have "higher morals" to go by. And maybe they had to keep that facade going with less than true answers. Not to say that all liberals or conservatives are liars. It goes by the person, not their politcal affiliation.

Posted by: Kati at June 05, 2008 01:45 AM (mrnzz)

Hide Comments | Add Comment