Monthly Archives: February 2012

There’s a Thin Line Between a Dog Rescuer and a Dog Hoarder

As you might have guessed from the title of my blog, I’m a genuine dog lover.  My parents and I owned a German shepherd many years and, even though we had to put him to sleep in 1985, we still remember him fondly.  I feel I saved my current dog from what could have been an unhappy life, when an ex-roommate and I agreed I’d take the puppy.  It remains one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.  There’s nothing like a dog!  I hate to see dogs – or any animals – suffer because of human neglect and stupidity.  Animal lovers just don’t understand of course.  But, most of them are idiots anyway, so I don’t care what they think.  It’s obvious that, in a city as populous as Dallas, there’d be countless cases of animal trauma – and animal hoarding.  This extraordinary editorial that appeared recently in the truly independent Dallas Observer highlights the problems the city faces with dog hoarders.

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Who Actually Benefits From Federal Benefits?

Roger Ippolito, a 74-year-old Korean War veteran, receives $450 a month in social security benefits. Amanda Voisard/ZUMA

 

For years social conservatives have bemoaned those who live off the public dole – the proverbial “welfare queen,” as Ronald Reagan so lovingly put it – rather than contribute to society by going to work and paying taxes.  Reagan ushered in a new era of bigotry, which the Newt Gingrich congressional gang refined in the 1990’s with their “Contract with America.”  All of the current GOP presidential candidates lament the alleged rise of socialism under President Obama.  Rick Perry (who makes Reagan and George W. Bush look like geniuses) even denounced Social Security as a “Ponzi scheme,” although he’s accepted his retirement package while still governor.  But, all of these clowns have ignored the stark reality of the growing wealth gap in the United States  and the simple fact that a large number of those “welfare queens” are people who once contributed mightily to their country with military service and years of hard work.

 

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Today’s Birthdays

Former TV talk-show personality Sally Jessy Raphael is 77.

 

Actor Tom Courtenay (Doctor Zhivago, The Last Butterfly) is 75.

Journalist Bob Schieffer (CBS News) is 75.

Actress Karen Grassle (Little House on the Prairie, President’s Mistress) is 70.

 

Former professional basketball player and current CBS sports analyst Matt Guokas (Philadelphia 76ers) is 68.

 

National Track and Field and Olympic Hall of Famer Lee Evans (set a world record for the 400-meter run at 1968 Mexico City Summer Olympics: 43.86 seconds at an altitude over 1,000 meters) is 65.

Guitarist Stuart ‘Woody’ Wood (Bay City Rollers) is 55.

Actress Téa Leoni  (Jurassic Park III, Santa Barbara) is 46.

 

Actor Sean Astin (The Goonies, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring) is 41.

Comedian – actress Chelsea Handler (Chelsea Lately) is 37.

 

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On February 25…

1836 – Samuel Colt received a patent for a pistol that used a revolving cylinder containing powder and bullets in six individual tubes.

1862 – The U.S. Congress passed the Legal Tender Act authorizing the use of paper notes to pay the government’s bills.  This ended the policy of using only gold or silver for transactions. 

1870 – Hiram Rhoades Revels, a Republican from Natchez, MS, became the first African-American to be sworn into Congress.

1873 – Enrico Caruso, one of the world’s greatest operatic tenors, was born in Naples, Italy.

 

1928 – The Federal Radio Commission issued the first U.S. television license to Charles Jenkins Laboratories in Washington, D.C.

 

1940 – The first televised hockey game was broadcast.  The New York Rangers whipped the Montreal Canadiens at Madison Square Garden on W2XBS-TV in New York City, 6-2.

1948 – A communist government takes power in Czechoslovakia.

 

1964 – Twenty-two-year old Cassius Clay won the world heavyweight boxing title by defeating Sonny Liston in the seventh round in Miami, FL. Clay had been an 8-1 underdog.  Clay later changed his name to Muhammed Ali.

 

1972 – Germany gave in to ransom demands from the Arab terrorist hijackers of a jumbo jet and paid $5 million for the release of its passengers.

1984 – More than 500 people, mostly children, died in Cubatao, Brazil, about 30 miles south of Sao Paulo, when a gas line exploded.

 

1986 – Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos fled to the U.S. after an uprising.  His wife, Imelda, came with him, but she had to leave her massive shoe collection behind, which was sold to pay off the Philippine national debt.

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Cartoon of the Day

 

 

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Picture of the Day

A billboard placed in New York City’s Times Square on Tuesday, the 21st, by the Media Research Corporation, a group that tracks the notorious liberal bias in the media.  You know, the kind you can’t find anywhere else except Glenn Beck’s head.

 

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Quote of the Day

“I understand why Barack Obama wants to send every kid to college, because of their indoctrination mills, absolutely.  The indoctrination that is going on at the university level is a harm to our country.”

— Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum, in an interview with conservative radio host Glenn Beck.

Santorum and Beck mulled over a number of social and political issues, but hearing them converse about education is like Abbott and Costello discuss quantum physics.  Higher education makes people think outside the religious and social boxes in which their families and communities place them.  Therefore, in Santorum’s convoluted view, it’s better for them not to go to college and just stay ignorant.  I guess that’s why he and Beck get along so well.  Add Sarah Palin into the sloppy mix and it’ll be the holy trinity of stupid!

 

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Texting Affects Ability to Interpret Words

As if some of us hadn’t figured this out already, new research designed to understand the effect of text messaging on language found that texting has a negative impact on people’s linguistic ability to interpret and accept words.  The study found that those who texted more were less accepting of new words, but those who read more traditional print media such as books, magazines, and newspapers were more accepting of the same words.  Data was culled from examining university students, so you know the researchers tried really hard.

 

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Color Photographs of the German Front During World War I

 

Courtesy of Hans Hildebrand, Daily Telegraph

 

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Lawsuit Claims Obama Can’t Be President Because He’s Black

This apparently is for real.  An Alaskan man, Gordon Warren Epperly, filed a lawsuit to have President Obama removed this November’s ballot because…he’s biracial, or a mulatto.  The suit states, in part:

“Barack Hussein Obama II, a.k.a. Barack Hussein Obama, a.ka. Barack H. Obama has the race status of being a “mulatto.” Barack Obama’s father (Barack Hussein Obama I) was a full blood Negro being born Nyang’oma Kogelo, Nyanza Province, Kenya and raised in the Colony of Kenya. Barack Obama’s mother (Stanley Ann Dunham) was a white Caucasian woman being born in Wichita, Kansas on November 29, 1942 and raised in the state of Washington and in the state of Hawaii.

As stated above, for an Individual to be a candidate for the office of president of the United States, the candidate must meet the qualifications set forth in the United States Constitution and one of those qualifications is that the Candidate shall be a “natural born citizen” of the United States. As Barack Hussein Obama II is of the “mulatto” race, his status of citizenship is founded upon the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Before the [purported] ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, the race of “Negro” or “mulatto” had no standing to be citizens of the United States under the United States Constitution.

As the fourteenth amendment is only a grant of “civil rights” and not a grant of “political rights” Barack Hussein Obama II does not have and “political rights” under any provision of the United States Constitution to hold any Public Office of the United States government.”

In other words, Epperly still believes that the original framers of the U.S. Constitution meant for only full-blooded Caucasian males to serve as elected officials, mainly president.  I already knew the “birther” movement was born of racial hatred and intolerance.  But, this move is pure bigotry.  White people who wish the United States was a White-only society don’t realize they already have one.  It’s called Europe.  That’s where Epperly and his like-minded ilk need to go.  And, take that idiot Sarah Palin with you!

 

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