Fight the Amoral Fight

BC – this is more a riff on what you wrote than a direct response. Hope you don't mind!

Where to draw the line ...
Right where public good outweighs the individual freedom to be stupid, LOL

Seat belt laws were sold to the public as life savers but they were sold to legislators as money/productivity savers. By avoiding more serious injuries and long-term disability, seat belt use is a public good by all measures and, after all these years, the stats bear that out. Hence, laws to make seat belt use mandatory. For the record, I hate wearing a seat belt – especially in the vehicle I drive most – and I do it, anyway. I probably would never have started doing so if it weren't for the law.

Vaccines are a similar story. Communicable, potentially epidemic, diseases have consequences for everyone, whether they get sick or not. Vaccinations are statistically extremely safe for the individual relative to the risk to everyone if too many do not vaccinate.

Smallpox vaccines are no longer given, I think. Even the military and foreign aid workers don't have to get it. Smallpox was eradicated in the wild a couple decades ago. Were there some folk who felt their individual rights were trampled on when they and their kids were “forced” to get the vaccine? I don't know and I don't care.
Polio could be eradicated. There is a big push on. It would help if there weren't “leaders” telling people that the vaccine is a plot by the West to sterilize Muslims (it happens that Polio's main strongholds today are in predominantly Muslim areas).
These pushes to vaccinate to eradicate are very expensive, and I see where some might also think they cross the line into “personal freedom” territory. Why do we do it? Because it costs so much less than dealing with the consequences of outbreaks, in money and in human suffering.
It would be far less cost-effective to make every effort to eradicate diseases like pertussis and measles and mumps, so it is “voluntary” except that organizations can make it mandatory for attendance/participation.
There is no line, here, though. Vaccinate.

I guess we've got that covered. Again. LOL
Sorry – hot button issue.
I do think it's much harder to know where to draw the line on some issues.

I think what LC said about rigorous scientific study is valid when it comes to things which are measurable in that way. So, if we have an end goal in mind - lessening suffering and costs associated with car accidents, for instance - we can study what best practices will approach that goal, considering costs and human psychology while we're at it - and end up with things like seat belt laws.

Should every car have a breathalyzer installed with the requirement that every driver must pass the test before the car will even start? I don't know. It seems really intrusive. I would rather see better education efforts but, really, how much better can it get? We all know not to drive under the influence of alcohol and many do it, anyway, and innocents suffer from something entirely preventable. That is, many people pay, one way or another, for one person's personal freedom to drink and drive. I can think of some other ways to prevent drunk driving with modern technology but they are all intrusive and subject to misuse.

Saw on the news where Walenda has been granted permission to tightrope walk across Niagara Falls. Now, I think that's silly, but, he probably should have that permission. It's possible that some kid(s) will try to emulate him, and that may be reason enough to stop him, but, I don't think so. It is not a large risk to the population as a whole and I'm guessing the guy has life insurance to care for his dependents if the worst happens. He won't need health insurance, LOL

The contraceptive “debate” being had by a bunch of privileged white men is another case. It used to be that easy access to contraceptives was a Conservative position. Yes, really. Why? Because it saves an incredible amount of money! And suffering and social ills. The stats are there, easily found, constantly quoted - and suddenly ignored. It is so much easier to attack women than to attack our economic issues – some of which would be alleviated, have been alleviated, by cheap/free access to reproductive health care for women and men.
The only way this becomes an issue of individual rights is if an individual is required to use contraceptives, with penalties for pregnancy, and that is not what's happening here.
Another funny fact – Liberals once opposed easy access to family planning services because it was seen as a bigoted attack on minorities by government. ha. ha.
Moral of the story – if politicians need someone to kick around they pick women, children, the elderly, the poor, and any handy non-white group. Health care, education, immigration, minimum wage, social safety nets … the list of issues that affect less powerful groups is long and we never seem to get enough of these “debates”. The folks making the law have no other use for those issues beyond scoring political points – and distracting the electorate from the work they are not doing.

Yep. I'm off the rails again ...

calpoppy – I would say that the theocrats in this country look more to Saudi Arabia than Iran as a model. In SA the rich are really, incredibly, unimaginably rich, and the king and his court have achieved a position on the world stage with a lot of influence over how money flows around the globe and other world affairs. Iran might have been going that way until they had that little revolution awhile back and kicked out our puppet. Now it seems nobody gets much at all. I don't think that's what our guys are after and they'll go for the straight-up theocratic aristocracy model over Iran's failing attempt to meld theocracy with democracy.
Otherwise, in terms of laws, their god is the same as Santorum's god. That's, you know, the irony of the thing.

The sweater is … still there! If I spent half the time knitting that I spend perusing knitting-related websites, I'd be done by now! Ah, well. I did finish my “in between sweater knitting” dishcloth. It came out fine and, more to the point (not really needing a dishcloth, so much), I have a good idea of the properties of the yarn I used. Next up (as another break from endless stockinette) is a scarflette for my aunt because my mom liked the one I made for her for Christmas :)

Glad you have enjoyed the change in the weather! It's about time you got your turn :)

LC – I can imagine! That would be hilarious! Destructive and dispiriting, sure, but aren't most confirmation hearings that way these days? Might as well get a chuckle out of it.

Bogon – you did a good job on that story! Even some character development in there which I've seen authors miss despite having hundreds of pages at their disposal, LOL

I would rather be the straightener, too, if those were my only two choices. But, I don't want that kind of responsibility! I'm more of a consensus sort of person.

[Yes I am. Shut up.] [ ;) ]

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Well, that only took about 24 hours to write. Man, I'm wordy.
I did get some knitting done. I also got swamped with work yesterday and today. Tomorrow will be more of the same.
Tonight I will (try to) watch a movie that I bought (a big deal – I own very few DVDs) and that came in the mail today. I've seen it several times. I'm excited!
Can't stop the signal.

Er, weather? Rocking horse. Another low chance of rain tomorrow night, I guess.
Glad I live here :)

I wasn't going to blog about this ... or at all today ...
But, I am happy to see note of this guy ... and my afternoon plans have been postponed ...

Most folks have probably not been following this First Amendment story out of Cranston, Rhode Island. It started awhile ago when a parent complained at a school board meeting about a prayer banner at the high school. A student spoke in support of the complaint. The board refused to remove the banner, the ACLU got involved and they needed a litigant and the student agreed to be that litigant. Not surprisingly, things got ugly for that 16-year-old girl, ultimately requiring a police escort for her to go to school and the FBI's involvement to investigate violent threats made against her in various places, including her facebook page.
Also not surprisingly, the court ruled the prayer unconstitutional, as they must and always do. Many in the community are asking the board to appeal the ruling, apparently thinking that spending yet more taxpayer money on a case that can't be won is worthwhile.
That's the recap. Here's why I'm mentioning it now:
A first-hand account from the recent school board meeting where they were again hearing requests for appeal says, in part, that a man

"who got up early in the comment session and said “I went to Catholic schools, where I said the rosary every day. I also said it at home, with my father. In fact, I said it today with a dying friend. So I’m a practicing Catholic.

“On the other hand, my great grandfather came here because he was not allowed to own the land he farmed, in Ireland. Because he was a Catholic. In a prod country.

“Don’t appeal.”

He sat down, and the atmosphere in the room changed. The appeal nuts were no longer whooping and hollering and, when they did resume, a lot of the spirit had gone out of them."

I just think that's worth noting. Because I do realize that there are folks who know the religious history of this country, and why the Establishment Clause exists, and I so so appreciate it when a person of faith stands up for themselves and all the rest of us.


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Now I'm told the postponement is over ... seeya!

BC! Good job on that rant :)

Re: Too many people - definitely true that the children in a family of 4 will do better than children in a family of 10, and this is most obvious in high-poverty, low-resource areas. It isn't just a matter of population, though.
The other thing that has been found through study, time and again, is that pregnancy, childbirth, and caring for infants reduces a woman's productivity to such a large extent that, without the means to control family size and spacing of children, societies that withhold access to family planning services lose essentially half their available workforce. That doesn't just mean nine-to-fivers, of course, but all the extra work that women do in the community. More succinctly, the entire community, however it is defined, benefits substantially from reduced family size. The stats on that are mind-blowing - wish I had some to hand, LOL

Thanks for the link to Taibbi's article. I don't always like or agree with him but he always makes me laugh!
"... like watching a cruel experiment involving baboons, laughing gas and a forklift."
I'm still grinning over that line :)

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Here's some more lighter fare ... sort of. Why would this cat behave this way?



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Still recovering from the weekend here - today was a day of extreme rest but still not enough! So, I'm going to rest some more, LOL

Happy Monday Evening :)

Howdy!
Some random-ish stuff, some follow-up ...

On the Army's spiritual fitness test and Sgt. Griffith's efforts, the Pasadena Sun has statements from various religious persons and a couple atheists. It is four pages but each is short.

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Had been thinking about posting this since it came out - Public Citizen has a campaign going to break up BoA. This video is perhaps better seen without sound, lol, but has good information and a place to go to take action, if one is so inclined.



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For the plant lovers - 30,000-year-old seeds planted, grown, and successfully pollenated! From a squirrel stash! They are very pretty :)

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The weather is pretty nice - warm and partly sunny and, most importantly, not windy!

Thursday! Already!

Warm and sunny and not too breezy, atm. Nice :)
Yesterday's weather was great, too.

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LC - Public Citizen titles its action page, "Too Big to Fail = Too Big to Exist" and has a petition to sign. You probably knew that.
Their Action Center has lots of petitions and, more importantly, lots of information on what's going on, all in one place. You probably knew that, too :)

BC - very funny! That's what would happen today but if you look at what was said at the time you won't find much difference. Politics has always been horrid.

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Got some stuff!

At HoPuff is an article about religious groups getting a clue and banding together to get religion out of politics. Good piece and good sentiment, imo.

On the other hand, a judge in central PA has ruled that personal offense is justification for assault (video). I mean, I find the victim's actions offensive enough to make me cringe, but, assault? Really? I don't think we have the right to not be offended, let alone the right to physically attack someone for causing offense. Guess the judge disagrees. Do you?

Let's return to money and politics - last week John Scalzi had a pretty good piece about how "Not Being Able to Scrape By With $200k Is Usually Your Own Fault" that seems worth posting. It's brief.

This is more fun, but, if you are going to click on the following link to WEIT, do it during daytime and many hours before you plan to sleep - it is the stuff of nightmares. In the comments there is a link to the story of a biggun. Eek. Next, check out this Wikipedia page to see other members of the family that are much easier on the eyes. Awwww. I want some!
If that got you curious, it's worth checking out WP on the whole class. There's a lot of them and they are all very very cool :)

On the knitting front, I watched the Yarn Harlot do lever knitting on youtube, along with some other vids on that technique. I don't know that I can do that but I need to find some alternative. I've become much more relaxed, overall, while knitting, but my hand cramps pretty badly, despite regular stretching, and that limits the amount of time I can spend on that activity. If only I could spend less time on the computer I might be okay, LOL

That's some of what I've been looking at. What about you?

LC - I would hope that a judge's religion would not affect his rulings so wouldn't want him to have to recuse himself. I mean, "conflict of interest" usually is about either money or personal involvement with the parties in the case. If it becomes a matter of religious beliefs, we've got trouble, since there is no way to accurately check that.
And don't forget that the first judge to overturn Prop. 8 was/is gay and proponents said he should recuse himself. That's ridiculous, too.

Anyway, I don't know that the judge's religion drove his decision. I think a lot of people are willing to give special privilege to religion and religious sensibilities, over and above the law. It may be that Muslims are more prone to do that, but, I am not at all sure of that. Certainly not in our country.

The "fighting words" entry was very interesting! I did not know that.

Glad you liked the critters :)

Did you get fog this morning? They say Mr. Ed is back in town for a bit and some (relatively) cold air heading our way.

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Speaking of religious sensibilities ... one place/time where they must be taken into consideration is Afghanistan/now. The kind of sloppiness that was shown by those responsible for burning Korans there just can not happen. Reality is what it is.
OTOH, I have two Korans in my house and, far as I can tell, they are nothing special, as books go. Both are ink on paper, like any other book. One is very pretty and well annotated. I got it free at the book festival and it was printed by The Institute of Islamic Knowledge in Houston, Texas. Is it worth anyone's life? I don't think so. They were handing them out like candy. Hundreds of them.
Still, when in Rome ...

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I plugged Sgt. Griffith's upcoming event, Rock Beyond Belief, so I will plug this one, too - the Reason Rally is being held in D. C. on March 24 and I would go, if I could, just to see Tim Minchin and James Randi. And Adam Savage! Plus, I love D. C. and being there in early Spring would make me happy :) *sigh*
[Really, I would like to go just about anywhere, at the moment, LOL Despite the nice weather and plenty of daytrips, I need a major change of scenery, I think. I get like that.]

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Um ... I would offer something more fun, but, I haven't found much today. Let's see ... more knitting woes? Why not?
Very late last night - like, well after midnight - I thought I'd do that one last purl row I need before splitting the front [Yes, I'm still working the front. Shut up.] of the sweater. I had been working on it the night before and did all this measuring and counting and figured I needed that row to get back to RS and be ready for the next step.
I was really tired. I mean, really tired! Which is why I didn't want to do any more than that one row. Counting and casting off and so forth would be too much in that state of mind. You understand.
So, I put on some music (couldn't even attend to the last book of the Iliad, much as I want to get that done), and purled the row ... wait. That doesn't look right. How did I get purl bumps on the right side? What did I ... grrr @#$%^&!!!!! I did that row last night after I figured out I needed it! Why didn't I see that?!?! Because I was mindless, too tired to be knitting, that's why :(
Back in the bag it went and, now that I've finished lunch, I'll be doing some tinking. I may stay in tonight and knit while I'm awake, for a change ;)

Puppies!!!!
LC - not just crazy-adorable pups but a nice photo, to boot! Now I want to go play chase at the beach - they look soooo happy :)

Knitting back on track!

The marine layer was gone by 9 here yesterday, also. Today ... I dunno. By the time I got up around 10 it was hazy-sunny. Chilly. Looking at the rgb it looks like Mr. Ed gave us a break and hung out further down the coast.

One day we will all grow up. In the meantime, ideologues will ideologize*, and make the world a stupider place.
I read somewhere recently that Portugal decriminalized all drugs. This move, of course, allows folk to seek help for addiction and saves taxpayers a ton of money.

* this is not a word ;)

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Rain coming! Maybe. A little. More importantly, COLD coming :( It may be freezing tonight and calpoppy may get snow! But, not much, since there is so little moisture involved.
Winter warmth is gone for the week, anyway.

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Did I hear Newt say he'd get gas prices to $2.50/gallon if he were King? How does that work in that utopian free-market, capitalist, economy that Republicans are supposed to love so much?
Does this message even work any more? I saw some poll results that suggest that Americans have wised up and realize that the prez does not actually dictate prices on anything. Newt, I guess, thinks he can. Maybe some still believe that.

The need for authority runs deep in the human psyche. Some need direction more than others but it lives in all of us. Republicans are really good at tapping into that. It is truly ironic - they insist that government should get out of everything while running for an office of government on a platform that includes promising government intervention and control. You gotta admit, that's quite a trick, and they pull it off beautifully.

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Oh, I dunno. It's Sunday ... think I'll take a nap :)

Karen - even you need a lazy day, now and then ;) Sounds nice! I missed most of the Oscars but that's okay - I missed all of the movies, LOL
I have a friend who worked some parties this weekend and am looking forward to good stories, though!

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Well, my day's gone wonky. I had to get up early to get my mom to Ontario airport this morning on kind of a last minute decision. I'm sleepy again.

On the upside of that, I got to drive through the squally weather. I must have been minutes behind a couple showers on the way out there, as the roads were wet in places, and the clouds were very beautiful, especially up against the San Gabriels. The Mt. Wilson cam observer comment says "snow showers" so it might be pretty tomorrow (just gray, now, of course!).
On the way back I had the joy of going from completely dry road to "OMG I CAN'T SEEEEEEEE!!!" in an instant and that'll wake a body up.
I just love it when you can see sunlit rain pouring from a cloud over yonder.
The temperature changed rather a lot. It hovered around 55 the whole way there but was down to 46 in the SGV, which is also where I saw the most rain, on the way back around 11 or 11:30.
Here in SP it looks like it rained a bit. Perhaps there will be more. Looks nifty on the RGB again, and the swirly looks big and ominous.

So, it would be nice to use what has become a day off to visit blogs ... but, that may not be a great idea. I didn't get that nap yesterday and won't nap, now, if I can stay awake ... video games and mindless tv sound good :)

Karen - once again, SP received less than a tenth of an inch! Oh, well. I'm glad you got some and that other points south did, too.

I heard enough about Tree of Life that I think I'll skip it. I do want to see The Artist. Looks like fun and they are both so cute, lol
Hugo seems like something I'd like. I might read the book first.
I watch so few movies, these days. Mostly on HBO (to justify paying for it!) but I ought to check out the library's collection. That would be easy.

BC - oh, yeah. Sudden downpours, dense fog around the corner, dust storms ... I've run into that quandary several times!
Yesterday I was on the 210 freeway, going 70 mph, with a whole lot of other people, so all I could do was keep going and fumble for the wipers. On a happy note: my fellow SoCalians did unusually well by not slamming on brakes and by sticking to their lanes, making it much safer than some situations I've seen.
Once, I pulled way over (I hoped - couldn't really see and went by 'feel') in a blinding sand storm on I-15 and put my arms up to guard my head and face in case of impact. There were many close calls by the sounds of it and I ended up with one truck half an inch from my rear bumper and a car spun out sideways blocking me in front. I never saw either of them (and the guy behind me said he didn't even know my car was there!) until the storm had passed. Ah, good times, LOL

Hey, I'm in the process of finding stuff from my favorites to add to your tea blog - and have gotten sidetracked! Will post that before posting this.
Thanks for writing that, btw - interesting history and it's been great reading what the tea-drinkers have to say :)

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Weather is back to normal, as expected. In fact, it's downright seasonable, for a change! Chance of rain in the forecast tomorrow.
Really cold last night and this morning but they haven't put up another advisory for tonight (yet).

ohdearohdearohdear. I have to watch the weather! My mom is in Ohio and under a tornado watch which means that, even though I know they have little chance of being hit by a tornado, I'll be worrying all day. Also, intensely jealous! She was laughing at me - "haha I got thunderstorms!" My mom is mean, LOL

I have just been informed that they have TWC on so they'll get warning, at least.

I put the farm's address into wundermap and will be watching obsessively all day. Heck of a line heading towards them, atm.

Weather here is fine - but actually cooler than where mom is! She thought that was funny, too.

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calpoppy - the Mt Wilson cam shows snow still on the ground but gone from the trees. Glad you got some! Bet it was pretty :) And, yeah, nice that it melted so you don't have to drive on it.
I am envious of your Joshua Trees :)
Between bragging on the weather, my mom said that the crocus are coming up in SE Ohio - too early, like everywhere else.

Being part of a pack, whatever the size, is a joy, for sure.
Traveling guilt-free won't make up for the losses (obviously) but it is good to be able to do that. If this dang stray cat hadn't decided to become our garage cat ...

Karen - our Blockbuster closed down recently so the kiosk thingy at the grocery store is the only rental option in town, I think. I've never used one and may have to try it.
Let us know what you think of Hugo.

They've taken rain out of our forecast and replaced it with "partly cloudy". Oh, well. Looks like you still have a chance!

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Oh, hey! Happy Leap Day! :)

That means I'll need a March blog, I guess.