THE DRESDEN FILES Reading Challenge



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Thursday, April 12, 2012

WEASELS OF THE WEEK, APRIL EDITION

It’s been a while since I did a WEASELS column, and, after watching the nightly news programs that I enjoy, I thought it was about time to do another one. Understand, I don’t have as strong a stomach as I used to have in regards to the political nonsense that’s going on lately. I’m removing Rick Santorum from this list, principally because, while I thought – and still DO think – that the man is a wild-eyed Eisenhowerian idiot as well as a racially insensitive and homophobic bigot, he’s got enough troubles in his life right now. I pity both of the Santorums with my whole heart. It’s not easy having a special needs child in your life (as I know all too well, having a couple of kiddos that have them) but to have one with the problems that Isabella has, and to know in advance that she’s not going to live for very long is something that I wouldn’t wish off on my very worst enemy on the longest day that I live. Goddess Bless you all, Santorum family.

OK, on to the weasels.

WEASEL OF THE WEEK, #1: As usual, Willard “Mitt” Romney. Le SIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGH. I don’t think that I really need to go into detail here other than to say that he’s NOT going to be crowned KingOfTheUnitedStates if he actually does secure the nomination, regardless of what he thinks. If, that is, he DOES think.

WEASEL OF THE WEEK, #2: Rick “GovGoodHair” Perry. Again, le SIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGH. What with his stupid insistence on trashing women’s health care here in Texas, need I say more? The only person that’s going to be surprized when he is defeated in his next race for governor is going to be: RICK PERRY. Pissing on women’s issues is not exactly a smart thing to do. Tends to piss off the women – and, dear GovGoodHair, we DO vote and we DO care about getting f’ed over by men.


WEASEL OF THE WEEK, #3: Allen “CrazyMan” West. From the Daily Inquisitor (http://www.inquisitr.com/218423/allen-west-calls-80-house-democrats-communists-then-he-rants-like-a-lunatic/): Rep. Allen West apparently wants to be the 21st century version of Joe McCarthy, telling nearly 100 visitors at a town hall event in Florida on Tuesday night that he recently “heard” that 80 House Democrats are actually members of the Communist Party. What I find disturbing, to put it mildly, is here is a man that served in the Army for 20+ years, and only reached the rank of Lt. Colonel. From his biography in Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_West_(politician), Col. West elected to retire after an investigation of his conduct during the interrogation of a detainee in Taji, Iraq. “elected to retire” is militaryspeak for “resign or be prosecuted”. And now, he’s seeing Commies in the Progressive Democratic Caucus? Puh-LEEEEEEEEEEZE, give me a break. My only question is just how long he’s going to be a representative!

WEASEL OF THE WEEK, #4: Al Gore and Joel Hyatt of CURRENT TV. I followed Keith Olbermann over to CURRENT TV when these folks hired him for a number of reasons. I liked what he had to say, and, while I thought that he went a lot over the top in his opinions, at least he wasn’t afraid to HAVE opinions and express them. I loved the “Fridays with Thurber” segments, and I liked the way that he poked holes in peoples’ pretensions. If I thought that, sometimes, he should have shut the F up, on balance he was about as objective a person as could be wished for. Unfortunately, CURRENT TV, while it really is trying to be a serious competitor in the overly crowded cable news biz, isn’t exactly doing a great job. I was really happy to see Jennifer Granholm and Cenk Uygar added to the line-up; I’ve watched them both and thought that they both were interesting people. Unfortunately, and ultimately, both of them are pretty boring. Replacing Keith Olbermann with Eliot Spitzer is a big mistake. I like Governor Spitzer, don’t get me wrong, just as I like Governor Granholm and Mr. Uygar. It’s just, well, a little of them all goes a very long way. Basically, they’re all pretty boring.

WEASEL OF THE YEAR (NO contest): George Zimmerman. Period. No matter what political follies we get in this country, this man – or rather, this person of the male persuasion – committed an act of murder. He’s been charged with murder in the second degree, which means that the death penalty is off the table. Regardless of whether or not he is actually convicted in the legal sense of the word doesn’t really matter at this point. Yes, I can hear you all now: “WHAAAAAAAAAAAAT?????????? It does TOO matter”. No, it doesn’t. Regardless of the outcome of his trial, he is going to have to live with the fact of his having killed someone who wasn’t guilty of anything other than walking down the street, being black. He’s going to have to live with that for the rest of his life, which I honestly don’t think is going to be either long or happy. If he is convicted, he’s going to spend his time in prison in either AdSeg or SuperSeg because if he were to be placed in general population, he’d live only as long as somebody in one of the black gangs didn’t recognize him.

Going to be a fun year for politics, folks! Please remember also to keep Mr. Martin and Mrs. Fulton, Trayvon Martin’s parents, in your thoughts and prayers.



WHAT, EXACTLY, IS INTEGRITY?

WonderWife is looking for a job. Again. So, here we go on the roller-coaster of the employment search. So far, 5 replies, 4 phone interviews – and, HOPEFULLY, a new job quick. With the skill set that she’s got now (she passed her Certified Weld Inspector testing a couple of months ago), she shouldn’t be out of work for very long.

Why is she unemployed? That’s an interesting story, actually, and it begins and ends with her personal ethicality and her personal integrity. The dictionary definition of integrity according to Webster’s Dictionary is interesting as well (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/integrity). To wit:


1: firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values: incorruptibility

2: an unimpaired condition: soundness

3: the quality or state of being complete or undivided: completeness

Last Friday, she was ordered to sign off on something that wasn’t right. Structurally, it passed a cursory examination, and probably wouldn’t have split or caused problems. It wasn’t QUITE up to specs, but it was close enough. Trouble was, it was a piece of drill stem with a marginal weld that was going out to an offshore oilfield to be placed in a deep-water/deep-drilled well (anybody out there remember the Deep Water HORIZON?). She refused to sign off on the piece of pipe; when she was told “do it OR ELSE”, she quit. Walked away from a very well-paying job with benefits on a point of principle. No, she didn’t ask me if it was OK if she did this. She didn’t need to. She knew that I’d back her decision even if it means we were going to be having a bit of a hard time until she found another job. Y’see, my wife has personal ethics and personal integrity.

She had the integrity to refuse to compromise on matters of principle as it related to her job. She has always had this. Has it made her life hard? Yes, it has. There aren’t very many people out there that would do something like this. That’s why I love her so much. She cares now and has always cared, throughout her life, to do what’s right, even if it costs her, sometimes, more than she can afford to lose. Kinda reminds me, in a lot of ways, of the speech that the fake President made at the end of DAVE. You remember, the line where he says that he ought to care more about doing what’s right than doing what’s popular, and that he should be willing give it all up if he doesn’t do that. If he isn’t, then maybe he doesn’t deserve the job in the first place.

I have been following the Republican electoral process with a great deal of interest, because of three men that were in the race (and who now are not, for various reasons). These three men were all men of principle and personal ethics. They weren’t liars or prevaricators. They were honest and honourable men. Even if I found some of their positions to be, well, extreme and Eisenhowerian (Rick Santorum) or fairly chuckle-headed in some ways (John Huntsman), or just plain incomprehensible in this day and age (Gary Johnson), still, they all had the integrity to state their positions and stand by them. Unfortunately, their principles and honesty didn’t get them very far.

I hope that whatever company hires WonderWife appreciates her integrity. I’m proud of her.