Tag Guns

A well regulated argument

Michael 2 Comments

I had a hard time debating with myself if I wanted to post this or not. It’s a topic that gets beaten to death so often you’d think it would be reasonable enough and just die but then, it’s not a reasonable topic. I also thought about putting out a “special” post last Friday because it was Gun Violence Awareness Day. But then I thought, the last thing you needed was me throwing in a nickel’s worth of my two cents on that day.

There is no doubt there is gun violence all over the place. Every week brings new mass shootings to the national news and local newscasts are filled with stories of shootings every day. In my greater metro area, between Friday and Sunday of this past weekend, four people lost their lives to gun violence and several others injured. There have been less than a handful of days a shooting hadn’t been reported here since a local mass shooting at an AirBnB party the night before Easter, including one when the victim was a one year old sitting in the back of a car targeted in a drive by shooting. If you’re not aware of the gun violence in the United States, then you’re really too stupid to be reading this.

So let’s summarize, all the people who think the Second Amendment gives you the right to own a gun, you’re wrong.

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

That was, is, and forever will be until its repeal, all the Second Amendment says. Nobody can deny you the possession of a weapon used to defend the STATE (i.e. the USA) if done so needed as a part of a REGULATED military effort). Considering we have a perfectly acceptable armed forces system now that was not in place in 1789, there is no longer a reason to guarantee anybody to right to maintain a weapon. But even if there was, the right is only protected when used to defend the country. Not to hunt, not to target shoot, not to defend oneself, not to forget you have it in your carryon bag at the airport, not to settle suburban hedge trimming disputes, and not to commit mass, or even single murder.

I am nothing if I cannot look at both sides, so let’s look. Gun control advocates point to the numbers, the most often quoted is that in the U. S. of A. in 2020, there were 45,222 gun related deaths (I don’t know why but that’s the last year the total is available). Gun advocates will say, “Woah, woah, woah. Over half of those were suicides.” And they are right. Fifty-four percent of the 45,000+ deaths, or about 24,000 were suicides. They don’t mention, but I will, that 2% (a little over 900). That leaves 43% or 19,455 people intentionally killed by another American presumably exercising his or her right to own a gun as part of a regulated militia to protect the country. That is over 19,000 people who were victims of gun violence.

The gun advocate will say that of those 45,222, almost 25,000 people were going to die anyway. (Maybe, maybe not, but let’s stick with saving the 19,000 for now.)  How does that compare. Forget deaths due to cancer, heart disease, train derailments, bad lettuce, or anything else not gun related. Let’s compare that to those who are participating in protecting the country in the modern well-regulated armed forces system. And let’s not just look at 2020. Let’s look at the entire twenty-first century to date. So far, in all armed conflicts since 2001, there have been 7,075 fatalities, about an average of 36 per year. That’s 18,964 LESS deaths due to defending the state in a well regulated military than deaths due to gun violence. Per year.

I could stop there but somebody is going to say, “But I just use my gun for hunting or target shooter or protecting my family. Not to randomly shoot somebody.” First, let’s ignore the protect your family argument because if you have a gun for protection and you are not planning on shooting somebody if you need protecting, then why do you have it? Then for the hunters and sportsmen (sportspeople?), you don’t need an assault rifle to shoot a deer, nor a 60 or 100 shot magazine to fire 20 times at a paper target. And really, you don’t need any ammunition at all until you’re ready to hunt or competitively shoot. I recall reading an argument to not regulate guns but, given that the Second Amendment is quiet on what you load into those arms, to ban ammunition. Maybe not such a horrible idea.

Consider this. For years, I shot skeet recreationally. (I’m not sure why because you just can’t make a good meal out of them, but even so … anyway) Every Sunday afternoon I could be found at the rod and gun club blasting clay pigeons into oblivion. I travelled to and from the club with my unloaded shot gun and at the club bought only the amount of ammunition I would use for the afternoon’s festivities and then go home with an unloaded shotgun. They say never to store you gun and ammunition in the same place. Mine were separated by about 15 miles. I’d call that safe and responsible.

It always amazes me when people toss around the word “Right” in their argument for … well, for anything. Gun rights, women’s rights, students’ rights, union rights … like they have a right to do whatever they please and find somewhere in the Constitution to defend it. And there are a lot of guaranteed rights in the US Constitution. But in each case there are also qualifiers and limitations. Rights are guaranteed. Unregulated license is not.  We are a nation obsessed with the Rights without bearing the Responsibilities.

Now I’m not going to say we should or should not repeat the Second Amendment, although I will say before anybody tries to use the Second Amendment as a justification for killing 19,000 people this year, they really need to see a good psychiatrist.

Sorry, no cute picture for this post. I couldn’t seem to put one together to celebrate so much death.

Things I think I think

Michael 5 Comments

Now that I’ve had my fill of ranting for a while here, it’s time to catch up on some thing that have been floating around in my brain and make some room up there for future ramblings.

thumbnail_IMG_0599Have you ever tried to grow a tree from an avocado pit? Let me rephrase that, have you never tried to grow a tree from an avocado pit? I think that’s required in “Things to do in your first adult kitchen 101.” I tried and sort of even succeeded. Sort of. For a while I had an actual tree. It stood about 5 feet tall but was only as big around as a school pencil. Unfortunately, not quite as sturdy. My latest experiment was “let’s grow a pineapple plant from the crown of one.” (The things we did while locked in.) A year later I have not just one, but two.  I wonder if this is how Dole got started.

I recently ranted over the increasing number of loaded guns brought to airport security. The most common excuse for such behavior was “Duh, I forgets I was packing a rod.” I found a story about another feller who forgot he was carrying a loaded weapon. This guy brought his gun not the airport but to his bathroom. As he dropped his pants to drop into the seat, the gun dropped out of his pocket into the floor and went off, sending the bullet through the bathroom floor which doubled as the bathroom ceiling to the apartment below where it met the hand of another young man, unarmed but now not unharmed. You can’t blame the gun guy. There have been alligator sightings in the area and you never know when one might pop up anywhere there is water. (My conjecture, not his explanation. He said he forgot it was in his pocket. Yeah, right.)

Service with aAre there any grandfather clock aficionado out there? I have a contemporary long case that has travelled with me now through three homes and resided in multiple places at each. The years have been kinder to the case than the movement. It is still in great shape, shapewise, but it runs late. Not slow. Late. It keeps a 60 minute hour today as good as the day it was uncrated but little by little it has developed its unique peculiarity of chiming the hour late. We’re now up to 5 minutes late. It’s not unusual for a guest when hearing the chime to comment, “Oh it’s x o’clock, no wait, I have 5 after. Your clock is slow,” and I respond, “No, it’s not slow, it’s late.” It has taken 20 years for the chime to be out of sync by 5 minutes. (Out of synch?) An optimist would note that in another 220 years, it will work its way around and be right on time.

Just two rants ago I questioned what could be more valuable than your own child in response to Consumers Union’s suggestion that until all manufacturers put warning devices to alert to unforgotten children locked in the back of hot cars, one should put something of value there that you would not likely forget. For one young father around here last week, that should have been tacos. Apparently, the good lad had a hankering for tacos. Not just any tacos, he wanted the kind available only at the local casino. There he parked his car, left his children behind just to run in and place the order, then decided he might as well wait for that order sitting in front of a slot machine instead of in front of his steering wheel. Security cameras caught his elation at hitting a jackpot about the same time they caught his kids waiting alone in the car. No word on how long the tacos were waiting.

Okay, sharp witted readers may have inferred that I implied this post might be rant-free, yet 50% was rant-like. Let’s call it rank-lite. Hey, I’m making progress!

Uncommon Sense

Michael 3 Comments

The past few weeks have sorely tested my patience I wish everybody would go out and invest in some self-help books that include how to recapture some common freaking sense. Let’s start.

It’s summertime in the good old U. S. of A. which means, even in the absence of global warming, it gets hot. Glass amplifies heat. An enclosed space holds heat. Things inside hot enclosed spaces cook. And that’s how Jordan Mott came up with the oven in 1490 (minus the glass – that’s a bonus). Because we know it doesn’t count unless it happened in America, we can fast forward to 1882 when Thomas Ahern worked out the details for an electric oven. Granted, he was Canadian but that’s as close as we’re going to get unless you want to count the first person who fried an egg on the hood of a car. That had to be a “real” American, and that gets us to cars, hot cars, hot car interiors on hot summer days. There have been such a spate of kids being cooked in the back seats of cars – again. The government is mandating that by 2025 all auto manufacturers to put in systems that display and sound warning messages to check the back seat for Junior and Fido when you shut off your car. If you aren’t lucky enough to have one of the cars that already have such a warning and/or until you do, they suggest you put “something of value” in the back seat so you don’t forget your kid. Duh! Is it just me or is there nothing anybody owns more valuable than their own child? That was an honest to gosh, news piece just within the last week on most major news outlets. Don’t forget your kid, put something of value in the back with them.”

While we’re on the subject of kids, in June in a small Pennsylvania airport, the TSA confiscated a loaded handgun – in a baby stroller! According to a report on TSA.gov, “The man said that when he and his girlfriend take their dogs and child for a walk that he keeps his loaded gun in the rear stroller pocket and forgot to remove it when they came to catch their flight.” I call bull-doodoo! If you’re taking a baby on a plane with a stroller you are using every cubic inch of that to add carryon volume. And where in H-E-Double Toothpicks is this guy walking that he needs to carry a loaded gun with him when he’s out with his pseudo-family? Let’s stay with guns in airports for a while, even though I ranted about this before. Also, from TSA.gov, “Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers detected twice as many firearms per million passengers screened at airport security checkpoints nationwide in 2020 compared to 2019, and at a significantly higher rate than any other year since the agency’s inception.” A total of 3,257 guns were confiscated from passengers carry them on their persons or in their carry-on bags, and about 83 percent of them were loaded. Those figures didn’t include the number of guns confiscated because they were improperly packed in checked baggage, or toy and BB guns. All while people on planes are beating each other up for taking too much of the shared armrest or [shudder] being compelled to wear a mask.

And now that the delta variant has bloomed in the US to where masking might become more routine again, I figure something in August I get to write this post all over again with a new set of “can you believe this” tales.

Patience. Please give me patience.

not-vaccinated-section-3

Reading Isn’t Believing

Michael 2 Comments

And they say you can’t believe everything you read. (I say you even can’t believe everything you think but that’s a topic for a different post.) No, this is really about what you read, or don’t, or think you’ve read. Or maybe even for some people what you think you wanted to read. Rarely it might be what you read that you wanted to think.

Not only are 4 out every 5 calls I get enticements to either throw my money away on a non-existent extended warranty, or to have them syphon money out of my accounts if I do so much as to actually think to answer it with a phone that had once been near an ATM machine while I was making a withdrawal (I don’t really know about that but it seems like the scammers have to do less and less to get our money, and what could they do to me for presuming otherwise, sue me for libel?) (now where was I?) (oh yes, I remember), not only are there oodles more nuisance phone calls, nuisance emails – either spam or outright phishing schemes – have taken a dramatic upward arc on the occurrence scale. However…every now and then you come across a spammer who didn’t get the new spam scam users guide. These are the ones that have multiple fonts, bold, lots or asterisks and exclamation points, and refer to accounts at banks and retailers you’ve never used or refer to you as your email address.

2021-03-03

Yesterday I found a new one. Just in case you thought all the bold type, red bullet points, and mysterious name weren’t incentive enough to open the email, they included in the subject line, “This message is From a trusted sender.” I know that convinced me to open that missive right then and do whatever it said.  Hey, that Nigerian prince might still have some of his millions left to give away.

2021-03-03 (1)

Clearly that was something not to believe even if I did read it in black and white.

Some signs nobody ever reads. Not far from me there is a stretch of road where for about 30 yards the posted speed limit is 5mph. I’m not sure my car can go that slow. It seems to me nothing between stop and 15mph even exists. Another instance of not believing what I read, although with not quite the same conviction. Oh I’ll slow down as slow as I can get, but 5? Ehhhhhh, probably not.

There is a sign I take with great seriousness and wish everybody who read it would believe it. No, it’s not the “Masks Required” sign but it would be nice if more people believed that too. No, this is this sign.

Gun-Sign-1024x503

The rate of confiscated guns per million passengers doubled in 2020, a year when the number of people flying decreased by 60%. So far, with 2 whole months in for 2021, the rate is close to 4 times that of 2020. That puts the TSA on pace to confiscate close to 15,000 guns at security checkpoints. If that doesn’t worry you enough, over 12,000 of those guns will be loaded. Eighty-three percent of the handguns pulled out of pockets, purses, and carry-on bags are loaded.

The most common reason people give for attempting to enter an airport secure area with a concealed and loaded weapon is that they forgot they had it. Yeah right. Put that in writing and I won’t believe it then either. According to the Pew Research Center, 67% of gunowners say they purchased their guns for protection. If all those people getting on the planes are representative of gunowners, when the time comes to protect life or property I suppose they will have to convince the assailant to “hang on there a second, I want to shoot you which is my right, I just have to remember where I put that darn gun.”

Gun-Sign-Crop-1-768x377It would be nice if people who decide they don’t want to believe the part of the TSA sign that says firearms aren’t allowed through airport check points at least would believe the rest of the sign, the part in smaller print that says they can be fined up to $13,000 dollars for doing so. Then again, maybe that’s not a lot of money to them. In that case … I know this Nigerian prince who needs a little help.

You can believe me on this. I am a trusted sender.

In the Relentless Pursuit of Normal

Michael 2 Comments
What do table tennis, magic coffee cream, concealed carry permits, and toilet paper have in common? I don’t know but they all have starring roles in today’s post.
 
ping-pong-paddleDid you know Pennsylvania is the second largest gambling center in the United States? Nevada by far brings in the most revenue garnering a little over 25% of the American dollars legally wagered, but Pennsylvania casinos saw over 3.25 billion dollars (Billion with a B) cross the felts or fed into machines. With the state’s casinos on lockdown card players and slots junkies can scratch their itches easily enough with online betting and in severe moments of needed relief, calling the family around the dining room table and issuing Monopoly Money for impromptu quality time AKA blackjack. But what is the sports betting public to do. The online casino sites include sports betting but there are no sports to bet on. Or are there? Enter Russian table tennis. The mobile sports app associated with one of the area casino’s sports book operation reported 56% of last weekend’s bets were on the Table Tennis Cup matches in Moscow. On the other side of the state the same app operating for another casino saw 79% of the wagers on the cup matches. I couldn’t find a total dollar amount bet on table tennis but an internet search returned multiple pages of strategies and handicapping for betting on this week’s games. And you thought it was something played in garages by teenagers who couldn’t get dates to the prom. (Why yes, that is where and when I learned the game. And your point is?) And life becomes normal,  sort of, for the sports junkie gambler.
 
Who would have thought 1 cup of sugar, 1/3 cup of instant coffee crystals, and 2/3 cup of ice water would save the world? Would you? Perhaps not the world but certainly those on it used to starting their days with a $6 cup of sweet, creamy caffeinated goodness. Apparently you just toss the sugar and coffee with a splash of the water into a bowl and mix until everything it is wet, then start whisking like crazy while slowly adding the ice water and then keep on whisking for several to many minutes until light and fluffy. Those without Incredible Hulk like arms will probably want to use a stand mixer with a balloon whisk attachment. Sugar and water do not typically result in something with the consistency of whipped cream but that’s exactly what this concoction turns out like! Top your regular old black coffee with the stuff or blend a couple tablespoons of it with a generous portion of ice cubes and a bit of whole milk for a home version of otherwise expensive drive through frozen cappuccino and make your morning commute to the home office and/or dining room table almost normal.
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MagicCoffee
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In Pennsylvania you are required to have a concealed weapon permit to carry a gun unless you want to strap it on your hip and mosey through the streets old wild west style. By the state definition “concealed” includes transporting weapons in the car even if visible except for going to or from gun dealers, shooting ranges, or vacation homes, or to surrender the weapon at a weapons turn in location. So if you plan on ever taking that gun anywhere you better get a concealed carry permit. Permits are issued by county sherriff offices and several counties have closed their gun permit offices during The Corona Crisis. (That’s what I’m officially calling it now. If the network news can make up a name to promote impending armageddon so can I!) Anyway, the day before the the office in my county closed they issued over 200 permits to carry concealed. And it’s a good thing they did because since The Corona Crisis hit, gun sales have increased by as much as 600%. (Actually, according to the organization  Firearms Owners Against Crime, sales are up 100 to 600 percent. (Oh I hope their members are more accurate than their analytics experts.)) Why the sudden increase in gun sales and permit requests? “A lot of my friends already have it, so I kind of felt like I should get it too,” one person told a local television news reporter. And the testosterone fueled Jones Keeper Uppers are functioning just like normal. 
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tpI was at the grocery store yesterday. That’s one of the places we are allowed to go. Grocery store, pharmacy,  medical appointments,  and out for walks or exercise as long as we maintain the now normal social distance.  That is unless you are an essential employee at an essential business in which case you can go out to get to and from there. Low and behold, there was toilet paper! Enough options that toilet paper math wasn’t out of the question. As I sauntered through the store with my freshly wiped down cart I noticed all the shelves had something on them. Well, almost all. There was milk, bread, eggs, fresh and canned meats and fish, fresh produce, frozen foods, beans, flour and other baking needs and soap, alcohol, and other cleaning products. Everything except the always unavailable hand sanitizer. And rice. Of all the different types of rice in all the different types of packages there were none to be found. All I could think was that some family is going to be awfully tired of stir fries by September. And just like that, even as the supply of toilet paper seems to be normalizing, hoarding has gotten it’s new normal.
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Although my normal lifestyle can be confused with self-isolation and social distancing even I now get bored a little faster and miss stopping to chat with fellow walkers around the complex. I know it is not going to be in the next few weeks but I’d bet we’ll be back to our normal normal sooner than we think. At least I would bet if I knew how to use one of those mobile sports betting apps. I would also bet that as soon as the normal normal becomes normal again, six dollar frozen coffee drinks will be back to being the normal caffeine of choice on normal commutes. I’m willing to wager many of those carry permits never share pocket space with what the permit permits carrying and someday rice will again fill the rice and grains aisles but it will never replace the paper products aisle and toilet paper math for shopping fun for the whole family! (Yes, that is one of my favorite posts.)
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Now go wash your hands!
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What A Dump

Michael Leave a comment

It’s that time again, the time when if you don’t pull the mental chain your brain will back up and then you’ll have to get out the big plunger.

Misunderstanding

You’ll recall my recent discussion on non-dairy butter, not the concept but that the package read “butter.” Not “plant butter,” not “soy butter,” not “butter tasting butter substitute,” but “butter.” I guess I have a wider readership than even I could have imagined. Shortly after that post – ummm – posted the ACLU filed suit against Arkansas claiming the state’s new labeling law stipulating that only meat can be called meat, only milk can be called milk, only rice can be called rice, and presumably only butter can be called butter violates the manufacturers’ of the ersatz products free speech. Hmm. Now this is just a thought, but if American chicken and hog farmers actually came up with green eggs and ham and attempted to market them as “broccoli” and “kale” would that same ACLU step in to protect them?

Although I don’t like it and have said so, there is no stopping American stores from running back to school sales in July. I’m sorry but in my mind that is just way too early. And I’ve been one of those parents with a calendar on the kitchen wall crossing off the days until those kids go back to school! But I get it, it’s a once a year marketing opportunity and they have to make hay, or money, while the sun shines. But now I have a real issue with those stores. Two days ago I was in the local supermarket and at the end of the “seasonal” aisle where all the back to school items were located was a big display of Halloween candy. Come on now!

This morning a man was stopped at the local airport for carrying a loaded gun in his carry on bag. It was the 23rd such seizure this year. Today is the 210th day of 2019 so a little more frequently than once every 10 days somebody is trying to sneak a gun into the secure area of the airport. Ours is not a particularly large airport with about 400 departures a day. I can’t imagine what TSA agents at a big airport find. I said those people carrying weapons are trying to sneak a gun past security. They claim they “forgot” the gun was in their carryon or they “had it when they were at the range last week.” Did they really? Did they really bring their travel carryon to the range last week? The gun confiscated this morning had 14 bullets in the clip, the clip in the gun, and an additional bullet in the chamber. Doesn’t seem like something one could, or should “forget.”

The lawyers at Publishers Clearing House are really good. You’re not going to see them okay an ad that calls margarine butter, I mean that says “You are a winner!” No, they say you could be a winner or you might be holding the winning entry. They ain’t gonna get sued for stretching the truth. I got another one of those mailings last week. Not from PCH. From the dealership where I bought my car and have it serviced. That would be Car #2, not the daily driver although the last letter I got was in reference to my everyday vehicle. Car #1 is a ten year old Chevrolet Malibu and earlier this year the dealer sent me a notice that it was time to “exchange” that car for a new model. I agreed with them but when I went over to swap keys and registrations they really wanted me to exchange money for a new car! I knew all along they weren’t serious but I had to go over for a state inspection anyway so I thought I’d see how much I could get out of them. Not much it turned out. Last week’s letter was from a different dealer about a different car. I know it’s a marketing tool just like back to school sales in July but the letter says they need cars like mine to “fulfill special used vehicle requests.” This particular car is not a 10 year old Chevy. It’s a 20 year old Mazda Miata with not quite 31,000 miles. I bought it from this dealer and they have serviced it since it was in the internal combustion engine equivalent of diapers. They might very well have a request for such a car. But when they say “We would like to exchange your 2000 Mazda MX-5 Miata for any new or Certified Pre-Owned Mazda from our inventory,” I doubt their sincerity. But as fate would have it, Wednesday I have a service appointment there for that very car. I know just the new Miata in their inventory that would make a dandy exchange!

I feel better now that I held my occasional brain dump. Thank you for tolerating me. I’d be happy to exchange your new reading for my old writing any day!

Miata

My State of the World Address

Michael 9 Comments

Tomorrow President Trump will deliver the State of the Union Address. Later tomorrow news and social media sites (which sound remarkably alike lately) will parse and criticize either Trump’s or Joe Kennedy’s (who will present the Democrats’ rebuttal) comments.

ResidentialSealSo in the spirit of annoying at least half the people out there, and as an official Resident of the United States, I’m going to make my comments on the state of the Union now. You see, I can do that because I don’t need a Trump or God forbid a Kennedy to tell me how my state is fairing. Unlike their addresses, mine is actually based on universal truths. So universal that you don’t even need to be from the United States to relate to them, thus I am considering this the State of the World.

The world is in trouble mostly because people want to believe it’s in trouble. It really isn’t. Without sounding like a t-shirt, keep calm and pray if you got ’em. What the world needs is a good dose of common sense. Here are some reasons why.

We are our own worst enemies. This weekend’s local news was filled with the city’s school’s teachers who are threatening to strike. They want to be paid more and to contribute less to their benefits. They will probably strike and eventually a compromise will be approved and they will get more money and a lower contribution though not as much or as great as they would like and will grudgingly return to work. Like labor unions that represent workers who make or sell something, the teacher unions don’t take into consideration that the extra money that must be spent on their increases must come from somewhere and it won’t be from profits. It will be from higher prices or to compensate for the teachers’ and other government employees’ windfalls, higher taxes. These will turn into reasons for next year’s higher pay demands by other unions, cost of living adjustments demands by non-union workers, and increased minimum wage proposals by politicians and thus the cycle continues. This is why although the average wage has risen from $7,300 in 1967 to $73,300 over fifty years to 2017, a tenfold increase, the average new car that in 1967 cost $2,750 cost $33,500 in 2917, 12 times as much as from 50 years prior, and the average house that cost $14,250 in 1967 rose to $377,100 in 2017, 26 & 1/2 times greater. Don’t even ask about insurance rates.

Big Pharma is not out to get you and all doctors are not pill mills. Yes, drug companies manufacture and wholesale opioid narcotics. Yes, opioid narcotics are an addictive nightmare and some abused opioids began as prescriptions. But most opioid that are being abused are being manufactured in illegal labs by criminals. Heroin and heroin/fentanyl combinations are by far the largest abused, and deadly, opioids. But, opioid by class are only the fifth most abused substances coming in behind alcohol, marijuana, methamphetamine, and cocaine. Prescription drug abuse ranks higher only when you include the prescribed opioids with benzodiazapines (anybody remember “Valley of the Dolls”), codeine and codeine derivatives, anabolic steroids, and the prescription stimulants methylphenidate (Ritalin) and amphetamine (Aderall).

It should not come as a surprise that efforts to fight opioid addiction are misdirected since every other addiction is being mistreated or outright ignored. Oooh, oooh, drugs are bad, drugs are bad say the sheep. Ooh, ooh, Marijuana is soooo good and it cures all kinds of diseases so we should all be allowed to have some say the same sheep. Drinking and driving is clearly bad. Sixty-five percent of fatal single vehicle accidents involve alcohol, 29% of all fatal accidents involve alcohol. Three drinks will impair an average build adult. Don’t drive if you drink that third drink! Cigarette smoking is evil. Period. The nicotine will get you every time. There is nicotine in those vaping thingies! That’s why people crave them. Duh!

Guns don’t kill people. But they sure do make it easy for people to. Especially those that fire 150 rounds a minute. Without taking the all or none approach can we agree that automatic weapons don’t belong in the hands anybody not currently and actively serving in the military in a combat zone? Hunting and target shooting can be accomplished quite nicely one bullet at a time.

Climate change is real. It’s also inevitable. The world changes. It has changed. It will continue to change. That’s how we got here. That’s how we’ll leave. Deal with it.

We are own worst enemies, part two. Data breaches continue and will so. Some of the biggest you may not have even know. The ten biggest data breaches by number of people’s information exposed are Yahoo (twice for number 1 and 2 at 3 billion in December 2016 and 500 million in September 2016), My Space (360 million, May 2016), Equifax (145.5 million, September 2017), EBay (145 million, May 2014), Target (110 million, November 2013), LinkedIn (100 million, May  2016), AOL (92 million, 2007), JP Morgan Chase (83 million, October 2013), and Anthem Health (80 million, February 2015). Just for grins, do you know who comes in at #11? The Sony Playstation network with 77 million exposures back in April of 2011. And who even knew that My Space still had 360 million users two years ago? Our privacy and our money are at risk every time we access the interwebs. Yet we continue to use digital financing at increasing rates. Starbucks now has stores that do not accept cash joining a growing trend of restaurants and convenience stores in large metropolitan areas that have gone cashless, and Internet sales in 2017 represented over 9% of all retail sales in the U.S. up from 3.6% in 2008.

I could go on. And on and on. But I won’t in the hopes of keeping a few readers. If you want an improving future it’s clear what we have to do. Rekindle common sense, invoke rational thinking, and pray if you got ’em.

NB: Salary and cost figures by USA Today; drug use figures via National Institute on Drug Abuse; drinking and driving statistics via Father’s Against Drunk Driving (FADD), data breaches and rates by USA Today, E-commerce statistics by U.S. Census Bureau.

 

Careful Wishing

Michael Leave a comment

Sometime over the past week a first or second grader grabbed his “not usual backpack” on his way to school one day.  This wrong backpack had a toy gun in it.  Sometime during the school day it became the toy gun not in the backpack and he was ultimately sent home for violating the zero tolerance policy on weapons in the school.  We replayed that scene across several local school districts about a half dozen times since the beginning of the school year.  Apparently a lot of kids keep their toy guns in backpacks now.

Sometime over the past month a first or second grader grabbed his backpack on the way to school and when he got there he found his mother’s real gun in it.  A while before that another first or second grader pulled from his backpack at school his grandfather’s hunting knife.  Sometime between them yet another first or second grader discovered heroin in his backpack courtesy of his parents.

What do all these have in common?  Besides that all of the children were suspended per their district’s zero tolerance policy on weapons and drugs, all of them were phoned into one or another of the local news outlets’ “on your side” reporters who “went to bat” for the youngsters.  The claim was that they were unfairly disciplined either because of their age, what was found, or how what was found was put into the child’s backpack becoming the rallying cry for saving the children.

Another thing in common is that in these and similar incidents, the public was behind the reporters.  The vast majority of people who cared enough to express an opinion expressed that the children should not have been punished.  It wasn’t their fault that the gun – toy or real – ended up at school.  It wasn’t their fault that a knife, several inches long and sharp enough to slice through an animal hide popped out at the elementary school cafeteria inducing inferiority complexes among the standard issue plastic tableware.  It wasn’t the child’s fault that his backpack was the closest hiding place for drugs at home that didn’t get removed before the backpack left home.

They argue that zero tolerance certainly didn’t mean to include actions not within the students’ control and certainly not the actions of first or second graders.  Yet when the knife slashes 20 other students, or the gun is discharged and becomes the weapon holding a classroom hostage, even zero tolerance is too tolerant.

It seems somebody needs to revisit the various school districts’ policies.  At what age does accountability begin?  Are students expected to pay for the actions of their parents?  Is “zero tolerance” a policy or a catchphrase?

Most importantly on that visit, people have to make a decision.  Does zero mean zero?  And if it does, does it mean zero at all times.  How careful is one willing to be when one is wishing in today’s society?

Now, that’s what we think. Really. How ‘bout you?