Random Thoughts And Comments
Posted by Tom Remington on September 2, 2008
It donned on me quite early this morning that this HAD to be a day for “Random Thoughts and Comments”.
It was a long weekend, or that’s what it is called. I’m not sure what was so long about it. It seemed very short to me. I hope your “long” weekend was a good one. What did you do? Me? Not much. I spent far too much time working but then in this business you have to make hay when the sun shines.
I did go down to the beach yesterday around noon. There was just a slight milky white sky but all in all the sun was quite bright. The weather is amazing and something scientists can’t understand. Even though we think we can - we do talk a lot about it - I think it is better to just shut up about it and enjoy.
I’m no different than anyone else. I like to bitch about it - like it does any good.
It was hot at the beach and for the Gulf of Mexico, the water was riled up with some decent waves for the surfers and boogie-boarders to enjoy, all a result of Mr. Gustav. Everyone was out it seemed and most were in the water.
We set up our chairs and I threw up an umbrella to get out of the direct sunlight. After a short stroll down the beach, wading in the warm surf, I was pretty much drenched from the sweat and so we headed home to jump in the pool. (BBQed up a nice steak last night to end the weekend.)
I’ve been trying to get a good handle on this V.P. pick of McCain’s - this Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. Is she the girl next door? How far removed from the mainstream political, good ole boy, do it my way Washington is she? This obviously is scary to some. I like it.
My thought that Palin was a pretty good pick became immediately reinforced by the reactions of the left and the Obama worshipers. They hate her and everything she stands for.
You know sometimes I choose to escape to a bit of a “La-La Land”. I’m sure we all do to some degree. Unless we are immersed into some aspect of our society, isn’t it safe to say that we form general opinions about how people think and why?
In my “La-La Land”, I puzzle over things like “Pro Choice”, “Feminism”, “Equal Rights”, “Environmentalism”, “Conservation” and any other “ism” you want to toss in the ring. We all have our thoughts on all of these issues and I would be willing to wager that if 100 people were put in a room, there would be 100 different opinions about each one of the topics listed.
If I talk to a friend or a neighbor about any of these subjects, they may not get into their true, gut feelings and only scratch the surface. I think this is kind of where my “La-La Land” takes me and it’s a safe place to be at that moment.
But what happens in the heat of battle, if that be the correct way to describe it. You see, I see the announcement of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as Sen. John McCain’s running mate as launching a missile into the Democrats’ camp, the Dem camp being all those supporting Barack Obama.
This has prompted a response of which we begin to see the true colors of that side, a side that has readily been described as far left. In this latest skirmish, here is what any observer would have learned in regards to some of the topics I listed above.
Pro Choice - We have all come to learn that pro choice means a woman is thought to have the right to choose whether or not to keep a baby when she learns she is pregnant. Pro life means you don’t kill the baby through abortion. What we have learned from the left is that pro choice means your only choice is to abort. When someone chooses to keep a baby, that’s wrong. So for the left, the only choice is kill the baby.
We can also learn that supporting and promoting women in all walks of life is a wonderful thing, unless you come from the right. If so, only liberal thinking women deserve a chance at positions of power.
What else? Oh, yeah! Barack Obama and his supporters get angry when anyone, mostly from the right, questions his experience as being adequate enough to lead the greatest nation on earth. But it is acceptable to question the experience of someone who would be a vice president. Huh? I wonder if it really does matter that the pick is a woman?
As this war heats up, other issues begin to rear their head. Palin supports wildlife management that animal rights and the anti-hunting crowd don’t approve of. This of course has sparked some debate about her being a choice for V.P. I have spent a great deal more time discussing this subject than most and have learned that “science” is a cherry-picker’s tool. Depending on the position at the moment, science is not reliable in making decisions to determine things like removing wolves from the endangered list but science is pretty good if the same crowd can suggest that killing wolves from an airplane or helicopter isn’t scientific. This portion of the left has really been sent into a tail spin over the Palin pick.
Bear and human encounters in New Jersey are escalating out of control. One report I read said encounters were up nearly 90% from over a year ago and yet the anti-hunting government is still telling people hunting only increases bear populations.
How can that be? Have you ever noticed this avenue used by the antis? The only times bear numbers in New Jersey decreased and human encounters dropped was the year after a hunt, yet the government lies to its people about facts.
I’ve always wondered how that hunters have always been blamed for the extinction of some animals. I’m not completely stupid. I know and admit that many years ago without any regulations and game management, things weren’t looking real good and yes, hunting was blamed for drastic reductions of certain game animals in certain places. So why are we also blamed for population increases when we hunt them?
It’s true. Coyote lovers say that if we begin hunting the little varmints we’ll only make the population go up but if we begin hunting the wolf, the population will be wiped out again. Does this make sense to you?
I was just reading about a study that Dr. Charles Kay, a professor at Utah State University, did on the abundance or lack thereof, of wildlife during the Lewis and Clark Expedition. To keep it brief, it was all quite interesting. Using the journal kept by Lewis and Clark, Kay discovered that in places where the natives lived, game animals and other wildlife, were quite sparse, due to over hunting. In places, he called buffer zones, where natives didn’t live, wildlife was quite abundant.
Anti-hunting groups will quickly cite such instances as proof that hunting is bad for the ecosystems and will turn around in the next sentence and say that hunting only increases populations. Give me a break!
Did you hear about the turkey buzzards in one Florida park that are pecking the rubber gaskets off cars left in the parking lot? Medard Park, not too far from where I live and a place I’ve been to a few times, is the site of where these buzzards land on you car when you aren’t around and peck and chew the rubber gaskets around your windows and doors. Biologists think the rubber looks like dead and decayed carcasses so they go after it. Animals do weird things, sometimes just because they can.
Kind of like me!
Tom Remington
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Actually, it annoys me that McCain selected yet another “trophy woman” as his running mate. There are several well-qualified and experienced women who could have filled the bill, yet he chose a “hottie”. Sort of like throwing away the first wife when a newer model comes along. I’m not impressed.
I do find the reverse of your above comment interesting: The McCain campaign has gone on and on about “experience” and yet the person they choose to run the government in case McCain dies (not impossible for a 72 year old with some health issues) is inexperienced. So perhaps the whole “experience” thing is really a non-issue?
Either way, both sides SUCK. You can twist the words to make either side look bad but the fact is they both are only saying and doing whatever it takes to get elected. You don’t really think McCain chose Palin for any reason other than being a token woman do you? Do you think it’s a surprise that Obama picked an old, white male as his running mate?
I am so sick of politics. I swear it’s time to become a Libertarian. Sigh.
September 2nd, 2008 at 12:21 pm
THIS IS MOVING. HOW QUICKLY WE FORGET…..IF ….WE EVER KNEW……
WHY WOMEN SHOULD VOTE
This is the story of our Grandmothers and Great-grandmothers; they lived only 90 years ago. Remember, it was not until 1920
that women were granted the right to go to the polls and vote.
The women were innocent and defenseless, but they were jailed
nonetheless for picketing the White House, carrying signs asking
for the vote.
And by the end of the night, they were barely alive.
Forty prison guards wielding clubs and their warden’s blessing
went on a rampage against the 33 women wrongly convicted of
‘obstructing sidewalk traffic.’
(Lucy Burns)
They beat Lucy Burns, chained her hands to the cell bars above
her head and left her hanging for the night, bleeding and gasping
for air.
(Dora Lewis)
They hurled Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed her
head against an iron bed and knocked her out cold. Her cellmate,
Alice Cosu, thought Lewis was dead and suffered a heart attack.
Additional affidavits describe the guards grabbing, dragging,
beating, choking, slamming, pinching, twisting and kicking the women.
Thus unfolded the ‘Night of Terror’ on Nov. 15, 1917, when the warden at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia ordered his
guards to teach a lesson to the suffragists imprisoned there because
they dared to picket Woodrow Wilson’s White House for the right
to vote.
For weeks, the women’s only water came from an open pail. Their
food–all of it colorless slop–was infested with worms.
(Alice Paul)
When one of the leaders, Alice Paul, embarked on a hunger strike, they tied her to a chair, forced a tube down her throat and poured liquid into her until she vomited. She was tortured like this for weeks
until word was smuggled out to the press.
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/suffrage/nwp/prisoners.pdf
So, refresh my memory. Some women won’t vote this year because-
-why, exactly? We have carpool duties? We have to get to work?
Our vote doesn’t matter? It’s raining?
Last week, I went to a sparsely attended screening of HBO’s new
movie ‘Iron Jawed Angels.’ It is a graphic depiction of the battle
these women waged so that I could pull the curtain at the polling
booth and have my say. I am ashamed to say I needed the reminder.
All these years later, voter registration is still my passion. But the
actual act of voting had become less personal for me, more rote.
Frankly, voting often felt more like an obligation than a privilege.
Sometimes it was incon venient.
My friend Wendy, who is my age and studied women’s history,
saw the HBO movie, too. When she stopped by my desk to talk
about it, she looked angry. She was–with herself. ‘One thought
kept coming back to me as I watched that movie,’ she said.
‘What would those women think of the way I use, or don’t use,
my right to vote? All of us take it for granted now, not just
younger women, but those of us who did seek to learn.’ The
right to vote, she said, had become valuable to her ‘all over again.’
HBO released the movie on video and DVD . I wish all history,
social studies and government teachers would include the movie in
their curriculum I want it shown on Bunco night, too, and anywhere
else women gather. I realize this isn’t our usual idea of socializing,
but we are not voting in the numbers that we should be, and I think
a little shock therapy is in order.
It is jarring to watch Woodrow Wilson and his cronies try to persuade a psychiatrist to declare Alice Paul insane so that she could be permanently institutionalized. And it is inspiring to watch the doctor refuse. Alice Paul was strong, he said, and brave. That didn’t make her crazy.
The doctor admonished the men: ‘Courage in women is often mistaken for insanity.’
Think about it She could have refused McCain, might be she ain’t crazy??
September 2nd, 2008 at 12:34 pm
I guess the best dirt they can come up with is that her 17 year old daughter is in the family way? But is this news worth a whole day of coverage by the “O” loving news media?
September 2nd, 2008 at 5:22 pm
[...] Random Thoughts And Comments By Tom Remington Palin supports wildlife management that animal rights and the anti-hunting crowd don’t approve of. This of course has sparked some debate about her being a choice for VP I have spent a great deal more time discussing this subject than … Black Bear Blog - http://mainehuntingtoday.com/bbb [...]
September 2nd, 2008 at 9:35 pm
the comments about the left only wanting to kill babies is absurd.How does that square with the right wing saying that lefties are just baby-making welfare recipients? I found this site accidentlly ,what a bunch of bullshit. you are a disgrace to intelligent people ,of which you are obviously not one!
September 3rd, 2008 at 3:28 pm
You know, there is a strange allignment between the abortion pushers and the animal “rights” lovers….Has everyone or anyone noticed that? Maybe they are so far off base, they can’t seem to get any moral ground right…or they just don’t think that humans mean as much as animals! Or are they just so far away from what God wants for us that they just don’t care anymore?
Either way, I would bet the persentages of those who don’t fear God or follow Him, have the highest scores in both catagories!
And to bring God’s teachings into the discussion, would rile the Hell out of them!
September 3rd, 2008 at 4:16 pm
Certain studies have indicated that those who support abortion attempt to compensate for guilty feelings by doting on animals even to the extreme of putting animal life ahead of humans.
September 3rd, 2008 at 4:20 pm