I’m not going to focus on this one issue, but this part form the declaration always makes me chuckle and reminds that some truths may not be as self evident as they might seem.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
I could spend two entries on that portion alone. What I really want to point out are the ‘Indictments’, or the things which we sought independence from. One thing interestingly absent from this list is religious oppression.
Here, in it’s entirety are the indictments in common language.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness of his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
It is amazing how history repeats itself.
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Twenty years later, Peter was walking through the Chicago Zoo with his teen-aged son. As they approached the elephant enclosure, one of the creatures turned and walked over to near where Peter and his son Cameron were standing. The large bull elephant stared at Peter, lifted its front foot off the ground, and then put it down. The elephant did that several times then trumpeted loudly, all the while staring at the man.
Remembering the encounter in 1986, Peter couldn’t help wondering if this was the same elephant. Peter summoned up his courage; climbed over the railing and made his way into the enclosure. He walked right up to the elephant and stared back in wonder. The elephant trumpeted again, wrapped its trunk around one of Peter legs and slammed his stupid ass against the railing, killing him instantly.
Probably wasn’t the same elephant.
This is for all of my friends who send me those heart-warming stories.
Sydney, Australia—A judge halted a drug conspiracy trial Tuesday after some jurors were found to have been playing the puzzle game Sudoku while evidence was being given.
Sydney District Court Judge Peter Zahra ended the trial Tuesday for two men facing a possible life sentence for drug conspiracy charges. The trial had been running for 66 days and had cost taxpayers an estimated $950,000.
The judge was alerted after jurors were observed writing vertically, rather than horizontally. It had been assumed they were taking notes.
“Yes, it helps me keep my mind busy paying more attention,” the jury foreman told the judge Tuesday. “Some of the evidence is rather drawn out and I find it difficult to maintain my attention the whole time, and that doesn’t distract me too much from proceedings.”
Jurors in the trial are anonymous, and no action can be taken against them for the puzzle playing.
The foreman admitted to the judge four to five jurors were playing puzzle games for up to half the time the trial had been going.
“Jurors are sort of the judges of the facts and it’s very disappointing they weren’t giving our clients a fair trial,” said Robyn Hakelis, a lawyer for one of the defendants.
A new trial is expected to begin in a few weeks.
I would hope we have a little stricter laws regarding jurors in the US.
]]>Over the course of his 81 years, my Uncle has learned to cook two things to absolute perfection every time: barbecue pork ribs and a pound cake (henceforth known as the Cake of Death).
It should be noted that my Uncle and I, along with many of you Texans, have this thing we need to monitor called ‘blood sugar’. Cake of any sort is not appreciated by our bodies and the Cake of Death, well, let’s just say it should inflict a diabetic coma well before the taste leaves your mouth.
The Cake of Death isn’t very large, it’s made in a bundt cake pan. Here are some the evil angels it employs to make it delectable and deadly:
Six sticks of butter
2 cups of sweet cream
Six cups of sugar
1/2 cup Karo syrup (something has to hold it together)
1 pound of cream cheese.
Lemon juice and I’m sure there’s some flour in there.
This cake is made for one purpose and one purpose alone, to induce cardiac arrest or diabetic coma. The taste is so rich and creamy that one can’t help but eat as much as possible in one sitting. I gave half my cake to the neighbors and their kids didn’t even get a taste.
Anyway, the cake sure was good and if you don’t hear from me for awhile, you’ll all know what happened.
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- the birds have to use potholders to pull worms out of the ground.
- the potatoes cook underground, and all you have to do to have lunch is to pull one out and add butter, salt and pepper.
- farmers are feeding their chickens crushed ice to keep them from laying hard-boiled eggs.
- the cows are giving evaporated milk.
- the trees are whistling for the dogs.
- you no longer associate bridges (or rivers) with water.
- you can say 113 degrees without fainting.
- you eat hot chilies to cool your mouth off.
- you can make instant sun tea.
- you learn that a seat belt makes a pretty good branding iron.
- the temperature drops below 95, you feel a bit chilly.
- you’ve experienced condensation on your butt from the hot water in the toilet bowl.
- you can attend any function wearing shorts and a tank top.
- The 4 seasons are: tolerable, hot, really hot, and ARE YOU KIDDING ME??!!
- you discover that in July, it takes only 2 fingers to drive your car.
- you notice the best parking place is determined by shade instead of distance.
- hot water now comes out of both taps.
- it’s noon in July, kids are on summer vacation, and not one person is out on the streets.
- you actually burn your hand opening the car door.
- your biggest bicycle wreck fear is, “What if I get knocked out and end up lying on the pavement and cook to death?”
- you realize that asphalt has a liquid state.
- a sad Texan once prayed, “I wish it would rain - not so much for me, cuz I’ve seen it—but for my 7-year-old.”
Following his suspension, professor Ayers claimed that he was doing research on accessibility to porn to minors. Apparently a very exciting research project. So exciting in fact that he failed to secure the necessary permission before launching tax-payer funded computer into the world wide web of porn. Given the amount of files deleted there seems to have been quite a bit of in-depth research going on.
Since Ayers is tenured he was allowed a hearing after which he was to be terminated. A panel of his peers found otherwise and had him reinstated on suspension. Their reason? These extremely well educated people have come to the conclusion that the good professor’s free speech rights were violated and he was within the guidelines of the school’s computer use policy.
In a May 6 letter to UT regents, the five-member faculty tribunal acknowledged that UTSA’s computer use policy banned accessing “obscene” materials. But because Ayers’ termination letter accused him of accessing “sexually explicit” materials, the policy didn’t apply, the tribunal reasoned.
“If the intent is to regard accessing sexually explicit Web sites as improper, then the policy should clearly state that,” the tribunal wrote.
Just to add insult to injury, Ayers’ attorney went on to basically label the school officials ignorant and the small sleepy town of 1.4 million as backward.
Maldonado, Ayers’ lawyer, said the professor didn’t tell anyone about his research because he was embarrassed.
“This is in many ways still a fairly small town,” Maldonado said. “He didn’t feel comfortable that it would be accepted, even in an academic institution.”
Puleez. Cry me a river. A tenured professor makes enough to surf all the porn he wants on his own computer and the fact that he’s tenured shouldn’t separate him from the other professors and administrators that have gotten the boot for the same thing.
]]>I believe that moving away from international dependence on oil is and inherently good thing, what I don’t believe is that it will have any discernible impact on oil prices.
Many people blame the green lobby for not allowing oil to be tapped in the Anwar province. Some blame OPEC for excessive profits. There are even some that believe that taxation of oil company windfall profits will drive the prices down.
All of them are dead wrong.
On a daily basis there are some 7 million barrels of oil pumped from within the United States. US oil consumption dropped over the course of the past year to 20.7 million barrels. To help with the math, over one third of the oil needed to support this country is already being produced by this country.
Here’s the kicker, oil pumped from US oil fields is being sold for roughly $1.70 less a barrel ($133) than those mean old Arabs are selling it for($135). Remember, US demand for oil has dropped so internal supply and demand isn’t a factor.
The way I see it there are a few major factors. Other developing countries are willing to pay top dollar, oil is a finite resource controlled by a mere handful, and with it being a finite resource they can pretty much charge whatever the market will bear.
Drilling in more locations in the US won’t reduce the cost of oil because the same countries competing for that oil will continue to compete and American capitalism will prevail. That, and US oil companies have already capitalized on the greed factor and if they’re not going to sell US produced oil any cheaper now, what makes anyone that will change. The only thing that can possibly be accomplished is our lack of dependence on foreign oil and more money going into US held companies.
The real answer? How about a realistic energy plan that weans us off of a finite resource and puts on a realistic path toward sustainable energy.
The next time your at the pump, don’t get mad at the Arabs, we’re getting screwed right in our backyard.
Sources: OPEC Changes Oil Forecast
]]>The past year has been somewhat of a tragic comedy and I’ll share some of the lowlights here and hopefully dispel any rumors that I’ve lost my mind. That may be a tough one to prove.
Last September I signed a contract to migrate some 1300 SQL databases from San Antonio to North Carolina for one of larger banking institutions. The workload initially took me away but then in November my mom passed away. As tragic as it was, it was truly a celebration of her long and happy life. Upon my return home I discovered my older cat had become quite ill and was needing a lot of extra care that I really wasn’t in to. I shit you not, that same week I found out I had lymphoma as would be undergoing a series of radiation treatments following the new year. My girlfriend and I broke up about 10 times, dad got divorced and my A/C unit gave up the ghost.
About this time I had forgotten that I even had a blog which is funny because in the past the two things I’ve always done to relieve stress is blog and play golf. Oh, I failed to mention that I developed some weird hip pointer (I still think the Dr. was making things up) which prohibited any golf playing.
I can look back at everything now and smile and even laugh. Nothing was as bad as it appeared on the surface. My mom was 93, my cat’s 11, the lymphoma treatment was painless and successful, I finished the contract early and got a hefty bonus, the A/C was under warranty and fixed within 12 hours, the hip pointer got better with time off and the girlfriend and I are still fighting every chance we get. Putting things back into perspective it wasn’t nearly as bad of a year as I felt at the time.
Kentucky Man jailed for child neglect
Sheesh, if laws were this strict when I was growing up, my folks would be serving life in prison.