Today is the day that we honor those men and women who put on the uniform of the United States Armed Forces, served, fought, and many times died to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic.” Many of us will wear little flag pins, attend Veteran’s Day celebrations, and – in some cases – use the occasion to deride or belittle our military, as a Salon writer did the other day.
The best way, in my mind, to honor a veteran is to thank them for their service. Many are old; many are in failing health; many suffer from wounds received in battle, or the kind of wound that goes deeper but can’t be seen. But they put on the uniform to protect our ability to wear those little flag pins, to attend those Veteran’s Day celebrations, and yes, even to belittle and deride the military.
My Dad was a veteran – 21 years in the United States Army. He died last month, so I’ll never again be able to tell him thanks for what he did, but I made it a point in his later years to make sure he knew how appreciative I was that he did what he did. It was a major sacrifice, giving up family and home to go places and do things to defend the Stars and Stripes. And it took a toll on him emotionally. But, although he never spoke about many of the things he did – like being a heavy artillery fire coordinator in Korea, or being part of the funeral detail for President Dwight Eisenhower in 1968 – he was unabashedly proud of having served. Talk to just about any veteran, and you’ll find the same attitude.
But be sure to talk to them. And thank them. Few of us could do what they did.
By some accounts, there are between 600 and 5,000 American citizens still in Iraq, threatened by the advance of Islamists on Baghdad. The carrier USS George H. W. Bush has been moved into position in the Persian Gulf by SecDef Hagel, “in case” it should be needed to provide support “in case of” an evacuation.
Meanwhile, our President is golfing this weekend.
“In case?” Would we not begin evacuating our people PDQ? Is this even a question? When did it become acceptable to sacrifice American non-combatants in favor of “intense diplomacy”?
Iraq just bought 36 F-16 jets from this government. Is it acceptable to take their money, yet not offer support and protection from 7th Century zealots bent on world domination?
I’m remembering the line from Heath Ledger’s Joker in “The Dark Knight” – “What happened, did your balls drop off?”
It appears that we’re on our own. Our President has essentially abdicated the really tough parts of being President in favor of vacationing, partying, and fundraising. His Cabinet members are either clueless or corrupt, or both. His assistants are PoliSci majors without a clue as to how the real world works. And his enemies appear to be the American people, and not the Islamists who want to destroy us.
You former military members out there, it’s time to come up with a plan. How can our military sit back and watch our civilians be massacred in the name of political correctness? How can we, as Americans, watch as our President (who used the “we leave no man behind” excuse for Bowe Berghdal, but wouldn’t rescue our staff in Benghazi) play 72 holes of golf while our people in Iraq are threatened with capture or execution? And let us not forget, many of those Americans are contractors with defense industry leaders and they possess many trade and military secrets that Al-Qaeda would love to get their hands on.
Mr. President, you’re a running joke. Pentagon, you’re worthless. Military members, you men and women who swore an oath to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution” and, by Constitutional decree, are duty-bound to protect our nation and its people – get off the stick and start doing your job, chain of command be damned.
In Texas, there is currently a debate over openly carrying firearms in public. The law states that homeowners and property owners can openly carry on their property or in their home, but as of right now only long guns (rifles, shotguns, etc.) can be legally carried in plain view. Supporters of a group called Open Carry Texas hope to change that. There is legislation pending in Austin (HB 700, introduced during the last regular session in 2013) that would allow anyone who legally owns a firearm AND possesses a concealed handgun license (CHL) to openly carry a handgun, but the law as currently written (Title 10, Section 46 in particular) does not permit CHL holders to wear their sidearm in a holster unless they are members of law enforcement.
The group Open Carry Texas, and one of its satellites, Open Carry Tarrant County, want the Legislature to pass open carry, and they hold rallies across the state in support of that legislation. Many times, they gather in parking lots (after alerting local law enforcement), carry signs and distribute literature in support of their cause. Oh, and they also sling their rifles (sometimes AR-15s, sometimes deer rifles, sometimes shotguns) over their shoulders.
(Full disclosure: I am a staunch supporter of the Second Amendment, but I do not own a gun because there are small children in and out of the house on a frequent basis. The Texas law does provide criminal penalties for not securing a firearm in a house where a child can get to it, and besides, I believe if you can’t adequately secure it, you shouldn’t have it, and if you have to secure it to the point where it’s unusable you shouldn’t have it because you waste valuable time getting to it in an emergency. No flaming, please; that’s personal preference.)
Many people are more than just mildly alarmed at the sight of a group of armed men and women gathering in a parking lot or on a street corner. They are obviously not aware of the law in Texas, but even if they were it would still be a bit disconcerting. The first question many folks ask is why? And they’re afraid to approach the group to ask it, even though they appear otherwise unthreatening and are handing out literature for information and education. This has frightened citizens of Arlington so much that the city has passed an ordinance forbidding the handing out of flyers on street corners and in parking lots. Note they cannot forbid the open carrying of long guns except on city-owned property and on property where the owner has expressly forbidden it … but at the same time, parking lots and street corners are considered city-owned property, so they’re able to enforce the ban without really enforcing the ban against long guns.
As you can imagine, Open Carry Texas and OCTC have redoubled their efforts to get information out about the open carry bill … but in my humble opinion, they’re doing their cause more harm than good. Even other Second Amendment supporters have suggested to OCT to lighten up a bit and back off, saying there are better ways to bring awareness to your cause than by frightening people into going the other way. And the businesses they have encountered (by now you’ve heard of the Chipotle incident, no doubt, and the Fort Worth Jack-in-the-Box thing) have listened to the will of their customers (2A supporters would say “kowtowed to the anti-gun lobby”) and banned long guns in their establishments. For them, it’s a no-win situation because they either lose revenue from anti-gun advocates or they lose revenue from 2A supporters.
It seems to me that some in OCT and OCTC are using not-so-subtle intimidation tactics to get their point across, even though their initial attempt was to inform. I know you could probably talk to more than a dozen OCT members and they would tell you that such is not their intent, but my response to them would be, why do you feel the need to bring your rifles out in an attempt to prove your point? Many people in Texas are afraid of guns, pure and simple. By slinging their rifles over their shoulder, they risk alienating the very people they’re trying to inform and educate, and when it comes to passing weapons legislation (even in a supposedly “red” Legislature) the groups are doing more harm than good to their cause. OCT supporters need to try a different tactic.
This is the story about a communications company (I won’t name any names, but their initials are AT&T) and how sometimes the choices you make get overruled if you’re not paying attention.
One day I received a text message saying “paperless billing has been requested for your account.” Really? I thought. I never requested anything. So I called AT&T to find out what was going on. It should be a simple fix, I thought to myself. Just a computer glitch.
The lady on the other end of the phone (whose name is being protected because she’s not the cause of the problem) asked me if I had made any changes to my account recently. According to her, when a change is made to the account paperless billing is automatically activated, unless the customer says no. When I told her I had made no changes to the account, I received quite a jolt. She told me both the rate plan and data plans I currently had were changed to one of their new mobile share plans. I asked her (politely, given the circumstances) who made the changes, because I hadn’t, and no one else on the account was authorized to do so. She told me the changes appeared to be generated from their U-Verse department, approximately ten minutes before I received the text message. Incensed doesn’t even begin to describe my state of mind at that time.
After over an hour on hold, she finally came back and told me everything had been put back the way it was (except for two of the data plans which were grandfathered – those would have to be worked separately, but they finally were reinstated) and I would receive a credit on my bill for my troubles. (And actually, in looking at the bill, the credit was actually the pro-rated amount I would have been charged for the services I didn’t want, but I don’t care how it happened, as long as I got the credit.) She also told me that the incident would be looked into and hopefully someone would get in touch with me when they figured out what happened.
That was troubling enough. But four days later, when I received my U-Verse bill, I discovered that my internet service had been upgraded – again, without my knowledge or consent. This time, I didn’t even get the courtesy of a text message telling me what had happened. I once again called AT&T, once again described what had happened, and this lady (a different one, and again her name is protected) indicated that this change to my account had come from the Retentions department. (Note to AT&T: If you’re going to change customers’ accounts without their knowledge or consent, don’t let the department in charge of keeping customers happy do it.) Later, she told me it was the Sales department – and their explanation was, well, since I had HD service and a slower internet, that the higher speeds were necessary to keep the picture from pixelating and possibly freezing. (Since I work in video production and do a lot with both HD and online streaming, I knew this explanation was patently false.) I told her to put things back the way they were, which she was able to do.
So, AT&T was oh-for-two so far. Today, however, they got the golden sombrero. (For you non-baseball fans out there, that’s four strikeouts in a row.) When I looked at my new U-Verse bill, I discovered that a service I actually wanted and was paying for – the home wiring protection – had been removed. Really, guys?!? The guy I talked to this time (again, protecting his name) told me that the service had been removed on March 7, but he couldn’t determine a reason why. He tried to get me to call the sales department to have it added back, but I told him to do it himself, and to his credit he did.
The wireless side of the house also had changed my account – again – this time, listing my wife as the primary account holder. Again, I told them to change it back to normal.
Did all of AT&T’s computers suddenly get stupid in the same week? I find it hard to believe that all of these occurrences were due to computer glitches. Some friends have suggested that perhaps it’s a scheme to switch people over to new, more expensive services without their knowledge, hoping they don’t notice, and when they get the bill claim that the old service has been changed to the new one, and sorry but there’s nothing that can be done. I’m frankly surprised my changes could be reversed, but perhaps it was because (1) I called quickly, and (2) I was insistent (and slightly rude).
A letter has been sent to Randall Stephenson, CEO of AT&T (and thanks to Consumerist for the physical address information – check them out for lots of stuff like this), but in the meantime (assuming I get any sort of response – and believe me, I’m not holding my breath) I’d like to ask all who read this a simple question:
Have you discovered that any or all of your AT&T services had been changed without your permission or knowledge? This would include wireless, U-Verse, home phone, and DSL internet. I’m going to take a very unscientific poll to see what the responses are. It’s totally anonymous, and feel free to forward the blog link along to any friends or family who might have mentioned that something like that has happened to them.
What will I do with the results? Not sure yet, but I’m sure both the Texas Attorney General’s office and the Federal Trade Commission would be interested in something like this, even if it is apocryphal and unscientific.
But, then again, if the numbers are large enough, they may be forced to pay attention. From what my wife and I can gather from our brief investigation on the internet, it appears this has happened before.
Since AT&T forces its customers to agree to binding arbitration, a class action lawsuit is highly unlikely. But pressure from Texas and the Feds might cause AT&T to rethink its strategy of “slamming” consumers, as the old Ma Bell did with long distance customers. Apparently, old habits die hard.
By now you’ve probably heard about Sheryl Sandberg’s mission to ban the word “bossy” when discussing female leadership attributes. Sandberg is the COO of Facebook, and she thinks that calling little girls “bossy” is demeaning and tends to diminish their leadership skills.
Reason.com has an article on this (located here) but the article isn’t as interesting as the comments below it. Many of the commenters hit the nail on the head when they say “bossy” doesn’t only apply to females, but to anyone who tries to tell someone else what to do without any credibility. One of the other commenters put it thusly (and I’m paraphrasing): A boy will tell someone “that doesn’t go there” when another boy is assembling a car, while a girl would tell someone “you’re not doing it right.”
And that brings up a point, not only about the word “bossy” but about leadership and parenting as well. Many times as parents we tend to tell our kids, “Don’t be bad,” or “You’re a bad kid,” instead of saying, “What you did was wrong,” or “That was a mistake.” We tend to want to criticize the person rather than the action. And parents are supposedly taught that kids can be corrected without damaging their self-esteem by pointing out the behavior rather than the person.
I think that applies to leadership, too. In the other example above, the boy who says, “That doesn’t go there,” is not impugning the other kid’s assembly skills, while the girl is. And you could just as easily reverse the genders, because ridicule and put-downs are not exclusive by sex. Leaders point out the flaws in behavior or technique, or demonstrate the proper procedure. Bossy people put people down.
I’d be more in favor of banning the behavior than the word, but that’d be bossy. Instead, if we all led by example, there’d be no need for the word, would there, Sheryl?
I discovered a few minutes ago that I’ve been blogging on this blog since March, 2009. Five years this month. In that time, I’ve written 80-some-odd blog entries (and some have most definitely been odd). And what I have realized is that I am so blessed to have the ability to say what I want whether anybody reads this tripe or not. And I’m blessed to live in a nation that still allows this sort of thing (for now, at least).
And I don’t really care if anyone reads it or not, though I’m gratified when a comment appears that isn’t spam. I don’t write this thing to be read, I write as a sort of catharsis. It’s a release, and every so often things go unwritten because of the crush of life. Plus I’m lousy at following up on my thoughts.
But I’m grateful to be able to express my opinions and thoughts, and if you’ve taken the time to read my drivel, I’m grateful for you, too.
I came across an article this morning about a Maryland school that threw a pizza party for straight-A students. (The link is here.) In a nutshell, the school recognized high achievers, but some critics of the party say it made underachievers “feel bad” and could lead to “bullying.”
I say: horsefeathers.
When someone is handed a trophy for just showing up, what kind of a message does that send? It’s OK if you didn’t do well, just showing up is an accomplishment, so don’t worry about trying harder next time. I think the school is Maryland is doing the right thing, and for the right reasons. And if the lily-livered liberals that have infested our educational system would stay out of the way, the kids who didn’t go to the party would get the right message – which is, study hard, excel, and you can come to the party next time.
It should be viewed as an incentive for excelling, as opposed to a way to exclude the kids who didn’t do well, and thus make them “feel bad.”
I didn’t care about making my kids feel bad when they did less than exceptional on their schoolwork. I didn’t belittle them, but I did incentivize them, and they responded. And to anyone who think that doing that amounts to bribery, don’t you enjoy being recognized for the work you do? And isn’t it a good feeling to excel at something and reap the benefits (whether monetary – a raise, a bonus, a one-time award – or emotional)?
Kids need to be made to feel exceptional, but in order to do that they have to be exceptional. And handing out participation trophies is not the way to do that. Kudos to the school in Maryland for doing the right thing.
That’s a new word I discovered on Twitter the other day. It’s an amalgam of “screwed” and “doomed,” which we as a nation most certainly are. I don’t know who posted the tweet that contained this new word, but I extend to him or her my heartiest congratulations for the addition of another word to the lexicon of misery. And hopes that I won’t get sued for using it without attribution.
Seriously, when I turn around these days it’s hard not to be saddened, depressed, angered, frightened, even terrified by the things I see happening. The so-called President of the United States using terms like “terrorists,” “ransom,” “hostage,” in connection with the drawn-out non-negotiations over the debt ceiling and the Continuing Resolution (which has apparently taken the place of the Constitutionally-mandated budget). I see progressives pushing the Common Core curriculum, which not only requires students to solve math problems in this fashion but also requires students to to work in teams to solve problems like this.
I see stories about NSA data collection. I read about the Obamacare rollout train wreck, and how it is really a deliberate attempt to accelerate the nation’s downward spiral toward single-payer. Syria. Benghazi. Fast and Furious. IRS. McCain and Graham and amnesty for illegal aliens. Miley Cyrus.
Even the attempted Chick-Fil-A boycott last spring.
I look at all these things, and I look at the fact that the propagandists (otherwise referred to as the mainstream media) not only lift Obama to near-Messianic heights but flat-out lie about conservatives, calling them everything from “bomb-throwers” to “domestic enemies” (according to Democratic Congressman Steve Cohen of Tennessee). And so-called “conservatives” like New York Representative Peter King work to stab fellow conservatives like Texas Senator Ted Cruz in the back for their principled stand against out-of-control government spending, Obamacare, and the ever-widening tentacles of government control.
Is this what George Orwell had in mind when he wrote 1984? I have to think that events like those of the last few months would never have intruded into his wildest dreams, and even Ayn Rand would be shocked and dismayed by the level of outright evil being exhibited by those in government. And she had the example of the Nazis and Soviets to use (partly) as the basis for Atlas Shrugged.
All I can do – all any of us can do right now – is turn to Jesus and keep or start praying. And, mind you, I’m not a religious person. I’m a Christian, committed to follow Christ, but I don’t attend church. I’ve seen the demagoguery, the backstabbing, the outright lying that happens in church surroundings, and I want no part of that. But I do believe fervently in the power of prayer, and I believe that even with faith the size of a mustard seed that we can all see miracles happen.
And turning this nation around will certainly require a miracle.
I hold no illusions that the United States of America will ever be as it once was, and frankly, even that was an illusion foisted upon us by our “leaders” and those who wrote history books. And I know that, to get it where it needs to be, there will be struggle, hardship, and perhaps even bloodshed. I pray it never comes to that – I pray we’re all smarter than that, and I believe the Lord would not have us respond to force with force.
But we still need to pray. And we need to pray that those whose eyes are closed (or blinded) to the way things need to be will have their eyes opened. It’s already happening for a lot of people who are able to see what their new premiums will be under Obamacare.
I truly believe that a vast majority of Americans still believe in what this nation is capable of, despite evidence to the contrary. I believe that a vast majority of Americans still believe that this is an exceptional country, as Ronald Reagan called it the “shining city on a hill.” And even if that image was, to a large extent, manufactured to make Americans feel better in the years after World War Two, I still believe in the red, white and blue. I believe in truth, justice, and the American way, and I believe most other Americans do, too.
I pray that’s true. If it’s not, then we are well and truly scroomed.
I was going to write something else, but after the news that the GOP made like the French and surrendered, I’m too pissed off. Every American should call their Representative – especially if they’re a Republican – and let them know in no uncertain terms that they will be out of a job next November.
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