As a public service, even though the holidays are over, I feel it's necessary to outline the six degrees of regifting separation. With any luck, I'll soon be known as the "Emily Post" of regifting. Within this article, I intend not only to provide the six degrees of regifting separation, but to provide the etiquette that should accompany regifting, with basic rules: Basically, to determine who should be the recipient of a regifted item, you must place your relationshipd into these six circles...

Our neighbors have their great grandson over at their house daily. He's generally a good kid, but we've found one very frustrating trait we've tried to deal with. He will walk in the house regularly without knocking. It is not unusual for me to be sitting on the couch reading or doing something else and look up and see him standing there. We've tried to talk to his parents and our neighbors about it, but this is their "golden" child (they have two boys). He simply cannot do wrong. When I addr...

Every year, sportswriters look for controversy. Since the inception of the much hated Bowl Champiohsip Series, much of it in the late season has centered around worthy teams that were snubbed from their "rightful" place among the BCS elite. And sometimes the writers are right. But sometimes it becomes a matter of Much Ado About Nothing. This year, the latter was true of the vaunted Oregon Ducks, who viewed their bowl matchup with Oklahoma as not worthy of their time and attention. Perhaps the...

I have noticed an interesting trend among apologists for the left lately. When referring to the Iraqi dead, they will often use the number of 1.5 million, rather than the 30,000 acknowledged by even LIBERAL estimates to have died since our invasion of Iraq. When pressed, they will acknowledge that the 1.5 million number includes those estimated by the UN to have died as a result of sanctions. Why is this ironic? Well, all it requires is a memory span of just over three years to understand thi...

The MSM has spun the conditions in Iraq by, among other things, referring to the terrorists that bomb fellow Iraqis and US troops as "insurgents". They have made it appear as if such "insurgency" was a popular movement in Iraq, and as if our troops are  in grave danger in Iraq by remaining there. An analysis of the facts would seem to indicate it just ain't so. See, there are about 26 million people in Iraq. Assuming 50% of those are adults, that would leave 13 million. Assuming even 50%...

The death count in Iraq is nearing 2200. That's right around 1.5% of the number of troops we sent over there. And yet, the media makes it sound as if our troops are being slaughtered by a massive insurgency. Closer to home, 4 people died in wildfires in the southern Great Plains. The media, once again playing upo the deaths, makes it sounds as if a maelstrom has virtually wiped out everything south of the Kansas border (ok, you might not be getting much of this nationally, but trust me, we AR...

We've all been there before. The "New Blogger on the block", putting out our writing and hoping that somehow we will be seen on the large, impersonal internet. Somehow, we make it to the point where our articles are read. This is one reason why I am so fond of JoeUser's format. My articles receive a wide readership here, while I would be struggling to promote them on other sites. If I write an article, my work ranks high in the google search engines on the subject matter because of the promin...

I have listened to both sides of the debate on Bush and the NSA wiretaps. I still contend that a decision of guilt or innocence at this point is premature, but if the facts are as we now have them (that Bush had the program reviewed and there was congressional oversight), then Bush cannot be considered to be guilty of any crime as regards the NSA wiretaps. Whether or not the individual congresspersons are guilty for not taking the matter before the full House and Senate is another matter entirel...

I will have to plead guilty to gleaning information from a sound bite. Every MSM news source that I heard stated that the budget bill for 2006 was cutting food stamps. The blogs that I read supported that statement. And so, I did a little searching (not as much as I'd like, but as much as time reasonably allowed). See, what the budget does is changes ELIGIBILITY requirements. That's a horse of an entirely different color. The thing is, cutting eligibility requirements would mean t...

On a personal level, I absolutely, completely detest abortion. That is my personal philosophy, and there's really nothing you can do to change that. But politically I hold to the Libertarian position, which is predominantly pro-choice (although there is strong debate on that subject within the party, that's not the topic of this particular article). While those positions may appear to be inconsistent, they are not, and I hope to use this article to help you understand why. See, the first part...

Thanks to shovelheat for the inspiration ( Link , he has the link on his article), I wrote a letter to my future. I decided to print the text below: Dear FutureMe, You are a schmuck. While you could have spent productive time working to make the world a better place, your past self has been engaged in futile exercises such as writing emails to himself in the future. I wouldn't be surpirsed if you're reading this as you're mired on the couch with a pint of Haagen Daazs and watching the la...

Shortly after No Child Left Behind was seriously introduced to the American public, I realized that it was a deeply flawed philosophy. You see, NCLB basically strives to bring every school up to the "average". Now, I won't use this opportunity to bash Bush's intelligence because I realize that NCLB is a movement towards realizing the objectives of Goals 2000, an educational initiative authored by Bill Clinton when he was governor of Arkansas. The problem of trying to bring every school up to ...

NOTE: This is a sort of sequel to my article on Christmas materialism. I'm hoping  to slowly help you, the reader, to understand the thought processes that were behind my transformation from hardcore socialist to Libertarian. This is the time of the year when a lot of dicsussion centers on how to help the poor and needy in our community. The holiday season increases our awareness of their presence, and most of us, at the core, want to see the poor among us have a reasonable standard of l...

I have seen right wingers called sheep by the left. I have two words for them: Harriet Myers. See, right wingers tend to analyze and investigate the facts, not just rely on headlines or sound bites to gather their information. And, rightly or wrongly, they make their decisions based on the results of their analysis. Harriet Myers is just such a case in point. For those of you who have been in a coma or camped out in Crawford Texas with Cindy Sheehan eating Iraqi meals, Harriet Myers was...

One of our newer users has repeatedly accused me of being a neocon. Frankly, it's gone beyond ticking me off. The reason this person continues to use such grossly inaccurate labelling is because he has been trained and conditioned to see politics as left or right (with an occasional nod to the middle). The problem is, political and philosophical views go FAR beyond that. One of the most appalling mistakes the Democrats have made, in my opinion, is not recognizing that fact. If you want to wea...