Jerreigh@contemplayshuns.com

Barbies the Rest of Us Can Relate To

Finally, Barbie dolls real people can relate to.  New Barbie dolls that coincide with her and our aging gracefully.

Bifocals Barbie. Comes with her own set of blended-lens fashion frames in six wild colors (half frames, too!), neck chain, and large-print editions of Vogue and Martha Stewart Living.

Hot Flash Barbie. Press Barbie's bellybutton and watch her face turn beet red while tiny drops of perspiration appear on her forehead. Comes with hand held fan and tiny tissues.

Facial Hair Barbie. As Barbie's hormone levels shift, see her whiskers grow. Available with teensy tweezers and magnifying mirror.

Flabby Arms Barbie. Hide Barbie's droopy triceps with these new,roomier-sleeved gowns. Good news on the tummy front, two-MuMus with tummy-support panels are included.

Bunion Barbie. Years of disco dancing in stiletto heels have definitely taken their toll on Barbie's dainty arched feet. Soothe her sores with the pumice stone and plasters, then slip on soft terry mules.

No-More-Wrinkles Barbie. Erase those pesky crow's-feet and lip lines With a tube of Skin Sparkle-Spackle, from Barbie's own line of exclusive age-blasting cosmetics.

Soccer Mom Barbie. All that experience as a cheerleader is really paying off as Barbie dusts off her old high school megaphone to root for Babs and Ken Jr. Comes with minivan in robin-egg blue or white and cooler filled with doughnut holes and fruit punch.

Mid-life Crisis Barbie. It's time to ditch Ken. Barbie needs a change, And Alonzo (her personal trainer) is just what the doctor ordered, along with Prozac. They're hopping in her new red Miata and heading for the Napa Valley to open a B&B. Includes a real tape of "Breaking Up Is Hard to Do."

Divorced Barbie. Sells for $199.99. Comes with Ken's house, Ken's car, and Ken's boat.

Recovery Barbie. Too many parties have finally caught up with the ultimate party girl. Now she does 12 Steps instead of dance steps. Clean and sober, she's going to meetings religiously. Comes with a little copy of The Big Book and a six-pack of Diet Coke.

Post-Menopausal Barbie. This Barbie wets her pants when she sneezes, forgets where she puts things, and cries a lot. She is sick and tired of Ken sitting on the couch watching the tube, clicking through the channels. Comes with Depends and Kleenex. As a bonus this year, the book "Getting In Touch with Your Inner Self" is included.

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The list of new Barbies came in an e-mail promising that if I forwarded it to 11 people a video would come up on my screen. "This works. I don't know how but it works," the e-mail promised.  "This is the coolest thing I've ever gotten!  All you have to do is send it to 11 people and this little video comes up on your screen and shows the funniest clip. I can't tell you what it is, but I couldn't stop laughing so hard I was crying! So spend a few seconds to send this and you'll be glad you did!"

So if 11 people read this on my blog will I see the video?  Probably not.  I think the e-mail came from the Lying Piece of Sh*t Barbie.

FISA Debate | Give Me Your Liberty Or Die

Can you hear me now?

No,  I'm not checking reception from my cell phone.

Just wondering if the government snoops can hear me.  Or if the American public can hear our basic freedom melting away.

In grade school we all learned Patrick Henry's famous quote:  "Give me liberty or give me death."

Benjamin Franklin said more or less the same thing:  "The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either."

But the message from Bush, Cheney & GOP is:  Give me your liberty or die.

And a lot of us seem to be buying it.

Last summer,  Congress passed the Protect America Act giving government snoops more or less unlimited power to listen in on our phone calls.

Democrats expressed some reservations, but they wanted to go on vacation.

Can't wait, said Mike McConnell, director of national intelligence.  Al Qaeda's ready to attack and Americans will die if you go on vacation without giving us unlimited power to snoop.

So, the Democrats caved and did what they were told.  Couldn't give up any of their vacation to spend time with hearings and debate.

But some folks back home didn't like like that very much.  And the Democrats were embarrassed.  Never again, they vowed.

Again is here.  The Protect America Act will expire this week if Congress doesn't renew it.

Make it permanent, say Bush, Cheney & GOP or the terrorists will kill us.  The Democrats are offering a 30-day extension to give them time to consider the issue in a more deliberate fashion.

We'll die if the law expires, Bush says.  But he'll veto a 30-day extension.  Do it my way or die, seems to be his position.

Will the Democrats cave again?  It's hard to say.  But we'll know this week.

Will the terrorists kill me if Congress stands up to protect our freedom?

Give me liberty or give me death. Can you hear me now?

That's my two cents' worth.  What's yours?  -- Jerreigh@contemplayshuns.com

The Story of Stuff | Designed for the Dump

You probably haven't heard of Annie Leonard and her The Story of Stuff.  But you will.  At least I hope so.

Our president and Congress are falling all over themselves to send us checks for six hundred bucks apiece to "stimulate" our economy because they're afraid we're headed for a (gasp) recession.

The fact is our economy's in much worse shape than that.  We should hope a recession's all we're headed for.  The six hundred bucks actually will feed the problem, not fix it.

Why is that?  Click on the picture at the top of this post and watch Annie Leonard's 20-minute movie.  She explains it extremely well.

I found out about Leonard's The Story of Stuff from The Daily Kos.  If you have a few minutes, you might want to check it out, too.  But whatever you do, I hope you'll take 20 minutes to watch Leonard's movie.  And, if it resonates with you, pass it along.  You'll be doing the world -- and yourself -- a favor.

That's my two cents' worth.  What's yours?  -- Jerreigh@contemplayshuns.com

Economic Stimulus | Pondering Options For Spending My $600

Have you figured out how you're going to spend your six hundred bucks?

I haven't decided yet.  A trip to Mexico?  Never been there.  Or pay down one of the credit cards?  What's the fun of that?  A new toy? Most of them cost more than $600.

And I'm not sure how any of those fix what's wrong with our economy.  After all, isn't that the point?  Somehow, we're all going to take our six hundred bucks and collectively "stimulate" the economy to avoid the R word.

I have a couple months to decide, sounds like.  So, maybe I'll figure something out.

I'll be glad to get the money, I guess.  A little bit of repayment for all that dough I spent raising my kids.  After all, the government's borrowing the money to send it to me.  So, that means my kids or grandkids will end up paying for it.   I don't take much comfort in that.  I'd rather have my kids spending their money raising their kids than putting $600 into my pocket.  Hmmm.  Maybe I'll do something fun with the kids and grandkids.  It's their money, after all, that I'll be spending.

I don't get what this so-called "economic stimulus" is supposed to accomplish.  It doesn't fix what's broken.  Well, it is an election year.  So, there's an element of political bribery involved, I suppose.  And there's an element of raw fear on the part of a group of people -- Congress and our president -- who don't seem to have a clue about what they could do that might really help and who are afraid they have to do something to keep we the people under control.  Don't want a bunch of angry voters heading to the polls in November.

What we really need, it seems to me, is for Congress and the president to come up with ways to fix the underlying problems with our economy so we have real, long-term improvement.

During the Depression, there were a lot of people out of work.  So, FDR put them to work with the WPA and other government work programs.

And, with the transition from an agricultural to an industrial economy already under way, we had a lot of people who had no way to support themselves in their old age.  When most of us lived on farms, the norm was for the working generation to take care of the old folks, who lived under the same roof. So FDR created Social Security to provide retirement income for our old folks.

Today, the problems are much different.  We've quit making things.  It's "cheaper" to buy them from China -- or wherever.  Except, of course, there's a huge hidden cost in the form of lost jobs.

The folks who want to believe our economy's doing just fine point to the fact that the unemployment rate is low.  But a lot of folks are working for less money than they used to.

If there are 10 of us and we make $1,000 each, our average income is $1,000.  If one of us makes $10,000 and the other nine make $100 each, our average income has increased to $1,090 and our little mini-economy has grown by a "healthy" 9 percent, or $900.  But most of us are worse off.  That's what's happening to our economy.

We have corporate executives and Wall Street types looting billions upon billions of dollars from our economy to make themselves richer on the backs of us poor working stiffs without adding any value.  How is me giving me a check for $600 going to to fix that?

I remember when executives used to wrestle with guilt if they thought they might have to lay someone off.  Now they brag about how many jobs they cut or sent overseas to make their own bonuses bigger.  How is giving me a check for $600 going to fix that?

The huge losses on Wall Street and the other stock exchanges of the world started with a group of economic whiz kids figuring out how to make millions of risk-free fees for themselves by lending money  to people who couldn't afford to buy the homes they bought and then selling this high-risk debt to other investors -- some of whom should have known better -- thereby looting billions from the economy without adding any real value.  How is giving me a check for $600 going to fix that?

I could go on, but I hope I've made my point.  We don't need checks for $600.  We need political leadership that will help us start taking back control of our government and our economy.

What are the chances of that happening?  How do we change the odds?

That's my two cents' worth.  What's yours?  -- Jerreigh@contemplayshuns.com

Dick Cheney | Anyone Else Would Probably Be Dead

Socialized medicine.

Republicans portray it as the worst thing since unsliced bread.  But would Dick Cheney be dead without the benefits of "socialized medicine?"

The California Nurses Association thinks so.  I agree with them.

The nurses ran ads in 10 Iowa newspapers last month under the headline:  "If he were anyone else, he'd probably be dead by now."

Here's what the ad says:

"The patient's history and prognosis were grim: four heart attacks, quadruple bypass surgery, angioplasty, an implanted defibrillator and now an emergency procedure to treat an irregular heartbeat.

"For millions of Americans, this might be a death sentence. For the vice president, it was just another medical treatment. And it cost him very little. Unlike the average American, the president, vice president and members of Congress all enjoy government-financed health care with few restrictions or prohibitive fees. They are never turned away for pre-existing conditions or denied care for what an insurance company labels 'experimental treatments.'

"The rest of us deserve no less."

The vice president apparently doesn't agree.  Or maybe he just didn't like them pointing out one more perk he has that the rest of us don't.  A spokeswoman for the VP was quoted by therawstory.com as saying, "something this outrageous does not warrant a response."  Or maybe she doesn't have a good one.

I don't know what the answer to our health care fiasco is.  But it's time for some honest, in-depth debate on the issue.  What we have now is broken.

I'm on the nurses' side.  But I also buy unsliced bread pretty regularly.

That's my two cents' worth.  What's yours?  -- Jerreigh@contemplayshuns.com

Mike Huckabee | Putting God Into The Constitution

Holy Bible thumpin', Batman.

Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee wants to change the Constitution to God's standards, abolish the IRS and stick a pole up somebody's tailpipe if they mess with the Confederate flag.

That last sentiment hardly seems consistent with what a preacher should be preachin'.  I wonder if Jesus would go around sticking flagpoles up people's tailpipes.  Or approve of people who do.

Which brings me to another thing ole Huck seems to worry about.  He's afraid gay sex leads to bestiality -- folks sticking their flagpoles up the tailpipes of animals.  Or, more precisely, he wants you to be afraid of that so you'll vote for  him because he's against it.

It may be time to start prayin' that ole Huck don't get elected.

I was a bit creeped out when ole Huck was one of the three Republican candidates who raised their hands to say they didn't believe in evolution.

We're seven years into a presidency where science not only doesn't matter but is actively subverted by ideologues who rewrite papers by government scientists to remove scientific findings that don't match their theology or ideology. We don't need another president who wants to attack science.

But the thing that scares me the most about ole Huck is his idea of changing our Constitution "so it's in God's standards."

Holy Taliban.  Has ole Huck read any history?  This country was started by good religious folks -- many, but not all, of them Christians -- who packed up and left Europe to get away from the kind of religion-controls-politics environment ole Huck is peddling.

There's a reason our Constitution doesn't refer to God, forbids any religious test for holding public office and states that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."  It's because the people who fought the American Revolution and wrote the Constitution had lived through the kind of hell ole Huck wants to bring back.

The people who wrote our Constitution had parents or grandparents who had lived through things like the Salem witch trials.  And they knew first hand about places in both the "old" and "new" worlds where you had to change religions if the king or other person in charge changed religions and where praying to the right God in the wrong way was enough to get you killed or thrown in jail.

That kind of thinking's still around.  Lee Maynard takes the title of a very funny book about rural America, Screaming With the Cannibals, from the notion that the Kentucky Holy Rollers across the river from his hometown of Crum, West Virginia, were cannibals.  He opens the book with a scene where he's in that Kentucky church, screaming with the cannibals.

I hope my kids and grandkids don't have to endure a world where who you pray to and how you do it matters.  If you call yourself a "Christian" and believe that's a world you want to live in, all I can say is you're wrong.  Go read about the Salem witch trials and life in Puritan America, if you don't believe me.

Maybe ole Huck really believes the stuff he's peddling.  Or maybe he's just pandering to the the worst instincts of the rural voters of South Carolina.

Either way, I pray ole Huck disappears from the political scene very, very soon.

That's my two cents' worth.  What's yours?  -- Jerreigh@contemplayshuns.com

Can a hearse carrying a corpse drive in the carpool lane?

Can you cry under water?

How important does a person have to be before they are considered assassinated instead of just murdered?

Why do you "put your two cents in" but it's only a "penny for your thoughts?" Where's that extra penny going to?

Once you're in heaven, do you get stuck wearing the clothes you were buried in for eternity?

Why does a round pizza come in a square box?

What disease did cured ham actually have?

How is it that we put man on the moon before we figured out it would be a good idea to put wheels on luggage?

Why is it that people say they slept like a baby when babies wake up every two hours?

If a deaf person has to go to court is it still called a hearing?

Why are you IN a movie but you're ON TV?

Why do people pay to go up tall buildings and then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground?

Why do doctors leave the room while you change? They're going to see you naked anyway.

Why is "bra" singular and "panties" plural?

Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible crisp, which no decent human being would eat?

If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares why is there a stupid song about him?

If the professor on Gilligan's Island can make a radio out of a coconut why can't he fix a hole in a boat?

Why does Goofy stand erect while Pluto remains on all fours? They're both dogs!

If Wile E. Coyote had enough money to buy all that ACME stuff why didn't he just buy dinner?

If corn oil is made from corn and vegetable oil is made from vegetables, what is baby oil made from?

If electricity comes from electrons, does morality come from morons?

Do the Alphabet song and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star have the same tune?

Why did you just try singing the two songs above?

Did you ever notice that when you blow in a dog's face he gets mad at you, but when you take him for a car ride he sticks his head out the window?

Political Flashbacks | Vote Early And Often

I feel like I'm having political flashbacks.

Voters are so apathetic today that it's hard to get a 40 percent turnout -- and that's with mail-in ballots and voter registration  tables in local grocery stores.

I grew up in Arkansas.  People took their politics seriously there.  At least back then, they did.  We actually had a county that regularly had voter turnouts above 100 percent.  And the local political boss who ran things in the county didn't seem to be at all embarrassed about it. I'm not making this up.

The local motto was vote early and often.  And people did.  They just used a different name each time. People took their voting so seriously in that county that some of them kept doing it for years after they died.

I also remember reading about similar shenanigans in Louisiana and in Chicago, back in the days of the first Mayor Daley.

I live in Colorado now.  Politics are much tamer here.  Or so I thought.  Maybe I just haven't been paying attention.

But they're beginning to look a lot more like what went on back in the Arkansas of my youth -- thanks to electronic voting machines and our secretary of state, Mike Coffman.

Coffman has decertified all of the voting machines being used in our state except one.  No one seems to know exactly what criteria he used in making this decision, but there have been news stories about him having ties to people who work for the company with the one machine he said is okay.  Hmmm.

This is not a small matter.  Many of our counties aren't sure how they'll conduct elections this year since many of them own machines Coffman just said they can't use.

Coffman appears to be softening a bit in the face of a growing number of questions about why he did what he did.  He doesn't seem to have a good explanation.  He even invited Denver to appeal his decision.

There also have been news stories suggesting the Legislature may rewrite the law to take Coffman out of the loop when it comes to deciding which voting machines can be used.  And the state Democratic party put out a press release calling on Coffman to resign:

"The public's confidence in the elections process continues to erode under the watch of this Secretary of State whose essential role is to fulfill his responsibilities as the state's chief elections officer," said (State Democratic Chair Pat) Waak.  "Coffman has failed miserably in his attempts to instill the confidence and trust the voting public deserves in the elections process.  He needs to leave."

I'm just guessing here.  But I think Coffman probably won't quit.  And it's probably safe to assume the Democrats know that.  So, we have a little political posturing going on here.  But the fact is something is terribly wrong with the electronic voting mess here in Colorado -- and a lot of other states.  And Coffman has nominated himself as the poster child for what's wrong.

Sadly, the old saw about voting early and often isn't needed if we end up with electronic voting machines that aren't protected from being hacked by the people running our elections and that don't produce an auditable paper trail.

The old-time political bosses had to stuff the ballot boxes with enough votes to be sure they had more votes than the people who showed up to kick them out of office.  That meant voter turnouts in excess of 100 percent because the votes were counted in front of enough people that stuffing the ballot boxes was important to having enough votes when the votes were counted.

With electronic voting, all you need to do is tell the machine to rig the election.  It doesn't matter how many people vote.  So, we can leave the dead folks alone.  We'll just rig the voting machines to give us the result we want.

Is that what's happening in Colorado?  I can't say that it is.  But I can't say that it isn't, either.  And that puts everything in jeopardy.

We need to fix this mess.  Coffman won't resign -- not until later this year, any way.  He apparently is planning to run for Congress even though he just got elected secretary of state a year ago.  Just long enough to rig the results of his next election?

That's my two cents' worth.  What's yours?  -- Jerreigh@contemplayshuns.com

Jerreigh's Two-Bit Solution

I’ve come up with the perfect solution for the mess in Iraq.  One all of us can participate in, and support our president in the process:  Take the money being spent on the war and give it to Americans for an all-out shopping spree, the ultimate weapon against terrorism.

You’re skeptical?  Shame on you.  Shortly after 9/11, no less an authority than President Bush urged Americans to go shopping.  He said it was the best way for those of us not wearing military uniforms to do our part to fight terrorism.

The timing is perfect.  The “Holiday” (formerly Christmas) shopping season is over, and retailers need our help.  Let’s not let the terrorists win by sitting on our credit cards.

I don’t know exactly how much we’re spending on Iraq.  I've seen figures as high as $270 million a day.  Let's be conservative.  Call it $200 million a day.  That’s easy to remember.  I’ll use that number to explain my solution for the mess in Iraq.

Take the $200 million per day being spent on the war and give it to Americans for an anti-terrorism shopping spree.  Everyone can participate.  So, it’s an All-American solution.

It’s my idea.  So, I’ll be the CEO of the All-American Shopping Spree Against Terrorism.  As CEO, I’ll take $100 million a day.  We’ll divide the other $100 million up among the rest of you.  With a population of 300 million, that comes to $100 million a day for me and 33.33 cents apiece for each of you.

Well that’ not fair.  Besides, 33.33 cents is a little tough to work with.  So, we’ll make it $125 million a day for me and split the other $75,000,000 among the rest of you.  That comes to 25 cents a day for every man, women and child.  That’s better.  We’ll call it Jerreigh’s Two-Bit Solution.  Has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?

A word of warning to potential slackers:  I may have a lay some of you off later in the year – for the good of the organization, of course.  And to free up a little cash for my year-end bonus.  You can’t expect me to carry the heavy burden of being CEO without a healthy bonus, can you?

Once I become rich, I’ll be looking to the president and Congress for a tax cut.  Maybe we can just excuse anyone making $100 million a day from paying any taxes at all.  Leaves the maximum amount for the patriotic shopping-to-fight-terrorism effort.  I’ll ask them to knock two bits off of everyone else’s taxes.  So, you’ll benefit, too.  Just think, a tax rebate that pays you for another day’s shopping to fight terrorism.  What could be more American than that?

What a great idea.  We get the troops out of the way so the Shiites and Sunnis can work things out among themselves -– a democratic solution for Iraq at last.  We get Americans back into the malls where they belong.  And all of us can finally be part of the war effort.

So, what are you waiting for?  Get out there and shop!  It’s your patriotic duty.

That's my two cents' worth.  Well two bits' worth.  What's yours?  -- Jerreigh@contemplayshuns.com

Will we share heaven with our enemies?

Will the suicide "martyrs" who blow up people in the name of Allah share heaven with their victims?

Will the plantation owners of the Old South share heaven with their slaves?  What about the Irish Catholics and Protestants who killed one another in the name of Jesus?  Or the millions upon millions of people throughout history who have killed, tortured or otherwise mistreated one another simply because they prayed to a different God -- or prayed to the same God in a different way?  Or for no other reason than that they could?

What about the American soldiers who have tortured prisoners at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and elsewhere?  Or George Bush, who claims to be pro-life and pro-family?  Will he share heaven with people whose lives he destroyed or disrupted by fighting the wrong war at the wrong place in the wrong way?

This is not a trivial question.  One of the seven habits espoused by Stephen Covey in The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People is to "begin with the end in mind."  He suggests visualizing yourself on your deathbed.  What would you want your friends, family and colleagues to say about you as they look back on your life?  Is that what they will say?  If not, Covey says, then change your life to change what they will say.

But what if we take it a step further.  When you die, will you go to heaven?  Will you have to share heaven with your enemies?  If so, what will you say to one another?  What will you say to God to justify being allowed in despite what you've done to your enemies?

If there's a heaven, I hope to be there.  Someday.  Not for a while, I hope.  But there are some people I've wronged along the way that I'm not looking forward to seeing there.  I wonder if saying I'm sorry will be enough.

What about you?  If you claim to be a Christian and say the Lord's Prayer, what treatment are you asking of God when you pray to have your trespasses forgiven in the same way you've forgiven those who have done you wrong?  I think that's  a  dangerous prayer  for many of us.

That's my two cents' worth.  What's yours?  -- Jerreigh@contemplayshuns.com

 
Photo:  NASA, ESA, and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)