Hold on to your horses, I'm going political a second night in a row.

What the fuck is wrong with the Democrats? Their grasp of the reins in Washington is so recent and so tenuous that they need to hold themselves to a higher standard. They act as if the people of this country won't vote them out of power as easily as they were voted in. I am, of course, speaking of Barack Obama's three cabinet appointees who can't be bothered to pay their taxes— not one, not two, but THREE of them. Are you fucking kidding me?! Before facing public scrutiny, did it not occur to any one of these people to speak with the president privately and explain. "Hey, maybe I'm not the right candidate now. I haven't really bothered to pay up my taxes." Apparently they all thought it would be better to embarrass the new president during his first two weeks in office. In my book, they've shamed themselves, shamed the president, and shamed their party. The Democratic party should bar them from ever participating in Party politics again.

What's more, the same Democratic party should conduct a voluntary review of the tax status of all state- and federal-level office holders who claim to be Democrats. They should publicly come clean and force their own recalcitrant members to get things right. This is the 21st fucking century, you can't hide this shit anymore. By allowing Party members to do these things, future exploding mines are being laid. The media are counting the Republican party out these days, but we all know it isn't out— not at all. Very soon now it's going to stand up and figure out a different way of fighting, and as soon as it does, it's going to start retaking lost ground. If the Democrats don't start cleaning themselves up soon, the Republicans will be back all the sooner.

I'm not a Democrat by any means, but I don't want the Republicans back in power until they figure out that being in power doesn't give them a right to walk all over the people of this country.

OK, getting off my soapbox now.

You'll have to forgive me for getting so riled up, but I just finished a letter to my brother. There is a situation that's been going on back in Raleigh with some of my cousins that has me all hot up on my brother's behalf. My letter to him primed me for an angry blog post.

I guess, rather than try to switch subjects, I'll just sign off a little early.

"I'm not a member of any organized political party. I'm a Democrat!"— Will Rogers

I am getting way out of control. I awoke between 11:00 and 11:30 AM today with a desperate need to visit the bathroom a few times. Between visits I decided to check my email, during which time I chatted briefly with my friend Russell via Facebook. Still unsure whether or not my day had really begun, I then decided to call Raleigh and check on my brother, who hurt his back on Sunday. I didn't get to speak to him, but had a pleasant (although quick) conversation with Denise, my sister-in-law. After hanging up with her, I decided I still wasn't awake and went back to bed, putting the phone near my bed in case my brother called back.

It turned out to be one of my 'headache days', sans the headache-upon-arising. I awoke again about 2:30 PM, ready for the day, cleaned up a bit, got some fried chicken at Stater Bros, watched an episode of The Adventures of Brisco County Jr, and sometime between 5 PM and 6 PM the headache moved in. Again, looking back at the symptoms— excessive sleepiness, excessive trips to the bathroom— the surprise was that the headache wasn't immediately evident when I first got up. Fortunately, the standard cure worked: a double dose of ibuprofen about an hour apart with some caffeine and something to eat.

Now it's a quarter-to-three in the AM and I'm wide awake. This would not be a problem if there were a place for me to go nearby, wherein I could sit for a few hours and write. (As I've mentioned before, I have difficulty maintaining focus if I write at home.) Starbucks is good until 11:30 PM most nights, but that leaves me with three or four hours most nights— time which I usually kill with World of Warcraft or some other game. I don't even have a comfortable chair for reading at home. If I could find some place to hang out in the wee hours of the night, that would be marvelous! Of course, San Bernardino being San Bernardino, there might not be any place safe to hang out all night. I would feel less out of control if I were more productive in these hours.

It occured to me the other day that my blog is more like a journal than it is a real blog. Most bloggers have something to say, but I just rattle on like some latter day Samuel Pepys without a plague to report on.

You know, speaking of having something to say, I just want to throw this out there: There was a lot of space given up in the news today to Barack Obama coming down hard against any whiff of protectionism in the bail-out plan. I subscribe to The Economist and there have been mentions over the last several weeks about how the U.S. needs to steer a course away from the waters of protectionism. It seems most of the world wants us to think of the word 'protectionism' as a dirty one. Is that necessarily so?

I am no political or financial scholar. I have stated many times that my own opinions on these affairs are reactionary and emotionally based. But, it seems to me that by repeating over and over how evil protectionism is at a national level, what most people/countries are saying is that they still want America to export money and jobs. From where I sit, we're running short of both these days. I understand that many smaller countries around the globe would be substantially affected by an American withdrawl of money and/or jobs, but where do we draw the line for the benefit of the American people? Afterall, I feel for the poorer peoples of the world, but I pay taxes into my government to take care of Americans first, others second.

The other factor I look at is this: The last time the U.S. was very protectionist in nature was the 1950's— this was also a time of vast prosperity in this country. You could look at it as a period when the U.S. was amassing the wealth that it would then spend the next several decades dispersing around the globe. Maybe for our country to be the great dispenser of wealth and jobs, we need periods of protectionism wherein we stockpile those things.

Feel free to argue against me. Like I said, I'm naive on these subjects. I'm not even sure I believe these things myself— rather they're just thoughts I've had and felt that I needed to express.

Until next time.

"Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed by those who are dumber."— Plato

Short rant tonight. I am tired of people pushing their babies and children into traffic before them as if their offspring had the magical ability to stop a couple tons of metal and plastic dead in its tracks. I've had two close calls recently. Last week I was riding with a friend down a four-lane road with a turning lane in the middle. We had just gone through a big intersection when, from the left side of the road, a woman riding a bicycle and balancing a baby carrier on her handlebars shot across the two lanes of on-coming traffic, swerving just in time to stay in the turn lane and not ride straight into our path. She didn't slow her bike at all, prefering to continue veering in one direction and then another to keep herself from hitting any of the cars around her. Her actions scared the shit out of us!

The second incident happened a few days later, further down the same road and closer to where I live, where there aren't as many lights at night. People frequently cross this street day or night without benefit of a crosswalk or signal light. At night it's particularly bad because people tend to be visible only by the thin silhouettes they create in the headlights of the oncoming cars. One woman carrying a baby in a blanket tried to step out of the turning lane into the lane immediately in front of me, causing me to swerve to the side.

This baby-of-steel phenomenon is one I first noticed while working in Santa Ana. There are more baby strollers in Santa Ana than cars. You can't drive one mile down one of those city streets without seeing a young mother blithely push her baby into traffic ahead of her. You know a people are breeding too much when this is the level of concern they feel towards their children.

I believe this should be a citable offense. Gods know we don't need to make these children wards of the State, but there should be a substantial fine attached to this offense as well as a mandatory 8-hour class in parenting. Yes, I know that neither of these punishments will fix the problem, but my hope is that by leveling a financial burden and an inconvenience at the offenders they will opt to take the five seconds required to protect their children.

PS: For those that don't know me well, I am not a crusader for children's rights, etc. Quite the opposite. With the exception of children whom I don't directly know, I have little use for children in general. I am equally concerned for the innocent drivers whose lives will be destroyed in an accident like this.

OK, stepping off my soapbox for awhile.

"Let us put our minds together and see what life we can make for our children."— Sitting Bull