Lobbying Against Common Sense

What do you remember about school lunches from when you were a kid? When I was a kid in public grade school, I remember this: we had cheese and sausage pizza every Friday. We loved it. Mmm. Those rectangular slices of cheesy doughy goodness. And I distinctly remember my first week in the 7th grade lunch line. Now that we were in junior high, we could choose what we wanted to eat, as opposed to everyone just getting the same tray of food. That first week, they ran out of whatever they were serving, and we had to wait for more to come out of the oven. While we were waiting, the lunch lady walked down the line to let everyone know that they did still have fries. So if anyone was just ordering fries, they could go to the front of the line and get them without waiting. I asked a second lunch lady, "Who would get only fries for lunch?" She responded, "Well, some of the girls only get fries if they're on a diet." My 7th grade reaction: "What? They're on a diet and they're eating french fries?" But yes, they were. And I'm afraid to report that 7th grade me was apparently wiser than some of the folks wandering around our nation's capital these days.

You see, the US Department of Agriculture just released their new guidelines for school nutrition standards. They're not official yet, they've just released them for public comment. And let me tell you, there are some CRAZY things in there. Crazy. But not to worry, there are some fine, fine lobbyists that are attempting to set things straight.

Crazy Example #1: The new guidelines limit starchy vegetables (corn, peas, lima beans, and *drum roll please* pototoes) to two servings a week. That's right. The government is suggesting that it's maybe not such a hot idea to feed kids french fries five days a week. CRAZY I told you. But John Keeling of the National Potato Council is here to defend the noble potato. For one thing, he tells NPR, "The products that are in schools today basically are not your daddy's french fries." Really, John? They're still made out of potatoes, right? So even before you fry them, a potato has about 200 calories. And I don't know if you know this, John, but schools have been cutting recess, so when are the kids supposed to burn off all of those carbohydrates? But that's not all. John also tells NPR, "You won't solve obesity on the backs of a single vegetable." Really, John? Thanks for that tidbit. So if all we do is eliminate french fries, we won't cure childhood obesity? Well then, I guess we're just screwed, aren't we, John. Chocolate cake for everyone!!!

Crazy Example #2: Senator Susan Collins from Maine (they grow a lot of potatoes in Maine) apparently brought a potato and a head of lettuce to the senate and held one in each hand as she shared this bit of useful information: "One medium white potato has nearly twice as much vitamin C as this entire head of iceberg lettuce." Really, Susan? No, I mean, really? You forgot to mention that a potato also has more vitamin C than a ream of paper. You see, lettuce contains very little vitamin C. Orange rinds contain more vitamin C than lettuce, too. Should we all start eating orange rinds? No? Could this be because there are more palatable foods that also have more vitamin C than lettuce? Hmm, I wonder. So your medium potato has 28% of our daily vitamin C, but it comes with 161 calories. But look at this handy little chart I made with the help of World's Healthiest Foods:

Look at that! Not only does potato not make the top ten, but look what does.... strawberries. God, do you think we'll be able to find a way to get our kids to eat strawberries? That seems like quite a tough job. We'd probably have to cut them into strips and deep fry them. No wait... that's potatoes.

Crazy Example #3: Under the current guidelines, the tomato sauce on frozen school pizza counts as a full serving of vegetables. Yes, that's right. Do we need to give the kids another vegetable? Give them a slice a of pizza! But according to Corey Henry of the American Frozen Food Institute, if we eliminate this guideline "You would likely see a dramatic reduction in the amount of frozen pizza, or pizza in general, that you're able to serve in school cafeterias." You know what, Corey? I'm gonna' go with that being a good thing. I do not consider frozen pizza to be at the top of the list of foods I'm super thrilled with my kid eating on a regular basis. Sure, my kid eats pizza, but it's not on my list of foods my kid needs to consume every week. Newsflash, Corey: frozen pizza is not a health food.

Now I know that we parents don't always feed our kids the best possible foods for every meal. There are plenty of frozen chicken nuggets being served up to our little darlings. But the fact that food producers are trying to convince our legislators to sacrifice the health of our children for their bottom lines is about all I can stand. And I know that there are people who believe that the government should not be dictating what kinds of foods Americans eat, so I want to remind you that this is not what we're talking about. You can eat whatever you want. You can give your kids whatever food you want. What these guidelines do is tell the schools what kinds of foods they can serve to America's children. There are already guidelines in place that are supposedly aimed at providing healthy meals in our schools. These guidelines state that children must be served a certain number of vegetables, for example. But these guidelines then state that pizza counts as a vegetable! Forgive me, but it does not take a certified nutritionist to tell you that frozen pizza and french fries are not the components of a healthy diet and are not what you think of when you tell kids to "eat their veggies."

So kids... email your senators and congressmen. Tell them that you know what every American already knows. Pizza and french fries are not health foods and should not form the cornerstone of our school menus.

*****

This post was inspired by a story I heard on NPR today: Lobbyists Want Fries And Pizza To Stay In School. Thank's NPR. You're always an inspiration.

What the **** Tennessee???

It's been a while since I was thoroughly annoyed by one of our idiotic states, but Tennessee is seriously working overtime to get into the mix. (If you missed the other states that annoy me, they are: Illinois, South Carolina, and South Dakota.)

So what is Tennessee doing that it has now won my Stupid State Award? Really, what hasn't it done? Let's take a look, shall we?

First off, I'm sure most of you have heard by now that the Tennessee senate passed SB 49 on Friday, nicknamed the "Don't Say Gay" bill, that would prevent science teachers from discussing homosexuality with their elementary and middle school students. They can't talk about it! Can't acknowledge it's existence. Gay kid in the classroom? Sorry. Kid with gay parents in the classroom? Nope, still no. How about kids in the classroom with eyes and legs who are sure to walk around in the world and see gay people, even if they are not gay themselves? No, no, and no. Children in Tennessee classrooms cannot be exposed to the idea of homosexuality. Now I don't think anyone thinks that grade school children should be taught about the details of sexuality, but that's not what we're talking about. What the bill states is that teachers cannot discuss homosexuality. At. All. Really? As if gay teenagers need something else to make their lives harder. Hello, Tennessee! Have you not heard of the It Gets Better Project? Do you not recall that this was a response to a gay COLLEGE student killing himself because of the unbearable stress of being ridiculed by his peers??? Apparently, promoting "family values" is more important to Stacey Campfield (the bill's sponsor) than protecting the emotional well-being of the children of Tennessee.

Oh, but don't worry. The gays aren't the only group that the Tennessee legislature hates. Oh no. They hate the Muslims, too! SB 1028 aims to save Tennessee from the threat of terrorism by regulating any organization that "adheres to sharia". Now I'm not a Muslim. I've never been a Muslim. But I've read some of this bill, and it is asinine. Here's an example. The beginning of the bill sets out to define what sharia is, and therein explaining why it is a huge threat to the people of Tennessee. Here's one of the things it says:

Sharia requires all its adherents to actively and passively support the replacement of America’s constitutional republic, including the representative government of this state with a political system based upon sharia; 

Got that? So if you are an adherent of Sharia law, you, by definition, want it to replace the US Constitution and the US government as a whole with Sharia. Which sounds pretty terrifying, were it not completely inaccurate. I'm not sure what kind of religious scholars they consulted while writing this bill, but here's what a quick check of Wikipedia says:

Muslims believe Sharia is God's law, but they differ as to what exactly it entails. Modernists, traditionalists and fundamentalists all hold different views of Sharia, as do adherents to different schools of Islamic thought and scholarship. Different countries and cultures have varying interpretations of Sharia as well. Sharia deals with many topics addressed by secular law, including crime, politics and economics, as well as personal matters such as sexuality, hygiene, diet, prayer, and fasting

Really, all you need to know is this: "Muslims... differ as to what exactly it entails." But they all agree that it's a code of conduct for moral behavior. Sharia is what tells Muslims to pray five times a day or to abstain from drinking alcohol. By banning adherence to Sharia, they are basically stating that Muslim-Americans are banned from practicing their faith. (Yeah, this sounds completely Constitutional.) The Sharia defined in Tennessee's SB 1028 is as ridiculous as stating that:

Evangelical Christians believe that every word of the Bible is the literal Word of God and that God's Laws supercede the laws of man. God's laws are enumerated in the Bible and include supporting the ownership of slaves, polygamy, and the stoning of adulterers.

You know. That really isn't that crazy. I think we should keep a closer eye on those Evangelical Christian types. You know how they are always getting into trouble for all the adulterers they're stoning.

Dammit, Tennessee, don't go hiding behind your fake pretenses of "protecting children" and "protecting family values" and "protecting our citizens from terrorism." That's a bunch of crap and we ALL know it. You don't like gays and you don't like Muslims. And now EVERYONE knows it. Can you please go back to hating in the privacy of your own homes instead of insisting that your hate becomes legislation? Because it just makes you look like a bunch of asses.

Old Cell Drunk

There is a game that I play whenever I'm out driving around town. It's great fun, so I thought I'd share. I think it's the modern day equivalent of the old punchbug game from when we were kids. Here's how you play:

First, you'll need to find an Old Cell Drunk car. Here's how you spot them:

• OCD cars usually drive at or below the posted speed limit
• OCD cars drive at the same speed as the car in the lane next to them, thus preventing the cars behind them from passing either of them
• OCD cars leave significantly more space between their car and the car in front of them than their speed would require
• OCD cars sometimes cross over the lines of their lane, but aren't changing lanes.

I think you get the picture.

Once you spot one, you have to guess: old person, cell phone, or drunk.

Now, if you're one of those people who doesn't play little mental games like this while you're driving: GET OFF THE PHONE!!!

I know you think you can multi-task. You can't. No really. You can't. "But I've never been close to getting into an accident," you say. No sh*t. That's because you're driving 15 miles an hour slower than everybody else and there's enough room for an aircraft carrier between you and the car in front of you!

Don't believe me? Play the game. Go on, do it. Drive around and see if you can pick out the schmuck on his cell phone long before you actually confirm the cell phone. I'll bet you can. Because when you're not playing the game... you are the game. Now hang up the phone.

(Yeah, I'm pretty sure I'm gonna lose a few followers here, but it had to be done.)

Cheers!

You Want a Fee? I'll Give You A Fee...

Have you heard about the new rule proposed by the US Department of Transportation? If not, let me tell you. It is CRAZY! Get this: the DOT, headed by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, wants to implement a rule that if you pay a luggage fee for your checked bags and then those bags arrive late, the airline should refund you the fee. Crazy, right? I mean come on. You've paid a pretty nominal fee to have your bag put on a plane, now you're expecting that the airline is going to put it on the same plane that you're on? That your bag will actually arrive at the same location that you do? At the same time? That for a mere $25, the airline will actually keep you and your bag together? I'm sorry, but that is just crazy talk.

NOT!!!!

Listen up, airline industry. We have had ENOUGH. You have raised prices, instituted about 89 million fees that aren't included in the fare so we don't know how much our ticket is really going to cost, make us sit in tiny little seats designed for people who are 4'2" and have no arms, never leave on time, never arrive on time, charge us to change flights, make it impossible to use our precious frequent flyer miles without connecting in podunksville, charge us each different prices for the same damn flight, never tell us what's going on when our flight is delayed, routinely overbook flights so there is not enough room for all of us to get onto a flight that we all payed for, taken away meal service, taken away our peanuts, and even taken away those disgusting pillows and blankets that we only used because the air temperature on the plane is about 10 degrees below 0!

Last year you weren't able to get 2 million bags onto the same flight as its owner. 2 million!!! That question that they ask us at security, "Has your bag been out of your site at any time?" Our answer, "No. But once I give it to you, am I ever going to see it again?" How hard is it to get the bag onto the plane? When I arrive there, I have to walk through 15 security checkpoints, walk to the very end of the terminal because all those gates closest to the security checkpoint are only for show and don't ever get used by real passengers, and then sit and wait for the plane that was supposed to arrive an hour ago and still isn't on the ground yet. In all of that time, you still couldn't get my bag from the curb to the gate so that my bag and me are both on the same plane?

And you're really going to try to play the If-we-have-to-refund-the-fees-it-will-just-make-prices-higher-for-everyone card? Really? You know how you could avoid refunding the fees? STOP LOSING OUR F**KING BAGS!!! What the hell.

Mr. LaHood, it's not like you need my permission to implement any rule changes on the airlines. But in case you were wondering, you have my full support.

In you'd like more info, here's the full story on AP: Gov't wants airlines to repay fee after losing bag

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Post submitted to Adventures in Mommyhood Sunday Funday

Springtime Reminder

Spring arrived in Chicago today. It was beautiful. We had our windows open. We played in the back yard. We visited my mom and played in her back yard. Yes, it was a beautiful day.

After my mom's, we came home and I brought the 7 month old upstairs to bed. He fell asleep right away. Awesome.

I hung out in his room for a bit. It's quiet. It's dark. I can catch up on my favorite iPhone activities in peace. So after twenty gloriously silent minutes of Facebook, Twitter, Words with Friends, and a crossword puzzle, I decided to head out. But it was a bit warm in the room, so I decided to crack a window.

Idiot!

The door to the bedroom was still cracked, so opening the window created a cross breeze and the door SLAMMED shut. Baby wakes up. Baby cries. Mommy rocks baby. Baby doesn't want to go back to sleep. Mommy mentally curses the stupid bird outside the window that won't SHUT UP!

Baby eventually falls asleep. Mommy finally escapes baby's room.

A reminder to all now that spring is upon us: Don't Forget About the Cross Breezes!

(In case you were wondering who could find something about this absolutely lovely spring day to bitch about, it would be the girl whose avatar lets you know that it's only a matter of time before someone plots to drop a house on her.)

Anyway... Happy Spring, everybody! (It was still a pretty awesome day.)

What is Wrong with my Flat Sheets?

So I may be new to this blogging thing, but I'm pretty sure that the way to attract hordes of followers to your site is not to write a post about laundry. But what can I say, I have been doing laundry all day. And when I say, "all day," I  mean ALL DAY. I started around 10 a.m.. I just finished. It is 10 p.m. To be fair, it is my own damn fault, which should be obvious to anyone who's ever done laundry. You know what it takes to accumulate 12 hours worth of laundry? Weeks of not doing laundry. Weeks and weeks. In my case, weeks and weeks and weeks. The only laundry I've done in recent memory has been preceded by the following statement from my husband, "Honey. I know you're really busy, but I have, like, no underwear left." What I want to tell him is that the washing machine does work when a man pushes the "start" button. But then I remember the fact that he does all of the cooking in our house, so the least I could do is an occasional load of laundry so that he doesn't have to go commando to work. Yeah, I suck.

So that's what I've been doing for the last several weeks; waiting until someone in the house completely runs out of clothing or underwear and then I do an emergency load - just enough to get us through the next 24 hours/crisis period. Which brings us to today, where my laundry situation makes The Next Martha's sock pond look quaint. At least her kids have clean socks. If my kids want clean socks, they need to give me at least threes hour notice. (BTW, if you don't know about The Next Martha, you can check her out on Twitter @TheNextMartha or on her blog: The Martha Project.)

Anyway, so my laundry room contained a small mountain of laundry that was finally tackled through hours of ceaseless attack. Beyond unwashed clothes, there were other obstacles that I also beat down. There was the mountain of clean clothes on the folding table that had accumulated whenever I previously washed and dried a load, but didn't bother folding it. There was the bin that I keep in the laundry room for kids' clothes that have gotten too small, that was overflowing to the point that it looked like the clothing version of Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout.

But it all got done. All of it. All our clothes are clean, dry, folded, and put away. (Well, except for a couple stragglers that go in the kids' rooms and they're currently sleeping.) All the outgrown clothes have been folded and sorted and packed into bins to be saved for the baby, saved for my sister's baby, or be sold/passed on to someone else's baby. I even did two sets of sheets! Folded. Put away. Really.

Which brings me to my greatest annoyance of the day: my flat sheets. Yes, that's right, the flat ones. Fitted ones and I get along pretty well. I'm no Martha Stewart, but they come out looking pretty darn good. See...

Not bad, huh? So here's what so damn annoying. I have conquered the fitted sheet. I can stick that lovely little package in my armoire and be proud. So then why the hell does my flat sheet give me such trouble? Here's what I mean. Every one of my flat sheets has edges that look like this:

It's a creased up mess.What's with that? And how do I stop it?

A couple months ago I got the bright idea that maybe if I ironed them once a year it would help. So I actually hauled out my ironing board and ironed those babies. Yes, I ironed my sheets. Who does that? But those damn creases were making me nuts. And it worked, too. For exactly one week until I washed them again. Then those stupid creases came right back again. And I tell you, folks, I am not about to start ironing my sheets on a weekly basis. (I don't know if you were paying attention up above, but I've barely been washing my sheets, much less ironing them.)

So I put them away, without a clue as to how to resolve my crazy crease problem. My two clean sets of sheets neatly tucked away in my armoire. One tiny corner of my house, actually clean. Who knows when I will next see two sets of sheets folded and put away again? Could be months.

I found out moments later that while I was folding sheets, my four year old was busy downstairs sprinkling breadcrumbs on the kitchen floor. So there's that.

Message Received

I am a woman with faults. Many faults. For example,  I have more than my fair share of snarkiness. This particular trait can be portrayed as cleverness in this here blog, but in the real world, I'm guessing that my husband sometimes wishes I were less "clever." But even with all my faults, there are times when I am quite considerate. One of these times is when I am in my car. I usually try very hard to be aware of the drivers around me. Since having kids, I don't drive as fast as I used to and, as such, I don't hang out in the left lane where I don't belong. And if I am driving along in the right lane and a car begins driving in the left lane next to me at the exact same speed as me, oblivious to the cars stacking up behind us with no way of passing, I slow down or speed up so that the folks behind us can get by. This is not to say I've never inadvertently cut someone off or failed to use my turn signal, but in general, I just try to be a courteous driver.

And this is why it PISSES ME OFF when other people act like A**HOLES when they are in their cars.

As you may have guessed, this happened to me today.

I did not get much sleep last night. 4yo was up, then the 7mo was up, then the 7mo wouldn't go back to sleep. Daddy got up with the kids so I could sleep in, but the 4yo had other ideas. So I eventually got up, but was crazy tired. No caffeine in the house, so I headed to McDonald's for a $1 monster sized Diet Coke. (Sure it's cheaper at the gas station, but they don't have a drive-thru and this was a pre-shower caffeine run.)

I pull in to the McDonald's parking lot and there is a car at the drive-thru speaker ordering. There is a second car which is in the drive-thru lane, but is a full car length behind the first car and has its hazards on. I paused a moment and then decided that since the guy had his hazards on he was clearly trying to communicate something to the other drivers around him. I figured that "something" to be that he was pulled over and not really in the drive-thru line. Apparently, I was mistaken. What he was really trying to communicate was, "Hey, everybody. I'm an a**hole in a silver sedan!"

Since I did not get this message from his hazard lights alone, I made the CRAZY mistake of pulling around this car that was not moving and had its hazard lights on. Guy then must have realized that I didn't get his message, the one about him being an a**hole in a silver sedan, and decided to try to communicate it some other way. So he of course lays on his horn and starts screaming out his window at me about how I just cut in front of him in line.

So this next mistake was my bad. I still did not fully appreciate the message he was trying to communicate, though the poor guy was clearly doing his best to communicate to me his message of his a**holeness with the limited faculties available to him.   So being that it's a beautiful spring day and I've got my window down, I say back to him in the sweetest, most non-confrontational manner I can (really, no sarcasm, I was trying to be nice), "I'm really sorry. I thought since you had your hazards on that..."

That's as much as I got out before he just started yelling at me again.

Really? WTF???

It's not like I'm never wrong, in fact, it happens rather frequently. But I wasn't. And even if I was, I was trying to be nice. I was apologizing for the misunderstanding. W.T.F.? 

Oh wait, maybe I've been misunderstanding this guy's message.

Ohhhhhhh! You're a huge a**hole in a silver sedan!!!! I get it now! I'm sorry. I was never very good at charades. But don't you worry, anonymous a**hole in a silver sedan, I've got a blog and I'll be sure to get your message out there.

Ass.

Home F***ed-Up Home

So my last two posts have been about states passing dumb or infuriating laws that irked me. Continuing with that theme, I look to Sweet Home, Illinois.

Looking at the big picture, it's really hard to know where to start. There is so much craziness here lately. Like many states, our fiscal situation is well beyond "not good." The state is months behind on paying its bills, including money it owes to schools, service organizations, and private businesses, all of whom are having to lay people off because they can't afford to pay them if the state doesn't pay up for services already rendered. So we are adding to the unemployment numbers by making companies cut employees they wouldn't otherwise have had to cut. Some businesses have even gone out of business while waiting for the state to pay up. I guess that's one way for the state to reduce what it owes, just don't pay your debtors until they're forced to go out if business.

What has gotten us here is politics, plain and simple. Our politicians want to get re-elected, so they promise us better government services and lower taxes. A few years ago we started offering free public transportation to seniors. Why? Because Blago wanted to get re-elected and seniors are a HUGE voting block. If we are offering free public transportation to those who really need it, you know who could use free public transpiration more than seniors: poor people. It would make it easier for them to get jobs and become more productive members of society. You know who doesn't need free transportation? Middle class and wealthy seniors. You know who isn't a reliable group of voters? Poor people. But regardless of who could benefit from free rides the most, Blago didn't pay for it. Free rides for seniors, no plan on where the money that seniors used to pay and now wouldn't pay would come from. Details.

Full disclosure, I voted for Blago for his first term. But I also pretty distinctly remember the moment when he fully lost me. In 2003, Blago signed into law some pretty steep tax and fee increases for trucking companies in Illinois. At the time, truckers said that such large increases would drive trucking businesses out of Illinois. Supporters of the law claimed this was a group who was unhappy about a tax increase and were just trying to make the situation seem worse than it was.

To my untrained mind, this seemed, well, retarded. Government is offering a bajillion services and politicians don't want to upset the voters by raising their taxes, so they pick an industry and raise taxes on them. Well what do we think is going to happen? How hard is it to relocate your business on the other side of a state line. Seriously, folks, this isn't rocket science. If it's more expensive to operate your business in Illinois than it is in Missouri or Iowa or Indiana, why would you stay in Illinois?

A year later, the verdict was pretty much in. Thousands of trucking companies had already left the state, taking jobs and money with them. Again, DUH!

So that was back during the Blago era. Let's see how far we've come. A few days ago there was a big hullabaloo about Caterpillar leaving Illinois. CAT is huge in Illinois. They employ 23,000 people. Later, CAT CEO announced that CAT has no plans to leave Illinois, but that “policymakers in Springfield” are making it “harder by the day.” So a momentary respite; we have not yet driven away one of the biggest employers in the state. Good for us. Can we keep it that way?

Listen up Illinois: the party is over. We are up to our eyeballs in debt. The state can't pay its bills on time. This problem is not going to be easy to fix. It is going to mean fewer services. It is going to mean tax increases. It is going to mean that some public sector employees are going to lose their jobs. It is going to suck. But guess what... We, through our electoral choices and lax attention to our legislators, have dug this hole. And it is a deep f***ing hole. So the party is over and the bill has arrived and we are starting to realize that this is gonna' be hard for a while. Yes. Yes it is.

And this pretty much applies to the nation as well. You want the country out of debt, too? Then don't give me any garbage about how you can't have tax increases during a recession. You cannot fill the budget holes we've created through spending cuts or tax increases alone.  You need both. And you're going to need to compromise on some of your other "core principles." I know compromise is a dirty word now, but that's how you make it happen. If you want the state/country to be out of debt and that's your priority, then you have to deal with the hard consequences that go with it.  Sorry.

Legislation for the Grumpy

Oh, it's been one of those days. A new blog post idea every couple hours. People were finding a myriad of ways to irk me today. In no particular order, here are some of the topics that caused generally higher levels of annoyance than usual (which is already pretty high):

• Scott Walker
• Corporate income taxes
• South Carolina
• Miranda rights

I also had a couple questions about prayer that I think the web community could help me answer, but I think my blog is a little too young for such sensitive topics at the moment.

So let's spin the wheel and see where we land tonight...............

South Carolina it is!  (Ooh.  It's a theme.  Last week it was South Dakota that was on my list.)

Ok, South Carolina, I know you're one of the redder of the red states, and as such, your general "government get out of my business" hackles are going to be raised a little more easily than they might in some other states, but really? With all that's going on in the country and, I'm assuming, in your state right now, this is where you're choosing to spend your energy?

For those of you who don't know, South Carolina lawmakers have proposed a bill which would allow incandescent bulbs to be made in SC and then sold only in SC, thereby allowing them (they hope) to avoid the federal law phasing out incandescent bulbs in favor of CFL's. (Here's the SC light bulb story on AP if you're interested.) The bill is called the "Incandescent Light Bulb Freedom Act." Seriously, if the name of your bill sounds like it belongs in an SNL sketch, you should just stop right there.

I get it SC. You don't want the federal government telling you what kind of light bulbs to buy. And CFL's don't fully light up right away. And the color is different. And they're more expensive. And they have mercury. And they're not as pretty.  I know.  And you're right.

Except that there's this: when you use that incandescent light bulb, we have to burn more coal to light your house than we otherwise would. And that pollutes my air. And it uses up what I think we can all agree is a precious and finite resource: fossil fuel. We may not love coal, but it's pretty much what we've got right now, so can't we all agree that we should try to use less of it?

And (IMHO) this is really government at its best. It's making people do things that, if only one person did it, wouldn't amount to very much, but if we all do it, actually has a huge impact. And it's not just "isn't this nice" sort of impact. It's preserving our national wealth and decreasing air pollution, which is something that helps us all, i.e. just what the government is supposed to do for us.  

It reminds me of that kick-ass video where the 1959 Chevy and the 2009 Chevy are used in a crash test. (If you haven't seen it, you totally need to watch it: Crash Test Video. I'm not kidding. It's kick-ass.) The 1959 Chevy is this huge hunk of steel compared to the little plastic 2009 Chevy, but the '59 is completely destroyed.  No crumple zones. No seat belts. No air bags.Windshield goes flying off the car. The entire dashboard moves into the passenger cabin and crushes the driver / impales him with the steering column. In the '09, the passenger area remains almost completely intact. My point? None of that happens without government intervention. Without government safety standards, sure, there would be some cars that hold themselves up as the leaders in safety. But your baseline automobiles wouldn't be the amazingly safe vehicles we all benefit from having today.

So South Carolina, really? Incandescent light bulbs? I know it's a sad day, but it's time to let it go. Their time has come, just like it came for the horse-drawn carriages and Atari video game systems. If you really want to protect people's right to play Pong, fine; have at it. Just realize, it's only a matter of time. And there's probably a few more pressing issues that the people of South Carolina need you to start tending to. So get to it.

Meanwhile, I need to figure out which of those other topics I'm going to bitch about tomorrow.

Gun Rights Parable

So I have a little story to tell.  It's a fictional story, but well, you never know how fictional.

A woman, let's call her Suzy, just bought her first home. Suzy's a single mom and the house she and her daughter will now call home is farm house just outside the city limits of your typical American small town. Suzy's excited about having a home and a yard where her daughter can play, but she's concerned about the safety of her family. She knows that living in rural America, if she calls 911, it'll be 10-15 minutes before anyone would actually arrive at her house. Suzy doesn't own a gun, but has been around them all her life and knows well how to be a responsible gun owner.  Suzy decides to buy a gun.

But wait... in the town where Suzy lives, there are no gun shops. Due to laws recently passed, the nearest gun shop is a two hour drive from her home. So Suzy waits for her next day off from her job as a waitress in the town's diner, arranges to have a neighbor watch her daughter, and drives the two hours to the nearest gun shop to buy a gun.

When Suzy gets to the gun shop, she has already done her research and generally knows which gun she wants to buy.  She talks to the owner and gets some additional information about her potential purchase. She picks out a gun and prepares to make her purchase.

Wait again...

"There's a three day waiting period to buy a gun, ma'am.  Need to do a background check. So you need to fill out this form and come back in three days," the shop owner informs her.

"Couldn't I have filled this out at home," Suzy asks?

"Nope," responds the gun shop owner. "Needs to be filled out in person so I can check your ID."

"But I had to drive two hours to get here. I'll have to take another day off of work to come back."

"Sorry ma'am.  There's nothing I can do about it. And I hate to be the one to tell you, but you have to attend a gun safety class, too."

"What?"

"Yes, ma'am. After you fill out this form, you also need to attend a gun safety class before I can sell you a gun."

"But I've been handling guns my whole life."  Suzy is getting frustrated. "Who offers the classes? And how long are they?"

"There's a place just down the street that offers the classes. Class is only a few hours long."

"Down the street? But I told you I live two hours away. I have to come back and take the class and then come back again to buy the gun? This is ridiculous."

"I know ma'am. We're not a fan of the law either."

"Well, ok. I'll fill out the form, but it might be a couple months before I can get back twice for both the class and again to buy the gun."

"Um, I'm afraid that won't do. After you fill out the form, you need to buy the gun within 10 weeks or the process expires and you have to start all over again."

"What! That's crazy! I work two jobs, I had to find someone to watch my daughter, and I had to drive two hours to get here. Now you're telling me I need to do that two more times in the next 10 weeks as well as attend a class that will tell me a bunch of information I already know just to buy a gun! This is ridiculous! It's like they're trying to make it impossible to buy a gun legally."

"Yes, ma'am. I agree. It really is ridiculous."

Suzy filled out the form, left the store, and began her two hour drive back home.

Now I don't know how you feel about gun rights in America, but regardless of your position on the subject, owning a gun is legal in this country. So any laws we enact should be aimed at making it safer for gun owners and non-gun owners, should help us ensure that criminals don't buy guns, and should prevent people from becoming victims of gun violence. Laws should not be put into place where the sole intention is to make it harder for people to do what is 100% legal in this country: buy or own a gun.

But wait, there's more...

100% of what I just said absolutely, positively applies to the rights of women in this country to get an abortion. No matter your personal opinion about the morality of a woman's choice to have an abortion, it is 100% legal in this country. So no woman should have to drive two hours to see a doctor, only to be told that they have to come back three days later. No woman should be told that in those three days, they have to go see another group who will council them against the decision that they are making. No woman should have to jump through hoops designed, not to provide them with more information or better healthcare, but only designed to make it harder for them to choose to have a medical procedure that is 100% legal in this country.

So South Dakota, let me suggest that you put into place the same laws for your gun owners as you do for women in your state. My guess is that voters in South Dakota would never stand for such blatant disregard for their rights as Americans.