1st Anniversary

One year ago today this site launched to little fanfare. While a few things have changed since then, that little fanfare has remained constant. Over the past year a lot of things have happened in the world, and time and mood permitting, we have attempted to discuss a few of them. More often than not, they really didn’t warrant discussion. So, what was happening on January 31, 2013 that was so important that this little chunk of the interweb was birthed?  Here are a few of them:

·         Egypt’s $1.5 Billion U.S. Aid Questioned Amid Crackdown

·         China’s (Fake) Gay Marriage Debate

·         Subsidies for Saints Owner Open New Orleans to Super Bowl

·         L.A. School District Sued Over Sexual Abuse of Students

·         J.C. Penney Aims to Win Trust With ‘Elsewhere’ Prices

·         AT&T Gave Obama Inaugural $3 Million, Awaits Airwave Sale

·         High Winds Spread Air Travel Delays Throughout the Northeast

·         Are China’s Hackers Preying on Journalist E-Mail Habits?

·         Mobs Wrecked Confederate Capital as Lee Left: Lewis Lapham

·         Ethanol Strengthens to Gasoline as EPA Proposes Targets

·         Las Vegas Sands Rises as Macau Casino Results Beat Forecasts

·         U.S. Auto Sales Seen Rising on Post-Crisis Lease Renewals

·         Hostess Chooses Apollo, Metropoulos as Lead Bidder

·         NFL Sees Modest Revenue Growth as Sponsors Stay Shaky on Economy

·         Biggest IPO Since Facebook Tests Pfizer’s Pigs and Dogs Strategy

·         Cayman Sea Turtles Endure Slaughter, Tourists: Commentary

·         Dells Pledge $50 Million to Build Austin Medical School

·         Sex Impossible for Most Men After Prostate Therapy

·         Dissident Cuban Blogger Gets Passport After Castro Eases Rules

But for some reason I thought I needed to waste your time and mine with this garbage. I hope to continue with more of the same.

Croc Attack!

Police have found evidence that "strongly indicates" a 12-year-old boy who was witnessed being snatched by a crocodile in a remote part of Australia was killed in the attack. Apparently this is news because everyone was expecting that the crocodile had simply taken the boy hostage and would be demanding a ransom.

In a statement, the police said they would not be specifying the “type of evidence located out of respect for the family." So, by dancing around the subject we are left to assume that they have found body parts around the water hole. Or maybe one vital body part. Or maybe a hunter killed a crocodile and when they cut it open they found another crocodile inside, and when they cut that crocodile open they found the boy inside. By not telling what they found, the police leave a lot to the imagination.  They have turned what should be a sad story into a Choose Your Own Adventure. That’s probably more disrespectful to the family than just coming out and saying that the crocodile ate the boy.

And at the end of the article, in a weird “if you enjoyed this story, you’ll also like…” cross promotion, CNN links you to two more Australian wild animal stories:

Australian boy says kangaroo saved him

Coroner rules dingo to blame for Australian baby's death

In a case of life imitating art, all of these stories have parallels to the Hollywood movies Lake Placid, Kangaroo Jack and A Cry in the Dark.

If anyone was offended by today’s entry, let me go ahead and apologize now for referring to Kangaroo Jack as “art.”

I love you so much…

...that I am signing up for a one-way ticket to Mars.

That’s basically what Ken Sullivan has told his wife, Becky. Ken is in a group of a thousand or so finalists for the Mars One project that could send him to the red planet permanently in about 10 years. Ken and Becky have been married five years and have four children, and that has apparently pushed Ken to the limit. He has decided that life on a desolate planet (or perhaps in a space capsule) is preferable to the little slice of heaven he carved out for himself here on Earth.

Obviously, things are a little rocky in this relationship. But Ken is a man of his word who views his wedding vows as a verbal commitment to his partner. They are, in both moral and legal senses, a binding contract. So he is going to ride this rocky patch out and fulfill his commitment to his wife, albeit from a planet 140 million miles away.

His wife is not really on the same page. “The question is do we get divorced now or get divorced later,” Becky told The Salt Lake City Tribune. Way to bail on your marriage at the first sign of a rough patch, especially when she seems to feel like her husband being on Mars wouldn’t be that much different than normal. “He already works out of town, so we’re used to the long-distance thing, but it would be hard when he doesn’t come home after awhile. I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t leave my kids, but I’ve spent every day with them, and he doesn’t, so I guess it’s different,” Becky told the Tribune, who Becky seems to think is her own personal marriage counselor.

This will give him the possibility to do something significant with his life. According to Ken, he sees this as a chance to explore, “and the opportunity to do something no one has ever done before, and making a name for myself would be nice to do.” Now you can start to see why Ken is so desperate to get out of Dodge. He has hooked his wagon to a shrill, petty harpy. He woke up one morning and realized he was Witness Protection-era Henry Hill… he gets to live the rest of his life as a schnook. But now he has found his escape.

Godspeed Ken Sullivan.

Excuse me while I pull my hair out

The baseball Hall of Fame is a joke, its election process is a farce, and anyone who tries to defend it is a moron. Now that I have that off my chest, let me attempt to explain why I feel that way.

(Empty your bladder before proceeding)

Do not have fun on Halloween!

Students at the University of Colorado Boulder have been told not to wear "offensive" Halloween costumes including cowboys, Indians, geishas, squaws or anything involving a sombrero.

Students have also been told to avoid "white trash" costumes and anything that portrays a particular culture as "over-sexualized" - which would seem to preclude most students from wearing their everyday attire.

They are also asked not to host parties with offensive themes including those with “ghetto” or "hillbilly" themes.  And in one final sweeping category, the university suggested no costumes associated with "crime or sex work." Apparently this was an effort to also eliminate dressing up as any athlete or politician.

This sort of hyper-PC move is obviously ridiculous and I don’t support it in principle.  However, I do take a little solace in the fact that the school has eliminated almost every conceivable costume not directly associated with Halloween. It would be nice to see some costumes that really get back to the spirit of the holiday.  You know, such things as ghosts, goblins, ghouls and witches.

Strike that… no witches. We wouldn’t want to unfairly stereotype or offend anyone at The Pagan Federation.

Not again

At some point this space will be used to talk about something other than transgenders once every few weeks. But this is really annoying me and it’s the only thing I have found worth addressing in my spare time. I’m not sure what it is that bothers me the most about these stories; the societal acceptance, the media’s presentation, or the lame-brained laws that are being put in place.

Let’s look at the most recent case. The headline in this Telegraph article reads, “Six-year-old becomes first transgender child in Argentina to change identity.” The headline of the story seems to imply that this six-year-old (Lulu) had the awareness to know what being transgendered is and had the wherewithal to do something about it by utilizing a new government law. The article states:

A six-year-old girl, who was born a boy, has become the first transgender child in Argentina to have her new name officially changed on her identity documents.

 

The article states that Argentina’s new Gender Identity Law enshrines the right to be identified by name and sex as defined by the individual. So that’s it?  That’s what it takes to become a different gender in Argentina? Obviously a six-year-old would have to have the help and approval of their parents to get this done. Which was certainly the case here:

The decision was made after Lulu’s mother, Gabriela, wrote to [the governor of Buenos Aires, Daniel Scioli] as well as Argentinian president Cristina Kirchner. She said her daughter identified herself as a girl as soon as she started talking.

Wouldn’t it be possible that this has all come about because of poor guidance from the mother and/or father? Maybe if they had been clearer about their child’s actual gender, the young boy would not have identified himself as a girl. Or maybe the parents just wanted a girl and decided this was the easiest way to have one. It sounds like some cruel experiment that nobody seems to be questioning the validity of.

While this whole transgender thing has not been fully clear to me, I was beginning to feel like I got it a little more… until this sentence showed up in the article:

Cesar Cigliutti, head of Homosexual Community Argentina (CHA), which supported the family, said Lulu’s case was “historic”.

So, is Lulu transgendered or homosexual?  They are two different things, right?  Not that I think a six-year-old’s sexual identity should even remotely be on anyone’s radar. The story really seems to highlight poor parenting and poor lawmaking.

It also raises another question, though. While I don’t agree with the events that transpired in Lulu’s case mostly because it deals with a six-year-old, what if a person like myself (a heterosexual male in his 30’s who looks and talks exactly like Burt Reynolds in Smokey and the Bandit) decided that they wanted to take the same steps? You basically just go to some government office and say you identify yourself as a certain gender and that’s it.You are now that gender. The M on my driver’s license would suddenly become an F and I would officially be a woman. I could freely shop in Victoria’s Secret, go into the dressing room and even the womens' restroom. Sure, I look and sound just like The Bandit, but if anyone had an issue with it, I would pull out my driver’s license and point to the F and reassure them, “Look, it’s not what you think. I am actually a transgendered woman. With a penis.  And I’m also a lesbian.”

Uh, what?

Not transgendered

Just because you take pills doesn't mean you change sex.  If you "elected to retain the reproductive organs of a woman", dude, you are still a woman.

The Syria situation raises some serious questions...

... like "What the hell has happened to John Kerry's face?"

Not to beat a dead horse…

…but this story is so absurd. You have to read this to believe it. I’m not sure Bradley Manning has officially changed his name to Chelsea or not, but does anyone at CBS realize that changing your name does not change your gender? Chelsea Manning is a man! That’s it.  There is nothing ambiguous about it. To pretend otherwise makes them look absolutely foolish.

I will assume Bradley has officially changed his name to Chelsea and refer to him as such, but what if Chelsea were to escape from captivity and CBS ran a story about that? According to their own reporting practices it would read something like this:

"Fort Leavenworth authorities are searching for an inmate who escaped on Wednesday. At about 11:45 a.m., Chelsea Elizabeth Manning escaped by walking away from an inmate work crew assigned to the field squad.

"Manning is a white female who is 5’2”, 140 lbs with short, dirty-blonde hair.  Anyone who sees this fugitive should immediately contact Fort Leavenworth officials."

How would that ever lead someone to this person?

This is really mind-boggling to me.  I guess in the minds of the people in charge at CBS, this person is black.

CBS is ridiculous

One day after being sentenced to 35 years in prison for the release of massive amounts of classified information, Bradley Manning has decided that he wants to become a woman. And that’s exactly the way it should be reported.  Despite What CBS would like to tell you, Bradley Manning is actually a man.

As I read this story I couldn’t help but notice something really strange. Somewhere between the time that I read the opening sentence…

“One day after being sentenced for leaking a large amount of classified documents to an anti-secrecy website, Army Pfc. Bradley Manning announced he intends to live the remainder of his life as “Chelsea Manning,” a woman, and begin hormone therapy as soon as possible.”

…and the time I got to the fourth paragraph…

“Manning is also requesting the public now refer to her by her new name and as a woman. She says she looks forward to receiving letters from supporters and intends to write back.”

…Manning’s gender had miraculously changed!  Just like that, in mere seconds. No hormones. No surgery.  Nothing.

I’m sure CBS thinks it is doing the right thing by immediately accepting this convicted criminal’s wishes, but if all it takes to become a woman is to declare that your new name is Chelsea, then why is there a need for hormones? According to CBS, Manning is already a woman. So I suppose they think he should be housed with female inmates for the next 35 years.

Wait a second…

This Manning fellow is a genius! And our media outlets are morons.