Archive for March, 2006
Illegals & Faxes
The illegal immigration issue continues to rage, as the Senate debates amnesty provisions in the McCain/Kenndy bill. If you would like to support reducing the illegals crossing the borders (some of whom may be coming here to sell drugs as members of international gangs or even bomb us as terrorist — they don’t all just pick fruit.) and actually enforcing the law as it exists…
You should check out NumbersUSA.com You can sign up and send faxes to your congressmen with a few mouse clicks. If you want to be more involved you can customize your faxes to say exactly what you want to say. Want to do more? They list contact info for the people that represent you so you can call, write, and email them as well. Get involved.
A few minutes of you time could save you huge amounts of tax dollars by reducing the illegals getting Social Security and Welfare checks — not to mention the insurance costs of illegal immigrants getting emergency room services (someone’s gotta pay those docs & nurses). Another drain that is so far out it’s funny: in some states illegal immigrants can get IN STATE tution to go to college… American’s from other states can’t but non-citizens from other countries SURE! Why not? We wouldn’t want to “trample on their rights” but just don’t think to much about your rights… your only a tax paying, vote casting, citizen.
The best bill in the Senate is by far the one put out by Sen. Frist. His bill has enforcement position similar to the House’s bill, but allows for the doubling of Green Cards. Remember green cards? The legal way to enter the States and work and chase the American dream? It actually makes sense to increase the green cards if we start actually enforcing our immigration laws. It would reduce the number illegals and replace them (somewhat) with law abiding visitors (who like to work as well). Truth be told, we could probably increase the green card by 4 or 5 times if we really got serious about enforcement. This would fill the labor demand created by fewer illegals but still allow more jobs for American’s will fewer skills and little education (the unemployment rate for American’s without a High School diploma is 14%). It would also increase the number of tax payers and reduce the number of people on Government assistance. BOTH of which will reduce the tax burden on us the hard working middle class Americans.
Biggest Loser
“So when it comes down to it, a calorie is a calorie is a calorie… There is only one moral of the story: burn as many damn calories as possible whenever you work out.” - Jillian Michaels Winning by Losing (Biggest Loser Trainer)
Jillian is discussing ideal workout intensity. The age old debate between higher burning, high intensity, work outs verses low intensity “fat burning” work outs. Surprise, surprise… it’s not about target zones, magic formulas or special tricks. It’s about burning more calories than you eat.
Tri 2 Training Update
Well I would like to say I went for a 5k run today. Unfortunately, a slow, painful jog would better describe how I traversed the 5 kilometers this evening. I did lap another person on the track a couple of times during the 2nd half of my run, but she was a tad heavy so it wasn't a huge victory. One thing is for certain: I still hate running as much as ever. I will concede, though, that a pair of running shoes is probably one of the cheapest and best pieces of work out equipement you can buy. Swim trunks COULD be if you live near a lake… other wise you're paying for a pool and suddenly swimming isn't so cheap.
Wireless Posting
The new SW allows us to post wirelessly from a PPC phone. Cool!
Illegal Immigrants: Bring It!
“Breaking dramatically from the House’s get-tough prescription for illegal immigration, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted Monday to place the nation’s 11 million-plus illegal immigrants on a path to eventual citizenship.” — mercurynews.com
The House recently passed HR 4437 which does the following:
- makes illegal immigration a felony (allowing local law enforcement to have teeth against the problem)
- creates a fine of up to $50,000 against businesses employing illegal aliens (reducing the economic advantage to underpaid workers)
- deports illegal caught in the US (the most logical solution to people in the country illegally - putting them back out of it)
The Senate, however, is apparently afraid of the large protest over the weekend (immigration protest) and sought to appease the Illegal Immigrant Activists. As a side note: it definitely says something about the current state of illegal immigrants in our country when they can come out in public arenas and protest the strengthening enforcement against their illegal activities. That’d be like thieves marching for fewer cops…
Post Its
Have a lot of spare time and even more post its? Why not label everything?
A witty blog Now Spin This has resurfaced as Still Spinning.
UPDATE:? Looks like the site is moving again to a more permenant location: StillSpinning.net
Tri Training Season 2
Now that it’s finally warming up and I’m mostly over my illness, I can start training for the new season of Triathlons! That’s right, I’m coming out of retirement after a year long sabatical…
I’m still getting my bike legs back from the winter so I did a 15 mile jaunt today with moderate hills. It took me 1:19 to complete… glad it’s still early in the season.
New Site SW
That's right! Since we are now officially 2 years back on the air — we decided to spiff up the place.
Project Magma was taking too long so we chose an alternative. We are now running on Word Press 2.0 which will allow browsing by topics and an improved search. Enjoy. :)
Comments are currently turned off to keep us from policing them. That may change once were fully settled in. It will take us a few days to get everything moved into the new DB so bare with us.
The Iraq War Turns 3
That’s right it’s been 3 years since we started the war in Iraq. You will of course hear 4 years in the news because that sounds longer and technically we have started the 4th year of our presence there. What you won’t hear as much any more is our causalty rate. Why? Because it’s going down and mentioning that would be too close to good news. The causalty rate in Iraq has been around 2 deaths per day most months with a few months hitting an average 3 per day. This year, however, the causalty rate has dropped to about 1 per day. Of course here in America we value all human life (so we claim) and so 1 death is 1 too many, but let’s put the war in perspective.
Leading Causes Of Death In America
| Cause | Annually * | Per Day |
| Heart Disease (all) | 725,000 | 1986 |
| Cancer (all) | 556,000 | 1523 |
| Coronary Heart Disease (Heart Attacks & Angina) | 479,000 | 1312 |
| American Health Care System** | 225,000 | 616 |
| … | … | … |
| Auto Accidents (all) | 40,000 | 109 |
| Drunk Driving | 16,000 | 43 |
| Falling Down | 15,000 | 41 |
| Poisoning | 9,000 | 24 |
| Drowning | 4,000 | 10.9 |
| … | … | … |
| War In Irag (3 year average) | 766 | 2.09 |
*rounded to the nearest thousand - most data was from the year 2002
** deaths due to unnecessary surgery,medication errors, hospital errors, infections in hospitals, and negative effects of drugs (http://www.health-care-reform.net/causedeath.htm)
More Quotes
“The ladies of The View are glittering jewels of colossal ignorance who think they’re the smartest people in the room.” - Rush Limbaugh
“Where a calculator on the ENIAC is equipped with 19,000 vacuum tubes and weighs 30 tons, computers in the future may have only 1,000 vacuum tubes and perhaps only weigh 1.5 tons.”" - Popular Mechanics, March 1949.
“If I’m not back in five minutes.. wait longer” - Jim Carrey, Ace Ventura Pet Detective
“Absurdity. A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one’s own opinion.” - Ambrose Bierce

