Fame, Fortune, & Priorities

Adele, the young singer who won six grammy's Sunday night, told Vogue that she planned on taking five years off in order to be happy:

 "I am [bleeping] off for four or five years ... If I am constantly working, my relationships fail. So at least now I can have enough time to write a happy record."

I doubt she will actually walk away for that long, but at least she understands that if she is to have a happy and fufilling personal life, she has to put in the work. 

So she has a good head on her shoulders as well as an amazing voice.  Let's hope she is able to keep it in the crazy world of the music business. 

Here is her Grammy performance from Sunday night.  Enjoy!!!

A World without Catholic Charities

I think it will come as no surprise to anyone that I have strong opinions about a myriad of topics. The Catholic Church among them. I am strongly anti-Catholic church, but not Catholic people. I have no issue with someone who chooses to follow the faith, it just isn't for me. One of the reasons that I feel so strongly about it is the hypocrisy of allowing people like Nanny Pelosi to meet with the pope and to receive communion, especially in his presence. My church wouldn't allow someone like the strongly pro-abortion politician to receive communion. You want to espouse those ideas so publicly and pass the laws that undermine church teaching you shouldn't be allowed to partake in receiving the holy sacraments.

But my opinion doesn't cloud my judgement when it comes to the autonomy that they should receive when it comes to the right to worship. Catholic Charities does works around the entire world for the betterment of society. They help the forgotten children get into the homes of the childless among many other things. I know several people who adopted through Catholic Charities.

More than 90% of the homeless shelters and soup kitchens in this country alone are run by faith-based groups. They never ask what faith, if any, you are. They will give you shelter and food. They will give one time loans to the people who may be on the verge of homelessness. They help people with young children keep the electricity and heat on in their homes. They clothe the needy.

In the aftermath of Katrina the faith-based groups worked tirelessly to help the victims get back on their feet. They are still there in some cases. The same is true of Haiti. Our world is a better place because of faith-based charities.

Over the weekend at CPAC I was having dinner with a friend who ran into a friend who is a liberal and she joined us for dinner. She told me that she didn't see it as an attack on the church. She reminded me that many catholic women use birth control. Ok, I suppose that is true. But it doesn't matter if many Catholic women use birth control or not. The church doesn't run by polls. It runs by a doctrine based upon the belief system set out in the bible. Just because many of the "faithful" choose not to follow the doctrine doesn't mean that the doctrine doesn't exist. It doesn't mean that the doctrine should be changed. It doesn't mean that the doctrine is misguided. Nor does it mean that the church should have to pay for it. All human beings fall short of the will of God. Every last one of us. Sadly, far too many Christians fall into the cafeteria style religion that has become all to common in modern-day society. We pick and choose what we take from the faith and leave the things that we find hard or go against what modern-day society tells us is acceptable in the world. This being the case makes it even more imperative that the church stands its ground. The moral guidance that faith gives our society should not be watered down.

The exemption for faith-based groups exist. They are so stringent that they hard to achieve, but not impossible. I once worked for a charity called the prison fellowship ministries. I only worked there on a contract basis, but the full-time employees have to sign something saying that they accept Jesus Christ as their savior. If you are unwilling to sign it, you can't be an employee there. It is that simple. But most faith-based charities don't require that. You can be of any faith to work there and they will help anyone of any faith, or lack thereof.

I asked this woman if she would be alright if Catholic charities and other faith-based groups stopped helping people of different faiths. She told me she would fine with that. Really? You are willing to forgo the good these organizations do just to prove a point about birth control? I was stunned to say the least. I would like to think she doesn't have a firm idea of what faith-based groups do around the world.

But I got to thinking, maybe that is the point. Maybe this is the whole reason that they are pushing this. Stay with me now. Say that many faith-based groups do decide to change the way they run their organizations. They will only administer help to people within their own faith in order to stay in compliance with the exemption. What happens to all the others who will no longer be getting the help that they give? They have to turn to the state. Especially if they are not people of faith.

It would be virtually impossible for the faith-based groups to know if the people they are helping are truly people of that faith. I wouldn't put it past atheist activists to try to get services from a faith-based group and then publicize the fact that they were not truly just administering to the "faithful". Many good people would lose jobs at Catholic University's and hospitals. Many people in need of service would be turned away.

Many government grants go to Catholic charity groups all over the country. They are much better at administering to the needs of the poor and underprivileged. This will all have to stop. The programs again would fall back to the pervue of the federal and state governments. The entire reason that they were given to the faith-based groups in the first place was that they helped more people for less money. They understand the needs of an individual community much better because they live there. They dont' fall into the one size fits all mentality that is the norm with government based programs.

So the next time that President Obama talks about helping the poor we need to remind ourselves of the damage he will cause by pushing this mandate to its logical conclusion. The poor will become even more underserved, unless of course they happen to be of the same faith of the organization down the street that could and would help.

I don't think this was the hope and change that people voted for.

Camp Whitney V. Camp Bobby

I am so over all the coverage on the death of Whitney Houston. Yes, of course it is tragic. She was too young to die. But the wall to wall coverage, especially when you consider they don't really know anything, is over the top. But that is the nature of the beast in our celebrity driven culture today.

What we do know is that she drowned in a bathtub, the coroners have confirmed water was found in her lungs. What we also know is that in normal circumstances if you fall asleep in the tub and fall into the water you will wake yourself up in time to keep yourself from drowning. It isn't a stretch to believe that Whitney had some sort of drugs in her system that rendered her unable to wake herself up in time. Her addiction issues are well-known and her most recent stay in rehab came less than a year ago in April or May. There are witnesses that said they saw her out drinking several nights before her death and TMZ reports that prescription drugs were found in her hotel room. Anyone that is less than one year out of rehab should not be drinking, let alone taking prescription drugs. All that is doing is changing one addiction for another.

I have watched and read many of things being said about her death. There are many that are putting the blame on her ex-husband Bobby Brown for the downward spiral that became her life shortly after marrying him. While it is true that most of her fame came before and immediately after her marriage, she was a big girl.

Many young women go through the I am addicted to a bad boy phase during the teen and early adult years. I went through that myself. I stayed with a man who had substance abuse problems for far too long. The closer my wedding got to him the more I realized that I couldn't go through with it. Mainly because the realization of how bad of father he would be hit me and I didn't want to put my children through that. While it was painful, I walked away. I also spent years after that examining the reasons that I stayed with him for as long as I did. The conclusion that I came to was my own low self-esteem. He treated me the way he did because I allowed it. I was smart enough to never became the substance abuser that he was. While I did partake in things that I shouldn't have, I always understood my limitations.

To blame Bobby Brown for the downward spiral of Whitney's life is to take every bit of responsibility that she had for her own life. Life doesn't work that way. It would be nice if it did, but the truth is, it just doesn't. While no one can argue with the facts that if you come from a family of substance abuse you are far more likely to be an abuser yourself. That is also true of child abuse, many child abusers were abused themselves. But it is not a forgone conclusion that you will become an abuser simply based on your childhood.

People do survive whatever issues they face in their childhoods and grow to be happy, well-adjusted adults. There are people who have no substance abuse in their childhoods and grow up to become abusers. We make choices in life. One of the reasons that I don't drink very much is because I have addictive personality so I avoid things that cause those type of problems. I won't take much in the way of pain medication unless it is absolutely necessary and I just can't get through the day without it. I try not to take aspirin if I can at all help it.

The truth is that substance abuse is one of the most selfish acts you can do as a human being. Once it has wormed its way into your life it completely takes over. The addiction is first and foremost in your life. It comes before your spouse, your job, your child, and anything else that you love. For you to reach that point your self-esteem is very low. Somewhere within yourself you feel you are not good enough. You need to be drinking and partying for others to like you. It helps you be "one of the crowd". You put everything else in your life on the back-burner. Nothing else really matters as much as the next high. I have seen people walk away from their children, I have seen people ruin their marriages, and I have seen people die at far too early of an age just for the next high. The man I loved died at the ripe old age of 35, leaving two small children who will not even remember him. He did that to himself. No one else was to blame for his problems. He knew he had a problem, but he refused to do anything about it. He didn't love himself enough to change the direction of his life.

The same is true of Whitney Houston. She didn't love herself enough. She didn't realize that her daughter, while a young adult, still needs her mommy. Her family wasn't ready to say goodbye to her. But she didn't care enough to deal with the real reasons that she was addicted. After being in rehab, she was no longer physically addicted to the substances that landed her there in the first place. It became what was between her ears and what was in heart, not what was in her bloodstream. That problem had been licked.

While Bobby Brown is not a man I would want in my life, I certainly can't blame him for someone else's actions. They only things that caused Whitney to use drugs and drink too much were her own two hands. One of her big hits was about the greatest love of all, the love of yourself. Too bad for her family and for the world that loved her talent that they were no more than lyrics to her.

Sarah Palin Rocks CPAC

Sarah Palin's long awaited appearance at CPAC finally took place last night.  I had the privilege to see it in person.  The atmosphere was completely electric.  The speech was red meat to the base and exactly what we were hoping to hear.  Her zingers were great and she showed how she can work on her feet.  The occupiers bought a few tickets and tried to disrupt the speech, but the crowd took care of that.  In case you have not heard, that was the reason that the chants of USA started.  She kept moving as the security took care of the occupiers. 

Enjoy......................

She did take the time to meet with some of the attendees who were lucky enough to get close to her.  I was walking by and saw this huge crowd and flashes going off.  I was on my way to lunch, but by that point she was mobbed by the people, that we just kept walking and went and got our crawfish.  My friend Marta was able to shake her hand.  My buddy Phil was able to get a birdseye view of the occupiers.  He was trying to give them a Newt sticker earlier in the day. 

The occupiers came and failed.  We had a great conference. 

Whitney Houston Dead at 48

Whitney Houston was found dead in a hotel room in Los Angeles.  She was only 48 years old.  A very tragic story. 

Whitney had God-given talent and beauty.  She could sing and she could act.  She had the world at her feet when she was only in early 20's. 

Sadly party demons took over her life after her marriage to bad boy Bobby Brown.  It is a real shame she was never able to get her life back on track. 

Reportly she was seen drinking and partying on Friday at the hotel bar. 

May she find the peace she was unable to find in life. 

CPAC and The Occupiers

I had loads of fun with the occuppiers. I mean that seriously. They also brought there homes with them, when they marched they brought their stinky tents with them. Too funny.

I have video but I had to recharge my batteries and don't have time to get it done this morning. I will upload later.

I see that they admitted they were paid to be there. Shocker!!!

They did get into the hotel, but that didn't last long. They tried to get to Breitbart. You can just imagine how that worked out.

The conservative media was threatened with arrest if they got too close to them.

The occuppiers were sitting in the middle of road chanting Whose Street, Our Street and the police did nothing, yet Stacy from The Other McCain got his beer taken away from him.

But the saddest/funniest part of it is the fact that I don't think that they realize they were just a source of entertainment to us.

The AFL-CIO rented a bunch of rooms last night which means they will be around again today. Lets hope the occupiers took the opportunity to take a shower.

CPAC Speech of the Day

While three presidential candidates spoke today, this was the speech that got the biggest buzz of the day. 

Sit back, get your popcorn and enjoy!!!

CPAC Speech of the Day - Marco Rubio

This by far, got the biggest buzz of the day.

Sit back and enjoy.......................

CPAC Day One - Part 1

The security is overwhelming.  I have never seen it like this.  They are checking each and every pass at the door for every speaker and event.  That has not happened in the past.  I guess they are taking the occupier protests seriously and doing their best to protect the speakers and the attendees.  I am sure that they have had to hire additional people. 

AFL-CIO has decided to up the game and has rented rooms here, so it will be impossible to throw them out, as they are guests.  Lovely. 

I just met Victoria Jackson from SNL fame.  I ran into Stacy from the Other McCain and The DaTech Guy earlier this morning.  They were both telling me I need to support Santorum. 

Santorum stickers are everywhere.  He seems to have a great deal of support here.  I would venture to say he could win the straw poll. 

Romney has a plan to use this conference to "woo" conservatives.  Good luck with that venture. 

The Citadel has 31 cadets here.  Nice to see people who not only willing to serve in the military, but also politically active at such a young age.

Jim DeMint gave a great opening speech.  I believe that CSPAN covers the event and will have videos. 

Herman Cain's bus is here.  I have not yet seen Mr. Cain himself, but the bus is at least here.  He is due to speak after 4 today. 

The blogger bash is tonight, that should be a good time. 

It is still early, so not much more to report. 

But, I have to say, I always love it when conservatives are in town.  They are in short supply in this neck of the woods. 

Rick Santorum Wins Minnesota and Missouri

He gets zero delegates, but hey a win is a win right?  Right? 

Conservatives, Occuppiers, & Union Thugs; Oh, My

So the occupiers have nothing better to do Friday afternoon and they have decided to get together with their union thug buddies to converge at The Marriott Wardman Hotel to "protest" this year's CPAC. One can hope they will behave better than they did three months ago at the AFP gathering at the Washington Convention Center.

They have set up a facebook page to help organize this little field trip for themselves. I feel no need to link to that, but I suppose if you search you can find it if you are so inclined.

The first of two demonstrations will be noon on Friday and the second planned for the Reagan dinner Friday night.

Oh, darn, noon on Friday is when Ann Coulter will be speaking. Oh, well I guess I will have to forgo that.

I say Bring.It.On

CPAC will have a much younger crowd then the AFP conference had. Wardman will also provide much better security for the attendees.

If you happen to be in the DC area on Friday at lunchtime, come on down to the Wardham. The smell might be bad, but the sight of them will be worth the price of admission.

Quote of the Day - Jay Carney Edition

“A lot of that is due to younger people getting more of an education, which is an economic positive,”

Jay Carney, White House Spokesman, on what will happen to the unemployment number when the more than one million people who were removed from the workforce, return to find jobs. 

So, let me get this straight.  It is an econominc postive that younger kids just starting out are continuing with their educations because there are no jobs for them?  Is that all the debt that they are accuring in students loans an economic postive for them too? 

I guess they have to spin the lie that is our "official" unemployment number somehow. 

Newt's Moon Colony - SNL Take

Madonna's Superbowl XLVI Halftime Show

I thought this was one of the better halftime shows.  I am a huge fan of Madonna. 

Enjoy

Shame on you Clint Eastwood - Halftime in America Chrysler Commercial

I cannot believe that Clint Eastwood did this ad.  Halftime in America huh?  I suppose he thinks the bailouts that benefited the unions more than anyone else were a good thing.  I guess the fact that Chrysler isn't an American company anymore is just some pesky little detail. 

Kelly Clarkson Nails the National Anthem at SuperBowl XLVI

I will tell you how out of it I am when it comes to pop culture, I couldn't have pulled this woman out of a line up.  Wasn't she a blonde at one point? 

Tebow of the Day - Snow Tebow

Ann Coulter has Offically Crossed over to the Dark Side

Yeah, Ann Coulter is now saying that the tea party is being hypocritical for not supporting Romney. Of the four candidates left, Newt has the highest conservative voting record. While Romney was never in Congress so it is hard to compare apples to apples, but there is this one little, ok not little, really big thing called Romneycare.

It wasn't all that long ago that Coulter was saying if Christie didn't run, Romney would be the nominee and he would lose to Obama. Romney's record hasn't changed in the past year. He will still lose if he is the nominee. I fully understand if what she is trying to do is be a cheerleader for the party's nominee to get Obama out of office. But that isn't what she is doing.

I am left dumbfounded and disappointed in Ms. Coulter.



Another Big Win for Romney

I was on twitter last night after the news broke that Romney did indeed win the Nevada Caucus.  The polls had been showing he would not only win, but win big.  I had said that wasn't necessarily going to be the case since 08 was the first time they ever had a caucus and the turnout was very low. 

Romney won pretty much every important demographic in the exit polling.  He even won the Catholic vote over two Catholic candidates.  The one important demographic he lost was independents, which mainly broke for Ron Paul. 

Romney's speech got rave reviews on Twitter last night, even by those who are lets say,  not exactly fans of his. 
Ann Romney also seems to be a big hit with people who are not happy with Romney. Maybe we should nominate her instead? She is a very classy lady. She is FLOTUS material, that is for sure.

A Random Conversation with a Liberal

I have been under the weather as of late so I have not really posting all that much of late. Boy, much has happened over the past week or so; where to begin.

I have a part-time job. I work there for the insurance not really the paycheck. But obviously the paycheck pays the insurance costs. As many of you have heard JC Penney has made some major changes in the way it prices things. The branding they are doing is saying that the marked down the prices by about 40%. Which what they really did was price it the way things used to be priced before the public at large was brainwashed into believing that they were saving money when things said sale, or worse yet there was a coupon. For those who still don't get it, when a store has a coupon they use a lower mark down. You are pretty much paying the same cost with or without a coupon, it is all in your head that you are saving money in a department store setting.

The truth is that the business is very slow; at least at the store that I work at. So in order to not have the bad publicity of layoffs they have done several things. They have cut hours for entire departments and some have no full-time employees left. Which means the level of benefits change drastically. For others they offered them positions that they knew full well most would not take. The added benefit after the bad publicity is also the money that they will save on unemployment. My hours were cut so I no longer qualify for the part-time associate insurance. So it is pointless for me to keep the job as that is the only reason that I took it in the first place.

This of course has been the topic of discussion among employees as you can well imagine. Someone who works there has a close family that live in same complex and they are dependent upon each other for daycare of their kids and the like. Four out of the six adults work at the same place. Not something I would think is a good idea. But that is just me. One just started there less than a year ago after arriving in the U.S. from another country. He originally was going to take a position with another retailer, but then the job at Penney's opened up. It was a good set up for them as they could car pool. Well he works in the department that no longer has any full-time employees. His daughter who also works there has lost about half her hours and had her commission cut by quite a bit. Even had they not cut her hours, her paycheck basically would have dropped in half. She told anyone that would listen that she couldn't work for the lesser rate and had to find another job. Yet, she is upset that they cut her hours. Her boss knew that she said she would be looking for another job, so doesn't it make sense that she would be logical choice to cut the extra hours they needed? It makes perfect sense to me. She also feels that they owed her father a full-time position for at least year since he could have gone and worked somewhere else.

I was dumbfounded listening to this conversation. I told her if they had to guarantee him a certain amount of hours for certain period of time they never would have hired him. Did they pay him the wage he agreed to when he accepted the position? Did they treat him fairly in the work place? Did they put a gun to his head and force him to take that job over the other one? Was it anyone else's fault that you told anyone and everyone that you didn't want to work for a lower wage?

This throws a wrench into my life as well. But, oh well; that's life. Would I have prefered that they just laid me off so I could collect unemployment for a while and pay for Cobra while I look for something else. Sure would have, but they didn't They are going to cut my hours to force my hand into quitting. Is it nice? No. Is it legal? It sure is. Would I have made a different decision if I were the head of the company? No I would not. Retail has very small margins to make its profit. Most stores run in the black until very late into the fiscal year. We are in a recession right now. They have to spend a great deal of money to publicize and explain the new pricing to people who were used to seeing signs that said 50% off, the people who would come in and try to use 15 coupons on two items are not going to be happy that they can't use them anymore. They are planning on slower sales for a time I am sure. They are doing what they have to do to keep their board and stock holders happy. That is their corporate responsibility as a publicly traded company.

I then had to listen to "Only in America do they not help you get a job". In Europe they can't just fire you like that. True, they can't. But, the other side of that coin is the fact that on average when times are good they have higher unemployment and a more stagnant economy. It doesn't occur to them that finding a job in Europe is harder for that very reason. When it is so difficult to fire someone when times are lean, they don't hire when times are fat.

I ended the conversation by saying you live in a right to work state, if you don't like it move. You can go to one of those states that have all these laws designed to keep you employed and allow you sue to your heart's content if you get laid off. Just remember in those states, your taxes are generally much higher and so is the unemployment. If you don't like the capitalist system in America, then you should not have moved here. You are immigrants, you could have gone to many other places around the world when you decided to leave your country, but you chose to come here. We are a capitalist society. You want quasi-socialism move to Greece and ask them how that is working out for them.