Uncommon Decency

If you see someone you know

You say hello

If someone falls to the ground in front of you

You check to see if they’re alright

If someone says thank you

You say you’re welcome

If someone graduates from college

You say congratulations

If two men tell you they’re getting married

You say ...

Well

What do

You

Say

?

I want to be free

I want to be free

Not to own a gun

But to walk the streets without the fear that I might be shot with one

I want to be free

Not to make a billion dollars

But to feel like I make enough

I want to be free

Not to stop other people from marrying

But to be happy in my own marriage

I want to be free

To join with others to eliminate abortion

Without raping women in the process

I want to be free to

To welcome people to my country with open arms

In their language

I want to be free to

Invest my money

Drink my water

Take my medicine and

Not die or end up on the streets or both

I want to be free to disagree with you and

Still be your fellow American

I want to be free to talk with you

To compromise with you and

To solve problems with you and

Still be committed

Passionate

Driven

Principled

I want to be free

How about you

Obama and Golf

Stop it with the golf already.  Really.  I don’t care if the President plays some golf.   No one should.  We need to stop talking about things like golf, birth certificates, and dogs.  These aren’t the key issues.  If you want to criticize the President because he hasn’t invaded Iran, that’s fine.  That’s an important issue.  Plus, a substantive argument like that can be addressed, answered, debated, and even discussed (if that happens anymore).   If you want to talk about golf why don’t you talk about Tiger Woods, and leave serious discussion about politics to more serious people.

A Better Line

Obama put in place a freeze on the deportation of some immigrants who came to the United States as kids.  Republicans responded by saying that Obama should have let Congress take action.  Ha!  The truth is he waited far too long for Congress to take action on a number of fronts.  Congress, led by a Republican majority in the House, did everything it could to obstruct any legislation at all but that which would have been completely unpalatable to the President.  The President stood around alternating between glaring and saying please a lot.  Nothing got done.  Eventually he figured out that if anything was to get done he had to do it himself.  So, that is what he is doing.  And now the Republicans in Congress tell him that he should be working with them?  They’re going to have to come up with a better line than that.

V#$#%$ spells vagina

“It was so offensive, I don’t even want to say it in front of women … I would not say that in mixed company.”  What word was this state representative in Michigan reacting to?  What word was it that got another state representative barred from the next debate just for using it?  What heinous word is this?  Well … it is … (recoil in horror) … vagina.  What a horrible thing to say … especially in front of men!  I mean, come on, clearly the more appropriate word is pussy.  Relax … I’m just teasing, I know that it’s not appropriate for adults to talk about our own private parts, especially when it’s an event that women and men are allowed to attend together at the same time.  The nerve of that woman!  Especially in a debate about abortion.  What was she thinking?  Just because she has one she thinks she can talk about it?  Outrageous!  This seals it.  I am moving back to Michigan right away, because they clearly have their priorities straight.

Neshaminy Strike: Let's Get Real Part II

It is awful that you lost your house.  It is hard to raise children on the money that you make working part time as a waitress.  I am sorry that you have to contribute so much to your health plan.  That being said, none of that has anything to do with the contract dispute between the teachers and the school board in Neshaminy.  If the board doesn’t have enough money, that matters.  It doesn’t matter if you don’t have enough money.  It doesn’t matter if a teacher makes more than you do or has better health care.  The focus needs to come back to what the district can afford, what the teachers need, whether the teachers are bearing more of the burden of a shortfall then they should, who is responsible for the shortfall, should teachers get credit for teaching the last four years, etc..  The problems you are facing on the home front are important, but this contract dispute is not the place to solve them.

Neshaminy Strike: Let's Get Real Part I

Barrett Oterson took her daughter to Walter Miller Elementary School to help her study … on the grass while teachers picketed nearby.  She was joined by other parents and their young ones.  Here is what she told the paper about what she was doing: “My daughter kept asking me, ‘Why aren’t we going to school?’  So I said, ‘Why don’t we just go and have class ourselves.” 

Now, let’s be real about what Ms. Oterson was doing.  She was using her kid to send a message to the teachers.    This wasn’t about keeping her education going, because she could have done that at home.   It wasn’t about her daughter’s question, if it was even asked, because I’ve dealt with that one myself and I didn’t need to take my daughter to the school to answer it.  All I had to do was talk to her in a general way about how people get paid to work and sometimes disagree about what they should be paid.   What she accomplished was impressive … she got her side a nice picture on the front page of the paper.  That wasn’t even all she did.  She risked the safety of her daughter to do it (there were death threats and cars swerving at picket lines) and introduced an interesting dimension into her daughter’s relationship with her teachers.  Now, that might have been worth it in order to get an advantage in a conflict with teachers … but let’s not pretend it had anything to do with educating her kids.