In an Australian court today, a psychologist defended his treatment of a bulimic patient.  Apparently, putting her in a dog callar and threatening her with a whip is an ethical and possibly effective recourse when all else fails.  You buying that?  Me neither.

My husband and I were friends with a practicing psychologist in New York who once told us something I've never forgotten. I'll paraphrase. 'The most depraved and degrading organizations in this country is the American Associations of Psychology and Psychiatry.'  Hmmm. Interesting.

Last year, Dems violated the agreed upon practice of not using congressional pay as a campaign issue.  Both parties realize that Americans think they are overpaid, spoiled and underworked, so for years, the parties have not made political hay out of annual raises.  When Dems played the pay card to their advantage, suggesting deceitfully, that only the GOP wanted to up the salary, it helped to sweep them into office.  Today, however, we know who the real whiners are when it comes to not being able to line their pockets with taxpayer dollars...

DEMOCRATS are upset that the GOPers blocked annual COLA increase.  Say it ain't so, Joe!  Not those lovely folks who refused to support a pay raise unless the minimum wage was also increased. It can't be!  Even knowing that minimum wage has no measurable impact on the percentage of impoverished citizens, a number that has remained stable between 8 and 11 percent for fifty years, minimum wage increases notwithstanding, the Dems played to the poor underclass, all the while intending to fleece them with the yearly pay raise after blackmailing GOP congressmen into supporting this failed fiscal policy.  Well, on this issue at least, it appears republicans grew a spine.

Thank heavens for, at least a little, fiscal conservatism.

For questions regarding the minimum wage, I suggest contacting Senators Kerry or Kennedy since Mass. has a much higher minimum wage than most states.  Perhaps you can meet them in Boston to discuss the issue over your $8 big mac.  (Yep, wage goes up, prices go up...)

Yeah, yeah, two Americas. Ho-hum.  Remember when Edwards condemned the rich getting richer and the poor getting left behind.  That must've been before he broke ground on his 28,200 square foot domicile in Orange Co., NC.  Apparently, Edwards has decided to create his own country where there is just one economic class - filthy rich.  The Edwards home will bring in 6 million annually in taxes alone.  Well, there's one thing the state can thank him for, that's about all since as a Senator, he rarely bothered to show up for work. 

Two Americas.  You'll never say that again without cynicism.

(Following copied in its entirety from the Carolina Journal website)

2007-01-26

Carolina Journal Exclusives

Edwards Home County's Largest

By Don Carrington

RALEIGH - Presidential candidate John Edwards and his family recently moved into what county tax officials say is the most valuable home in Orange County. The house, which includes a recreational building attached to the main living quarters, also is probably the largest in the county.

The Edwards residential property will likely have the highest tax value in the county,- Orange County Tax Assessor John Smith told Carolina Journal. He estimated that the tax value will exceed $6 million when the facility is completed.

The rambling structure sits in the middle of a 102-acre estate on Old Greensboro Road west of Chapel Hill. The heavily wooded site and winding driveway ensure that the home is not visible from the road. "No Trespassing" signs discourage passersby from venturing past the gate.

Don Knight, Orange County building plans examiner, told CJ that, including the recreational building, the Edwardses' home would be one of the largest in Orange County.

Knight approved the building plans that showed the Edwards home totaling 28,200 square feet of connected space. The main house is 10,400 square feet and has two garages. The recreation building, a red, barn-like building containing 15,600 square feet, is connected to the house by a closed-in and roofed structure of varying widths and elevations that totals 2,200 square feet.

The main house is all on one level except for a 600-square-foot bedroom and bath area above the guest garage.

The recreation building contains a basketball court, a squash court, two stages, a bedroom, kitchen, bathrooms, swimming pool, a four-story tower, and a room designated "John's Lounge."

Edwards was the Democratic candidate for vice president in 2004 and a former N.C. senator.

Thursday afternoon, the Edwards for President press office was unable to provide information on any additional buildings planned for the estate.

Don Carrington is executive editor of Carolina Journal.

Get ready for the spindles on the American moral compass to go bezerk again.  The Sundance Film Festival is premiering "Zoo" a film about bestiality.  The Florida Sun-Sentinel offers the following review:

 "Zoo" is a documentary about what director Robinson Devor accurately characterizes as "the last taboo, on the boundary of something comprehensible." But remarkably, an elegant, eerily lyrical film has resulted.

"Zoo," premiering before a rapt audience Saturday night at Sundance, manages to be a poetic film about a forbidden subject, a perfect marriage between a cool and contemplative director (the little-seen "Police Beat") and potentially incendiary subject matter: sex between men and animals. Not graphic in the least, this strange and strangely beautiful film combines audio interviews (two of the three men involved did not want to appear on camera) with elegiac visual re-creations intended to conjure up the mood and spirit of situations. The director himself puts it best: "I aestheticized the sleaze right out of it."

The description by reviewer Kenneth Turan (LA Times) is frightening.  "Elegant", "lyrical", "poetic" and "beautiful".  Even more disturbing is the characterization by director, Robinson Devor who desribes sex with animals as "on the boundary of the comprehensible".

What ought to send shivers up the spine is is that Devor admits that he hid the disgusting nature of his subject by shrouding it in good cinematography.  And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die... Half truths, the domain of the devil, aren't even needed in a society like ours where Devor feels confident in acknowledging the lack of true disclosure and presumably justifying his work of "art".  Not that I'd want to see bestiality live and in color, mind you.  But I won't be seeing "Zoo" either.

So, will Zoo do for copulating canines what Will and Grace did for homosexuality?  Time will tell I suppose.  After all, bestiality has been around forever and I suppose there is a definable percentage of the population who practices it (even three guys in Montana make up some kind of minority, right?)  Next thing you know, it'll be in grammar school history texts and grad students will be writing dissertations about how DaVinci was inspired by antics in the barn.  Only one word can describe this horrifying glorification of bestiality: sick.

From Brokeback Mountain to mountain goats...  what's next?

UPDATE: Nevermind, we already know what's next: Broadway.

I chuckled when I read this forwarded email - thought ya'll might as well.

THREE THINGS TO THINK ABOUT:

A somewhat emotional discussion follwed a post I wrote regarding an article about the possibility of degayifying in utero.  After I saw this article today on Drudge, I thought I'd post a few rather incriminating pictures (incriminating for Planned Parenthood, that is...)

By the way, our service project for the past few weeks has been to collect baby/maternity items to donate to an unabashedly pro-life foundation that offers aid to pregnant women and encourages them not to punish their unborn children for their gestational circumstance.  I know, that's a lot of loaded emotionspeak but, hey, it's my pulpit and I'll preach if I want to (to paraphrase an old song ;-)

Here goes:

Here's the little one's feet at 11 weeks.  Don't you want to just kiss those little toes?  A week before this point, week ten, the little guy or gal has been medically renamed "a fetus" and ALL of his/her body systems are formed.  From this point on the baby feels pain and is only getting bigger.

Here are those toes again, at 7 weeks...

Week nine, baby is moving around now, even if mom can't feel it.  If the disproportionate head makes you think you can ignore the humanity of this precious little being, let me warn you - I had a child who was still this dispropotionate at birth.  Took him almost 4 years to grow into that noggin!  He had the doctor's worried and underwent many a test only to find out that he simply had a very big head - and apparently superior intellect - He'll be 5 this week and has been reading for a couple of years.  Smartypants!

My baby, noggin boy's little sister also completes another trip around the sun this week.  She'll be 2, can you believe it?  Time for another one.... LOL!

In modern American society where many, if not most families are comprised of only 1 or 2 children, I am always assaulted by the complete lack of common courtesy displayed by people who say idiotic things like "Four kids!  Are you done?"  "You're not having any more are you?"  Or the absolute worst "Wow!  3 boys!  You've got your hands full!"

To the invasions of my personal life, I often use the response a dear friend offered when she was suffering fools during her fifth pregnancy. "We're not stopping 'til we get an ugly one. [Holds up youngest child] And isn't she cute?"

The comments about boys being challenging are especially unwelcome now that my sons understand them.  A few years ago, after a complete stranger felt compelled to express her heartfelt sympathies for my having to raise the little males, my oldest son, then about 6, asked me with tears in his eyes, "Mom, is it really too hard to have so many little boys?"  I almost walked back into the store to backhand that old hag.  I don't need sympathy, thank you.  I have been blessed to give life to four of the most beautiful of God's creations and don't you forget it!  I know I never do.

Anyway, I know, I've derailed from the abortion issue, but the mindset that children are a burden, that somehow, life is about being free of them, that is pervasive.  And it's tragic.  In utero or not.

A joke:

A man stops off at his favorite bar after work.  Finally, the place is open after months of renovations. He walks in to find everything entirely changed.  The whole place has gone high-tech.  Computer terminals all around, touch screens on the tables, you get the idea.  He bellies up to the bar and finds himself face to face with a completely functional robot bartender.  "Unreal" he thinks.  The bartender approaches and asks in a complete monotone, "What can I get for you, sir?"  "A martini"  the man replies. 

Soon the robot returns with the best martini Mr. Smith has ever tasted.  Again in a metallic sounding monotone, the robot queries, "What is your IQ?"  "160" the reply from a the puzzled patron.  So the robot bartender, in response to the number, beings a conversation with Mr. Smith about Einstein's theory of Relativity.  Mr. Smith leaves completely stimulated by the conversation and intrigued by the abilities of the robot.

The next night after work, Smith again hits the bar for a cocktail.  After ordering his martini, he tells the bartender that his IQ is 100.  Thus begins an exciting conversation about the NFL.  The robot knows all about which players are being traded and which coaches have the best stats.  Again Mr. Smith leaves in awe of the abilities of his automated bartender.

On the third night, Mr. Smith decides to see just how adept the robot is at judging the mentality of a variety of people, and so in response to the IQ question he utters "50".  The robot suddenly shifts into slow gear and after some buzzing and whirring, he gets directly in front of Mr. Smith and asks, slowly, almost tediously...

"Are"

"your"

"people"

"going"

"to"

"no-mi-nate Hillary?"

Not a joke:

Domino's Pizza is now accepting Mexican Pesos (don't wait for the punchline, there isn't one. Unless you count the coverage by MSNBC which makes those opposed to the measure sound like backward bigots.  So much for the old melting pot idea.)

Imagine,  it's New Year's Eve, you're hosting a party and you've invited a reknown singing group to attend.  The college choir shows up and begins belting out the National Anthem when they are attacked and beaten in the streets.  Back alley in Boston?  Ghetto in the NYC?  Chicago's south side?  Wrong. Wrong. And wrong.  These events played out on the streets of San Francisco's Richmond district.  You'll remember San Fran.  It's the city that hates the military.  The liberal city that voted to kick out recruiters. The progressive city filled with people who don't like the thought of their young being forced into a life of unjustified warmongering.  Yeah.

Apparently, the only problem they really have with violence out in the city of boxed rice products is that they like to commit it.  Out of uniform, untrained, indiscriminantly and barehanded.

has nothing to do with underwire.  Check this out.