Politically Correct

OK, y’all know the phrase. Do you ever think about it?

I mean really… Political Correctness is about as much an oxymoron as Jumbo Shrimp.

Think about this please. Actually the country somewhat depends upon it. I’ll elaborate on it more soon.

Oppose the Internet Blacklist Legislation

Dear friend,

I just emailed Congress to urge them to oppose the Internet Blacklist Legislation, known as the PROTECT-IP Act in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in the House. This legislation seeks to give the executive branch power to conduct slash-and-burn campaigns against websites that allegedly host – or even link to – content that infringes on intellectual property rights. That would “disappear” whole domain names, fundamentally undermining Internet security, and/or choke off their financial support. The Internet Blacklist Legislation puts more sites than ever at risk, effectively upending the DMCA safe harbors that have been crucial to the growth of Internet innovation and creativity.

Sadly, these short-sighted and dangerous bills won’t do much to stop online infringement – but they will jeopardize our ability to speak and read online with the kind of freedom we cherish in the offline world. Deep-pocketed Hollywood lobbyists are aggressively pushing to control and censor the open Internet, willing to sacrifice free speech and our Internet culture in hopes of controlling how people view their movies and products.

We need to stop this bill before it goes any further. Will you contact your representatives in Congress and urge them to oppose the Internet Blacklist Legislation? Visit: https://eff.org/r.C8A

Gun Control

IMHO—

Restrict laws for law abiding citizens having licensed guns and you strengthen unlawful people with unlicensed guns. Think criminals get their guns licensed? Sit in the back of the bus dipstick…

Think it’s guns that kill people, there again dipstick, sit in the back of the bus… People kill people….

Do you know the history of Germany that led up to the 2nd World War? Hitler declared that citizens had no need for guns because the “Government would take care of them”. We all saw how that turned out.

Maybe someone could challenge me on the topic?

How Ya Like Them Apples Boy?

How ya like them apples boy? Ever hear that?

I happen to really like that phrase and why not? When someone raises a stink about something and they get shot down, what’s better than sayin’ ‘How ya like them apples boy?’, LOL.

I’m gonna elaborate more on this later but if you don’t get it, go back to whatever bubble wrapped place you came from…

Old Riverside, TX

Riverside, TX is the closest thing that resembles a town to me so I thought I’d write a little about Good Old Riverside. The city limits signs read “Population 425″ and I don’t expect that to change much anytime soon ;)

Riverside is perched on a bit of a bluff overlooking the Trinity River in Northeastern Walker County, Texas . It’s located just up river from where the Trinity River flows into Lake Livingston (The second largest lake in Texas that is completely inside Texas). Today, Riverside is a quite little community that is mostly based on ranching, hunting leases and other recreational activities.

Riverside Train Bridge

Historic Riverside turret bridge

Riverside was founded in 1872 during a time when the economy in the area was run by cotton gins and the railway. The Houston & Great Northern Railroad (later International & Great Northern) was being built in the area for the reason that the river dried up in late summer and the steamboats could no longer navigate all the way to Riverside from the Gulf, down stream. Walker County landowners gave earth, lumber and minerals to the railroad in order to obtain shipping facilities.  Riverside began as a railroad town and grew alongside the tracks on the South side of the Trinity River, thus the name “Riverside.

Public recreational facilities in the area include Cove Marina, Bethy Creek Resort and the public boat ramp at the Hwy 19 bridge & the Trinity River. These are all water based recreational areas, which is the best kind ;)

I’ll be writing more about this area soon, it’s a great place to live! Texas rules!!

Kid Gets Suspended For An Opinion

Teachers as a whole seem to have changed. They’ve gone from teaching to indoctrinating. They are a big part in this slow boiling pot that all us frogs are in. To steal a scene… ‘I want you to get up now… I want all of you to get up out of your chairs… I want you to get right now and go to the window, open it, and stick your head out & yell “I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore’. That was from Network, 35 year ago. We’re still taking it and I say it stops with us and get out of my way if it doesn’t stop soon! [How ya like them apples boy?]

Check out this stream

Solyndra- They Only Received $535M

When asked to elaborate on the companies failure, the CEO & CFO of Solyndra ( a California based solar panel technology company) got a lot of mileage out of their “I plead the 5th” pie hole dribble…

And more speech practice

Under the last president, Solyndra couldn’t get the funding they wanted. George W denied the DOE funds to Solyndra, a couple months after taking office, spring of 2009, B. H. Obama grants the funding. Two years later Solyndra is facing bankruptcy and refusing to answer questions. I understand investigations into campaign contributions are under way.

Here’s another good one. Jonathan Silver was named Executive Director of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office in November 2009. He can’t say who made the decision to lend Solyndra $535,000,000.

Oh BTW… feel good in the aspect that Solyndra only burned through $527,000,000 so far ;(

 

Sherrod Brown- Another Brilliant Politician

Dateline September 6, 2011

Ohio State Senator Sherrod Brown releases his brilliant plan, sue companies that won’t hire you. Not based on the usual things like gender, race, creed, religion, sexual orientation… Nope, his idea is discrimination based on long term unemployment.

Yup, if you been unemployed for a very long time, you can sue the potential employer for not hiring you. Doesn’t really matter that you haven’t been able to hold a job because you are unemployable. Doesn’t matter that you have no job skills. Doesn’t matter that you have been fired from every job you’ve ever had for being late or absent too often. Doesn’t matter that you have anger management issues & punched someone out at a couple of your jobs and can’t provide any decent work references.

Now I’m not saying there are plenty of good-harted, hard working people that need a job. The economy sucks and there’s been cutbacks & layoffs. But this doesn’t address them directly from what I hear. Would you hire a meth head that’s been unemployed for 4 years & stealing & dealing to get by? Of course not…

Now there’s a great plan for stimulating the economy.  If this legislation passes, see how many potential employers stop hiring.

Enough for now, need to go grab a beer & chill out. I got plenty worked up when I heard that one… I think he was asked if there was booze in his coffee cup with this pic

Ref: http://brown.senate.gov/newsroom/press_releases/release/?id=4228263e-e410-415d-a2f2-0c15b60188ca

The Stratos is back!!!!!

Picked up the Stratos today, repairs finished!

Turns out poor Wesley Norman, of Norman’s Outboard Service, had medical problems and had to let his shop helper go. That set his schedule back a bit. Having the medical problems is bad enough but having to let the employee go because he was being a flake just added to poor Wesley’s dilemma.

We dropped by his shop last Monday to see if I could possible work part-time for him until he hired another mechanic but he passed on my help. I guess mixing customer and employee would be weird, but I thought I’d offer anyway. He jumped right on the repairs, replaced parts, machined gears, tested & we got the repaired boat back on Friday. He apparently bumped our boat ahead of a couple others to get it back to us sooner. On top of it all it was all done for around the estimated price.

We’re happy to have done business with Wesley and will be bringing him more work in the future 

Kinda Irked…

My favorite boat, a Stratos 274 bass boat, started having problems with the lower unit a few weeks ago. More to the point it was not fully engaging into reverse when shifted. The decision was made to take it into the shop, even though we are in the middle of the pre-spawn for bass, white bass, crappie & many other fish in the area. I’m now regretting that decision.

We took the Stratos into Norman’s Outboard Service in Onalaska, TX on Friday the 4th of March 2011 and we were told it would be a week and a half to two weeks turn-around time on the repair. Feeling confident about the gentleman’s qualifications that runs the shop, though a bit uneasy about not having the boat that long (especially during this time of year), we left the boat for repairs.

I started counting the days at about day 3, wondering if getting the repairs done right now was the right decision. After all, I can live without reverse for a while. It’s just a little more hassle launching and bunking the boat really. But I waited patiently day after day, for fourteen very painful days…

I decided to call Norman’s this Friday, 18th of March (two weeks after dropping my beloved boat off). The pleasant woman on the other end of the line informed me that Norman’s shop help was MIA, Norman had fallen behind his schedule and the work had yet to be started on my boat! Great, what I was fearing came to reality… boat stuck in the shop during the spawn!!! I wanted to say much more but I just said “that’s disappointing”.

Now call me silly but if I were a boat mechanic falling behind schedule on repairs, in Texas, during the spawn, I would SURELY have someone get calls out to the boat owners to inform them of such… But maybe I’m just thinking from a customer’s point of view…

We were planing on getting to Toledo Bend to meet a friend this weekend and make a pre-run next to O. H. Ivie before our club rally at Ivie on the 4/27/11 through 5/1/11. I guess either I should trust my instincts or shops should be more forthcoming…

That’s my social rant for now, I’m irked………………………