Peteisms

These "quaint" observations were attributed to me by my good buddy at MicroStrategy, Randy Hechinger.

Don't throw me in that briar patch!
I'd jump on that like a duck on a junebug!
This is a job for Superman!
Barf!
I hate Bill Gates, everything he stands for, and the horse he rode in on!
Its better than a sharp stick in the eye!
My head is like the permafrost: it takes a while for things to penetrate.
What a mountain of horse hockey!
I've been immortalized!
Seven A.M.? Even the chickens aren't up!
If I see a nit, I have to pick it.
Frog strangler (of rain)
Oh my ears and whiskers! It's lunch time!
It makes my jaws tight!
Well hot cinders and whoopie-doo!
That's been around since Methuselah was a pup!
He's an asshole! Ooooh, the Alka-Seltzer works!
What's so good about sliced bread?
Shazaam!
Get thee behind me, Satan!
If I had dynamite for brains, I couldn't blow my nose!
Ain't that a boot in the boodingy! (spelling unknown)
He's comin' outa shoot number 3, ridin' Cyclone!
Tell them to go butt a stump!
That really jacks my jaws!
Confusing as dropping your gum in the chicken yard
I'll be there, if it hairlips the governor!

A Few of My Thoughts

To become the great nation we once were, we must reward excellence and self-reliance, not subsidize mediocrity and dependence.

As we get older, we spend much time reliving the memories we have made. It therefore behooves us always to live so as to make those memories good.

The great danger in human communication is the false perception that it has been accomplished.

A one-term limit would ensure that no incumbent would ever waste time in office working for his reelection. The corruption-prone career politician would pass away.

Trying to change others' behavior is frustrating. Focus, rather, on improving your own behavior.

Banalities

Cliché
-----------------------
24/7
at this point in time
been there, done that
big time
on the table
don’t go there
due diligence
going forward
hang, hang outhaving said that
any way, shape, or form
level playing field
leverage (verb)
paradigm
proactive
quote unquote
seamless
separation of church and state
step up to the plate
timeline
transition (verb)

My Pet Peeves

politicians who spend most of their time and lots of money getting reelected
politicians who ignore the Constitution
"whether-or-not" introducing a noun clause
"anyone/everyone...their"
"he or she"
"amongst", "at this point in time", "an historic"
limp handshakes, especially while looking away
Sean Hannity shakes hands with a pen in his offered hand. That's offensive!
TV hosts who constantly interrupt their guests
"healthy" when "healthful" is meant
"myself" instead of "me"
"Hindsight is 20-20" (meaning perfect). 20-10 is twice as good as the "nominal" 20-20.
"one-800 number"
"quote-unquote"
"level playing field"
"way, shape, or form"
constantly repeating "you know?"
"Look, ..."
"criteria" and "phenomena" as singular nouns
customers at an all-you-can-eat restaurant leaving half their plate untouched
"podium" instead of "lectern"
rude people who sit with others while talking at length on their cell phone
censoring movies
hosts who invite you and then don't acknowledge your entrance
not using turn signals--especially when you're waiting at a side street on their right, and then they turn right (making you wait unnecessarily)
women who block the aisle with their cart and themselves (yes, it's mostly women)
body piercing and tatoos
"a whole 'nother..."
"how big of a..."
pron. "err" to sound like "air"
pron. "Caribbean" ca-RIB-e-an instead of Ca-rib-BEE-an
pron. en-tre-pren-OO-er instead of en-tre-pren-ERR
pron. FEB-you-wair-ee instead of FEB-ru-air-ee
pron. Co-pen-HAAGH-en instead of Co-pen-HAIG-en  I lived eight years in Denmark and never heard one Dane say Co-pen-HAAGH-en.  Damn Danny Kaye!
Torino (It's "Turin" in English, like Rome and Venice.)

and from http://www.getannoyed.com/
"Ya, know what I'm sayin"... answering with "Again..."
jerks who take up 2 parking spaces
the giving of non-traditional names to babies
women who wear too much perfume
text in all caps
using the phrase "110%"
constantly repeating "like"
blocking traffic by driving slowly in the inside lane

and from http://www.thesocialcentre.com/101-pet-peeves/
going right to the very end of a terminating lane and trying to push in

Irritating and Incorrect English from the Media and Congress:
06/13/07  "for Bill and I"---CNBC, Sue Herrera
06/13/07  gentlelady---U.S. Congress: a nonword, P.C., redundant, silly---improvement seen
08/24/08  "... or whomever is the next president"---Joe Biden, VP cand.

My Take on CO2

The Environmentalist Whackos are smart in one way. They know how to con the media (and hence the public and the politicians) into supporting them. They are calling CO2 "carbon" and "carbon pollution," realizing that this word conjures up the image of smokestacks spewing black smoke. Any high school chemistry student knows that the gas, carbon dioxide (CO2), in no way resembles the solid, carbon (C): CO2 is not smoke!

I have read several articles by esteemed atmospheric scientists that prove that CO2 is not dangerous, that the earth flourished in times when it was warmer. After all, plants require it for growth! I have also read that water vapor is about 50 times as effective as CO2 is as a greenhouse gas. (Maybe spitting outside should be illegal.) The politicians, led by Obama, cite the large numbers of scientists who warn us about the danger of CO2. These "scientists" include mostly those from sectors other than climatology. Would you consult a podiatrist about a brain tumor? Of course there is Al Gore, who only plays scientist. He knows that the oceans are soon going to rise 20 feet!

A few of my sources:
http://www-eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/Testimony/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lindzen
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2225439/posts
http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv15n2/reg15n2g.html
http://www.nationalcenter.org/NPA334.html
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=9136
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=6622
http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=12594
http://www.americasfuture.net/1997/nov97/97-1123a.html
http://www.uncommondescent.com/global-warming/father-of-climatology-calls-manmade-global-warming-absurd/

Letter to prospective Libertarians

The Libertarian Party is the third-largest party in the USA--by any measurement. This fact is not well known, because the liberal media hide it, preferring to mention other parties like the Green. The fundamental belief is that government should be as small as possible, that people know best how to spend their own money. The alternative is for bureaucrats in Washington to determine a one-size-fits-all solution for every problem, and of course, demand high taxes to pay for the resulting programs.

Individual liberty is the essence of the Libertarian philosophy. We believe that one should be allowed to do anything, as long as that action neither harms nor imperils others. It's for this reason most of us believe that narcotics and prostitution should be legal. Before making any law to prevent people from doing something, legislators should always ask, "Who is harmed?" No law should ever be written to protect us from ourselves.

The pioneers exemplified self-reliance and never dreamed that some remote "benevolent" government might levy high taxes on the successful and redistribute the money to failures. Remember the story of "The Grasshopper and the Ant?

On taxes, we believe that the people know best how to spend their own money. Big government politicians believe that they know better. They use the incredibly complicated tax code to force people and businesses to finance expensive programs which they claim will solve all kinds of problems, but actually are designed to benefit those who will help them get reelected. Two groups in this category are labor unions and trial lawyers. Business taxes may be a little different. I'm not sure what the majority of Libertarians believe about them. I myself believe there should be NO TAXES on American businesses. Like any other expense, these taxes are passed on to consumers.

In the case of welfare, we believe that ordinary citizens, not government, can best identify and help the needy, because they understand the situations. Therefore, any forthcoming help should begin with family, followed by people in the neighborhood, then municipality, county, and finally state--never the federal government. Furthermore, relieved of the tax burden imposed to finance government welfare programs, the people could and would be at least as generous as politicians.

The constitution is quite clear on the responsibilities of the federal government, but our Democrat and Republican career politicians ignore the constitution at the same time they're paying lip service to it. (I suggest you read the 10th amendment, which states that all power not specifically delegated to the federal government is left to the lower-level governments "and to the people".) Government at all levels has been growing at an incredible rate since FDR. I have read that we were taxed at about 2% before the second world war. It's amazing to me that people not only accept expensive government solutions, but that they also grant the government virtually universal control. This thinking is opposite to that held by the founding fathers, who feared a strong government and documented their ideas in our Constitution.

On the Iraq war: The Libertarian Party is opposed to attacking any nation for any reason other than as a response to BEING ATTACKED, as we were by the Japanese at Pearl Harbor, or in the rare case of an immediate and grave threat to our national security. It's a dangerous precedent to feel justified in attacking simply because they MIGHT attack you some day. Many nations could attack us for that reason. Also we feel that Congress should declare war before any attack.

Walter Williams, a nationally syndicated columnist, author, teacher, speaker, and social critic, said, "What's *just* has been debated for centuries but let me offer you my definition of social justice: I keep what I earn and you keep what you earn. Do you disagree? Well then tell me how much of what I earn *belongs* to you—-and why?"

On abortion, I was surprised to learn at the state convention in 2004 that the delegates were split equally. I had believed they would favor the liberty in Pro-Choice. We do, however, favor Pro-Choice in schools.

I hope I've been able to give you a good description of our party. I'll be happy to try to answer any questions you may have.

Sincerely,
Peter Hefner
Libertarian Party of Pennsylvania contact for Lycoming County

Can the Republicans be Turned?

I grew up a Republican, supporting Robert Taft against Eisenhower in 1952 during my senior year of high school. I and my friends worked hard for Goldwater in 1964, and we all suffered as a result of the disastrous loss. It hurt so bad that I gave up on politics for some years. Our forces thought JFK was a dangerous liberal. Strange thing, but most of us now look back on those days and the lessons he showed us about lower taxes with fondness, because the modern Democrats have been moving steadily to the left, spending, taxing, and borrowing like never before. George W Bush must have thought he was a Democrat, expanding government and spending even more than his Democratic predecessors.

In recent years I have left the Republican Party twice, to join with the Libertarians. After my first departure, I wrote Ron Paul, House Republican from Texas, to ask why he was not a Libertarian. The answer was that it's easier to move the Republican Party to the right than to make the Libertarian Party viable. His argument persuaded me, and I returned to the party of my boyhood. After that, there was no such movement to the right by the party, so I swung back to the Libertarians.

Enter Barack Obama. He exploited the actions of errant Republican leadership and sailed into office amid shouts of "Change!" Since Obama's inauguration, however, it appears that he and his radical leftist cohorts, House Speaker Nancy Polosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, have shocked the American people with their extreme ideology and attempts at prodigious government expansion, resulting in a national debt that dwarfs George W's and threatens to inundate our grandchildren and great grandchildren with heretofore unimaginable levels of debt.

Now the people have spoken out, resulting in incredible victories in Virginia, New Jersey, and even Massachusetts. And beyond that, a new national phenomenon has arisen: the Tea Party Movement. Without clear leadership or party affiliation, these motivated individuals have begun to exert a significant influence on the national political scene. Recent news from Texas reveals a new candidate, Debra Medina, who threatens to take the gubernatorial race by storm. She comes from the Tea Party ranks, and as such, could become the first of these to achieve a significant political victory.

So it appears that Ron Paul may have been right--that the Republican Party CAN be turned. Stay tuned.

The One-Term Limit

I believe that career politicians are bad because they spend most of their time and a lot of money from contributors working to get reelected again and again instead of working for the benefit of their constituents. Presidential term limits have served us well, but they're not enough. If limited to a ONE term, no U.S. Senator or Representative (or President or judge) will ever spend a minute campaigning while in office.

Our founding fathers assumed that every elected official would spend a few years in office and then return to his “real" job, so term limits were left out of the Constitution. Now, virtually everyone elected to public office tries to hold that office as long as possible. If he doesn’'t have such intentions at first, the Washington mindset soon poisons him, and today we have a Congress with a 17% favorable rating.

You may believe that members of Congress become more valuable as they gain experience. If so, you might oppose term limits, period. I contend that experience leads to a greater probability that the office holder will become less proficient, and as Lord Acton rightly observed, corrupted by power.” In spite of incompetence due to age or corruption, incumbents gain unfair advantage over their challengers partly by delivering “pork.”

The Constitution grants control over elections to the states. This means that One-Term Limit laws could be passed by the individual states without a Constitutional amendment. If this occurred, we could by comparison discover the best process, both for other states and eventually, for the republic.

In summary, the advantages of the one-term limit are these:
1. Force elected officials not to spend so much time and energy on getting reelected, and therefore contribute more to benefiting their constituents.
2. Eliminate vote-buying attempts to get reelected, including “bringing home the pork."
3. Eliminate the significant advantage to the incumbent over his rival in all elections.
4. Drastically reduce voting fraud and other election corruption, which normally occur when an incumbent has established support from politically-oriented institutions.
5. Make better laws by exploiting the advantage of real-world experience.
6. Save incredible amounts of money by eliminating campaign expenses.
7. Give more weight to a candidate's ideas and proposals than to his party affiliation.

Maiden Voyage

Hello, World! Here I go, off on yet another of life's jaunts. I have high hopes that this blog will add a little spice, a little fun, to my little life. I plan to learn a great deal through this marvelous tool, one not dreamed of by the school-age youngster I was.

Welcome, friends and relatives, to my world!