Fun With Play-Dough

Yes, Dubyah, it is a recession. I know it’s hard for you to understand, because you’re still able to put a nice big T-bone on that BBQ, but for most of us, the pickings are slim. Now that we’re all getting a little desperate, some people are, of course, overdoing it. 21-year-old Charles Fuller from Fort Worth stole a check from his girlfriend’s mother, filled it out himself, and tried to cash it.

Maybe he would have gotten away with it, except for the fact that he wrote it for $360 billion.  Crime doesn’t pay; it just highlights how stupid you are.

Speaking of, a Japanese man, who was employed by the city of Kinokawa, logged on to porn sites 780,000 times in eight months. Strangely enough, he wasn’t fired: he was demoted and received a pay cut.

And the romantic wedding stories just keep coming: a New York couple was arrested after a disagreement with the band; they trashed their congas, and the bride destroyed a speaker. The police used stun guns on both the bride and groom. I have to ask, is trouble with the law the bridal accessory du jour?

Dress, check; tiara, check; arrest warrant, check.

The bad news just keeps flying around the FLDS folks; it’s like Christmas and Easter rolled into one, except that this is the Tim Burton version. Wait; do those crack-heads even celebrate Christmas? Oh, I forgot; I don’t care.

The latest news reports claim some of the boys who showed up with fractures are “very young”. What, exactly, does that mean? Are they toddlers? Infants? How did they get these fractures? Was there sexual abuse? Former FLDS member Carolyn Jessop has said that she’s witnessed children hit so hard they flew across the room. Seems to me that they should do some digging at the compound; who knows whether all the kids survived that kind of treatment. Of course, accusations are denied vehemently; getting these people to admit to any wrongdoing is about as easy as herding cats.

That fence that people want so bad at the Southern border should be built around the ranch instead. Make it nice and high, close the door, lock it up, and throw away the key.  If that’s not an option, I want to see some damn arrest warrants.

Sadness in the Obama camp, endless looping of Reverend Wright’s comments: it’s time for a distracting news update:

When Kasey Kazee from Catlettsburg, Kentucky decided to rob a liquor store, he, of course, needed to conceal his face. What better way to do that than by wrapping your head in duct tape? Except for the fact that employees tackled him in the parking lot, and handed him over to police. Total missing from the cash register: $15.

I’m imagining the cops ripping the duct tape off his face.

Here comes the Bride, and there she goes…to jail. Dentist David W. Wielechowski, 32, of Shaler, and Christa Vattimo, 25, had married a month earlier in the Bahamas but repeated their vows in Pittsburgh Saturday at a reception for 150 guests. Apparently, this was not a good idea, as they got into a fight afterwards, during which the groom karate kicked his wife. She then somehow attacked two guests from another party who attempted to help her. True love is a beautiful thing.

An inmate in Bentonville, Arkansas, who is on trial for murder, has filed a complaint because the jail menu isn’t to his liking. He went in weighing 413 pounds, but has lost 100 over the past eight months. Broderick Laswell is practically wasting away; whenever he tries to exercise, his vision goes blurry and he feels faint. Inmates are only being fed 3,000 calories a day. It’s a travesty; what is the world coming to, if all you did was stab someone to death, set his house on fire, and you can’t even eat what you want?

Meanwhile, Iran’s cultural integrity is going straight to pot. The culprit: Barbie. Prosecutor General Ghorban Ali Dori Najafabadi agrees with me; he wrote a letter to the Vice President of Iran to draw attention to the terrible Western influences of Barbie, Superman, Batman, and so forth and so on. They are calling it “Westoxication”, and it needs to be stopped. Incidentally, Iran is the world’s third biggest importer of these toys. Many toys are smuggled into the country, because the demand outweighs the respect for Iran’s cultural heritage. Apparently, many people care more about making money than about their integrity. Seems there’s hope for Iran after all. However; what does it tell us that this cleric seems to feel more threatened by a plastic doll than by our government?

The media seems to think we’ve missed something, as they keep yapping about how expensive the gas is. Do they think we haven’t noticed? Talking about it doesn’t make it any cheaper anyway. Just remember that it can always be worse. My father, who lives in the Netherlands, pays (we did the math) $8.79 per gallon. I don’t know about you, but all I have to do is think of that number, and I’ll whistle while I pump.

156,463 homes have so far been foreclosed in 2008, so I’d say that the price of gas is probably not the biggest problem right now. Where do all these people go? How many of them actually end up homeless? What happens to the ones that don’t? Numbers don’t mean much without the human faces behind the story.

Nonetheless, there is much talk about the Gas tax holiday. I wasn’t sure exactly what the details were; yet I’d love to have an opinion. Here’s what I found, so you can make up your own mind:

Gas tax holidays are typically bad tax policy. First, the revenue must be made up somehow unless the state cuts spending. (In the case of a surplus, that still means that some spending is foregone or some other tax cut is foregone.) Therefore, another tax is going to have to go up or spending will have to be cut. Second, cutting the gas tax may not have much effect in the short-run due to relatively inelastic short-run supply, meaning much of the benefit of holidays will flow to the producers (i.e. stockholders of oil and gas companies). The longer the tax cut, however, the greater the benefits to consumers. (Source: The Tax Foundation blog)

“In the case of a surplus…” Now, that’s funny.

Then there was Josef Fritzl, who went to court today. Why, I’m not sure. I know every country needs an honest and fair legal system, but sometimes you have to wonder whether an exception should be made. Maybe they can accidentally set him loose and leave it up to his neighbors to deal with him. Not that it matters to the victims; after 24 years underground, suffering that level of abuse, no one can expect any semblance of normalcy. And the children that have never seen daylight; forget about it.

His wife claims she never knew, and I have enormous difficulty believing that. Not much is known about her life with him, at this point; the only thing we’ve been told is that he was an overbearing man who had an iron grip on his family, and had strictly forbidden anyone to go downstairs. Maybe she did, maybe she didn’t; but wouldn’t she have wondered why it was so damn important she stay out of the basement? For 24 years? What terribly monstrosity did he tell her was in there? Oh wait; that was him. 

The total number of FLDS children in custody now stands at 462, because an additional 25 women who claimed to be over 18 turned out to be a little younger. Thirty of them are allegedly pregnant.

It is obvious we haven’t heard the end of this, but what I’d like to know is, what’s going to happen to the men? Is anybody going to be arrested one of these days? Is the compound going to be shut down? Don’t talk to me about freedom of religion; these men are disgusting predators and must be held accountable.

Meantime, foster families that have agreed to take some of the children in are give pointers on how to make things go more smoothly. No Television, radio, or movies are allowed, and neither is the color red.

That’s right; FLDS members believe that red is reserved for Jesus, and should not be used for clothing, or interior decorating.

Funny, how people can justify rape on a grand scale, but if you wear a red shirt, you’re going to hell. I guess you have to have your priorities. I hope the little kids rebel and sneak in some TV time. I wonder, is PBS still showing the Big Red Dog?

In truly weird news today, 73-year old Josef F. from Vienna, Austria, was taken into custody after police found out he had held his daughter Elizabeth captive in his basement for 24 years. He also allegedly fathered six children with her. How anyone can get away with something like that, and for so long, is an utter mystery to me. But hen, maybe there are some things I’d rather not know.