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Posts Tagged ‘Public Policy’

Amber What?

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , , on August 10, 2013| Leave a Comment »

Maybe we need to come up with another type of alert when a teenager goes missing. Let’s call it the Black Cherry Amber Alert. Because while network news has been plastering the pretty blonde face of a 16 year old girl from California who was, granted, horribly abducted by a family friend, our local news story is just that, local.

Last weekend, a beautiful African American 17 year old girl from Nelson County VA was going shopping in Lynchburg and never returned home.  2ileopiAlexis Murphy was looking forward to starting her Senior year in high school; she had many friends and was supposed to play in a volleyball tournament this week. Instead, her white Nissan Maxima was found right down the road in Albemarle County, deserted in a movie theatre parking lot.

“Deputies with the sheriff’s office, the Virginia State Police and agents working with the FBI are all working to locate Murphy…” But what would activate an Amber Alert in Virginia? According to a VA government website:

1) The abducted child must be 17 years of age or younger or is currently enrolled in a * * * secondary school in the Commonwealth, regardless of age, and the law enforcement agency believes the child has been abducted (unwillingly taken from their environment without permission from the child’s parent or legal guardian).*

2) The law enforcement agency believes the missing child is in imminent danger of serious bodily harm or death.*

3) A law enforcement investigation has taken place that verified the abduction or eliminated alternative explanations.*

4) Sufficient information is available to disseminate to the public that could assist in locating the child, suspect, and/or the suspect’s vehicle.*

5) The Child must be entered into the Virginia Criminal Information Network (VCIN) and the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) missing person files as soon as practical.

A local rapper, J Willz, posted this “Gone Missing” music video to YouTube (above, please click to the wordpress website to play) trying to bring more attention to Alexis’ disappearance. And I thought I’d post a picture of black cherry amber. Our prayers are with the families of ALL missing children.

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A Gift Horse

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , on August 4, 2013| Leave a Comment »

What’s that old saying; “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth?” Maybe you’re too young to have heard it, but it means be grateful for whatever someone hands you. In the days before Oprah was giving away cars, horses were the penultimate gift. And you wouldn’t want to imply that this horse was “long in the tooth,” ie getting on in years with one hoof in the glue factory. That would be tacky.

But what if you’re an elected official, like say the GOP Governor in our fair state of Virginia. And what if one of your biggest political donors, let’s say he owns a pretty big vitamin supplement company and his name is Jonnie Williams Sr., chief executive of Star Scientific, let’s just say Jonnie decides to give you and your family gifts worth over six figures?

The First Lady of VA gets a Rolex to give to her hubby, and then a $15,000 shopping spree in NYC at Bergdorf’s.

The First Daughter receives a $15,000 wedding catering gift, and a another $10,000 engagement gift goes to a different daughter.

Believe me, I know weddings can be expensive! We have 4 this year to attend, and thank goodness for online wedding registries. I wonder what would cost $10,000? That wooden salad bowl?

Last week, R-Gov Bob McDonnell released a written statement apologizing for the scandal and saying that he had repaid Williams for $120,000 in loans: $70,000 to a real estate company owned by the governor and his sister and $50,000 to first lady Maureen McDonnell. http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/mcdonnell-daughter-repaid-15000-catering-gift/2013/07/31/58bb18ba-f9ea-11e2-9bde-7ddaa186b751_story.html

So while everyone has been focusing on the slimy, sexual antics of other political men, our Governor was hoping all this would just go away. But the tables have turned and Jonnie (whatever happened to the “H” in John?) is cooperating with federal investigators, which can only mean they are planning to prosecute McDonnell under the Hobbs Act which “…prohibits elected officials from taking money or other items of value in exchange for the performance of official duties.” http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/state-regional/star-donor-assists-u-s-in-mcdonnell-probe/article_f8012a33-00b4-56b9-b9af-1901751965e3.html

Now I had to raise my hand and swear I’d never take any gifts while I was a member of the School Board in NJ. And I was never offered any, still…there was no ambiguity about it, none whatsoever. And when I covered Borough Council Meetings, members would recuse themselves from votes if they had the slightest interest in a business.  On every level of government this conflict of interest oath must stand if we want to rise above the banana republics of the world.

Such a slippery slope our Governor has been on, and his holier than thou wanna-be replacement Ken Cuccinelli, running for his seat in November, hasn’t uttered a peep. Maybe Gov Ultrasound, and his  AG Cuccinelli who would like to overturn Roe vs Wade – who sponsored the ‘choose life’ license plates and supports fake pregnancy centers – maybe these two just need to refocus their public policy on the economy.

Something is rotten in the state of Virginia! Quick, call the veterinary dentist.

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Care to Camo

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , on May 25, 2013| 2 Comments »

It’s a weekend for sales. It’s a weekend for barbeque. And it’s a weekend to remember our fallen soldiers; only this time instead of waxing on about our military might, and the bravery exhibited by countless men and women in uniform, I thought I’d take a different tack.

I have to say I’m a bit embarrassed by: 1)  the crop of sexual harassment charges popping up in all forms; 2)  I’m super-shocked at the continuing hunger strike that is going on at Gitmo. But now I have to think that the pint-sized para-militray operation known as the Boy Scouts of America is taking one tiny step in the right direction. So it came as a bit of a shock to read that 3) Justice Antonin Scalia, a weekend scout leader for decades, has resigned!

“Some of the happiest memories of my adult life have been as a scoutmaster. Huddling under blankets around the campfire, and so forth. But now, all of that has been ruined.Ruined.” http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2013/05/scalia-resigns-post-as-scoutmaster.html

Let me be clear. I always wanted to be a Brownie. My foster mom didn’t drive, so it was a given that I couldn’t join those coveted ranks and wear that precious uniform with the beauty pageant-like ribbon decorating my chest. I had to sit in sacred Heart Church, in the noxious maroon uniform of Catholic school girls everywhere, bow-tied tight, and just watch as the Brownie troop entered, marching in time, stage to the right of Mary Mother of God. It was unnerving.

And except for finding out that the youngest little Girl Scouts now have a troop called “Princesses” in Cville, I’m delighted to find out that this largest of all organizations dedicated to All-Things-Girl has always had an all-inclusive policy when it comes to their members’ sexuality:  “Girl Scouts of the USA and its local councils and troops value diversity and inclusiveness and do not discriminate or recruit on the basis of race, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, national origin, or physical or developmental disability,” reads a statement on the organization’s blog. http://www.advocate.com/youth/2012/12/19/3-big-differences-boy-scouts-versus-girl-scouts

Hurray for Girl Power! Now, I’m not sure about that SCOTUS article, since it did seem rather tongue in cheek. But if Scalia did resign, well that is his right. I personally, on this chilly May morning, couldn’t imagine cuddling with him around any campfire, ever!

Thank you President Obama for having the courage to send out the message that this war on terror is not sustainable. That our military needs to be focusing on other things, and that terrorists throughout the world are better caught by intelligent spying and good old fashioned police work. Self-radicalizing nut jobs are becoming much more of an issue world-wide. If a soldier can be hacked to death in broad daylight in a London suburb, why did it not surprise me that a woman, who is a cub scout leader, talked him out of killing anyone else? She said it was better her, than her child who was on the bus with her. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2329236/Woolwich-attack–Moment-heroic-woman-tries-remonstrate-knife-wielding-soldier-killer-police-arrived-scene.html

Now that’s what I call courage.

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What if…

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , on April 21, 2013| Leave a Comment »

One of the most insightful questions we might ask ourselves, when confronted with a big decision, is how would one feel afterwards. A year from now, ten years from now, would we regret that decision or be happy we made it, no matter the outcome?

It was simply serendipitous that I signed up for twitter this past week. And I had to stop looking at one point, because the things people say in the aftermath of a tragedy like the Boston bombings left me numb. And I wanted to feel for myself, think for myself, not be bombarded with everyone else’s thoughts, in real time. Plus, instead of spurting out the first thing that comes to mind, I’ve discovered, with age, that I need some time to reflect, to analyze my thoughts before putting pen to paper, or tongue to teeth…or fingers to keyboard for that matter. I realize that once dementia sets in, all bets will be off.

Only one tweet rang true to me. It had to do with our failure in the Senate to pass a meaningful background check bill that would help stem the tide of gun violence in our country, compared to locking down a city like Boston to look for a nineteen year old terrorist. Bob tells me that approximately 80 people a day die on our streets and in our homes because they could easily pick up a gun; about 2/3 of these people are suicides. On Monday 3 people died in Boston. I know, it was a cynical calculation, a malevolent ratio 80:3 – with a whiff of truth. I wondered how Americans would feel ten years from now. Sometimes it takes someone outside of our culture, to articulate a different point of view.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/apr/21/boston-marathon-bombs-us-gun-law?CMP=twt_gu

“After all, it’s not as if this is the first time that homicidal killers have been on the loose in a major American city. In 2002, Washington DC was terrorised by two roving snipers, who randomly shot and killed 10 people. In February, a disgruntled police officer, Christopher Dorner, murdered four people over several days in Los Angeles. In neither case was LA or DC put on lockdown mode, perhaps because neither of these sprees was branded with that magically evocative and seemingly terrifying word for Americans, terrorism.”

This week the lilacs bloomed in memory of my foster mother, Nell. There were lilacs outside my bedroom window in Victory Gardens. I always had to kiss her goodbye whenever I left the house, because she said we never knew if we’d ever return. Certainly I knew accidents could happen, I was living proof, because a drunk driver had hit the Flapper’s car a few months after my father died. At the age of 10 months, about the Love Bug’s age, I left my PA home and became a Jersey girl.

But I never thought terror could happen here, until I heard about my Jersey neighbor’s husband. He left one morning to go to his office at Cantor Fitzgerald. She didn’t wake up before dawn to say goodbye to him on that beautiful morning in September for some ridiculous reason. At another wake without a body, I saw “what ifs” playing out again and again. Someone had dropped their child at school first and was running late, another friend was on a ferry that docked at Wall Street and picked up its fill of ash-covered commuters before returning to Highlands. And I knew that asking “what if” was a futile exercise in blame.
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Fear and Loathing

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , on April 9, 2013| 1 Comment »

It’s not often I find myself agreeing with John McCain. But thanks to twitter, I just read his response to this filibuster certain GOP/hardright/teapartiers have got going against background checks for gun owners:

“Sen. John McCain is flabbergasted, telling CBS’s Bob Schieffer: ‘I don’t understand it. The purpose of the United States Senate is to debate and to vote and to let the people know where we stand (so you’d encourage Republicans not to filibuster?) I would not only encourage it. I don’t understand it. What are we afraid of?'”

Good question Sen McCain. What are Republicans afraid of? This is really a bipartisan issue, a public health issue and not a 2nd Amendment issue IMHO! In states where background checks are required before purchasing a gun, gun trafficking has decreased 48% – nearly been cut in half. And women killed in domestic violence by a gun? Those numbers have decreased 38%. Bob always points out that the vast majority of gun deaths in this country are the result of suicide. I would imagine that waiting for a background check to clear may give a depressed individual time to rethink his decision.

I had to submit to a background check in order to teach in a public school. I had a young policeman, a friend of the Bride’s from high school, walk me through inking my fingerprints on pads of paper. My mug shot was taken. Maybe today they do a retinal scan? Sure, I was afraid a few parking tickets from the 60s might show up, but lucky for me I had no bench warrants for illegal parking. I passed. The Bride had to gain security clearance before her first government job out of college – FBI agents were talking with our neighbors. She passed. If you have nothing to be afraid of, if you tell the truth, and you want to carry a gun, HELL I want you to pass a background check…and so does 90 of the American public!
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2013/04/03/90-percent-of-americans-want-expanded-background-checks-on-guns-why-isnt-this-a-political-slam-dunk/

In a UC Davis study this much was clear: : “…among those purchasing handguns legally, those with criminal records were more likely than others to purchase assault-type handguns,” (and) “among those purchasing handguns legally who had criminal records, those purchasing assault-type handguns were much more likely than those purchasing other types of handguns to be arrested for violent crimes later.”
http://www.salon.com/2012/12/26/banning_assault_weapons_works/ Which only makes me wonder why you can buy a handgun in California with a criminal record? It feels to me, the more I read, that we as a nation are going down a rabbit hole.

Senators, if we can’t reinstate an assault weapons ban after Newtown, then will calmer heads please prevail and agree with the lowly background check. It’s simple, we are already set up to do them in every state, we will most likely run into a backlog and wait for several weeks if not months for our pretty fingertips to check out, thereby preventing many suicides. The only thing you have to fear, is yourselves.

Proud of another senator, our own VA Sen Tim Kaine for tweeting this morning “I’m ready to vote yes on limits on combat weapons & universal background checks. Read my op-ed in the @PilotNews http://hamptonroads.com” Oh yeah, I’m jumping on this twitter wagon!
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Leaning Out

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , on March 12, 2013| 4 Comments »

Let’s be clear. We’ve had this debate before, and it just leaves us with bad feelings. What is the future of feminism? Why do we women always want to be so darn likable?

The latest slant to this round of “Pin the blame on the woman,” comes from Sheryl Sandberg in her new book, Lean In. Granted she is speaking to a certain class of women; those on their way up the business school food chain, graduates of the Ivy League with plenty of support and mentorship. She wants little girls who were previously called “bossy” in preschool, to be acclaimed for leadership skills instead. I get that. The Bride’s preschool teacher pulled me aside one day and gently asked me to talk with her about her tendency to “lean over” to her seatmate’s art work and offer help and criticism. She was supposed to adhere to the rules, only care about her own work. Harumph.

What was i supposed to do when her Grandma Ada offered her money whenever the elementary teacher checked the box that read something like, “Always raising her hand, too talkative.” Don’t you know children were to be seen and not heard, that being quiet and still was the goal? Things hadn’t changed much from my Sacred Heart days of carefully folded hands on the desk in fear of a smack to the knuckles. Sandberg stresses the importance of choosing the right life partner, and wants you to ask, “What would I do if I weren’t afraid?”
http://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/archive/2013/03/many-working-class-women-are-already-leaning-in/273948/

I was talking to Grandma Ada about this and she said “Oy.” The day before she had attended a lecture with a man talking about his philanthropic work and his travels around the world. Ada was sitting next to his wife, and asked her the loaded, mind-boogling question of the century – “Do you work?” Now my MIL received her PhD at age 65 and is still counseling patients at age 88. Softening the question she added “outside the home” and the young woman (who was my age) turned to her and said. “No.” She took care of the children and the home so that Mr Wonderful could do what he did…well she didn’t phrase it that way exactly.

Let’s be clear. I graduated high school 3 years after Betty Friedan published The Feminine Mystique. She too was criticized for speaking to the well-educated, suburban woman. Men had returned from WWII and women went back into their homes and felt something was missing. This growing discontent sparked the second wave of feminism, after all we had the vote, what more could we want? Young women today are surprised to learn that we couldn’t wear pants on the streets of Boston, that we had to get a credit card in our husband’s name, that we were asked how fast we could type at every job interview. That we couldn’t even get a prescription for the new wonder drug…the birth control pill, unless we were married. We wanted our daughters to have it all, and now that they can, some are just saying, “No Thanks!”

Along with the increase in pay, they may not want to sacrifice time with their families. Many of the Bride’s Duke alums have opted to stay-at-home with their children, for now. Lucky for them, they can afford to do this. When my daughter was considering her medical specialty, the ability to have more time at home for her future family was a factor. I wonder how many men consider this when they choose a speciality? And just why is this a crime, leaning out for awhile? These women with a full-time 24/7 staff at home (nanny,cook,maid), a loving husband who does laundry, should not be saying to our daughters, “Look at me, I went back to the office 2 weeks after my baby was born.” Well la dee (expletive) da!

It’s about time for feminism’s third wave. Equal pay for equal work, it’s not really too much to ask. If working women, from the cleaning staff, to hospital corridors, from teachers to the board room keep pushing the envelope, if they learn how to negotiate for family leave along with pay hikes, if they keep raising their hands that glass ceiling will be shattering all over this country.
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Yager Bombs and More

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , on March 7, 2013| Leave a Comment »

“There’s Sir Dosser the Convict, Chango the Beast…” If you’re not getting the reference, this is a part of a radio interview done in Britain, gone viral with Mila Kunis. Highly entertaining, we learn they don’t have Blue Moon beer overseas and we Yanks don’t normally “…drop trout” at weddings. Here is the recap, the on-air reaction of the young guy, Chris Stark’s, boss – “Why are you going on about your mates again?”

Poor Mila, you can tell she has a cold and she’s enjoying this break from the ordinary slew of questions about her new movie with James Franco, a prequel to the Wizard of Oz. It’s a Sam Raimi production, who sounds like a reincarnation of Hitchcock. Animation mixed with live action is normally not my cup of tea (though I did enjoy Jessica Rabbit, she’s just drawn that way). But one of my Kindle downloads on this last trip was a mixture of fantasy and fiction, The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. Le Cirque des Rêves appears without warning and only opens at night. It too is about a charlatan, an illusionist, or two. And so I’m intrigued by the new Oz and just may dig my way out of this snow to see it!

From wanting to drink Yager Bombs with Mila, to the real world of droning on about bombs in a Senate filibuster. I thought you might like to know that our little city, Charlottesville, VA is the first in the nation to outright ban drones from roaming all over our backyards. Yes, for two years we can’t buy, borrow or test any drones and the ultrasound Governor is now considering a bill on his desk to make this a state-wide condition. http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/02/05/city-in-virginia-becomes-first-to-pass-anti-drone-legislation-

City Councilor, my Facebook buddy and former Mayor Dave Norris says, :…the city has a “long tradition of promoting civil liberties – ‘It’s just part of our culture here.'”

It’s a bit scary to me to think that we have been giving up so many of our civil liberties so freely. The right to vote, the right to govern our own bodies without government interference, the right of privacy, etc. The question about drones speaks to a much larger issue. It’s not so much catching the marijuana grower in his backyard, as it is:
When is it OK to kill anyone?
American or not?
With or without a drone? since this is just another instrument of death…a flying, remote-control-game-like tool of destruction. Let’s not stay up all night talking about whether its target is a US citizen on this soil or that. When do we as a nation say that this is OK?
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Up Against a Car

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , on January 29, 2013| 2 Comments »

Closing arguments have wrapped up in a trial that has everybody talking in Central VA. In the sleepy town of Culpeper, Daniel Harmon-Wright is fighting to get his life back. An ex-police officer, he made the mistake of taking on the wrong woman in the parking lot of a Catholic School on February 9, 2012. Somebody called and said there was a “suspicious looking car.” Think of Kathy Bates in Fried Green Tomatoes in front of the Winn Dixie, “TOWANDA.”

Only it didn’t work out that well when 54-year-old Patricia Ann Cook decided that she wasn’t getting out of her car for no good reason. When Harmon-Wright tried reaching inside (to get her keys I presume), she closed the window on the officer’s arm and started dragging him down the pavement. That’s when he shot her. He is charged with “…murder, malicious shooting into an occupied vehicle, malicious shooting into an occupied vehicle resulting in a death and use of a firearm in the commission of a felony…A prosecutor called the fatal shooting “excessive” and unnecessary, while Harmon-Wright’s attorney said the officer was doing his job in shooting at a ‘fleeing felon.'” http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/state-regional/ap/ex-culpeper-officer-s-murder-trial-nears-end/article_76733eba-ade6-5188-a938-ec980d8b5db2.html

Wait, who’s the felon? The officer had a history of unnecessary force, “…about a month before the fatal incident, Harmon-Wright received a reprimand for entering a house with his gun drawn and forcing a teenager to the floor. It turned out he had the wrong teen.”

I remember thinking how strange and stupid the whole thing was when I first heard about it, why not shoot out the tires, or just threaten her, or aim at her hand or something? Now I love the police just like the next guy, or girl, but growing up in the North we learned to never take chances when somebody in a uniform with a gun approaches us. You do what they say. Period. However, you know that if they want to search your car, they need a little something called “probable cause.” Just because you’re a young man with long hair and a brake light is out won’t cut it…do you detect a note of the anti-establishment 60s? Maybe Cook was having a bad day, maybe it was a menopausal Towanda kinda day? Did she deserve to die?

It’s serendipitous that the jury will most likely deliver its verdict on the same day that a new immigration policy is unfolding further upstream in Washington, DC. Police have been stopping suspicious looking people, (ie Mexican) and asking for their identification in some states. They have been imprisoning people who may have been called for a domestic dispute, turning them over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and deporting them…because they raised their voice and didn’t have a green card. Children have been separated from parents. During President Obama’s tenure, deportations have risen beyond the levels of President Bush, calling for a policy that “…would force local law enforcement to share fingerprints of those arrested with the Department of Homeland Security, which has immigration records, through the FBI.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/08/27/obama-is-deporting-more-immigrants-than-bush-republicans-dont-think-thats-enough/

We read about police states, but we never really think this could happen here. When is deadly force the right move? Who gets to question who about their immigration status? Now, because the clueless GOP thinks that losing 71% of the Latino vote in November is reason enough to consider a humane, comprehensive immigration policy, we should celebrate. Well, OK, just un pequeno.
RIP Patricia Ann Cook, the unarmed Sunday School teacher who was shot 7 times. And thank God for online petitions, like the one that kept the city from brushing this case under the proverbial rug.
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A Gun Gag

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , , on January 9, 2013| 2 Comments »

I remember the first time I went to see my regular doctor at UVA for a general physical exam. The Bride had recommended him and it turns out he is a real life Dr McDreamy. Handsome and smart, plenty of time to answer my questions, not in any rush to shoo me out the door. Maybe this is what academic medicine is all about? I was surprised that he ordered tests for blood and bone density, mammography – and he didn’t actually touch me. I guess my Irish ancestors get the prize for giving me all the right numbers in blood pressure, and remember I didn’t come in with a problem. But my first surprise was the nursing assessment before Dr McDreamy walked in; she asked me if, “I feel safe at home?”

Bob tells me that this is a relatively new question in the battery of things we patients must divulge when we are putting our lives into the hands of someone. I understood, I suppose if I was a battered and abused woman maybe I’d feel safe enough here to break down and tell? It made me wonder what protocol they use if a woman or man answered that question in a different way. How much do we drink, do we smoke, and btw how do we feel in our home? I remember when Bob worked on a baby who had drowned in a hot tub. I’m pretty sure they weren’t asking questions back then about pools and hot tubs.

Last month I accompanied the Love Bug to her 4 month Peds check-up. How’s the nursing going, sleeping? And political junkie that I am, I thought about the small battle that was waged last year to gag doctors in FL. Legislators there were fighting to silence their pediatricians’ general wellness questions; in particular, one question, “Are there guns in the home?” Yes sir, politics has slipped inside that HIPPA protected wall of the doctor/patient relationship – one I liken to a priest/confessor – and is yet again telling our health care professionals what to do.

“The way some doctors see it, asking patients whether they own a gun is no more politically loaded than any other health-related question they ask. So when a Florida law that prohibited them from discussing gun ownership with patients passed last year, they moved to fight it. A federal judge issued a permanent injunction blocking enforcement of the law in July.” http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2012/11/27/165985266/taking-aim-at-restrictions-on-medical-questions-about-gun-ownership

I relaxed. I thought this will never do, it just can’t happen, if a federal judge in FL blocked this inane law, then it’s over. But no, it isn’t over.
http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/bestoftv/2013/01/09/ac-acosta-gupta-health-care-guns.cnn?iref=allsearch

A little known 5 sentence provision was slipped onto the end of the Affordable Care Act. Legislators agreed to slash the language of the bill until all health care professionals could do was ask about guns – there is to be

NO documenting of their conversation about guns,
NO collection of data on guns, and
NO research on gun ownership as it relates to injuries…

Legislators argued and preened around the policy, taking out the part about doctors being jailed if they so much as ask about guns, or even losing their license. As many as 8 states are still fighting to reinstate this criminal provision. Remember the good old days when all we worried about was a transvaginal ultrasound? http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/bestoftv/2013/01/09/ac-acosta-gupta-health-care-guns.cnn?iref=allsearch

Why should we care? 1 in 5 deaths of children in our country under age 20 is directly related to firearms – 1 in 5. In a 2 year study, for children ages 5 – 14, guns were shown to be the third leading cause of death. And now, the powerful NRA has basically stopped all research into this public health and safety problem. Let the newspapers print the names and addresses of gun owners. How many more rights are we willing to give up for the almighty money of the gun lobby?

Here is a picture of the graffiti that has appeared on our new bridge over the Rivanna River. “Love” on one side, and “Peace and Faith” on the other. I hope it stays there for awhile, that free speech travels upriver.
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The Candywoman Can

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , on August 14, 2012| 2 Comments »


Who knew that naming the moderators for Fall’s upcoming Presidential debates would be historic? No woman has sat in that seat, asking the hard questions and keeping the candidates on point and on time since 1992. And now more than ever, we need you Candy Crowley. “A trio of high school girls from New Jersey had mounted an online petition campaign to get a woman back on the debate stand. Emma Axelrod, Sammi Siegel and Elena Tsemberis were cheering the Commission on Presidential Debates for its choice…” In addition, ABCs Martha Raddatz will moderate one vice-presidential debate. Go Girl Power! http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-candy-crowley-presidential-debate-20120813,0,5837308.story

Crowley has said that her first instinct was to think, “Great!” As a journalist, CNN’s Chief Political Correspondent, who hosts the Sunday morning TV show State of the Union http://sotu.blogs.cnn.com and specializes in our House and Presidential elections, Crowley was honored to be asked and jumped at the chance; and not surprisingly, being a woman wasn’t her first thought. She is a professional, and her goal, she said this morning on CNN, is to think outside of the beltway. Her goal will be to ask questions that people want to know. So Ms Crowley, if you’re listening, here are my top 3 questions for your October 16th debut, at Hofstra University in New York, from one inquiring mind.

1) Where do you think our “Rights” come from? Mitt, your running mate, Paul Ryan, has said he believes our Rights come from “God and nature, not from government.” Do you agree? Hopefully this question, in a town hall format, will open up all sorts of other questions about religion and human rights (which are also women’s rights…and LGBT rights). I’d like to know if Mitt is really planning to close Planned Parenthood and I’d like to know if Barrack is planning to close Gitmo.

2) How does your economic philosophy differ from your opponent? What is your plan to create jobs and at the same time, close the deficit? A seemingly incompatible duo – increase AND decrease. A sort of Houdini-like concept, but OK, try and give us an answer. I’d like to hear the top 3 priorities of each candidate, in a nutshell. Vouchers for Medicare? Push Social Security benefits to age 68? We want details, facts, not party talking points. Come out from behind the curtain and explain this economy to us.

“Unfortunately the key factual question regarding the effect of the Obama Administration’s stimulus appears – at first glance – to be out of easy reach. It is essentially a question of what would have happened if what did happen didn’t. Did the Administration’s policy matter? What would have been the result without it?” http://www.niemanwatchdog.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=background.view&backgroundid=00645

3) What have you learned from a recent mistake? In introducing your running mate this August Mitt, you made a bit of a gaffe calling Ryan “The next President of the United States.” You laughed about it, and immediately corrected it. How about health care policy – was your health insurance/universal health care plan good for MA? You agreed with a mandate then. And Barrack, do you regret spending so much political leverage on the Affordable Care Act?

I covered a few Town Hall meetings in my day. One stands out in my mind, one in which my friend arrived with bags of toy guns we had accepted at a Peace Fair’s “exchange your water pistol for a care bear” booth. The House Republican candidate for the 12th District in NJ, Dick Zimmer was a wunderkind. He had passed Meghan’s Law, and been a part of that GOP landscape for years. What bothered me was his position on assault weapons, he liked them. In 1994, President Clinton and Congress passed a 10 year ban on assault weapons, and good ole Dick wanted to just let that ban expire. Spotting the bags of toy guns, his operatives were doing their best NOT to call on us, but eventually we asked him to explain his position.

Good luck Candy! Whatever you do, with your gang of “undecided” Town Hall voters, take that ear bud out of your ear and look for the bags of toy guns.

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