May 31. 2008 by Dick.

Wow.

A friend and I were talking about names; we had a tiny question about how many peeps keep the given name their parents gave them.

One of my high school classmates changed hers from Diane to Eugenia so I googled her. A first page result was on classmates.com and, as it turns out, you have to sign up to access the info.

Signing up is free so I did. After all, I have a myspace page, right? What could it hurt.

I hate to be nickled and dimed. I dropped Verizon because they charge Vermonters by the minute for local calls. I’ll probably stop flying when the airlines start charging by the pound.

If you sign the classmates.com guestbook or send a message to a classmates.com member like me, I have to pay for it. This is worse than texting. Since I am pugnaciously parsimonious, you are far more likely to get my attention by email or phone.

I pay a flat rate for those.

dblog4495h-at-gmail-dot-com

Posted in Business, Dick's Dumps, Random Access | 1 Comment »

May 26. 2008 by Dick.

Today is Memorial Day in the United States. The holiday once known as Decoration Day commemorates the men and women who perished under the flag of this country.

Although the recognized birthplace of Memorial Day is Waterloo, New York, many Vermont Towns including North Puffin marked the end of the Civil War with a day and ceremonies to decorate the graves of the fallen soldiers. Today, in addition to parades and remembrances, Vermont offers Memorial Day Weekend Specials (3 nights and Sunday brunch for just $150 for two people) and an Open Studio Weekend with artists marking the beginning of summer. Other areas really do treat Memorial Day as the first day of summer. The Indy 500 today has run on Memorial Day weekend since 1911.

Lest we forget, the Americans we honor did not “give their lives.” They did not merely perish. They did not just cease living, check out, croak, depart, drop, expire, kick off, kick the bucket, pass away or pass on, pop off, or bite the dust. Their lives were taken from them by force on battlefields around the world. They were killed. Whether you believe they died with honor, whether you believe our cause just, died they did.

There is no end to the mutts who would kill our men and women and would then turn around and kill their own. If I had but one wish granted on this day, I wish not another soldier dies. Ever. But die they did and die they will.

Because those men and women died, I get to write these words. And you get to read them.

Posted in Society, Holidays, Death, Big Thoughts, Random Access | No Comments »

May 19. 2008 by Dick.

George McGovern (yes that George McGovern) wrote in the NYTimes, “The competition for the Democratic presidential nomination between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama has been long and intense. The news media have given it round-the-clock coverage, including seemingly round-the-clock debates between the two candidates. The campaign has been good not only for the Democratic Party but also for America. It has made millions of voters excited about selecting our next president.”

Senator McGovern is right.

But he is right in a way that worries me greatly.

I don’t have a great passion for John McCain but I do have a great passion for politics. And I do have a great passion for parity.

Senator McCain has gotten short shrift in the media during the 138 months of the Democratic Party Primary that Senator McGovern lauds. Every network story, every front page article is about the Obama v. Hillary battle. Unless it is about the Hillary-Obama battle. Anyone coming to our shores for the first time would think the presidential election is between the two Democratic candidates and that there is no one else in the race.

The Democrats certainly want it that way.

“Early voting was nearly three times what it has been for previous presidential races,” Kate Snow said on the May 13 edition of World News Tonight as she reported from the West Virginia Primary.

Ms. Snow? It was a party primary. It was not the Presidential election. That happens in November, not May.

I have to wonder if the round-the-clock news media coverage would be so skewed if Mike Huckabee and John McCain were having the same nearly equal battle while an anointed Democratic candidate campaigned less loudly from state to state.

See, I don’t think it would.

I think our media has given up giving the candidates equal time. And that is the worst thing that can happen to this election.

Posted in Politics, Media, Random Access | 1 Comment »