Friday Thinking, October 15th

 

This is a Woman's Hair Salon in Hamburger, Germany. How about it? Ready to get your hair done at "Funny Cuts?"

There are horse thieves, cattle rustlers, and wildlife poachers but fish kidnappers? Sunburst Trout Farm discovered the loss of 600 pounds of trout from one of their ponds. Local fish markets have been told to be on the look out for the stolen fish. Wonder if they are branded for identification? 

Xavier Ross, 19, was wanted on a felony burglary charge. Last Monday officers say a man was out in front of the Grand Rapids Police Headquarters playing "Chopsticks" repeatedly on a piano placed there for ArtPrize. A sergeant was about to the arrest the man for creating a disturbance when another officer reporting for his night shift recognized the piano play. After some quick checking he discovered the man at the keys was Xavier Ross. The would-be musician is in the Kent County Jail.

Charles Krauthammer has another excellent and insightful article this week. It is entitled "It's About His Policies" and I read it in the Orange County Register on-line. Here is a short quote from the piece" "the problem with the policies is twofold: ideology and effectiveness. First, Obama, abetted by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, tried to take a center-right country to the left. They grossly misread the 2008 election. It was a mandate to fix the economy and restore American confidence. Obama read it as a mandate to change the American social contract, giving it a more European social-democratic stamp, by fundamentally extending the reach and power of government in health care, energy, education, finance and industrial policy." Charles always seems to be able to get right to the heart of the problem and state his case in clear terms. If you get a chance, this is an excellent read...

A man wearing a "Scream" thriller movie mask tried to hold up a doughnut shop on New York's Long Island. Nassau County police say the thief walked into a Dunkin' Donuts in Farmingdale just before midnight Tuesday brandishing a silver handgun and demanding money. An employee, washing trays, tells the New York Post that he turned the water on the bandit, hitting the mask. The thief, clad all in black, fled empty-handed.

A book was thrown at Barack Obama’s head during his Germantown rally in Philadelphia, while a streaker also tainted the event that was supposed to rally Obama’s hardcore base of predominantly black supporters. This was supposed to be a pump-up rally of Obama’s support in the country but instead degenerated into something of a debacle. The Secret Service is now facing questions regarding their apparent laxity in security that actually allowed a book to narrowly miss hitting Obama’s head and a flabby streaker to disrupt the rally. The launching of a book towards Obama’s head is particularly significant because of the large African-American contingent in the crowd of about 18,000 people. African-Americans are still one of the only demographics in the US who haven’t completely abandoned Obama. In fact, according to polls, African-Americans still support Obama…almost as if…as if…they only watch MSNBC, read the New York Times, and get all their analysis from the likes Keith Olbermann and Ed Schultz. If a crowd of predominantly African-American people produces an individual disgruntled enough to commit a serious crime by injuring the president, then what does that say about Obama’s standing within the African-American community, one of his last bases of hardcore support? That just may signal that not all African-Americans are completely enamored with Obama after all. On the other hand, it may not be totally out of the question that some African-Americans can be upset enough at Obama to hurl a projectile at his head. After all: the unemployment rate for African-Americans is actually up by almost 4% this year alone, and the same unemployment rate for Africa-Americans was actually lower under good, old G.W. Bush than it is now under Obama, as was the African-American poverty rate. Yet, almost 100% of all African-Americans still support Obama! Huh? Hmmmm…I wonder just why that could be…hmmmmm…I bet if I said it had something to do with race, I bet you know what I’d get called though, right?!

Lets talk teachers for a minute... Teachers are one of our most important professions but I really think we have been spending way too much time throwing flowers on them. I had some outstanding teachers growing up -but the truth is that for every great teacher, I also had 2 mediocre ones and one really bad one. Teachers should be held to account for the success of their students. A teacher whose students excel should be rewarded and given a higher salary and bonuses -but a teacher whose students fail needs to be re-trained and replaced. And those "public sector" retirement packages that they do not even contribute too but allow them to retire at 55 with 80 and 100 percent of salary - that needs to stop. They deserve good packages - but not paid for entirely out of the tax payers pocket and not without their being required to contribute to it themselves. All I am saying is that they should be treated as any other professional and asked to earn what they get.....

Live Long and Prosper....