Borepatch hits one out of the park, across the bay, and into Oakland.
My favorite:
I mean, if I went around saying I was an Emperor because some tweed-jacket egghead had said I was Cum Laude, people would put me away!
Borepatch wins the Interwebz!
Posted by daddybear71 on May 9, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/09/borepatch-wins-the-interwebz/
Loaded Question
We all know that we have a prison camp for captured terrorists at Guantanamo, and maintain detention facilities at other locations worldwide. These people come from a plethora of countries, a lot of whom we have at least semi-friendly relations with.
What do we do if the governments of those countries, when they learn that we have captured their citizens and are detaining them in a state that’s not really criminal, but not POW, demands access to them, or even demands that a representative from their diplomatic corps be present when that person is questioned?
Let’s change the way we look at this. Let’s say that a British subject is in our country on a work visa, and is arrested on suspicion of rape and murder. Since those crimes are pretty heinous, and he’s a flight risk to return to Great Britain, we hold him without bail. Can the British ambassador demand access to him and provide counsel for any interrogation and and have a reasonable expectation that we do as asked? We could demand the same thing for one of our citizens, so would we turn down their request?
What if that British subject was arrested for espionage for a third country, say China? Would our response to the Brits be any different?
Now, let’s say this British subject was captured in Afghanistan. He’s suspected of being a member of Al Qaeda, and is being interrogated by our intelligence services. How do we react if the British ambassador in Washington demands that a British diplomat be allowed access to him at Guantanamo and be present during any interrogation? Update: A quick Google search shows that this has happened in the past, but it looks like a case by case kind of thing, not a blanket notification to home countries and almost automatic access to a citizen by diplomats.
What if the detainee is from Saudi Arabia, or Iraq, or Russia? Or say he was a German citizen, a country that might not look as favorably at our interrogation techniques as some of our other allies? We can expect a German diplomat to object strenuously to our applying harsh interrogation techniques to one of his citizens.
I know that we need to interrogate these prisoners and keep them away from the outside world as much as possible. Sometimes our interrogation methods, while legal and justified, can go beyond simple question and answer sessions. I’m a former intelligence soldier; I know how important the information gained in these interrogations can be. But the implications for international relations and how our own citizens are treated if arrested or captured are huge. I’m interested to know if anyone has any insight on how this is handled, and to hear y’all’s opinions on whether or not we should allow foreign diplomats to access their citizens while they are in our custody.
Posted by daddybear71 on May 9, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/09/loaded-question/
I’m so proud!
This evening, while driving her home from her mom’s house, Girlie Bear rocked out to songs by the following groups, among others:
AC/DC
Metallica
Queen
Judas Priest
Not only did she know the words to all of the songs, but she appropriately applied both air guitar and head banging!
I’ve never been so proud. My little girl knows good music when she hears it!
Posted by daddybear71 on May 9, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/09/im-so-proud/
Fetchez La Vache
Well, the first political ad of the season just showed on the morning news. Apparently we’re off to an early start. Whoopee.
In 2008, we were handed a crap sandwich and told it was marzipan and happiness. Nothing changed for the better. In 2010, we threw it back in the politicians’ faces and screamed “We’re mad as hell, and we’re not going to take this anymore!”. Again, nothing really changed. We’re still on the same trajectory toward insolvency and irrelevancy that we were on in 2006. If anything, we’re accelerating down that particular track.
We need to change tactics. As big a pain in the tuckus as we were to Democrats and establishment Republicans in 2010, we need to be even more painful to them. We need to expose and shame ‘conservatives’ who vote against our interests so that they can gain favor with the President and his cabal of too-cool-for-school ‘progressives’. We need to make the slumbering masses wake up and smell the house burning.
If necessary, we need to be ridiculous. Snark must run in the streets. Ridicule of politicians from all parties should be the order of the day. I’m not talking about principled disagreements with their stands on issues. I’m talking about lampooning them in the same manner Hollywood has been doing since Dan Akroyd tried to imitate Nixon on Saturday Night Live. And then we need to vote every single national and state politician who was elected prior to 2010 out of office.
I’ve got my wookie suit and chicken suit in the closet. Something tells me both will be getting a workout between now and November 2012.
Posted by daddybear71 on May 9, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/09/fetchez-la-vache/
Happy Birthday Kermit!
OK, I’m really just a big kid. I grew up watching Sesame Street and the Muppet Show. Kermit the Frog is one of my favorite characters of the 20th century.
On this day in 1955, Kermit made his debut on TV. He looks pretty good for 56.
Here’s one of my favorite songs, done very simply and well:
Posted by daddybear71 on May 9, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/09/happy-birthday-kermit/
Addition to the family
Don’t get excited. No-one’s pregnant. And no, we didn’t get another puppy.
I’ve introduced you all to Irish Woman’s alternate identity, Gopher Girl. She takes on this guise when she indulges in the irrational need to dig up the yard, garden, or pond.
Well, that trait appears to follow her bloodline. This weekend, BooBoo transformed into Captain Chaos!.* The transformation apparently began while I was at the NRA Annual Meeting in Pittsburgh, but became very evident on Saturday.
He’s discovered superheroes, and marketing works. He’s begun wearing towels and sheets as a cape, racing through the house, climbing to ever-increasing heights, and jumping from them. This was very evident when he played at the zoo’s playground on Sunday.
So far, this new obsession hasn’t caused any injuries that required more than a kiss. However, he may be causing damage to his mother’s cardio-vascular system as it goes from normal to oh-Lord-he’s-climbing-the-curtains-again and back several times a day.
Hopefully, Captain Chaos! will be a rare visitor to the house. He’s a good guy, but he can be a bit destructive in his enthusiasm. Oh well, at least he’s not fixated on professional wrestling.
*The exclamation point is part of the name, like when you say Blackhawk!.
Posted by daddybear71 on May 9, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/09/addition-to-the-family/
Trimming the Blog Roll
Sometime in the next few days, I’ll be cutting down the blog roll a bit.
Basically, if you haven’t posted in the past six months, you’re going to roll off.
If you maintain a blog, but haven’t posted in a long time and want to stay on my blog roll, drop me a comment and I’ll make sure to keep you on it.
If you notice that I got overzealous with the pruning shears and someone inadvertently gets whacked, feel free to squawk at me and I’ll correct the mistake.
Posted by daddybear71 on May 9, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/09/trimming-the-blog-roll/
On Manners
In a recent post, Jigsaw asked what skills we thought were essential to a child as they grew up. After spending a few hours walking around with Boo and Irish Woman at the zoo today, the most important thing I could add to her list was manners.
Watching the many families at the zoo, with children ranging from newborn to almost adult, the groups that were stood out were the well behaved ones. At some point in my life, it was the badly behaved children that were in the minority, but that doesn’t seem to be the case now. I’m not talking about rambunctious children who were loud and ran a bit. That’s expected behavior in an environment like the zoo. I’m talking about the rude children, who ran over those in front of them, regardless of age and size, cursed at a rate that would make a Marine blush, threw temper tantrums at all stages of the game, and demanded that their parents conform to their wishes instead of the other way around.
Example: We went to the new polar bear and grizzly bear exhibit. The grizzlies weren’t out at the time, but the polar bear was walking around in the shady areas of her enclosure. She could be seen from some of the windows for a few moments at a time, but you had to be patient and content with just a glimpse or two. A woman was there with her son, and when the polar bear wandered past their viewing window and went out of sight after a minute or two, the boy stamped his feet, banged on the glass, and cussed a blue streak. Obviously this was his normal mode of behavior, because his mother didn’t bat an eye. One twist was that this boy was almost as tall as I am and was wearing a varsity football tee shirt from a local high school. This wasn’t a spoiled toddler or 3rd grader. This was someone who is likely learning to drive and will be eligible to vote in a couple of years.
At one time, manners were learned on your parents’ knees, and enforced with the back of their hands. Sadly, it seems that most people aren’t teaching their kids to act properly in public. Acting like trash seems to be the norm now. By trash I don’t mean redneck, black, white, or whatever. Trash is a state of mind and manner of acting that has nothing to do with where you or your ancestors come from. I have known people who were as country redneck as they come, but they and their children knew to say please, excuse me, and thank you. I have seen black kids at our schools who were bussed in from very poor, bad neighborhoods who knew to hold the door for women and never cursed in front of an adult. Being trash comes from not having someone teach you how to act, enforcing those standards with pain if necessary, and setting an example. It’s an attitude of entitlement that grates on those of us who know how to act better. Trash can come from any social, economic, or ethnic background. In our neighborhood, I’d say that the children of the more well off are more likely to act like trash than those who come from more modest families, but there are those who teach their children how to act even if there’s a Lexus parked in the garage.
Unfortunately for us, trash seems to be fashionable. Reality TV stars trashing it up seem to be more popular than actual acting. Entertainers who behave in ways that would have gotten them blacklisted a few decades ago are given accolades. Athletes behave badly, but are absolved of their actions because they happen to have hit the genetic lottery.
As parents, we have to counteract these bad influences if we want our children to be more than another example of trash in society. In addition to teaching them to work hard, be honest, and learn skills, we need to teach them how to act. We have to walk the walk too. You can’t correct a child for being rude then act like trash yourself. Maybe the best thing we can pass on to our kids is to show them how to not be trash.
Posted by daddybear71 on May 8, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/08/on-manners/
Looking Good
The massive amounts of liquid sunshine we’ve been getting for the past few weeks are good for at least one thing. Our cherry trees are loaded!
We should be harvesting sometime in June. The peach tree isn’t as fruitful as last year, and the strawberries we planted a few weeks ago are establishing themselves. We’ll get a few berries off of them, but nothing like last year. But there’s always you-pick-it farms for family foraging!
Posted by daddybear71 on May 8, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/08/looking-good/
An Ode to my Mother
M is for the many times I had to help you to bed after you passed out in the kitchen
O is for the other women in my life who have been more maternal to me than you ever were
T is for the thirteen schools I attended in 12 years
H is for the healthy dose of neurosis that I’ve worked through for the past 20 years
E is for each and every time I found an excuse to not bring a girl home
R is for relocation, which we did pretty much every time you decided you were bored or didn’t feel like paying the rent
Put them all together, and you get “Female Genetic Donor”. Happy Freaking Mother’s Day.
OK, I’m a little bitter. My mother didn’t have 5 children because she loved kids. She had 5 children because she never figured out how to properly use birth control.
The flip side of that is all of the wonderful women that have taken Irish Woman and me under their wings over the years. Irish Woman’s aunt brought her up along with her own brood, even after her own husband died. Hoosier Mom took Robin in when she came over for a sleepover and never let her go. Heck, we’ve even got a semi-adopted grandmother that came with an ex-wife and is closer to me now than my own mother ever was and loves our kids as if they were her own.
And don’t get me started about Irish Woman. She was an older, established adult when me and my gaggle of hellions crashed her party. She immediately took on the role of mom to the kids, and has been a much better partner in parenting with me than anyone else ever has. My best compliment to her is that she is the same mother to Girlie Bear and Little Bear as she is to BooBoo. One note: she hates being called stepmother. She prefers the term “Parental Consultant”.
I guess my point is what I’ve said before: genetics don’t make family. If you and your biological mother and grandmother are close, that’s wonderful. But the nurturing mother figure in a lot of lives is someone who falls into the role by circumstances, not biology.
For you mothers, grandma’s, mammaw’s, aunts, stepmom’s, parental consultants, semi-adopted moms, or whatever you call yourself when you provide a strong, nurturing, guiding hand to a child, bless you. You do a job that’s harder than anyone has a right to ask of you.
Posted by daddybear71 on May 8, 2011
https://daddybearsden.com/2011/05/08/an-ode-to-my-mother/
DaddyBear
