I realize this is old, but after happening across it while cleaning out some old backups, I thought it was worth a post here.
This is an email I sent to Chevrolet in 2001 about purchasing a vehicle from Jim Reed Chevrolet in Nashville, TN, by far the worst experience I ever had at a Chevrolet Dealership.
To Whom it may Concern:
I would like to report one of the absolute worst car-buying experiences I have ever had. Two and a half months ago, my wife ordered a Chevy Impala LS from Jim Reed Chevrolet here in Nashville. They said it would be in by March 24th. About a month and a half later, she called about the car to check the status and was told it had not arrived. Later, on March 24th, she called again and found out that Jim Reed had sold the car to someone else. I was floored. However, they were able to find another car close to here and they also offered $100 worth of gas gift certificates for our trouble. My wife needed the car, so I agreed to buy it.
Three days later we arrive at the dealership to buy the car. Our salesman (we had told them we would be there around 8) had to be paged. We arrived at 8:15, and after waiting five minutes for him, he came in and told us that the car was still being prepared. At this point, he went to check on it. Twenty minutes later he returned with the car. We looked it over to ensure it matched the features of the car we ordered. It’s now 8:45.
We sit down in his office, and he starts going through some of the paperwork. At about 9 AM, he went to obtain the GMO price for the vehicle we were purchasing. The MSRP for the car we had ordered was $25,199. The MSRP on the car we were buying that day was $25,105; a $95 difference due to the fact that the sun roof was listed on the invoice at $700 instead of $795. When the salesman returned 15 minutes later, he told us that the GMO price for the car would be $23,159. The GMO price that we were quoted when we originally ordered the car was $22,851. I asked him why the GMO price for this car was higher even though the MSRP was lower. He stated that he didn’t know, and he needed to talk to his sales manager. He again left. Twenty minutes later he returned. It has now been an hour an a half since we arrived, and we hadn’t even started the financing yet, so by this time I am absolutely furious. He again stated that was the price he was given as the GMO price. I told him it was unacceptable, and that I was going to go to another dealership. I stood up to leave, but my wife managed to calm me down. He told me that he would “work” with me and asked me what I wanted. I told him I would pay the originally quoted price, minus the difference between the two MSRPs. He agreed and it was settled - two hours after we arrived.
The reason I buy Chevrolet cars is because I like them and also because of the GMO discount. If I wanted to haggle over a price, I would go to another dealership and haggle.
We then waited 40 minutes for financing, and after financing, my wife waited another 30 minutes for the car to get ready (I couldn’t stay any longer I had to get to work). Overall, it took us four hours to do something that should have taken an hour. I have bought cars in the past, and every time, I have been in and out in less than an hour. I found out later that while she was being shown the features of the car, the salesman was schmoozing her to try to get a good rating on his customer survey. This was extremely sad.
Thankfully, I thought that this would be the end of our dealings with Jim Reed Chevrolet. However, the gas card wasn’t ready, so my wife had to return to pick it up. She did so this morning. She had called ahead of time and told our salesman that she would be there between noon and 2 PM and he assured her he would be at the dealership. When she arrived, he was nowhere to be found. After waiting 30 minutes, she was finally able to get someone to help her. Around this time the salesman returned and said he had been to the bank. This is absolutely unacceptable. The salesman knew she was coming in. Why didn’t he leave the card with one of his associates in case she came in? He was so concerned about getting a good rating, yet he couldn’t do this simple little task?
I will buy Chevrolet again. I love the cars, and this is my first bad experience. However, I believe Jim Reed ripped us off, and then treated us like scum, all because they knew we were going to buy the car. Frankly I don’t appreciate this. Dealers like this one can ruin a company’s image.
I will never again step foot in Jim Reed Chevrolet. Tomorrow I plan to call the sales manager and have a few words with him. In my eyes Jim Reed failed me, my wife, AND the good Chevrolet name.
If you would like to contact me, I can be reached by email:
delphiprog@XXXXXXX.com
or by phone during the day at work:
615-XXX-XXXX
or by phone after 7 PM CST:
615-XXX-XXXX
Thanks,
Doug
Please Note: This letter was previously sent to GM Customer Relations via email. I was given the following “not our fault” response –
“Dear Mr. Beattie,
We are sorry you have experienced concerns with a Chevrolet Dealership. We realize our continued success is dependent, to a large degree, on the sales and service provided by our authorized dealerships.
Chevrolet dealerships are owned and operated independently of Chevrolet. As an independent business, each is responsible for their day to day business activities and the quality of service they provide. As a manufacturer, our authority involves the operating specifications of our vehicles and the application of the new vehicle warranty. We do realize however, that dealerships are our customers' direct link to Chevrolet.
We appreciate you taking the time to bring your concerns to our attention. If you have any further questions or comments, feel free to call the Chevrolet Customer Assistance Center at 1-800-222-1020 from 8:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. (EST) weekdays.
Sincerely,
Michael Boisvert
Customer Relationship Manager
GM Internet Response Center”
Frankly, if Chevrolet is concerned enough to send out Customer Satisfaction Surveys, why do I get a response like this?
If I had a choice, I would never, EVER buy from a dealer again. I would be more than happy to buy directly from Chevrolet. However, since Chevrolet (and all car-makers for that matter) feels that the best way to sell their cars is through unscrupulous dealers like Jim Reed, I am forced to continue to go to dealerships. I have seen good dealers and bad dealers. The problem is, the bad ones are awful and ruin Chevrolet’s great image. Jim Reed will get no more business from me.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Kowabunga
Most of the jobs I had as a teenager came and went. I spent some time at a golf course picking up range balls and cleaning golf carts for $3 an hour under the table. Later I worked for the small town I lived in mowing the cemetery and doing odd jobs for minimum wage ($4.25 an hour - which after taxes worked out to $3 an hour). Then along came Kowabunga.
Kowabunga is a job that has stayed with me my whole life. I spent the better part of my junior and senior year (1991-1992) working there, in some cases as much as 40 hours on school weeks. (I quickly realized the more I worked the more the government took from me) Anyway, Kowabunga stayed with me. To this day I have dreams about the owner suddenly re-opening it and asking me to manage it for him. I really have no idea why it had such a profound affect on me. Perhaps it was the amount of time I spent there during my transition from High School to College. Perhaps it was the fact that my first real dates came from women I met while working there. It was a major part of my life during my transition to adult hood. Anyway, I digress. Let's get on to learning more about Kowabunga!
Kowabunga was the concept of a man named Les Sloane, an old friend of my family. He had talked it up with my dad shortly before he started finding partners. According to my dad he was convinced he could make a killing on a pizza and arcade restaurant (ala Chuck e Cheeses). The games he said would make so much money that the food would be an after thought.
So Les got some partners together (If I remember right it was Les, a man named Cary Rubin, Cary's wife, and another man I only remember as Ed), and along with some investor capital he established Kowabunga Pizza and Arcade at the end of a strip mall in Englewood, Ohio. Ironically, the space had stood empty for years after the previous business - Godfather's Pizza - had gone out of business.
Thinking that they needed some sort of gimmick they decided to try to make a "kosher" pizza. A lot of the investors, and a lot of friends of the partners were Jewish, so maybe that was why they went that direction. Who knows. Anyway I had been looking for a job. I was offered a job at Kroger but turned it down for two reasons:
1. They required me to join the union, which automatically took money out of my paycheck to no benefit for me.
2. I had a chance to get hired at Kowabunga Pizza and Arcade.
So after being asked the question "are you going to WORK?" by Les to which I responded "yes". He had me in for an interview. The interview was mostly him spouting BS about how great the place was going to be. And oh, yeah, I was hired. I filled out a W2 and was told to report back for training in a week or so.
A week later, a Saturday afternoon if I remember right...
++To Be Continued++
Kowabunga is a job that has stayed with me my whole life. I spent the better part of my junior and senior year (1991-1992) working there, in some cases as much as 40 hours on school weeks. (I quickly realized the more I worked the more the government took from me) Anyway, Kowabunga stayed with me. To this day I have dreams about the owner suddenly re-opening it and asking me to manage it for him. I really have no idea why it had such a profound affect on me. Perhaps it was the amount of time I spent there during my transition from High School to College. Perhaps it was the fact that my first real dates came from women I met while working there. It was a major part of my life during my transition to adult hood. Anyway, I digress. Let's get on to learning more about Kowabunga!
Kowabunga was the concept of a man named Les Sloane, an old friend of my family. He had talked it up with my dad shortly before he started finding partners. According to my dad he was convinced he could make a killing on a pizza and arcade restaurant (ala Chuck e Cheeses). The games he said would make so much money that the food would be an after thought.
So Les got some partners together (If I remember right it was Les, a man named Cary Rubin, Cary's wife, and another man I only remember as Ed), and along with some investor capital he established Kowabunga Pizza and Arcade at the end of a strip mall in Englewood, Ohio. Ironically, the space had stood empty for years after the previous business - Godfather's Pizza - had gone out of business.
Thinking that they needed some sort of gimmick they decided to try to make a "kosher" pizza. A lot of the investors, and a lot of friends of the partners were Jewish, so maybe that was why they went that direction. Who knows. Anyway I had been looking for a job. I was offered a job at Kroger but turned it down for two reasons:
1. They required me to join the union, which automatically took money out of my paycheck to no benefit for me.
2. I had a chance to get hired at Kowabunga Pizza and Arcade.
So after being asked the question "are you going to WORK?" by Les to which I responded "yes". He had me in for an interview. The interview was mostly him spouting BS about how great the place was going to be. And oh, yeah, I was hired. I filled out a W2 and was told to report back for training in a week or so.
A week later, a Saturday afternoon if I remember right...
++To Be Continued++
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Religion - Part 3
I don't get it.
I was raised in a religious family. As far back as I can remember I was made to attend church with my mother and father every Sunday. Early on, you never asked why, you just went. I have a few early memories of our first church. One is a memory of everyone standing and shouting praises. I remember thinking that Jesus himself was there though when I later asked my mother about it this was not the case. Another memory was of a time in what may have been a Sunday School for small children, I was maybe 5 or 6. My brother who was 18 months old or so was there as well. And older boy (he seemed big to me then, but was probably only 10 or so) who realized we were brothers came up to me and asked me "Is that your brother over there?". When I responded in the affirmative he told me "OK, I'm going to beat his brains in". Of course I was scared and on the verge of tears before I realized the boy had no intention of following through on his threat. It still had an effect on me - I still remember it and it's one of the few memories I have of my early days in church.
As I got older my dislike of the church grew. My parents divorce in 1980, and my mother started attending a new church. I don't have much in the way of memories between 1980 and 1985. There was bible school in my grandmother's church in Waco Texas that I enjoyed during that period, but not much else. In 1986-87 I was in confirmation class where I started to note distinct cliques forming in Sunday School and UMYF (United Methodist Youth Fellowship). Those who weren't in the cliques tended to be excluded. I attended lock-ins in the church that seemed to go well and drove down the walls between us. But then there was the Church Summer Camp in 1987 or 88. By this time I had been attending Summer camp at YMCA Camp Kern for 3 years or so, and Boy scout Camp at least once. Both of these represent some of my fondest memories from my childhood. At the time I thought it might be a great bonding opportunity.
It was exactly the opposite.
It started off well. They had ping pong tables there and I loved ping pong. As it turned out that was about the only thing I liked about that week. First was the "warm fuzzies" necklaces. These were necklaces that were supposed to be given to people you cared about; along with an affirmation of that person and why you cared. Until you received one you could not give one, and once received you were supposed to give them away ASAP. I don't quite recall how they were started, but it took until Wednesday of a Sunday to Friday camp for me to finally receive one from one of the camp counselors.
Of course, I cherished it, and had no intention of giving it away. I mean most people had more than one at any given time, and many people had 10-15 of them. Of course, by the next day other campers started noticing that I had not yet given it away to anyone. They started to tear me apart for still having it. Finally, Thursday night I threw it in the trash. I had no one there that I felt comfortable giving it to at that point, for obvious reasons which will follow.
Speaking of Thursday night. That was the night of the "dance".
I was an awkward teenager. Well, maybe more so. I was a dweeb, I guess you could say. With rare exceptions I never had the courage to talk to girls, much less ask them to dance. I didn't obtain that ability until after I graduated from high school - I was a late bloomer so to speak. That might explain why I only attended one homecoming and never went to either of my high school proms. However, this "dance" at least at first wasn't about girls. It was about camaraderie and it was supposed to be fun and inclusive.
Each night all the campers gathered for a presentation or sermon if you will. It generally included a run down of the day and what was going on the next day. Thursday's was different in that when we came in all the chairs were in a big circle. Everyone knew the dance was directly after the presentation, so obviously, my stomach was churning. I was nervous as hell. When the presentation was done the speaker said that this year's dance would be different. To dance, he said, you must first be asked. Guy or girl it didn't matter, you were just supposed to be asked, but until you were asked you couldn't get up. Well, this was good news for me. I was safe, I could ask the guy sitting next to me as soon as I was asked. So the speaker asked one person to dance, and they got up and danced for a few seconds then the two of them asked two more people, and so on.
Slowly the people around me were asked. One by one everyone was standing. Except for me. No one asked me to dance. Not one person. Minute by minute I watched as the people sitting dwindled and the people dancing increased. At some point I was the only person sitting down. I continued to sit for a few minutes in disbelief. This "inclusive" activity had managed to exclude me. At some point I got up and exited through a side door. This was the point at which I threw my "warm fuzzy" into the trash. I walked far enough away from the building to where I could be sure my inevitable crying would not be heard, sat down and started to sob quietly. Apparently one of the counselors had seen me leaving and I soon felt someone touch my shoulder. I don't remember who it was, but it wasn't anyone associated with my group or me. Of course he wanted to know why I was upset.
"No one would dance with me" was about all I could push out.
"Oh, come now, we can find someone to dance with you, come on back with me." the person replied.
"No, I'm done. No one ever asked me to dance to begin with," I said matter of factly, "and I have enough pride that I'm not going to be led into a sympathy dance with someone who's only doing it because they pity me."
"Fair enough" was the answer, and the person left me alone to feel sorry for myself.
Clearly it's not the religion's fault that I was a shy teenager and no one at the camp really attempted to reach out to me. The thing that opened my eyes the most however, was how completely opposite this religious camp was from all the other camps I had attended. Specifically speaking, I spent many years at Camp Kern. I never felt like an outcast. One year I was given the "Most Flirtatious" award. Another year I actually met a girl and spent the King's Island Saturday with her. At Camp Kern, everyone was included in everything. There were no cliques, no competition, no feelings of not measuring up.
The religious camp was the exact opposite. If you didn't express certain feelings or beliefs you were automatically excluded. On a nightly basis people were "overcome" by the spirit and spent an hour crying for their past "sins" and swearing they were born again. They would get up and witness about the bad things they'd done and how because of the camp, their life was renewed and they felt closer to Jesus than ever. I can honestly say if I ever in my life felt "close to Jesus" that religious summer camp would have been the last place it could have been.
I was raised in a religious family. As far back as I can remember I was made to attend church with my mother and father every Sunday. Early on, you never asked why, you just went. I have a few early memories of our first church. One is a memory of everyone standing and shouting praises. I remember thinking that Jesus himself was there though when I later asked my mother about it this was not the case. Another memory was of a time in what may have been a Sunday School for small children, I was maybe 5 or 6. My brother who was 18 months old or so was there as well. And older boy (he seemed big to me then, but was probably only 10 or so) who realized we were brothers came up to me and asked me "Is that your brother over there?". When I responded in the affirmative he told me "OK, I'm going to beat his brains in". Of course I was scared and on the verge of tears before I realized the boy had no intention of following through on his threat. It still had an effect on me - I still remember it and it's one of the few memories I have of my early days in church.
As I got older my dislike of the church grew. My parents divorce in 1980, and my mother started attending a new church. I don't have much in the way of memories between 1980 and 1985. There was bible school in my grandmother's church in Waco Texas that I enjoyed during that period, but not much else. In 1986-87 I was in confirmation class where I started to note distinct cliques forming in Sunday School and UMYF (United Methodist Youth Fellowship). Those who weren't in the cliques tended to be excluded. I attended lock-ins in the church that seemed to go well and drove down the walls between us. But then there was the Church Summer Camp in 1987 or 88. By this time I had been attending Summer camp at YMCA Camp Kern for 3 years or so, and Boy scout Camp at least once. Both of these represent some of my fondest memories from my childhood. At the time I thought it might be a great bonding opportunity.
It was exactly the opposite.
It started off well. They had ping pong tables there and I loved ping pong. As it turned out that was about the only thing I liked about that week. First was the "warm fuzzies" necklaces. These were necklaces that were supposed to be given to people you cared about; along with an affirmation of that person and why you cared. Until you received one you could not give one, and once received you were supposed to give them away ASAP. I don't quite recall how they were started, but it took until Wednesday of a Sunday to Friday camp for me to finally receive one from one of the camp counselors.
Of course, I cherished it, and had no intention of giving it away. I mean most people had more than one at any given time, and many people had 10-15 of them. Of course, by the next day other campers started noticing that I had not yet given it away to anyone. They started to tear me apart for still having it. Finally, Thursday night I threw it in the trash. I had no one there that I felt comfortable giving it to at that point, for obvious reasons which will follow.
Speaking of Thursday night. That was the night of the "dance".
I was an awkward teenager. Well, maybe more so. I was a dweeb, I guess you could say. With rare exceptions I never had the courage to talk to girls, much less ask them to dance. I didn't obtain that ability until after I graduated from high school - I was a late bloomer so to speak. That might explain why I only attended one homecoming and never went to either of my high school proms. However, this "dance" at least at first wasn't about girls. It was about camaraderie and it was supposed to be fun and inclusive.
Each night all the campers gathered for a presentation or sermon if you will. It generally included a run down of the day and what was going on the next day. Thursday's was different in that when we came in all the chairs were in a big circle. Everyone knew the dance was directly after the presentation, so obviously, my stomach was churning. I was nervous as hell. When the presentation was done the speaker said that this year's dance would be different. To dance, he said, you must first be asked. Guy or girl it didn't matter, you were just supposed to be asked, but until you were asked you couldn't get up. Well, this was good news for me. I was safe, I could ask the guy sitting next to me as soon as I was asked. So the speaker asked one person to dance, and they got up and danced for a few seconds then the two of them asked two more people, and so on.
Slowly the people around me were asked. One by one everyone was standing. Except for me. No one asked me to dance. Not one person. Minute by minute I watched as the people sitting dwindled and the people dancing increased. At some point I was the only person sitting down. I continued to sit for a few minutes in disbelief. This "inclusive" activity had managed to exclude me. At some point I got up and exited through a side door. This was the point at which I threw my "warm fuzzy" into the trash. I walked far enough away from the building to where I could be sure my inevitable crying would not be heard, sat down and started to sob quietly. Apparently one of the counselors had seen me leaving and I soon felt someone touch my shoulder. I don't remember who it was, but it wasn't anyone associated with my group or me. Of course he wanted to know why I was upset.
"No one would dance with me" was about all I could push out.
"Oh, come now, we can find someone to dance with you, come on back with me." the person replied.
"No, I'm done. No one ever asked me to dance to begin with," I said matter of factly, "and I have enough pride that I'm not going to be led into a sympathy dance with someone who's only doing it because they pity me."
"Fair enough" was the answer, and the person left me alone to feel sorry for myself.
Clearly it's not the religion's fault that I was a shy teenager and no one at the camp really attempted to reach out to me. The thing that opened my eyes the most however, was how completely opposite this religious camp was from all the other camps I had attended. Specifically speaking, I spent many years at Camp Kern. I never felt like an outcast. One year I was given the "Most Flirtatious" award. Another year I actually met a girl and spent the King's Island Saturday with her. At Camp Kern, everyone was included in everything. There were no cliques, no competition, no feelings of not measuring up.
The religious camp was the exact opposite. If you didn't express certain feelings or beliefs you were automatically excluded. On a nightly basis people were "overcome" by the spirit and spent an hour crying for their past "sins" and swearing they were born again. They would get up and witness about the bad things they'd done and how because of the camp, their life was renewed and they felt closer to Jesus than ever. I can honestly say if I ever in my life felt "close to Jesus" that religious summer camp would have been the last place it could have been.
Friday, February 20, 2009
To the American Auto Industry
The US auto industry is whining for me to "buy American" and purchase the junk they sell. So I'd like to make a proposal to the American Auto Industry. When you decide to reimburse me for the thousands of dollars I spent repairing the last two piece of crap American cars I've owned, then I will consider buying another American made car. Until then I will continue to buy Japanese owned-American made vehicles.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Today's Sports Coaches: an Open Letter
I read with interest the story about the Girls High School basketball coach - Micah Grimes - who "cheered wildly" as his team closed in on 100 points (while holding their opponents to 0). He further pressed his players even into the fourth quarter.
I am not going to assassinate Grimes' character as that is not fair I do not know him. However, all around me I see him. His actions mimic coaches I see everyday at all levels of recreational and club sports teams. For some reason the mentality that the New England Patriots ran by in 2007 - which is fine in the NFL - has filtered down to grade school level sports.
Case in point. My son plays indoor soccer. Recently we moved from one facility to another. At the previous facility, teams were generally juggled and evenly matched. At the new facility there appear to be 7 year old club teams. Nick, not being on a club team because I don't deem it necessary at 6 to be that devoted to any one sport, got put on a team with some new and some mildly experienced players. This would be fine except for the fact that they're playing against teams that have been together since they were 4 and have excellent soccer skills for 7 year olds.
I am happy for the challenge posed by this. You always learn more playing against more talented players than less talented. What makes me sick is the way the coaches have allowed their players to play against Nick's team. Most of the time they spend pressing. Even in the fourth quarter after the team has scored 30+ goals in a 30 minute game, they are still pressing their offense and cheering on the goals.
Give me a break.
This past week I got the joy of listening to a parent run down the number of goals each player scored. Oh and "that one girl even scored a goal!". Yay. So not only does the coach condone it, the parents love it too. Well, congratulations. Your team is capable of beating a completely over matched team by 35 goals. I hope you're happy about that.
If I was a parent of a child on that team he'd have been off the team before the game was over. I would be thoroughly embarrassed by the boorish behavior of the coach, and not ever want Nick to be involved with such poor sportsmanship again.
So all you Micah Grimes and those of you defending him, you can have your lopsided wins. And you can speak all you want about how you did nothing wrong and you can continue to believe that mercilessly pounding an over matched opponent is "[playing] with honor and integrity and [showing] respect" for your opponents. Yep, go on ahead believing that. Hopefully it comforts you and helps inflate your tiny ego. Because clearly you need something that your life is not currently providing.
I am not going to assassinate Grimes' character as that is not fair I do not know him. However, all around me I see him. His actions mimic coaches I see everyday at all levels of recreational and club sports teams. For some reason the mentality that the New England Patriots ran by in 2007 - which is fine in the NFL - has filtered down to grade school level sports.
Case in point. My son plays indoor soccer. Recently we moved from one facility to another. At the previous facility, teams were generally juggled and evenly matched. At the new facility there appear to be 7 year old club teams. Nick, not being on a club team because I don't deem it necessary at 6 to be that devoted to any one sport, got put on a team with some new and some mildly experienced players. This would be fine except for the fact that they're playing against teams that have been together since they were 4 and have excellent soccer skills for 7 year olds.
I am happy for the challenge posed by this. You always learn more playing against more talented players than less talented. What makes me sick is the way the coaches have allowed their players to play against Nick's team. Most of the time they spend pressing. Even in the fourth quarter after the team has scored 30+ goals in a 30 minute game, they are still pressing their offense and cheering on the goals.
Give me a break.
This past week I got the joy of listening to a parent run down the number of goals each player scored. Oh and "that one girl even scored a goal!". Yay. So not only does the coach condone it, the parents love it too. Well, congratulations. Your team is capable of beating a completely over matched team by 35 goals. I hope you're happy about that.
If I was a parent of a child on that team he'd have been off the team before the game was over. I would be thoroughly embarrassed by the boorish behavior of the coach, and not ever want Nick to be involved with such poor sportsmanship again.
So all you Micah Grimes and those of you defending him, you can have your lopsided wins. And you can speak all you want about how you did nothing wrong and you can continue to believe that mercilessly pounding an over matched opponent is "[playing] with honor and integrity and [showing] respect" for your opponents. Yep, go on ahead believing that. Hopefully it comforts you and helps inflate your tiny ego. Because clearly you need something that your life is not currently providing.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Teens and technology
OK, so I ran across the following website:
http://www.thenationalcampaign.org/sextech/
that has a study of people ages 13-26. It made all sorts of fascinating findings about how many of these people had posted or IMed nude images (or sexually suggestive text) of themselves to others.
I'm not going to claim that it doesn't happen but I'm going to explain my own personal experience with these surveys.
I filled out all sorts of surveys in middle school and high school. I would claim all sorts of crazy crap about myself. I did drugs daily (never touched them). I would drink and drive (didn't drink). I had sex with a different person at least once a week (I was a virgin). Etc, etc. None of it was true, I just thought it was funny.
Looking back I probably should have been honest. But really who cares?
So how many of these kids are being honest? Doesn't really matter. Just make sure you teach your kids about the perils of doing stupid stuff and hope they listen to you. It's the best you can do.
http://www.thenationalcampaign.org/sextech/
that has a study of people ages 13-26. It made all sorts of fascinating findings about how many of these people had posted or IMed nude images (or sexually suggestive text) of themselves to others.
I'm not going to claim that it doesn't happen but I'm going to explain my own personal experience with these surveys.
I filled out all sorts of surveys in middle school and high school. I would claim all sorts of crazy crap about myself. I did drugs daily (never touched them). I would drink and drive (didn't drink). I had sex with a different person at least once a week (I was a virgin). Etc, etc. None of it was true, I just thought it was funny.
Looking back I probably should have been honest. But really who cares?
So how many of these kids are being honest? Doesn't really matter. Just make sure you teach your kids about the perils of doing stupid stuff and hope they listen to you. It's the best you can do.
Monday, December 1, 2008
The Wal-Mart Stampede
Sickened.
That's the best description I have for how I felt when I heard about this. I was watching the news Friday with my family. My dad and I ended up in an argument about who should be sued/punished. I argued that the shoppers should all be brought up on murder charges. He argued that Wal-Mart should be held responsible for creating the mob with its "deals", and not providing enough security. Obviously, out of the thousands of Wal-Marts in the country the only one stampeded was this one, so I held my ground.
Later I got more information on the story. Still no pictures, but more information - the crowd busted the doors down and actually walked over and around the dieing man lying on the floor so they could get to spend their money on their precious stuff. When asked to leave angry shoppers refused citing how long they'd waited in line, callously ignoring the death of an employee because they needed to get their stuff. Someone else's life is far less important than MY stuff!
So today I finally found some pictures of the incident here:
http://www.nydailynews.com/money/galleries/walmart_stampede_captured_in_pictures/walmart_stampede_captured_in_pictures.html
I was immediately struck by the ethnic race of the crowd. Obviously being a white male, I would have felt out of place there. My initial reaction - and I'm ashamed to say this - was "of course! They're black/hispanic. That explains it." We always tend to look for order and reason when something tragic like this happens. I realized what I'd done was essentially say "I would never do such a thing! I'm white!" This is wrong and - again - I'm ashamed at my initial reaction. However, upon thinking about this more, it really has nothing to do with color. Clearly this could happen to any race/ethnicity with equivalent values.
People in this country have lost sight of what truly matters. So much of our economy is based on the fact that everyone wants newer and better stuff. It's what Christmas is about, right? Getting new stuff, giving new stuff, shopping, buying new stuff. Yay!
It's gotta end folks. We're in the midst of the worst recession in decades and people are spending money like there's no tomorrow. And all because Wal-Mart is advertising 50% off on a television? A $2000 TV is marked down to $1000 and people rush out to buy it forgetting that they're spending ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS on a television! It's insane. And it's greed. Pure and simple greed.
One last word on the stampede. Even though this one occurred in a black/hispanic area, this could happen at any Wal-Mart. My wife refuses to shop there because most of the patrons (not all, just most) are mean and nasty, and this is a prime example. It's got nothing to do with race and everything to do with values. As a country we need to get back to what's important and get away from the "me and my stuff first" mentality.
That's the best description I have for how I felt when I heard about this. I was watching the news Friday with my family. My dad and I ended up in an argument about who should be sued/punished. I argued that the shoppers should all be brought up on murder charges. He argued that Wal-Mart should be held responsible for creating the mob with its "deals", and not providing enough security. Obviously, out of the thousands of Wal-Marts in the country the only one stampeded was this one, so I held my ground.
Later I got more information on the story. Still no pictures, but more information - the crowd busted the doors down and actually walked over and around the dieing man lying on the floor so they could get to spend their money on their precious stuff. When asked to leave angry shoppers refused citing how long they'd waited in line, callously ignoring the death of an employee because they needed to get their stuff. Someone else's life is far less important than MY stuff!
So today I finally found some pictures of the incident here:
http://www.nydailynews.com/money/galleries/walmart_stampede_captured_in_pictures/walmart_stampede_captured_in_pictures.html
I was immediately struck by the ethnic race of the crowd. Obviously being a white male, I would have felt out of place there. My initial reaction - and I'm ashamed to say this - was "of course! They're black/hispanic. That explains it." We always tend to look for order and reason when something tragic like this happens. I realized what I'd done was essentially say "I would never do such a thing! I'm white!" This is wrong and - again - I'm ashamed at my initial reaction. However, upon thinking about this more, it really has nothing to do with color. Clearly this could happen to any race/ethnicity with equivalent values.
People in this country have lost sight of what truly matters. So much of our economy is based on the fact that everyone wants newer and better stuff. It's what Christmas is about, right? Getting new stuff, giving new stuff, shopping, buying new stuff. Yay!
It's gotta end folks. We're in the midst of the worst recession in decades and people are spending money like there's no tomorrow. And all because Wal-Mart is advertising 50% off on a television? A $2000 TV is marked down to $1000 and people rush out to buy it forgetting that they're spending ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS on a television! It's insane. And it's greed. Pure and simple greed.
One last word on the stampede. Even though this one occurred in a black/hispanic area, this could happen at any Wal-Mart. My wife refuses to shop there because most of the patrons (not all, just most) are mean and nasty, and this is a prime example. It's got nothing to do with race and everything to do with values. As a country we need to get back to what's important and get away from the "me and my stuff first" mentality.
Monday, October 6, 2008
These people need to go to jail
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081006/ap_on_go_co/meltdown_lehman
All top executives at any banking corporation that failed need to do hard time. ALL OF THEM. A message needs to be sent to this greedy, corrupt disgusting people that we won't stand for it anymore. And don't think your Republicrats or Democans will do anything about it. They are part of the problem.
Please, PLEASE vote third party this election. This has got to change.
All top executives at any banking corporation that failed need to do hard time. ALL OF THEM. A message needs to be sent to this greedy, corrupt disgusting people that we won't stand for it anymore. And don't think your Republicrats or Democans will do anything about it. They are part of the problem.
Please, PLEASE vote third party this election. This has got to change.
Friday, August 29, 2008
Our Wonderful, Wasteful IRS
OK, so the IRS spent $42 million this year to notify tax payers that they needed to file a tax return to get their income redistribution payment from Uncle Sam. Fine.
So in June this year the IRS notified me that my 2006 Tax Return was being examined. I had claimed $7000 in 1099-misc income as Hobby Income. The IRS claims that it's not a hobby based on the fact that the income was in box 7, and since it was in box 7 it was subject to Self Employment Tax (more commonly known as Social Security). For those of you who have never worked for yourself, the government takes almost 15% of Self-Employment income right off the top for Social Security and Medicare. When you work for someone else, you only pay half of this and your employer pays the other half. However income from a hobby is not considered Self-Employment income, and therefore not subject to Self Employment Tax.
So this is where my beef with the IRS lies. Is my work for a Hobby (not subject to Self Employment tax) or is it a For Profit Business (subject to Self Employment tax)?
I thought long and hard about this because more often than not the IRS forces people running businesses to file as hobbies. The following was my response to the IRS:
The IRS finally responded last week in classic fashion - they sent me FOUR copies of the same letter in TWO different envelopes stating that they would get back to me by Sept 27th. We'll see how this pans out. I feel my argument is solid and I feel I could win with a good lawyer, but it wouldn't be worth it for me to pay to go to court. If at some point that's my only recourse, I'll simply pay the SE tax and move on. Sadly, that's how this government works. Taxpayers have little recourse against a wasteful, erroneous IRS.
So in June this year the IRS notified me that my 2006 Tax Return was being examined. I had claimed $7000 in 1099-misc income as Hobby Income. The IRS claims that it's not a hobby based on the fact that the income was in box 7, and since it was in box 7 it was subject to Self Employment Tax (more commonly known as Social Security). For those of you who have never worked for yourself, the government takes almost 15% of Self-Employment income right off the top for Social Security and Medicare. When you work for someone else, you only pay half of this and your employer pays the other half. However income from a hobby is not considered Self-Employment income, and therefore not subject to Self Employment Tax.
So this is where my beef with the IRS lies. Is my work for a Hobby (not subject to Self Employment tax) or is it a For Profit Business (subject to Self Employment tax)?
I thought long and hard about this because more often than not the IRS forces people running businesses to file as hobbies. The following was my response to the IRS:
Dear Ms. Lunnon:
With respect to our enclosed examination, the IRS contends that my Not For Profit Activity (otherwise known as a Hobby) was actually a For Profit Business, i.e. that I am self employed. This was due to income reported on line 7 of a 1099-MISC form for the Tax Year 2006. It is my contention that the issue boils down to whether or not the Activity I was engaged in was done For Profit. On our 2006 return I claimed it was a Not For Profit Activity (Hobby), and I stand by this assertion. I put a lot of thought into this and I did so based solely on the IRS’s own information about how to distinguish between an Activity done For Profit (Business) and an Activity done Not For Profit (Hobby). I know the IRS often looks into whether or not an Activity claimed as For Profit is really a Not For Profit Activity, so I paid particular attention to this information.
Firstly, I would like to note that the key difference between Hobby income and Business income is the intent to make a profit; not whether a profit was made. Just because I make money from a Hobby does not mean that I am self-employed or that I am running a Business, regardless of how said income is reported to the IRS. Further, Self Employment Tax is only required if the Activity is carried on as a trade or Business. In my case it is not, my Activity is carried on as a Hobby.
Secondly, I would like to make clear the following points:
I am not a contractor - there are no written contracts involved.
I do it for fun and enjoyment with no profit motive.
I don't do any advertising or marketing - I don't even have a Business card.
I do similar work for free, just for fun.I don't run my Hobby as a Business.
I spend between 60 and 120 hours a year on my Hobby; sometimes maybe a bit more and sometimes less.
The amount of money I receive is not a significant part of my income and I am not trying to increase or maximize it. I can stop it at any time with no significant financial impact.
In summary, it is quite clear that this Activity is engaged in for recreation and is not engaged in For Profit – even though a profit was made. Since this is the case I argue that my income is a result of my Hobby and should be treated and taxed as a Not For Profit Activity. I therefore am not liable for, nor should I be required to pay, Self Employment tax.
The IRS finally responded last week in classic fashion - they sent me FOUR copies of the same letter in TWO different envelopes stating that they would get back to me by Sept 27th. We'll see how this pans out. I feel my argument is solid and I feel I could win with a good lawyer, but it wouldn't be worth it for me to pay to go to court. If at some point that's my only recourse, I'll simply pay the SE tax and move on. Sadly, that's how this government works. Taxpayers have little recourse against a wasteful, erroneous IRS.
Monday, August 25, 2008
Vote for Change - Vote third party
This time two years ago I sent out an email encouraging everyone to at least consider voting third party. Two years ago this country overwhelmingly elected Democans into the Congress, and guess what? We have more of the same-old same-old in Washington. The Democan controlled congress has done little more than talk, while gas prices, inflation and food prices have gone through the roof. Congress's approval numbers have slipped to record lows.
And the Democans want us to believe that their candidate can change all this (he's pro-change - whatever the hell that means)? Wha? Oh really?!?
And the Republicrats want us to believe that their candidate will lower the deficit and not be a spend thrift like his cousin GWBush! Wha? Oh really?!?
Two years ago I asked you to consider voting third party. Right now I ask you to consider it again. Don't be hoodwinked another year by the powers that be in Washington. Send a message that your vote counts and that you'll no longer stand for their corrupt, wasteful ways, or their lying and bloviating and outright contempt for the American people. Send the message that you want change, not change from a Republicrat to a Democan, but true change that can only come from new fresh ideas, not watered down same-old politics.
And the Democans want us to believe that their candidate can change all this (he's pro-change - whatever the hell that means)? Wha? Oh really?!?
And the Republicrats want us to believe that their candidate will lower the deficit and not be a spend thrift like his cousin GWBush! Wha? Oh really?!?
Two years ago I asked you to consider voting third party. Right now I ask you to consider it again. Don't be hoodwinked another year by the powers that be in Washington. Send a message that your vote counts and that you'll no longer stand for their corrupt, wasteful ways, or their lying and bloviating and outright contempt for the American people. Send the message that you want change, not change from a Republicrat to a Democan, but true change that can only come from new fresh ideas, not watered down same-old politics.
A vote for a third party candidate is never wasted. In fact it is the only way for us as a country to affect real change. Send your message to the ruling parties in this country in November. Remember, the only truly "wasted" vote is a vote "against" another candidate.
I have attached below links to the four major third party candidates for president in 2008. I encourage you to read about each of them, and resolve this year to vote for the candidate that best matches your ideals. If that turns out to be a Republicrat or Democan, so be it. But at least be knowledgeable about what else is out there.
Don't believe me that voting 3rd party is not wasting your vote? Review the following:
http://satyagraha.wordpress.com/2008/01/07/why-vote-third-party/
http://www.silentpc.org/third.php
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/jsuebersax/parties.htm
If you want hard numbers and math doesn't scare you, take a gander at this link:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig5/hooper1.html
I have attached below links to the four major third party candidates for president in 2008. I encourage you to read about each of them, and resolve this year to vote for the candidate that best matches your ideals. If that turns out to be a Republicrat or Democan, so be it. But at least be knowledgeable about what else is out there.
Don't believe me that voting 3rd party is not wasting your vote? Review the following:
http://satyagraha.wordpress.com/2008/01/07/why-vote-third-party/
http://www.silentpc.org/third.php
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/jsuebersax/parties.htm
If you want hard numbers and math doesn't scare you, take a gander at this link:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig5/hooper1.html
Doug
Libertarian Candidate:
Robert Barr
http://www.lp.org/barr-root
Green Party Candidate:
Cynthia McKinney
http://votetruth08.com/
Constitution Party candidate:
Charles Baldwin
http://www.baldwin08.com/
Natural Law Party Candidate:
Ralph Nader
http://www.votenader.org/
Libertarian Candidate:
Robert Barr
http://www.lp.org/barr-root
Green Party Candidate:
Cynthia McKinney
http://votetruth08.com/
Constitution Party candidate:
Charles Baldwin
http://www.baldwin08.com/
Natural Law Party Candidate:
Ralph Nader
http://www.votenader.org/
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Evolution and the nature of gods
This is the second piece of my ongoing foray into my spiritual side. Over the years I've slowly moved away from belief in a God. Being the son of a Methodist pastor makes this all the more difficult. My mother, who is a wonderful person, has devoted her life to her God; the same God that I reject. The reasons I have rejected my family's faith are numerous and what follows is just the beginning of my thoughts on the subject. This particular piece addresses evolution, literal interpretation of the Bible and as human beings, our place in the universe.
I was recently made aware of the scary fact that nearly 50% of Americans believe a God created humans in their present form at some time within the last 10,000 years (see http://www.gallup.com/poll/21814/Evolution-Creationism-Intelligent-Design.aspx ). The percent who believe that man developed through evolution under the watchful eye of God is approaching that percent but has not yet reached it. What I fail to understand is how so many people can put such limits on their supposedly all-powerful and all-mighty God!
Let us COMPLETELY set all scientific understanding aside and deal in faith alone. First, I would like to address the group that seems to think man was created by God sometime in the past 10,000 years. Of those who believe this way most of them believe it because to them the Bible is literal truth. If you fall into this group you are saying that the Bible is 100% the word of God, written by God through man, historically accepted as Moses (although recent evidence suggests it was a collection of oral stories). Yet doesn't that mean that ultimately MAN wrote the Bible? Does that not leave room for flaws, especially if Genesis is simply a collection of oral stories?
Assume you were the person whom God tasked to write the first eleven chapters of Genesis, the so-called "primeval history". If God had come to you in 1000 BC and said "OK, lets get into the details of how the world was created. You see, according to the physical laws I set forth, all matter, everything you see started as a tiny point of infinite density and infinite mass. Then there was a great BANG..." God would have completely overwhelmed whomever he was talking to. Even if he could have spoken it to someone intelligent enough to understand it, he would know no one else in the world would believe it. So perhaps he needed to dumb it down. People in 1000 BC simply didn't know as much as people living today. To believe that God would attempt to explain the origins of our universe or even life on earth in the way it truly occurred would be lunacy. Surely even the most ardent Bible thumper would agree to that.
EVEN SO, assuming the above argument can't steer you away from a 100% biblical truth stance, look at it another way. By demanding that the Bible is 100% true and that the universe, the Earth and man were all created in seven 24 hour days, you are inherently placing limits on the all-mighty God you claim is all-powerful! You are demanding that you, YOU - a simple human being - can completely understand God and how the universe and everything in it was created. This takes A LOT of gall! You claim your God is all-powerful, omniscient and can do anything. Yet you demand that there's no way your God could have used evolution to create man. You demand that there's no way the earth could be billions of years old. Simply because some human being wrote Genesis thousands of years ago? This is - at best - a laughable position to hold. At worst it is a sin punishable by eternal damnation. But I'm not here to damn anyone - I will never claim to know what an all-powerful, omniscient God could only know.
Further, believing that Genesis is a 100% accurate account of the origin of the universe implies your God is a liar. What I am getting at is you would need to believe that God provided the Genesis explanation, then went on to completely try to confuse human beings trying to find out about their origins by (among many other things):
1. Intentionally laying out the universe such that it appears to be billions of years old even though it's only a few thousand
2. Creating fake fossils of billions of creatures and making them appear to have lived millions of years in the past even though they lived a few thousand years ago, if at all.
3. Knowing in advance how we would try to date objects and then intentionally creating the objects such that we COULD NOT accurately date them, in fact making them look far older than they are.
To me, a God who would intentionally mislead us only to punish us for using our intelligence - that he created in us no less - is a sociopathic God, and certainly not a God that I would deem worthy of worship.
This - of course - is not to say that macro-evolution or even the "Big Bang" is fact. They are theories that best describe the current scientific view of how nature works. As science moves forward in the next 100 years new concepts may be uncovered that will reshape our thinking on how everything came to be. And ultimately this is the difference between Evolution and Creationism. Evolution being a scientific concept has hypothesis and testable theories. Science provides us a logical way to attempt to determine how we came to be without relying on faith. Creationism or Intelligent Design has no testable hypothesis and therefore can never lead us to a greater understanding of the world or the universe. What I see intelligent design authorities doing is trying to explain how the earth could have been created only 10,000 years ago or why we couldn't have possibly evolved from an ape-like ancestor.
Which is why, all my life, I have never understood the disconnect between scientific evolution and intelligent design. Why can't they co-exist? Why do intelligent design advocates insist on limiting their omnipresent and omniscient God to having created Man in a certain way? Why is it such a huge step for them to believe that perhaps God simply set things in motion to see how they might play out?
Moving on, I'd like to address those who believe that God had a hand in guiding evolution on this planet intentionally to create humans. This is the other large group of people in the survey cited above. If you believe this way I assume you have at least moved forward enough to not believe in a literal translation of the Bible. I'd like to challenge you to move a bit further.
Why would an omniscient, omnipresent God care - specifically - about what goes on in this miniscule solar system in this average galaxy in this average galactic cluster in this average corner of the universe? Let me explain something to you. Any given individual is miniscule in relation to the universe. The observable universe is about 46 billion LIGHT YEARS across. It contains 80 BILLION galaxies comprising about 30,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (30 Billion Trillion or 30 sextillion) stars. Based on this size it is reasonable to assume that God did not create the universe solely for us. I cannot in good faith believe that this God cares about my life in particular. I think any God who could have created the universe would be more interested in setting it in motion and watching what happens as opposed to guiding a specific process on any specific planet. My God would simply lay out a set of laws and flip a switch, much like what I do when I write a piece of software. Except my God would be the ultimate programmer so to speak. I simply cannot grasp why it is so necessary that the Christian God - the ruler of a universe that's enormous beyond anything we can fathom - must be so completely wrapped up in the day to day lives of human beings on planet Earth. It makes no sense to me.
When you bring the fourth dimension - time - into the equation, it makes your life in this universe all the more minuscule. Not only are we unimaginably small on a physical scale, but also on a time scale. To any all powerful, omniscient God who "always is and always was", our physical existence is seemingly nothing. Why should this God care about the 20 minutes (or whatever) you spend praying to him each day? Or even the fact that you want this God to help your uncle beat cancer or your grandmother to recover from her stroke. It's ridiculous.
Further, assuming your God does exist, why should he care whether or not you - specifically - worship him? Why would he punish you mercilessly simply because you say he doesn't exist, or that you put your faith in a different God? It simply makes no sense. Again, we get back to a sociopathic God. A God who's so wrapped up in himself that he's willing to make insignificant humans suffer. And for what? Simply because they used the brains that he provided them to come to the conclusion that he doesn't exist. My God would "save" an atheist who lived a good life before he would save a murderer who repented. I refuse to worship any God who would do otherwise, even if said God appeared before me and asked me to.
I was recently made aware of the scary fact that nearly 50% of Americans believe a God created humans in their present form at some time within the last 10,000 years (see http://www.gallup.com/poll/
Let us COMPLETELY set all scientific understanding aside and deal in faith alone. First, I would like to address the group that seems to think man was created by God sometime in the past 10,000 years. Of those who believe this way most of them believe it because to them the Bible is literal truth. If you fall into this group you are saying that the Bible is 100% the word of God, written by God through man, historically accepted as Moses (although recent evidence suggests it was a collection of oral stories). Yet doesn't that mean that ultimately MAN wrote the Bible? Does that not leave room for flaws, especially if Genesis is simply a collection of oral stories?
Assume you were the person whom God tasked to write the first eleven chapters of Genesis, the so-called "primeval history". If God had come to you in 1000 BC and said "OK, lets get into the details of how the world was created. You see, according to the physical laws I set forth, all matter, everything you see started as a tiny point of infinite density and infinite mass. Then there was a great BANG..." God would have completely overwhelmed whomever he was talking to. Even if he could have spoken it to someone intelligent enough to understand it, he would know no one else in the world would believe it. So perhaps he needed to dumb it down. People in 1000 BC simply didn't know as much as people living today. To believe that God would attempt to explain the origins of our universe or even life on earth in the way it truly occurred would be lunacy. Surely even the most ardent Bible thumper would agree to that.
EVEN SO, assuming the above argument can't steer you away from a 100% biblical truth stance, look at it another way. By demanding that the Bible is 100% true and that the universe, the Earth and man were all created in seven 24 hour days, you are inherently placing limits on the all-mighty God you claim is all-powerful! You are demanding that you, YOU - a simple human being - can completely understand God and how the universe and everything in it was created. This takes A LOT of gall! You claim your God is all-powerful, omniscient and can do anything. Yet you demand that there's no way your God could have used evolution to create man. You demand that there's no way the earth could be billions of years old. Simply because some human being wrote Genesis thousands of years ago? This is - at best - a laughable position to hold. At worst it is a sin punishable by eternal damnation. But I'm not here to damn anyone - I will never claim to know what an all-powerful, omniscient God could only know.
Further, believing that Genesis is a 100% accurate account of the origin of the universe implies your God is a liar. What I am getting at is you would need to believe that God provided the Genesis explanation, then went on to completely try to confuse human beings trying to find out about their origins by (among many other things):
1. Intentionally laying out the universe such that it appears to be billions of years old even though it's only a few thousand
2. Creating fake fossils of billions of creatures and making them appear to have lived millions of years in the past even though they lived a few thousand years ago, if at all.
3. Knowing in advance how we would try to date objects and then intentionally creating the objects such that we COULD NOT accurately date them, in fact making them look far older than they are.
To me, a God who would intentionally mislead us only to punish us for using our intelligence - that he created in us no less - is a sociopathic God, and certainly not a God that I would deem worthy of worship.
This - of course - is not to say that macro-evolution or even the "Big Bang" is fact. They are theories that best describe the current scientific view of how nature works. As science moves forward in the next 100 years new concepts may be uncovered that will reshape our thinking on how everything came to be. And ultimately this is the difference between Evolution and Creationism. Evolution being a scientific concept has hypothesis and testable theories. Science provides us a logical way to attempt to determine how we came to be without relying on faith. Creationism or Intelligent Design has no testable hypothesis and therefore can never lead us to a greater understanding of the world or the universe. What I see intelligent design authorities doing is trying to explain how the earth could have been created only 10,000 years ago or why we couldn't have possibly evolved from an ape-like ancestor.
Which is why, all my life, I have never understood the disconnect between scientific evolution and intelligent design. Why can't they co-exist? Why do intelligent design advocates insist on limiting their omnipresent and omniscient God to having created Man in a certain way? Why is it such a huge step for them to believe that perhaps God simply set things in motion to see how they might play out?
Moving on, I'd like to address those who believe that God had a hand in guiding evolution on this planet intentionally to create humans. This is the other large group of people in the survey cited above. If you believe this way I assume you have at least moved forward enough to not believe in a literal translation of the Bible. I'd like to challenge you to move a bit further.
Why would an omniscient, omnipresent God care - specifically - about what goes on in this miniscule solar system in this average galaxy in this average galactic cluster in this average corner of the universe? Let me explain something to you. Any given individual is miniscule in relation to the universe. The observable universe is about 46 billion LIGHT YEARS across. It contains 80 BILLION galaxies comprising about 30,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (30 Billion Trillion or 30 sextillion) stars. Based on this size it is reasonable to assume that God did not create the universe solely for us. I cannot in good faith believe that this God cares about my life in particular. I think any God who could have created the universe would be more interested in setting it in motion and watching what happens as opposed to guiding a specific process on any specific planet. My God would simply lay out a set of laws and flip a switch, much like what I do when I write a piece of software. Except my God would be the ultimate programmer so to speak. I simply cannot grasp why it is so necessary that the Christian God - the ruler of a universe that's enormous beyond anything we can fathom - must be so completely wrapped up in the day to day lives of human beings on planet Earth. It makes no sense to me.
When you bring the fourth dimension - time - into the equation, it makes your life in this universe all the more minuscule. Not only are we unimaginably small on a physical scale, but also on a time scale. To any all powerful, omniscient God who "always is and always was", our physical existence is seemingly nothing. Why should this God care about the 20 minutes (or whatever) you spend praying to him each day? Or even the fact that you want this God to help your uncle beat cancer or your grandmother to recover from her stroke. It's ridiculous.
Further, assuming your God does exist, why should he care whether or not you - specifically - worship him? Why would he punish you mercilessly simply because you say he doesn't exist, or that you put your faith in a different God? It simply makes no sense. Again, we get back to a sociopathic God. A God who's so wrapped up in himself that he's willing to make insignificant humans suffer. And for what? Simply because they used the brains that he provided them to come to the conclusion that he doesn't exist. My God would "save" an atheist who lived a good life before he would save a murderer who repented. I refuse to worship any God who would do otherwise, even if said God appeared before me and asked me to.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
First Church of Doug
I am preparing a long article on religion. I thought I should start out by revealing "beliefs" that I have come to accept as a part of my religion. There is no way, scientifically, to know if God exists. I can't truly say one way or another. I guess you could label me a scared atheist; however, I am certainly not relying on a god to give my life meaning. So here goes.
Statement of "Beliefs" of the First Church of Doug
I believe that the bible was written by man and is therefore fallible.
Statement of "Beliefs" of the First Church of Doug
I believe that the bible was written by man and is therefore fallible.
I believe in a God who will not judge people based on "beliefs", but on deeds.
I believe in a God who would "save" a good person who calls him or herself an atheist before a bad person who prescribes to the tenets of Christianity or any other religion.
I believe in a God who has set the universe in motion simply to watch what happens.
I believe in a God who may have "seeded" life in the universe, but nothing more.
I believe in evolution as it pertains to the species of this planet.
I believe in a scientific approach to religion. Blind faith is not in my vocabulary.
I believe in a God who does not, nor did ever, perform miracles*. A God who picks and chooses to perform miracles* here and there would be a sociopathic God, not worthy of worship anyway.
I believe that while Jesus was a great human being he was not God's son, nor did he perform miracles*.
I believe that no one religion has it right. There are no "chosen" religions just like there are no "chosen" people.
I believe that no person's life is predetermined in any way. We all make our own choices. And while free will may not be so free, there is no higher power directing our lives. No one dies because of "God's Plan".
I believe that all of the above are open to change based on my personal life experiences. Nothing is set in stone.
*Note that something is not a miracle simply because science cannot explain it.
More on right click disable script
OK, so I just downloaded the latest version of Firefox. Excellent browser. One of the new features allows you to drag a picture off the browser and onto your desktop; no need to right-click. So one of the main reasons for sites to try to do something as idiotic as disabling right-click is now gone. So now those of you who continue this inane practice will look even more foolish, as you are now considering everyone who visits your site a thief and for no good reason! (Not that you had a good reason before, it's just even less so now)
Monday, March 31, 2008
HAcked by EJDER ;)
Wow.
I was alerted to a problem on my client's website this morning whereby someone named EJDER, JeXToXiC or Alemin_Krali (not sure which) apparently managed to write the same set of files into every folder on my client's website. Each and every file is exactly the same with the exception of the Error.txt file which reads "Sorry, your application has crashed on unload. Please check your app for errors."
The rest of the files are named such that they'd overwrite all the standard default start pages used by Web Servers - default.asp, .cfm, .htm, .html, .php, index.asp, .cfm, .htm, .html, .php.
So this is kind of funny, and I get on the horn with my service provider to let them know what happened. I get the files replaced with temporary stuff until I can get the problem fixed. Then I started looking at the files themselves. Whoever the jackass was that did this decided he/she would use Microsoft Word to write the "Hacked" notice. And they didn't even take the time to remove the extraneous crap from the files. Nice job guys. I thought hackers at least had some HTML skills. I mean come on guys. If you're going to "hack" my site (if that's what you call it), please have the decency to use something other than word to create your pages. Geesh.
I was alerted to a problem on my client's website this morning whereby someone named EJDER, JeXToXiC or Alemin_Krali (not sure which) apparently managed to write the same set of files into every folder on my client's website. Each and every file is exactly the same with the exception of the Error.txt file which reads "Sorry, your application has crashed on unload. Please check your app for errors."
The rest of the files are named such that they'd overwrite all the standard default start pages used by Web Servers - default.asp, .cfm, .htm, .html, .php, index.asp, .cfm, .htm, .html, .php.
So this is kind of funny, and I get on the horn with my service provider to let them know what happened. I get the files replaced with temporary stuff until I can get the problem fixed. Then I started looking at the files themselves. Whoever the jackass was that did this decided he/she would use Microsoft Word to write the "Hacked" notice. And they didn't even take the time to remove the extraneous crap from the files. Nice job guys. I thought hackers at least had some HTML skills. I mean come on guys. If you're going to "hack" my site (if that's what you call it), please have the decency to use something other than word to create your pages. Geesh.
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Tax Cuts for the Rich
OK, let me just say this once. I am SICK TO DEATH of the democrat party's standard line that the poor middle class in this country pays too much tax. Not only is it misleading, it is a blantant LIE. That's right, the democrats are lying to you about how much income tax the "rich" pay.
Did you know that the top 50% of tax payers pay 96% of income tax? Bet ya didn't, because you'd then know that lo and behold the democrat party has been lying to you! Here's a couple of articles with links to sources:
http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/incometaxandtheirs/a/whopaysmost.htm
There are some pretty graphs on this one for those of you who like pictures:
http://www.allegromedia.com/sugi/taxes/
And you can't forget about the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). That credit virtually ensures anyone making less than 20K a year not only pays no tax, but also receives money from nanny government.
So the next time some idiot tries to tell you the rich don't pay their fair share, just send them one of those links. However, don't expect it to change their mind. The democrats' have invested a lot of time and money into their BS class warfare crap. Convincing people that it is false will never happen.
Did you know that the top 50% of tax payers pay 96% of income tax? Bet ya didn't, because you'd then know that lo and behold the democrat party has been lying to you! Here's a couple of articles with links to sources:
http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/incometaxandtheirs/a/whopaysmost.htm
There are some pretty graphs on this one for those of you who like pictures:
http://www.allegromedia.com/sugi/taxes/
And you can't forget about the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). That credit virtually ensures anyone making less than 20K a year not only pays no tax, but also receives money from nanny government.
So the next time some idiot tries to tell you the rich don't pay their fair share, just send them one of those links. However, don't expect it to change their mind. The democrats' have invested a lot of time and money into their BS class warfare crap. Convincing people that it is false will never happen.
Friday, February 22, 2008
Illegal Aliens
It is my belief - regardless of how much our country "needs" the cheap labor they provide - that illegal aliens need to be removed from this country. Any good that the honest hard-working illegals do is counteracted many times over by the bad ones. MY case in point is this Alianiss Nunez Morales bitch (or whatever her name turns out to be) that hit a school bus and killed four kids and injured many more:
http://www.twincities.com/ci_8335909?source=most_viewed
Four lost lives, families grief stricken, many other children injured. The cost of this incident alone runs in the multi-million dollar range, and truly you can't put a price tag on a life.
As for the illegal woman, rather than wasting any more tax payer dollars on her she should be dropped over the Mexican border with a bullet through her head. Let them deal with their own garbage.
In the mean time, to hell with the freaking fences. Let's get some armed forces on the mexican border and shoot any living thing that crosses. That'll give them something to think about before they cross into the US.
http://www.twincities.com/ci_8335909?source=most_viewed
Four lost lives, families grief stricken, many other children injured. The cost of this incident alone runs in the multi-million dollar range, and truly you can't put a price tag on a life.
As for the illegal woman, rather than wasting any more tax payer dollars on her she should be dropped over the Mexican border with a bullet through her head. Let them deal with their own garbage.
In the mean time, to hell with the freaking fences. Let's get some armed forces on the mexican border and shoot any living thing that crosses. That'll give them something to think about before they cross into the US.
Friday, February 8, 2008
Fuck the MPAA
Check out the latest from our fabulously bloated government:
http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9867146-7.html?tag=nefd.top
That's right. College is overpriced as it is. Now we're going to add more to the cost of obtaining higher education simply because a huge corporation wants something to fix their dying business. I can't believe the morons in congress let this slide. If this isn't a heads up that the US government is seriously screwed up, I don't know what is.
Rather than attempt to figure out how to fix their ailing sales, they would rather sue people who download or provide for download their copyrighted material. All the lawsuits and legislation in the world is not going to fix a business going down the shitter. Congress needs to flip the bird at the MPAA and the RIAA and stop their tyrannical lawsuits.
And my guess is you're going to help our government continue to be unaccountable for its actions by voting Republicrat or Democan this November. And you'll probably vote against one candidate rather than voting for another. If people in this country could get past the notion that voting third party is a wasted vote we could affect some real change as the powers that be would realize they could no longer lie their way into office.
Remember, a vote for a third party IS NOT a wasted vote
http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9867146-7.html?tag=nefd.top
That's right. College is overpriced as it is. Now we're going to add more to the cost of obtaining higher education simply because a huge corporation wants something to fix their dying business. I can't believe the morons in congress let this slide. If this isn't a heads up that the US government is seriously screwed up, I don't know what is.
Rather than attempt to figure out how to fix their ailing sales, they would rather sue people who download or provide for download their copyrighted material. All the lawsuits and legislation in the world is not going to fix a business going down the shitter. Congress needs to flip the bird at the MPAA and the RIAA and stop their tyrannical lawsuits.
And my guess is you're going to help our government continue to be unaccountable for its actions by voting Republicrat or Democan this November. And you'll probably vote against one candidate rather than voting for another. If people in this country could get past the notion that voting third party is a wasted vote we could affect some real change as the powers that be would realize they could no longer lie their way into office.
Remember, a vote for a third party IS NOT a wasted vote
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
The Great Social Security Scam
So I received my annual report from the welfare program that the government calls "Social Security". The report details exactly how much the government plans on screwing me out of my own money so they can give it away to others who didn't plan properly for their retirement. In celebration of this joyous occasion I have updated my SSA Fleece application. You can find it here.
When you realize how much money is flowing through this bloated bureaucracy, perhaps you'll realize how awful a system it really is.
According to my calculations my employers and I will pay close to $340,000 into the system during my lifetime (assuming my current yearly wage stays static and I work until age 62). Earning even a 4% interest rate this amounts to over $1,000,000 by the time I reach age 70. According to my SSA document if I start receiving benefits at age 70, it will take 34.88 YEARS for me to recover this amount of money.
All I can say is wow.
When you realize how much money is flowing through this bloated bureaucracy, perhaps you'll realize how awful a system it really is.
According to my calculations my employers and I will pay close to $340,000 into the system during my lifetime (assuming my current yearly wage stays static and I work until age 62). Earning even a 4% interest rate this amounts to over $1,000,000 by the time I reach age 70. According to my SSA document if I start receiving benefits at age 70, it will take 34.88 YEARS for me to recover this amount of money.
All I can say is wow.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Idiots who disable right click on their websites
You've probably encountered websites that some misguided person wrote who thinks that he/she can "protect" his/her content by simply disabling your ability to use YOUR browser's context menu. This drives me nuts and I tend to immediately leave any website that automatically assumes I'm there to steal their content. In the past I've also taken to emailing the admin or site owner and informed them of two things:
1. I will never return to their site or use their service if they have right clicking disabled because I don't like being treated like a thief.
2. I can easily defeat their attempts to prevent me from right clicking by simply turning off javascript.
Of course, most emails I send are ignored (idiots don't like being shown that they are as much), but every once in a while people actually thank me for sending them an email and remove the right click disable script from their website.
Anyhow, I recently ran across a useful article that has a script that allows you to bookmark it and simply click it anytime you need to disable a "right click disable" script. It's located here:
http://javascript.about.com/library/blright.htm
Very useful. Thanks Stephen!
1. I will never return to their site or use their service if they have right clicking disabled because I don't like being treated like a thief.
2. I can easily defeat their attempts to prevent me from right clicking by simply turning off javascript.
Of course, most emails I send are ignored (idiots don't like being shown that they are as much), but every once in a while people actually thank me for sending them an email and remove the right click disable script from their website.
Anyhow, I recently ran across a useful article that has a script that allows you to bookmark it and simply click it anytime you need to disable a "right click disable" script. It's located here:
http://javascript.about.com/library/blright.htm
Very useful. Thanks Stephen!
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Mike Tomlin and the Two Point Conversion
Being a Cowboys fan I enjoy watching the Steelers lose. Their play Sunday was abysmal, but if they had a good coach they would have at least had a chance in overtime. Instead Mike Tomlin did his damnedest to keep them out of overtime. I have come to the conclusion that he is an idiot. Not only that, he turns around and lies about the situation.
Situation:
Here's Mike Tomlin's reasoning. I highlighted in red the parts to pay attention to:
Why did you go for the two-point conversions?
"Playing the charts"? "That is just baseball"? Are you on drugs Mike? This isn't baseball, jackass, it's football. As a coach your job is to coach the freaking game, not "play charts". Any minimum wage moron could "play charts". Then he goes on to show that his recollection of events doesn't match the game's timeline. So not only does he make a bonehead call and go for two with 10+ minutes remaining, in a post game interview he clearly lies about the situation.
Situation:
You just scored a touchdown with 10:30 left in the 4th quarter, and the score is now 28-23, down by 5. There is A LOT of time left, but you decide that you better go for two since you may only have a chance for a field goal later (ignoring the fact that you just drove down the field and scored a TD on consecutive possessions with ease). Questionable in my book, but fine. Then you get penalized and instead of going for 2 from the 2 1/2 yardline you're now going for two from the 12 1/2, a far, far more difficult task. So, WHY NOT KICK?
Here's Mike Tomlin's reasoning. I highlighted in red the parts to pay attention to:
Why did you go for the two-point conversions?
We wanted to make sure we were up by at least a field goal, so if they kicked one it would only be a tie. Being up by two doesn’t serve any purpose. If we go 30-28, we still lose the game based on what transpired after. With the first one it was still irrelevant. It was the same quandary. It was insignificant if we got the one. Playing the charts, that is not out of bounds. That is just baseball. Everybody has that chart. I don’t know if there was 10 and a half minutes left. There were 10 and a half minutes left when we scored that first touchdown with Santonio (Holmes) and we kicked the extra point. It was six minutes on the one he is talking about. We were trying to get the score to three points. We were down by 11 and we scored, so it would have been down to three.
"Playing the charts"? "That is just baseball"? Are you on drugs Mike? This isn't baseball, jackass, it's football. As a coach your job is to coach the freaking game, not "play charts". Any minimum wage moron could "play charts". Then he goes on to show that his recollection of events doesn't match the game's timeline. So not only does he make a bonehead call and go for two with 10+ minutes remaining, in a post game interview he clearly lies about the situation.
Sorry Mike, the Holmes TD came on the 1st play of the 4th quarter. You went for two after the 2nd TD of the 4th with 10:29 left in the game as was stated - regardless of your recollection of the events,
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