Brain Droppings

Double take time

2012-01-29T20:13:00.000-05:00

Subtitle Menu

Roman Empire
Nazi Germany
Daily Myfacewhen
New Rule

Wow, it's been too long since I posted. I guess I haven't really had time to write posts, with my tougher class schedule. I basically came to a general realization that changed a big part of my outlook on history last night, so I'm finally getting around to this.

The Roman Empire

The Roman Empire. Most people think of Julius Caesar and roads. There was a lot more to it than that, though. Rome was an expansionist power which had been a republic but was slowly taken over and transformed into a dictatorship. It was responsible for huge infrastructure improvements, most notably roads, domes, and aqueducts. Jews under the Roman Empire were commonly persecuted, driven from their homes, and killed. Faithful Romans believed that they were the best people in the world, and that their empire would stand for hundreds of years or more.

Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany makes people think of Hitler and killing Jews. There was a lot more to it, though. Germany was desperate for expansion after certain lands were taken in the Treaty of Versailles. Adolf Hitler, through a cunning manipulation of the German republic, slowly took over the government and transformed it into a dictatorship. Nazi Germany was responsible for huge infrastructure improvements, including roads, dams, and railroads. Nazi Germany made a point of persecuting and killing millions of Jews. Faithful Nazis believed that they were the best people in the world, and that their empire would stand for a thousand years or more.

MIND BLOWN

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule

It's not how many people you can get to dance with you that counts; it's that you can get the right one to keep dancing. Karli and I had a wonderful time at the Winter Dance last night, and I wanted to show my appreciation.

Fröhliche Silvester!

2012-01-01T00:00:00.000-05:00

Happy new year! I don't really have much to say other than that I have a lot to look back on from this past year. From my beautiful girlfriend Karli to my wonderful first semester at the Indiana Academy to my friends, old and new, I have to say that this was a great year for me personally. For that, I say thank you to all those who have made my life good. :)Now, let's watch the ball drop on the new year.

Home for the Holidays

2011-12-24T11:56:00.002-05:00

Subtitle Menu

Boring Christmas Eve
Daily Myfacewhen
New Rule

Boring Christmas Eve

It's Christmas Eve here in this podunk little middle of nowhere, and I have to say that it hasn't really felt very Christmas-y. It's not just the 40+ degree weather or the rain or the cloudy skies; it's the feeling. Christmas seems to mean little when you're away from the one with whom you want to celebrate. Yep, my Christmas is going to be spent a ways away from my wonderful girlfriend Karli. It just doesn't seem the same.

Also, having a long winter break like this (I've been out of school for over a week now), it loses the "Christmas Break" feel after about three to four days with no Christmas. Add in my busy life doing extra chores to clean up our house all nice to make it pretty before My dad and I leave for vacation to Utah in a week and a half, and this barely feels like Christmas in any respect. Hell, I haven't even been listening to Christmas songs on the radio! This is a part of growing up, I suppose. I want to be 6 again! Everything is magical when you're 6, and I like that.

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule

Never play your brother, who has access to several times the Magic: the Gathering cards you do, when he says one of his decks should be well-matched. It will be the only time he ever gets every single one of his best cards out of his library within ten turns, all while you're mana-screwed.

2011-12-15T18:57:00.001-05:00

This is gonna be a quick one. Nothing fancy, just a little bragging/boasting.

I finally convinced Karli to get a blog today. She's wanted one for a while, but she never was willing to, really. I love her so much! It's so nice to be able to help her with technological stuff (I tend to be fairly good with that kind of stuff; she hates computers). I set up her google chrome browser, her google account, helped her choose specifics on her blog layout, and made the title image for it. Basically, I gave her a wonderful birthday present (in my opinion). That reminds me-- her birthday is tomorrow! Everybody wish her a happy her day! Joe Stigall's birthday is tomorrow, too, but nobody really cares.

A short little update: I'm done with finals, have turned in the papers for my ball state class next semester, and I'm in a really good mood. Life is good; now I just have to not look forward to leaving here on Karli's birthday.

Hell Week

2011-12-10T21:23:00.001-05:00

Subtitle Menu

Hellish hell-hell stuff
Karli interruption!
Finals Prep
Why I hate the modern internet sometimes
Daily Myfacewhen
New Rule

Hellish hell-hell stuff

Last week was Hell Week. You know, the week before finals, where 30% of the work you do over the course of the semester is due, and where 29.9% of the work you do over the course of the semester is done. That's not much of an exaggeration. I had at least the normal amount of homework from every class, plus two final projects to complete (one of which I got the content for two days before the due date), a critical literary analysis paper (which I had to do on the most obscure topic in the world: refuting scholars' opinions on The Great Gatsby in reference to religion and settings), and a comprehensive calculus final review (which took me a solid three hours). As a result, I pulled two all-nighters in the one week just to keep on top of my homework. That brought my total all-nighters on the semester to two.

Karli Interruption!

We interrupt this regularly scheduled blog post to bring a severe mushy, loveyness to your attention.

Karli wants the people of the universe to know that I love her. She's been my support through all the shit this past week has brought, and she continues to be with me (despite my shittyness). For that, I cannot thank her enough. It doesn't hurt that she's absolutely gorgeousness!

Finals Week

Now it's finals week. You know, the week where you do nothing except the occasional impossibly difficult tests for which the hours of studying were not focused on the correct content. Then there are those who spend hours in their rooms the weekend before trying to study and never getting much of anything done. No homework sucks. With no technically required content, it's surprisingly difficult to study. Even when you have a plan as to how and what you will study, things just don't seem to work out well. So now, I'm going into finals genuinely worried about calc and a little worried about German (I'm going to do a big study group for foundations, which will already be my easiest test). At least I only have Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday finals. That is, if Miss Foltz ever gets back to me confirming that I can make up the final I'll miss because it's at the same time as German (BSU classes' tests take precedence over acad tests).

Why I hate the modern internet sometimes

I just felt that it was necessary to post this. Click on the image to actually be able to read it.

Daily Myfacewhen

Is it just me, or is this guy a Mon Calamari-human cross?

New Rule

I used to respect Mitt Romney as the least of all the Republican candidate evils: he understands that you can disagree with him (it is a free country) and still be human, and he has done intelligent things before, but now he's basically just a whose soul has been taken captive by the Tea Party. He may have given Massachusetts health care, but now he supports medicare benefit cuts for those who need it most, has signed a pledge to actively fight against ~~gay~~ human rights (after all, gay and human are truly synonymous), and has said (at one point) "Greed is good."

I now find that the only solution is to let the Republican candidates duke it out in a duel truly testing of ability- like Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton, they must duel with loaded paintball guns. None have been able to show me they are sophisticated enough to deserve political debate, so they get to determine it by who comes out with the smallest amount of paint on their best clothes. Why do I suggest this over the established system? Let's just look at the candidates for the upcoming election (I'll give you a hint: it sounds like a circus more than it does a group of skilled politicians). We've got Mitt Romney, the cartwheeling conservative who can't choose between smart and insane; Michele Bachmann, the Minnesota Maniac; Rick Perry, the hateful Brokeback Mountain Cowboy (have you seen his ads?); Hermain Cain, the businessman (both in and out of bed); and Ron Paul, the Statue of Liberty (for the dominant whites only, assuredly). Does my plan really sound insensible?

Tumblelog

2011-11-22T16:13:00.001-05:00

I got a tumblr and I figure it'll be easier to post more often when I only have to post little bits. So I'll be maintaining both, with short posts on tumblr more often and the good stuff here. The link to my tumblelog is here.

Freedom

2011-11-21T16:10:00.001-05:00

Subtitle Menu

SOPA/PIPA Acts
Land of the Free?
Anti-Bullying
Jesus' View of Hell
Last Supper

Wow, I haven't posted in a while. This is the latest of what matters in my life since I got home for Thanksgiving Break. Besides My girlfriend Karli. And homework. And Karli.

SOPA/PIPA Acts

I don't know what you've heard, but the House and Senate both have bills, named the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act respectively. Their names look like they're good ideas, except for a couple things. Huge things. Sure, they could stop people from watching illegally uploaded videos and songs by closing or blocking those sites. The rights as to what is and is not ok defined here are far too ambiguous, though. Fan art of movies could potentially be censored, along with all the content of the rest of the site. Like open source software? If someone has a copyright and claims something else (even independently made) is copying it and doing so for free, goodbye. It's not okay! Internet censorship is not for the "land of the free."

Land of the Free?

Of course, I wouldn't call it the land of the free here. Only is it truly the land of the free when ALL people have the right to total equality of rights. If someone wants to build a mosque a couple blocks from Ground Zero, they have to be allowed to. If someone is arrested with race or religion as an influencing factor, they should be let free, regardless of guilt. If someone wants to marry another of the same sex, they have to get to. If someone wants to burn another religion's holy book or otherwise insult their culture, they should be arrested and at the very least fined. You can't have freedom without the right to carry oneself with pride, and you can't have freedom without the right to be tolerated for being proud of and/or happy with who you are.

Anti-Bullying

I went to church yesterday (a shocker, right?). Actually, my church is one of the few that isn't hypocritical in its views. We pray for peace throughout the world, especially the "Holy Land." We emphasize love for all, including those of other faiths. We don't presume to know who does and does not go to Heaven and Hell. I like my church.

Anyways, during the sermon, the Reverend John Gardner, my good friend despite our age difference (and the fact that he's an Ohio State fan) told us that he had been receiving emails (someone must have put him on that site's mailing list) from a site with scathing things to say. These emails said things along the lines of, "Anti-bullying Legislation would lead to outlawing our right to discriminate against our inferiors!" It's a good thing our nation doesn't have too much bigotry, right? It appalls me that people would be against the protection of the weak, poor, helpless, and minorities from the prejudiced.

Jesus' View of Hell

In the same sermon, my pastor brought up an interesting text: Matthew 25:31-46. The long and short of it is that Jesus tells a story about separating good people from bad people, and he even tells the factors weighed in. People who are willing to take in strangers, help the poor, and feed the hungry are the ones considered good. They are the ones who go to Heaven, according to this text. Those who refuse these things to the same kind of people go to Hell. Interestingly, there is no mention made of any line of faith necessary to achieve righteousness. #proofthatnonchristianscangotoheavenftw

Last Supper

One last little blurb, then I'll be done. The Last Supper is one of the holiest sacraments in the Christian Faith. Right? Interestingly enough, only three of the Gospels put it in the light from which we see it today. The book of John never mentions Jesus talking along the lines of, "This is by body, now eat it" or, "This is my blood, now drink it." Instead, John claims that Simon Peter, the Disciple who would later thrice deny Christ to the Romans, whispered to Jesus, asking who the betrayer would be right after Jesus told them one among them would rat him out. Jesus said that it was the man to whom he would give a piece of bread that he had dipped in a "dish," then he gave it to Judas Iscariot. John claims that the devil entered into Judas when t=he ate the Bread. He then said, "Go do quickly what you will." Judas: set up by Jesus? Also, the Last Supper: 3 parts sacrament, one part devil?

Rollercoasters

2011-10-28T00:32:00.001-04:00

Subtitle Menu

Wha??
Daily Myfacewhen
New Rule

I'm not going to talk about any real rollercoasters. Sorry if I got your hopes up with that title. I'm really going to describe the events of my life, and how they confuse the hell out of me.

Wha??

Tuesday was possibly the most up and down day in my life.

It started with me feeling sort of crappy because I hadn't been able to get to sleep the last night and I had slept past my alarm. However, because I only have one class on Tuesdays, at 11:30 AM, I wasn't late to anything, at the very least. By the time Programming class came around, I was feeling mostly better, and that continued to improve until I was genuinely in a good mood by the end of class.

Right after that, I had a special convocation for my Foundations class: a model market economy game called Silver and Spice based on the global trade routes of the 15- and 1600s. Interestingly, Dr. Arnold, one of the History teachers here, was the one to create the game. It was quite fun, and I ended up one of the wealthiest players by the end.

Needless to say, I was practically glowing by 2:00, when it ended. Karli and I then went on a day trip into the city to visit Wishbone Gifts, because Karli wanted to buy a couple things. Except for the half hour we had to spend at the MITS (bus) station while surrounded by various "normal" middle- and high-schoolers from around Muncie, the entire trip was positively glorious. When we got back, we even ate at China Express, a good Chinese place close to the Academy. What could ruin that?

Almost immediately after arriving in Wagoner, I pat-checked my pockets. I noticed that I couldn't feel something in one of my pockets that should have been there: a lanyard with a collection of flash drives, including one with all of my files for both of my Computer Science classes. I tried to pass it off, thinking I might have not noticed it because there were a lot of things in my pockets. Still, when I got back to my room, I emptied my pockets and found that, indeed, it was gone. Losing anything sucks. Losing three flash drives, two plus classes worth of files, some personal files, and your favorite lanyard is pretty damn bad.

I was pretty broody from 5:15-ish straight through 11:45-ish, and I got almost no homework done, despite having a LOT to do. Then, just before midnight, I checked my email for the first time all day (I don't know why I didn't before then). The first thing to catch my eye was an email with the subject "Found flashdrives." I was about ready to do a dance after reading the email and confirming that they were mine when I saw one thing.

What I saw was that I had received two new homework assignments due the next day. Including a pretty large physics assignment. I was up till 2:30 AM working on those, but I at least got them done. I finally got to go to sleep.

Pretty weird day, no? Overall, it was great, but it was incredible how things just went from good to bad like a football being used for monkey-in-the-middle, with me as the monkey.

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule

Video games they will ruin your life. I be seein it happen all around me. It not good. An hour or so a day? Ok. Every spare moment? Not ok.

Taxes

2011-10-03T23:59:00.001-04:00

Subtitle Menu

Capitalism
Taxes
Daily Myfacewhen
New Rule

Capitalism

My Foundations teacher started his section on capitalism on Wednesday of last week. Being a simple concept, you would think that we would have one lecture and a reading on it, then be done. He finished today. You really don't need three class days to explain it. He didn't use all three days to. He explained it, then he basically went on a two-day rant on how amazing it is, and how it can work anywhere, how anyone can be a part of it without understanding it, etc. Have I ever mentioned that I don't exactly like capitalism?

Mr. Marsh kept talking on and on how only a few simple, easy conditions are necessary for capitalism to work in an economy. Let's take a look at those for a minute. Capitalism requires:

markets
private property
rule of law

'Rule of law' means government protection of private property. By that, it means prevention of government taking property, but more importantly, even our reading admitted that certain regulations must be in place to prevent fraudulent behavior. This is considered to be NECESSARY for a capitalist economy to stay strong. What is it that Republicans look to remove entirely, as a means for their own benefit by receiving huge dividends from big business in exchange for doing? Oh yeah. Totally deregulating business and allowing total reign to be in the hands of corrupted corporate executives. Why can't conservatives ever see this?

Taxes

I talked about that primarily to talk about taxes and the state of things that go along with certain tax structures. Specifically, I'll be talking about taxes in a truly capitalist system, in a practical capitalist system, and what I consider to be the best tax structure.

In a capitalist system where all three required conditions are present, taxes would be at a flat percentage rate for all people, and the taxes raised would be just enough to fund the government's structure and members, as well as enforcing the laws of the land. There would be very little outside this. The government would not play any role in what you can or can't do with private property or in the general life of people, and the nation's economy would thrive as long as no individual sector of the economy gained control of enough capital or governmental power to start controlling the flow of capital in the nation. This includes military spending, which can easily ruin an economy.

In a capitalist system in the real world, things don't work so well. The rule of law tends to be neglected or directly attacked, in the case of modern Republicans. They do, however, put laws preventing things they don't like into the legislature (going against the principles they claim to uphold of government staying out of personal lives). When a few people at the top gain control of a massive majority of the capital, they corrupt government officials and eventually push through legislation with loopholes allowing the richest to pay less or even no taxes. As a result, the government is incapable of bringing in enough capital from taxes to even fund a bare-bones government like that called for in theoretical capitalism. Despite this, military spending often goes through the roof because defense contractors pay legislators to form new contracts with their companies (which aren't paying taxes). To pay for all this, creative borrowing techniques are required. This essentially privatizes government itself. This is the ideal system, in the eyes of Republicans.

I would make taxes proportional to the remaining capital after cost of living. This is somewhat confusing to some people, but it is actually fairly simple. There would be basic levels of living costs for each level of earning. For example, under a 25% excess income tax, families earning under $25,000 per year can be expected to have extremely little, if any, left after putting clothes on their backs, a roof over their heads, and food on the table, so they might not have to pay taxes. Families earning around $100,000 per year might spend about 80% of their income on necessities. That leaves 20% taxable, and 1/4 of that would go to taxes, so they would have a 5% total income tax, or $5,000 in taxes. I would like to point out that I am pulling these numbers out of my ass, and I have no idea if they are at all realistic. It is just for the purpose of explaining the system. Skipping ahead a bit, families with $1,000,000 in income per year might actually spend 20% of their income, so using the math described above, they would pay $160,000 in taxes per year. Someone with $1,000,000,000 in income might spend about 1% of their income, so they would pay nearly a quarter of their total income at $247,500,000. This way, taxes are less of a burden on the less wealthy, the wealthy still don't really feel the effect much if at all, and the system has plenty of money to fund the programs deemed worthy. The numbers would have to be fixed to be realistic, but it is a simple, logical system.

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule

You are beautiful. It's true. The person you see in the mirror is uniquely you. Why would you want to change YOU?

Darwin Awards

2011-09-29T02:06:00.001-04:00

Subtitle Menu

Social Darwinism
Darwin Awards
Karli
Coding
Daily Myfacewhen
New Rule

I received a request from my friend Benjamin Turney to write a post about Social Darwinism. It was right up my alley, being socio-political, so I figured I'd give it a shot. Being me, though, I can't just write opinion. Well, I can, but I have a better idea. I'll get around to it soon.

Social Darwinism

The theory of Social Darwinism stems roughly from Darwin's Theory of Evolution. It takes this theory, summed up by the phrase "survival of the fittest," and uses it to form the social basis of a government. Social Darwinism uses this belief to justify the totally equal treatment of the rich and poor by staying out of their lives completely: the government neither tries to help the poor nor regulates the rich (or vice versa). The most common use of this interpretation is laissez-faire capitalism, allowing totally free and unregulated markets. If you've read my blog before, you probably get an idea of how much I love that. I don't. At all. It would lead to straight-out swindling, without having to invent new math to do so *cough insurance companies cough*.

However, that is not the basis of Social Darwinism. What it really is, is the idea that society is enhanced through evolution by those who die in stupid ways of their own fault, thus enhancing the gene pool by removing themselves from it. Most people think that idea is cruel, because they would argue that stupidity is not altogether wrong, but really, these people tend to be detrimental to society and their deaths often come while committing a crime. Am I saying that I want people to die so they won't be in the gene pool? No. I'm saying that when people do die like this, their deaths are in the better interest of the gene pool and not the people themselves.

Using this more logical (in my opinion) approach to Social Darwinism, a group of people have made a series of a few books telling stories of those very people who have removed themselves from the gene pool. The books are called the Darwin Awards. I have a few potential winners in mind, taken from wikipedia's article "List of Unusual Deaths".

Darwin Awards

1926: Phillip McClean,16, from Queensland, Australia became the only person documented to have been killed by a cassowary. After encountering the bird on their family property, McClean and his brother decided to kill it with clubs. When McClean struck the bird it knocked him down, then kicked him in the neck, opening a 1.25 cm long cut in one of his main blood vessels. Though the boy managed to get back on his feet and run away, he collapsed a short while later and died from the hemorrhage.

1975: Bandō Mitsugorō VIII, a Japanese kabuki actor, died of severe poisoning when he ate four fugu (puffer-fish) livers. Mitsugorō claimed to be immune to the poison and the fugu chef felt he could not refuse him.

1982: David Grundman was killed near Lake Pleasant, Arizona while shooting at cacti with his shotgun. After he fired several shots at a 26 ft (8 m) tall Saguaro Cactus from extremely close range, a 4 ft limb of the cactus detached and fell on him, crushing him.

1987: Franco Brun, a 22-year-old prisoner at Toronto East Detention Centre, in Toronto, Ontario, choked to death after attempting to swallow a Gideon's Bible.

1993: Michael A. Shingledecker Jr. was killed when he and a friend were struck by a pickup truck while lying flat on the yellow dividing line of a two-lane highway in Polk, Pennsylvania. They were copying a daredevil stunt from the movie The Program. Marco Birkhimer died of a similar accident while performing the same stunt in Route 206 of Bordentown, New Jersey.

2004: Phillip Quinn, a 24-year-old from Kent, Washington, was killed while heating up a lava lamp on his kitchen stove. The lamp exploded and a shard pierced his heart.

2005: Kenneth Pinyan of Gig Harbor, Washington, died of acute peritonitis after receiving anal intercourse from a stallion. The case led to the criminalization of bestiality in Washington state.

Karli

So... I can't say enough how much Karli means to me. She may be a pessimist, but knowing I can always cheer her up, at least a little, just makes me happier than I could ever explain. People have mentioned to me that I'm sorta anti-social most of the time that I'm not with her, and when I think about it, it's true. It's more easy to just live life and be happy when she's around. Even napping on those blue couches in Jeep is better curled up in a ball on half of it so she can be on the other half. It's weird, but true. That's all for the mushy, icky stuff.

Coding

I learned CSS for my web dev class recently. It is used for better formatting of websites and other HTML sites. In fact, the subtitle bar on the left of this post was entirely formatted by CSS, and I actually edited the post title to have small capitals rather than lowercase in the blog's code itself. I also have decided to learn Java in my spare time. Because teaching myself two computer languages at once is not enough. I love computer science oh so much.

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule

Everything is made better by barbecue sauce.

Arrrgh.

2011-09-19T16:36:00.000-04:00

Ahoy, mateys. It be International Talk Like a Pirate Day!

Blimey, it be a full 15 sleeps since me last post.

Enough of that. I have a lot to talk about.

Classes

AP Physics B is a LOT of fun. I'm really surprised at how simple most of the topics we've covered so far are. Even when we include friction, it is pretty simple to calculate acceleration and the force acting against an object.

German 301 at Ball State is actually my easiest class. It's not the difficulty of the work; it's the workload relative to my classes at the academy. I really, REALLY like the class. It helps that my teacher, Lathrop Johnson, taught my German teacher back home when Mr. McCord was in college. EPIC FACE.

Foundations of the American Experience is a great class so far. A month and a half in, and we've just covered through about 100 AD. We've read Plato, Aristotle, and Polybius; Bible and Torah and Koran. My teacher, Mr. Marsh, is very conservative, but he doesn't usually let it get into his lecture very much, and almost never outright saying anything skewed. He just implies things. He's a good guy teaching a great class, overall.

AP Calculus AB is one of my harder classes, having never taking Precalculus, but it's still a great class and Miss Foltz is a really good math teacher.

American Lit with Mr. Haynes is my hardest class. Anyone who has ever been in a class with him is probably scratching their heads, wondering what I'm talking about. Haynes is generally considered to be a great teacher, and the easiest English teacher. For me, the "easiest" American Lit class is still a severe struggle at times. My mind just can't wrap itself around literary analysis any better than I could wrap my mouth around a pillar at the Parthenon. It's still a fun, cool class, whenever I understand what's going on.

Web Page Development with Mr. Grady is awesome. I didn't actually have class until the third week of school, because the class is only on Mondays and extenuating circumstances caused the first two classes to not really happen. Mr. Grady is really fun, and Web Dev is one of my favorite classes.

Intro to Programming is by far my single favorite class, though. Learning C++ is the most fun I've ever had in a class, and the textbook is to me like Shakespeare is to literature buffs. There is nothing more satisfying to me than being able to build a program to solve any problem.

Deutsch ist sehr toll!

In meine Deutschklasse studieren wir über Politik. In Republik Deutschland ist es sehr anders. Es gibt zwei sehr großen Parteien. Sie heißen SPD und CDU. Diese zwei Parteien machen Koalitionen mit kleiner Parteien wie die Piratenpartei, die Grünepartei, und die Linke. Wegen diesen Koalitionen haben die kleinen Parteien mehr Kraft in der Regierung, und der Leiter muss dann manche Leute von die kleinen Parteien ins Kabinet setzen.

Karli

Karli knows why this is here. <3 Love you!

That wasn't too long, was it?

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule

Needs more cowbell.

Life 2.0

2011-09-04T00:48:00.000-04:00

It's weird. I'm "home" for my first extended weekend from the Academy, and even this familiar house just doesn't feel like home anymore. Nothing is quite the same here, and I've gotten so used to Academy life that this doesn't really feel right. I love life around people, and living in a house with three other family members (my brother Sasha is at Michigan State) is not quite as full. I have way more downtime than I'm used to, and I don't really want to have it. I don't do anything with it. Sure, I've got homework to do, but I still have three days left and only a couple places I'm going.

Also, college football. I watched it all day, and I feel like I should have been actually doing things. I did like that Michigan won 34-10 in three quarters of play before the game was called due to bad weather, but it just doesn't match up to spending all day with friends and then all evening adventuring somewhere.

It's like I put my former life in a box in my bedroom and only open it while I'm at my house. I have to say that I like it that way. My new life is better, thanks to all my friends who have become like my family, my school which has become my new home, and my near total disconnect from my past for all but one weekend a month which has prevented the pains of leaving.

Something political, too. Because I can't just NOT talk about politics.

The local TV in my area has begun to become monopolized. A few years ago, a company that (I think) owned either the local ABC or NBC station bought the other and they combined to come under the control of one. ABC has had serious news, and NBC has had "highlight reel" news and soft, unimportant stories. Other than that, the channels didn't change, and nobody complained because there were still a couple legit news channels (and FOX) to choose from.

It continued like that for a few years, then recently, the local FOX news station lost their affiliation with FOX and the affiliation was bought by the company that already had the local ABC and NBC stations. Because the station kept broadcasting, the second NBC digital channel is now the FOX channel. One company now controls three of the four privately run TV networks in the region.

Republicans probably think it's just "free enterprise." It's shady, and it could end up causing hell because one group now controls a majority of what people watch on TV around here. The worst part? If this had happened in the past, the government would have stepped in and prevented one group from monopolizing the media. It could easily be abused to misinform. Right now, the government apparently can't. That scares me, because the power of controlling what news we hear or don't hear is mostly in the hands of one group. There is very little to choose from. It's much like censorship of the media, but privately run now. This world is going down the drain.

Also, fun stuff about my academy laptop!

It became possessed earlier for a couple minutes. Literally, it started running things and changed a couple minor settings I didn't know existed. No damage was done; I learned a lot from it. Whatever happened apparently was solved by me shutting it down, because it's completely fine now, and the virus scanning software detects nothing. So it's possible to move the task bar to the top of the screen. Whu? Interesting.

My computer is very nice overall. Because it's a PC instead of the old Macbooks, it's much better in general for use by an Academy student. Most still have macbooks, but I got a new one because of my advanced computer science classes! Yay geekiness actually paying off! Also, this computer is a tank. You have to try to break it. One guy has managed to break four. I doubt that he'll be getting another after this.

Now, to something completely different.

I have a word (or a lot) to say on a more serious topic. Recently, I've been with a girl. This much is common knowledge, I would think. People know that she and I are quite close. Her name? Karli Jordan. I daresay that she is the light of my life. We each have stresses caused by things in our past, and that makes thing really tough. People at the Academy probably notice that we seem to fight a lot. It's because we still have a lot to learn about each other, and a lot to change to accommodate the others' needs. But you know what? I'll be damned if everything I go through with her isn't more than worth it, because she makes every day I'm around her special. I can't help but thank her for being mine.

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New Rule

D&D is a life.

World flipped upside down.

2011-08-26T14:46:00.000-04:00

Last night, I was reading some Aristotle for my Foundations (political history and theory) class. I read a few pages past where I needed to, and my mind was blown. In one of his writings, he explained the basic structure of his ideal nation's government and its constitution. It would have:

A large middle class with much of the power
A three-part government
The three branches would be:
Deliberative, which would draft and write laws and decide when to go to war
Executive, where magistrates would have the power to authorize laws and fill leadership roles in the government
Judicial, which would be the courts
The government would be multi-tiered, with different tiers superseding others in authority
The law is supreme, and none are above the law. *glare* NIXON!

Replace the word 'deliberative' with 'legislative' and assume two main sections of the deliberative branch, and you have... AMERICA. I was always taught that James Madison conceptualized the constitution, and then discussed it with his colleagues to form it. Yet the structure of America's government is almost exactly what Aristotle visualized over 2,000 years ago. Madison may have proposed it, but Aristotle deserves the credit for the idea.AMURRICUH IS ARISTOTLEAN?! LIEZ! :PThe interesting thing is that I disagree with many of Aristotle's ideas. He was an intense sexist, subscribing to the common thought of the time that man is the head of the family and has power over wife, children, and slaves. I understand his acceptance of slaves as there was no concept in that time of not having slaves in a society. But then, I agree with his views on several governmental structures. Direct democracy has an element of mob rule, which can bring seriously grievous issues to a nation because any loud voice can get their ideas made into law. Oligarchy comes from allowing the upper class to gain too much power, and they can run things with no consideration of the lower and middle class. Monarchy leaves the power to one, to do with as he pleases. Anarchy is essentially a one-person government with no laws except what one makes for themselves.

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New Rule

Schools need to teach theory as well as history. This Foundations class is the most useful I've ever taken.

Der Frosch und der Skorpion

2011-08-22T13:53:00.000-04:00

Today was the first day of my German 301 class at Ball State. Kind of. I still have to get registered for the class, which I'll probably do sometime tomorrow when I'm not busy till 7:30 PM. However, I got to sit in the class and I still have to do the homework, etc. Overall, the class was fun. I felt well-prepared for the class from my German classes back home, and we read a short parable. Not one from the Bible. One from the Washington Post. Here's the story as I can remember it, translated to english.

The Frog and the Scorpion

One day, a scorpion came upon a frog an the bank of a river. The scorpion wanted to cross, so he asked the frog if he could climb on the frog's back and have the frog swim to the other side.The frog, not being stupid, said, "No! Once I got in the water, you'd sting me and I'd die!"The scorpion reassured him, saying, "Not true. If I were to sting you, I'd fall in the water and drown."The frog felt that this was a fair argument, so he agreed. The scorpion climbed onto his back and began to swim across the river.The frog hadn't gone far before he was stung. "You stung me! Now we're both doomed!" he said.The scorpion replied calmly, "Yes I did. I sting everyone I come across; it's in my nature."

This was written as a comical parody of American politics. Republicans consistently argue for the same things, and even when they get what they want and their plan is a failure, they can put the blame on President Obama. They sink both sides by doing what at least some probably know will be bad for the nation because it will make them more popular among their constituents, then making the other side look bad as well. In essence, Democrats giving in to what they know is wrong is like the frog, and the Republicans hurting both sides makes them like the scorpion.

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New Rule

Permanent loss of appetite and sleepiness is a way of life.

Foundations of the Academy Experience

2011-08-19T14:01:00.002-04:00

So far, my experiences at the Indiana Academy have been pretty far-reaching. They are by no means exhaustive, but they are definitely broad. I feel that my exposure has been fairly good thus far. These are the primary parts of my Academy Experience.

Homework

Homework. That is the basis of all things Academy. You plan your schedule around homework, you procrastinate on all things homework, and you always eventually do all things homework, and you DEFINITELY nap between homework assignments. Some popular homework places: Jeep Lounge, under a tree, in one's own room, in someone else's room, in the corner lounge on your floor, the corner lounge by the teachers' offices, and (on the weekends) Tally. Places little to no homework gets done: adventures (see below), Burris Playground, and DS.

Adventures

Adventures. They are the things that you use to get away from homework. You adventure on Friday and Saturday night from 7 PM to 11:30 PM (building curfew) and sometimes on weekdays until 9. Some popular places for adventuring: the White River Rapids, Minnetrista, the Village, various playgrounds throughout Muncie, the mall, Goodwill, and Walmart. These places are places of escape and release. No homework is done at these places. Mini adventures also happen. They go to such places as Tally, Burris Playground, and other nearby places.

Sleep

Sleep is the number one most prized commodity at the Indiana Academy. For some, it seems unnecessary and extraneous, but it is for most the best thing a person can get here. Including good grades. Doctors recommend at least 7-8 hours of sleep a night. Most are lucky to get even 6. I don't have class until 10 at the earliest, but I try to get myself up at 6:30 to 7 every morning. Thus, I'm in bed and usually asleep by 12:30 every night. I also take short naps in Jeep lounge almost every day. Those big blue couches are the comfiest things you will ever lie in, even if you have to curl up in a ball. You just sink right in and are asleep within minutes. Even if your best friends are sitting within ten feet.

Also...

One last point. It sounds like a place full of work, play, sleep, and no time for relaxing while conscious. This isn't true. While there is a LOT of work to be done (2-5 hours per school day on average for most people), I don't feel like I'm necessarily working more than I did at home. Sure, I never really had homework except math back home, and now I have assignments nearly every class AND I have to study for the first time in my life. Still, homework is the norm. It's what you do.That makes the immensely greater workload seem no more strenuous than normal. Really, life here is fairly relaxed if you let it be.

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New Rule

Chris Woodiel, Jackson Eflin, Grace Minton, and Vincent Wong have proven to me that the Academy has never had a bad class. My class (2013), my seniors, my grandseniors, AND my great-grandseniors are cool? I see a trend here.

Academy, week 2

2011-08-15T09:31:00.001-04:00

Since I got to the academy, politics have lost their importance. With adventures to be had, homework to be done, movies to be watched, more adventures to be had, and homework to procrastinate on, who has time for politics?Instead, I'll try to post every few days about my academy experiences and adventures. I might bring up some other stuff if I see it in the news, too, but I'll mostly change my focus to my life as an Academy student.

Wow. Where do I start? Well, in my first week of classes and the following weekend, I switched from AP Chemistry to AP Physics B, learned trigonometry so I wouldn't feel desperately far behind in AP Calculus AB, procrastinated almost all of my assignments, went on three adventures, nearly died, drank lotso coffee, and, most importantly, had plenty of time with my wonderfulamazingawesomefabulousbeautiful girlfriend.

Let's go into detail. It got to Wednesday morning and I realized as I sat through my AP Chemistry lecture that I didn't want to be there. I didn't want to take AP Chemistry. I did want to take AP Physics B. I switched to AP Physics B. Cool story, right? ...Or not. What's nice is that I never have any classes before 10 AM now! :)

In AP Calc AB, which I tested into out of some strange lucky turn of events, I realized day one that I had never learned anything beyond the right triangle formulas for trig. I did not know how to use sine waves. This changed very quickly. It had to; I have already had two assignments and a project involving them.

Procrastination makes life more interesting.

Adventures-wise, each would deserve its own paragraph if I weren't feeling lazy. Last Wednesday was the first adventure of the week. My memory of that event is blurred by too much other fun. Then, on Friday, we (all of my friends and I) went to Minnetrista after a stop at the White River rapids in northern Muncie. I crossed the river and we all had a great time at Minnetrista, playing random games and rolling in the grass (which I am apparently mildly allergic to).

Saturday was... interesting. We went to a playground along the river, and almost right after getting there, a huge storm hit. If you saw on the news about those five (I think) people who died at the State fair, it was that same storm in Muncie. It started with ridiculous wind gusts. Then came rain! Fun fun fun! No. Sheets of rain. Not fun. Five of us (my girlfriend, our senior Brennan Murphy, our friends Benjamin and Trevor, and me) stayed huddled under a bridge near the playground where we would be safe and dry. The rest walked back. Two among us did not exactly enjoy the thunder and lightning display. One was rendered almost catatonic, and the other was crying hysterically. (Note from Karli: He pretty much acted as my superhero. If you see this, tell him he's wonderful for putting up with me.) <-- I did not write that. Karli did. We were eventually rescued from the downpour by an SLC and a warm van. We could have died! ;)

I love Starbucks. Their instant coffee packets have saved my life twice. I swear.

Karli Jordan is my girlfriend. You will hear plenty about her in the future.

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New Rule

October rule? Too bad. It's more of a guideline, anyways.

A few things.

2011-08-08T23:40:00.001-04:00

Debatable.

First off, I had a very enlightening talk with Joe Biasi (a 2011 Academy graduate) on Saturday involving various topics such as survival tips for the academy and academic advice, anecdotes about our upbringings, and discussion over political debates, among others. The last item on this list will be my topic here. He brought up the point that the goal of debate is not necessarily to persuade another. It is to present differing points of view and provide as much evidence as possible to support your opinion. Trying to persuade another with a strong and separate opinion is poor judgment, as it will often serve no purpose but to offend and anger the other party. Joe may be quiet, but he is quite wise when he chooses to speak.

A note: this blog may sometimes offend, but I write it to chronicle my views only, and while I do not try to offend, I do not seek total political correctness in my words or actions either. In other words, this is not debate. This is angsty teen opinion from an I-don't-give-a-damn-about-your-insecurities approach. Sorry, but deal with it.

Academy Life :)

The academy is, quite honestly, better than I expected. Sure, I haven't gotten into the full swing of classes, but the work looks doable, and the friendships I have formed here are incredible. With my girlfriend Karli Jordan, her roommate Bradi, a couple guys named DJ and Austin, and a senior (who is also my biggest role model here) named Danny as well as other seniors Sarah, Caroline, and Jocelyn, I have closer friends here than I ever have had. Add Brandon, Myranda, Emily, and Taryn, and this will be a fun year. On top of that, several grandseniors (2011 grads) will visit over the course of the year. They include Kalah, Joe, and Ajay for sure (Ajay is in the meme below.), and probably some others at least once or twice. Adventure? I think yes.

Classes!

I started classes at the academy today. I had AP Chem with Smierciak (for anyone who might know about the teachers), Foundations (a history/political theory class) with Marsh, AP Calc AB with Foltz, American Lit with Haynes, and Web Page Development with Grady. I have homework for three already. Most went the full 50 allotted minutes to introduce the students to the classes. Web Dev (which is allotted 2.5 hours) went for five minutes. Tomorrow, I have Intro to Programming with Cunningham (yay 11:30 class!). I'll also be taking German 3 at Ball State, but classes there don't start for two weeks.

The S&P 500 decreased the national credit rating yesterday. It went from AAA (where it had been since 1917) to AA+. You may think that's no big deal. It's a huge deal. The economy could very well greatly decrease foreign willingness to allow us to borrow against them, causing the debt ceiling bill to end up useless anyways. Also, after Republicans such as John Boehner wrote, backed, and pushed said bill through congress, they immediately blamed President Obama for the decreased credit score. The decrease was because of the bill. It sure looks like they're playing both sides here to declare triumph without the consequences of what was actually a failure, and nobody is calling them out on it. I hate that.

Daily Myfacewhen

It's not a myfacewhen, but it's just excellent. It's also a meme of another class of 2011 academite.

New Rule

You get help when you only have a math education through Algebra II and almost no background in trigonometry and you're in AP Calculus AB, pride be damned. AKA: me.

A crisis averted? Or just postponed?

2011-08-05T00:32:00.001-04:00

Three days ago, on August first, I witnessed a historic deal to raise the debt limit be passed in the House of Representatives, then the Senate. It guaranteed that the government wouldn't default on its loans, and thus, it would not collapse.

Pretty nice, right?

It's not that great. In fact, I hate it. It was necessary to keep the government afloat, because President Obama doesn't have the balls to use the 14th amendment to make the debt limit be raised. But it wasn't a bargain. It was a thorough bashing by the Republicans. I'll get to that later. First, the basic contents of the bill and both parties' general opinions of it.

The deal raises the debt limit by 2.4 trillion desperately needed dollars. It also guarantees a minimum of approximately 1 trillion dollars in spending cuts over the next ten years, largely to useful and good programs. It also establishes a "super-committee" of House and Senate members to cut an additional 2.5 trillion dollars. No tax increases are guaranteed, and they seem highly unlikely.

Republicans lauded it as a great compromise, and congratulated President Obama for reaching such a historic and "bipartisan" deal. All, or at least a massive majority (I can't remember) voted in its favor.

Democrats all hated it, and only half the Democrats in the House were willing to vote for it. One referred to it as a monster created by the Tea Party. They nearly unanimously felt disappointed, or even betrayed, by the President. One 'yea' vote was done by Gabrielle Giffords. It was her first vote since being shot in the head on January 20.

So whose side is Obama on? When he gets more compliments from his sworn enemies than from the people who got him elected, there's a problem. I think the problem could be called a particularly aggressive case of pansy-itis. He gives in to everything they ask, even if it goes directly against his beliefs, because he doesn't know how to stand up against the Tea Party.

Here's why I hate it. It will, or likely will, end up in deep cuts to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Planned Parenthood, and many more productive and useful programs, and almost nothing Republicans favor (the military) will lose funding. There is also NO new revenue flow. That will slow, or possibly halt, the recovery entirely. Why? You can only cut so much, ans much of what you can cut should not be cut. By bringing in new sources of revenue, you can keep those good programs and pay your way out of debt. Proof? New Deal in the 1930s. Clinton's economic policies of the '90s. When the best defense against those that I ever hear is, "It just doesn't work," I feel like they're just refusing to believe it because they're afraid of admitting they're wrong.

Also, you could have played the game "Where in DC is John Boehner" on the first. He wasn't in the House chambers, despite being Speaker, until right before the deciding vote. He missed the bill's debate, as well as the debate AND VOTES on THREE other, smaller bills.

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Scared Asian is scared.

New Rule

The Indiana Academy is the best place on Earth. There is no denying this fact.

Opinion on the news about the news

2011-07-18T15:04:00.001-04:00

Rupert Murdoch has made the international news a lot recently. The founder and CEO of News Corp., which owns FOX among others, has become deeply immersed in a major issue within his company involving phone hacking. This may be meaningless to some, but when I see a scandal around a man who has devoted his life to skewing the news to put it in a more conservative light, I become pretty excited. It looks right now that Murdoch will lose his position as CEO and be just one of many near-the-top officials. And here I thought there was no God.

Glenn Beck is holding a rally in a little more than a month. He's decided to stand directly with the Jews and against anyone who opposes them. Assuming they even want him to be there, such a polarizing event is not likely to help anything in a city already divided. This rally is called "Restoring Courage." How about, "Restoring Peace?" Is it bad to want peace in a region that has been highly contested and fought over with military might for centuries? Apparently, or he wouldn't be egging the Jews on, all the while flipping off the Muslims of Jerusalem. Bad move, Beck.

It looks like Al Sharpton will be a new anchor for MSNBC at six. That could turn out badly. I hope that he doesn't start acting as stupid as anchors for FOX do on the other end of the spectrum.

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New Rule

Life really isn't fair. Don't complain; it won't get you anywhere.

A victory for pastafarians everywhere!

2011-07-16T23:42:00.004-04:00

Austrian Pasta-head

My mom sent me a link via email sometime yesterday. Mildly intrigued by the title, I took a look at it. Little did I know it would be one of the most significant things I've read in a long time. The story? A NPR report on a man wearing a man who wore a pasta strainer on his head. The full story is here.

tl;dr this Austrian guy was protesting some new EU regulations that meant you couldn't wear headgear in drivers license pictures except for religion. He claimed pastafarianism and wore a spaghetti strainer. Three years later, he gets the license, strainer and all.

This is a HUGE win. Not just for pastafarians, but in freedom of religion in general. As the story says, it was a victory for "freedom from religion". Even in today's world, religion is quite often pushed on people. Whether it is in the public or private sector, people are constantly being badgered to believe one certain thing. The man from the article doesn't just want freedom to believe what he wants; he wants the recognized right to NOT believe anything at all. I'd suggest mulling it over a bit. He makes some fascinating points.

He also touches on the subject of preferential treatment. What one person may do, all should be able to do, from his perspective. There is no middle ground, no exceptions, or the system makes a farce of itself and there is no true separation of church and state. I believe the same is true in America. "The government shall make no establishment of religion." Making special exceptions to the otherwise blanket, one size fits all rules for religion is against what the system is supposed to stand for.

Maybe this is boring to you people, but I feel strongly about separation of church and state.

Ignorant Misadventure

My second topic today is an interesting picture I came across on randompics.net. It provides quite the interesting perspective on 9/11.

It's pretty self-explanatory; I just really, really like the logic behind it.

Swim team -sigh-

I had my summer swim conference meet today. I swam a relay (which got disqualified; not my fault at all). I got fifth place in the 100m butterfly, and I only did that well because I could breathe (yay new inhaler!). I swam 200m IM, and while seeded seventh, I got sixth. I beat everyone I expected to, so I was happy again. Breaststroke had me seeded sixth. I got sixth. Pretty good, right? No. The seed times were off, and I probably should have beaten two or three of the guys who beat me. I have this thing where I need to be able to see my closest competition to be able to kick it into high gear, and the guys I know I should have been able to beat were in lanes five and six. I had lane one. Oh well. I had a great time at the meet, hanging out with all my friends from all four teams (most of them from Bellmont High School in Adams County).

Now the season is over. I'm sad, and I don't know what I'll do in the mornings anymore. Meh, I'll probably just sleep.

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New Rule

Desmond Hume from LOST is a coward.

Gotta get this one in fast!

2011-07-14T23:54:00.002-04:00

...Jesus fuck, guys, it's just a goddamn movie. The books were pretty good, sure, but they've been over for years. The movies really aren't that remarkable. I might as well not even be on Facebook tonight, since there's not much more than HP bullshit clogging the tubes.

Just one more thing from the infinite pool of wisdom that is Chris Woodiel.

So anyways, he has a point. The movies are good, but if not for the books, they would never have reached the eighth in this seven-part series. I don't really have that much to say besides that, so sayonara!

daily Myfacewhen

...is not a myfacewhen. I do not care.

New Rule

The Battle of Hogwarts was a draw. The Death Eaters withdrew after losing their leader, but they were doing a pretty damn good job before, so it was a tie. I don't care what you say.

YAY CYNICISM ON THE EVE OF A NERD HOLIDAY!!!!!

A little of all of it.

2011-07-13T21:18:00.003-04:00

Bible quizzing.

What?

The very concept befuddles me. How do you benefit by mindlessly memorizing specific passages from the Bible. Where is the religious benefit in committing specific words from the Bible to memory? Anyone can do that. Religion isn't about learning scripture; it's about learning FROM scripture. They might be able to quote it at you, but I'll be damned if I've ever heard of someone who does bible quizzing that went any further than the words and the meaning they were told it has. Just following what you are told to do and believe without any skepticism makes you, in my opinion, a fool. I have a living, questioning, and ever-changing faith. Why should someone set store by the exact words of a book whose newest writings were written nearly 2,000 years ago? One should take things in the spirit they were written, and put them in modern perspective. But I guess that it's to each their own.

I hope Michele Bachmann wins the Republican nomination. Who would be better at alienating everyone who doesn't already worship the ground she walks on?

I don't want my summer swim team to end. It's been the highlight of my summer, except for my burgeoning relationships with my future Academy classmates. On the other hand, I can't wait for school. Seriously, I wish I could have swim until the day before move-in. I would skip my family vacation to keep swimming.

Sarah Palin has a documentary coming out. It hopes to disprove the "misconceptions" about her. I don't think they pitched the film to theaters very well, though. It's only going to be screened in ten cities, at least to start. To boot, the documentary is called "The Undefeated." Because that's the title usually given to the losing vice-presidential nominee (who was about as informed on the real issues in America as the average Nigerian) who later quits her job as Governor of Alaska to get her own TV show, or as she put it, "to spend more time with family." Misconceptions? How about understatements?

Anyone who has spare time should read Questionable Content and XKCD. QC is about a massively dysfunctional group of friends, coffee, a robot, and messed-up relationships. XKCD... has no explanation. It is funny, intelligent, and is often oddly philosophical. Scandinavia and the World is also very good. A collection of comics about the nations of Scandinavia, as well as various nations around the world, it personifies nations and gives them personalities from the point of view of the writer, a Danish woman.

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New Rule

May 2nd is an unofficial holiday, in remembrance of Fred Weasley, Remus Lupin, Nymphadora Tonks, Colin Creevey, and the unidentified fallen fifty who died fighting to protect Hogwarts school from the Death Eaters and their leader, Lord Voldemort. This may have already been so, but it's now officially a part of my life. Happy Harry Potter Week!

Some literal brain droppings.

2011-07-12T12:11:00.006-04:00

Don't think of a black cat.

Bahaha you did. I watched a lot of youtube videos of Derren Brown last night. He's this creepy mind control/ hypnotist guy who can almost literally read your mind and memorize entire books in minutes. That's one of his simplest mind control tricks.

I'm exhausted. I had a swim practice this morning, as usual, but the water was far too warm. When the water is too warm, it saps your energy. I was already tired from yesterday's practice. It sucked. And I have a meet tonight, to boot.

I watched Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets yesterday. I think I'll watch the first one today.

I also watched Air Force One yesterday. It's a great movie. Why? Harrison Ford. Just like Star Wars, The Fugitive, and Indiana Jones (not necessarily in that order), he makes the movie far better than it would have been otherwise. Sometime, I think I'mma have a massive Harrison Ford movie Marathon over the course of a couple days.

Bow ties need to learn to not be so mean to me. I've read like a dozen tutorials (with and without pictures) and been taught twice by my dad how to tie one, yet I still can't. It really sucks. I ~~like~~ love bow ties.

I can't wait for school to start. Some may say it's the end of my life, but seeing as I spend AT LEAST ten hours a day on the computer, most of it online, I have no life to end. I leave home for one purpose these days: swimming. That will end after this Saturday, and then I'll have a week of pure nothing until my family vacation. Eleven days in an RV with my family out west. Mm, fun. As a kicker, I get home from vacation August 2nd. I go to school the 3rd. Fml.

I need money. My parents haven't given me any opportunity to get a job (or a driver's license). They don't pay me for the work I do around the house anymore, so I'm broke. I've been paid for work by someone other than my parents a total of once in my life. For a grand total of $7.25. I hate my life sometimes.

A quote from a musical about the drafting and signing of the Declaration of Independence, "Is anybody there? Does anybody care?" Please, share your thoughts about what I write. Otherwise, I don't feel loved.

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New Rule

People who hate on haters have to be emo. Think about it.

Just putting this here.

2011-07-11T14:24:00.000-04:00

A few controversial statements. What else is new?

2011-07-10T23:33:00.002-04:00

Yay, third post in 24 hours! I feel so accomplished.

This is going to be a whole bunch of random, not particularly related, and often controversial things I have on my mind. And I'll be coming up them on the fly.

The first two are pretty big. I thought of them when I was bored, as usual. They are both tied into the same thing. ---that's it over there---> One of the big things right now for conservatives, the Tea Party in particular, is decentralization. They want to effectively remove the federal government's power and leave the power to the people or to the states.

Decentralization

First off, the only political philosophy that is based around having no central government is communism. Not Marxism. Real communism. Republicans hate communism, without even knowing the nature of the beast they condemn. Despite that, they are continually moving closer and closer to it in that regard. In other ways, they are the exact opposite, don't get me wrong. They think everyone should have to depend on themselves for their own success, and that it doesn't really matter how you get success and power as long as you do. It's pretty cruel to those with disabilities, disadvantaged backgrounds, etc. in particular. Republicans are not becoming commies. That would be an insult to communism. They are acting dangerously similar in some respects, though, and those respects are what I fear to be among the strongest negative traits of either Republicans or communists.

Also, this decentralization could lead to the devolution from the great government we have had for just under 225 years into the total disaster that was the "government" under the Articles of Confederation for the eight years prior to the Constitution's ratification. The articles are pretty much the basic platform of the Republicans' plans for the nation's government. Let's look at a few things that happened under the articles. Not a single civilized nation recognized America's national status. Trade, even between people of different states, was cut-throat and manipulative, and there were often tariffs, even on goods from other states in the U.S.! Foreign trade was nonexistent. The Continental Army couldn't get supplies. The only really good things to come out of it were national expansion and a means of organizing the governments of the new territories. Pretty suckish government, if you ask me.

Michele Bachmann

I could rant for hours about her. She makes Sarah Palin look polished and intelligent. She claims to have discovered she was a Republican when she paused in the middle of a book, looked out the window, and suddenly "realized" she wasn't a Democrat. She once got kicked out of the administration of a public school system she had helped start because she was pushing religion on the students. She got her law degree from a law school that once lost its American Bar Association accreditation. She later became a tax hound working for the IRS. She claims that she always hated the tax collection system, yet she loved taking all the tax dollars she could from her prey. And now, worst of all, she has repeatedly made it clear that she is not only willing, but that she is happy to let the government default on its loans and possibly even totally collapse, bringing about the end of this nation's proud 235-year history, if the other option would mean compromising on how the government will lower the debt. She's lucky she's in a nation where you're allowed to speak freely like that, because in other nations, that would cost her. In the form of beheading, hanging, or dismemberment.

Debt Reduction

People right now are looking at two basic plans to reduce the debt. Conservatives say that it should be done by defunding programs such as Social Security (which has some flaws, but has been fairly reliable and beneficial over the years), Medicare (which they will regret once they start needing to rely on the benefits it provides), and many tiny programs that cost the government pennies compared to some of the things they claim we need to keep (such as Planned Parenthood, which has been demonized, lied about, and turned into a monster that one would think has a budget equal to that of the entire state of Texas). Then there's a more liberal idea, calling for more sensible cuts to redundant or useless parts of Social Security and Medicare, as well as cuts to useless defense spending and a quick end to the overseas military conflicts. These, along with slightly increased taxes on the nation's top earners, would lead to a fairly quick end to the crisis and would bring more stability on the American homefront.

Either can possibly work (although I much prefer the liberal route), but neither is willing to give in to the current demands of the other. Democrats feel they've been more than generous enough by removing many of their original demands and replacing some with more conservative efforts. Republicans won't budge at all from their original demands, threatening to destroy the country if they don't have their way. They're acting like four year olds. I think I have a solution to both their woes: tariffs. It'll give the additional income Democrats know we need, without putting a strain on the rich, so the Republicans should be happy. As a bonus, nobody can say that it'll hurt jobs, because it'll only encourage outsourced jobs to be moved back to America to save money on the import taxes. Let's treat this thing like adults, get over our problems, and move on, shall we?

Today's Myfacewhen and New Rule are in my post from earlier.

Churchy stuff.

2011-07-10T13:43:00.001-04:00

I'm going to have two closely related subjects today, both of which I stumbled upon in Church this morning. One is from the sermon, and the other is from when I was browsing the Bible because I was bored during the sermon.

Hypocritical Christians

When I see a post on facebook with a prayer or a passage of scripture, I can't help but question their motives. They will always say they are doing so to spread the word of God. Unfortunately, in my life, I have often seen people searching to bolster their reputations as "good" Christians by showing their knowledge of passages, attendance at church and religious events, and even getting into petty arguments as to whose religious fervor is greater. As a result, I can't help but think they have ulterior motives.

There's another thing: when people post their scriptures, who is their primary audience? Fellow people who are strong, often unquestioning believers in the word of the Bible. Few of those who see those posts that do not believe will bother reading any further than the first few words, and they will generally get no meaning from it. They may even feel irked at what seems to be pushing beliefs on them. That leaves the like-minded folk, the ones who do the same and regularly post scripture/ prayers/ etc. They're the audience who are really being written for.

That would seem to prove that very few posts of religious material are actually being written for the purpose of spreading the word of the Bible. These people are often convinced that this is not true; that they actually are writing to "help" the non-believers "see the light of Christ." Unfortunately, it is true that when you lie to yourself enough, you end up believing the lie. Thus, my argument that putting religious material in a public forum is for the purpose of self-advancement and to bolster one's religious stature is complete.

Now, why is it so bad to want to boost your reputation among fellow Christians by showing off your faith? Let's ask the Bible.

Matthew 6.5-6, New Revised Standard Version. And I quote:

5 And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. 6 But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

Hm. Seems pretty straightforward that Jesus doesn't want you doing that. He says it makes you a hypocrite. So please, be as strong in your faith as you want, but don't use it with even the underlying goal of making yourself look better. It's arrogant and truly not a Christian act.

Misguided Faith

People in the area where I live constantly use their faith as a reason to put themselves above others. It is their belief that, while a person doesn't have to believe what they do, they will burn in Hell for all eternity if they don't. This is not what the spirit of Christianity is about, on any level.

First off, let's make one thing clear: you can hardly go a page in the Bible without seeing a mention of God's equal love for all people. It's pretty arrogant to put yourself on a moral higher ground when the Bible doesn't provide for any reason to think you should. Not a very Christian act in my opinion.

Next, trying to force or coerce someone to believe what you do is just cruel. Faith is, first and foremost, meant to be fulfilling to an individual. Due to different backgrounds and life choices, no one system will ever work for everyone. It just can't happen, unless individuality and culture are stifled. How can someone say that is God's will?

Third, the Bible says that NOBODY understands the will of God, or the way he works. How can we, as mortal humans, claim to know who He will allow to pass through the gates of Heaven? We can't. We can only speculate. Condemnation of an entire person is just bigoted and hateful.

All three of these common faults and direct offenses against the integrity of the living word of the Bible can be considered as stemming from a practice described in the passages below.

The Parable of the Sower from Matthew 13.3-8, NRSV. The common fault is in verse 7.

3 And he told them many things in parables, saying: ‘Listen! A sower went out to sow. 4 And as he sowed, some seeds fell on the path, and the birds came and ate them up. 5 Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and they sprang up quickly, since they had no depth of soil. 6 But when the sun rose, they were scorched; and since they had no root, they withered away. 7 Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. 8 Other seeds fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.

That described in verse 7 is explained in Matthew 13.22, NRSV.

As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the lure of wealth choke the word, and it yields nothing.

So, basically, this is getting at the fact that faith loses its meaning and its benefits when used for the wrong reasons. Anyone want to re-examine their motives now?

That was a long post. I'll keep my New Rule brief once I get to it.

Before that, in related news, it is a sad statement that I'm not at all surprised that this guy is Michele Bachmann's favorite preacher. After all, only EVERYTHING he says is offensive and has malicious intent.

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule

South Sudan needs a better name.

Some painful self-examination. (And a pat on my back)

2011-07-10T00:56:00.002-04:00

Sometime in the last 24 hours or so, I reached 1,000 pageviews on my blog. My role model in all things of life, Chris Woodiel, reached it in less than a month; mine took almost eight (including multiple LONG breaks between posts). But I've gotten like half of my pageviews in the last month or so, so I still feel accomplished. I understand that my politics are unsavory to most, so I'm not likely to get many regularly recurring readers.

I'm a literalist, believing that things should be what they mean, and I'm not afraid to speak my mind on uncomfortable topics. Some examples are my views on everything from health care to taxes to religion to individual rights. These things get me into very interesting debates, but they also draw the ire of those who stubbornly disagree with me. I don't think you should have to agree with me, don't get me wrong. That would make me Marxist or dictatorial. I think you should listen to what I have to say, and you should either provide a structured rebuttal for me to consider or admit that I am right. I often do make concessions once I see things from the point of view of intelligent counter-arguments to my statements.

I also ramble. To prove it, I'm going to ramble about how I ramble. I tend to take things into more detail than necessary, or I might even provide random extraneous (and only somewhat related) information. That lulls my readers, I am sure. I believe that what I have to say is relevant and persuasive, but one should never judge their own skills. It will either convince them that they are far better or far worse than they really are. I'd like some feedback on how I might improve my blog to make it more interesting for current readers and a more attractive option for new readers.

Now shall come some short rants.

Even when the Democrats, ostensibly in control of both the Senate and the White House, give up half of what they want in a deficit-reduction bill, Republicans refuse it and say it is their way or the highway. Bullshit. Willingness to compromise is a good quality in a person, and Republicans in positions of power are sorely lacking it.

Minnesota's state government has already shut down. It leaves thousands of workers idle, numerous state projects unfinished, and the state credit rating bottoming out. Imagine that on a national scale. Chaos would consume our nation within days. This is a time to compromise, making good appearances for your party be damned.

Betty Ford should be remembered for her resolve and candor, not her addiction. Her willingness to be so forthcoming about her issues should be an inspiration to us all.

Casey Anthony was determined to be not guilty of the charges of murder against her by a jury. That is the end. No amount of complaining will change that.

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule
"It just doesn't work" is not a valid argument against the New Deal. I have some very conclusive evidence that it does work. In America. Sorry.

STAR WARS gone Green(peace)

2011-07-09T13:10:00.006-04:00

I just stumbled on the coolest green initiative I've ever seen. Greenpeace decided to mount a campaign to get VW to agree to CO2 emission cuts. How? By making VW into the embodiment of the Dark Side of the Force. They are hoping that they can redeem VW by getting them to see the Light Side, where they do their best to not harm the ecosystem. The promotion video is below.

Help my quest to become an epic Jedi dude (in the eyes of Greenpeace) by going to my page on the site. Every pageview helps the cause!
I may or may not do a normal post later. We'll see.

Revelations, Vol. 1

2011-07-07T23:54:00.007-04:00

Every so often, I'll be sitting in the car or just doing nothing and, while lost in my thoughts, I'll realize something I hadn't before. Sometimes it's deep; it's usually something political. I'm going to try to start recording these here on my blog to collect my significant (in my opinion) thoughts. I hope you find today's post, and all those that may come on this subject, to be informative and interesting. A note: they may tend to be more along the lines of New Rules than normal posts, but it's my blog, so I don't care what you think.

Today's revelation came while in the car as my mom drove my sister and I to our summer swim meet about 45 minutes southeast of home. I was thinking about my recent posts and trying to think of a topic for a post for today. One thought floated to the top of my mind: my little bit about the emphasis of doing one's civic duty as a part of the political philosophy of republicanism. I went deeper into the thought, and from that came what I thought was a quite profound discrepancy in policy and a remarkably persuasive argument to use on stubborn politicians. Now, this brilliant thought I had. (Don't rag on me for my shameless self-promotion; that's half of why I have a blog- to feed my healthy ego.)

Politicians, left and right, are nearly unanimously in favor of the possibility and usefulness of the draft. The reasoning: in a time of military crisis, the military may need its ranks boosted in greater amounts than it can get through volunteers. So, they turn to the draft in order to bolster their numbers with those who are able, no matter if they want to or not. This is, in my opinion, a good policy, as it helps the military from becoming too stressed to the point of failure or total collapse.

Logic would suggest that the same kind of reasoning could be used in an economic crisis. Raise taxes on those who can afford the extra burden at least until the economy has recovered. Not because they didn't deserve the money, but because it's what is right to help pull a nation back from the brink. It's making those who are able to do their civic duty to their nation when the nation can't get enough without requiring its people to give back, no matter how much they don't want to. The exact same concept as with the military draft, applied in a different field.

"Republicans", however, are willing to go to ridiculous extremes to protect anything and everything involving the military, but won't budge whenever the words "taxes" and "raised" are in the same sentence, no matter who they would be raised on. They claim it slows the economic recovery because it damages the effectiveness of trickle-down economics. The very same economic system that was once called "voodoo economics" by none other than George H. W. Bush in 1980. He was later a proponent of the theory, but my guess would be that it was because it had become so popular among the conservative base. The real reason for never budging? The people who get Republicans elected by providing massive amounts of funding are the very people whose taxes would be raised. That would make them unhappy, and they would blame the Republicans for not blocking it. They would stop funding the campaigns, and the Republicans would lose their power. It's all about power, rather than what they may even know to be right, in the end.

Basically, Republicans are looking at two sides of the same coin and trying to take only the shinier side- the side they prefer. Well, you can't go halfway on an issue just so your base will be happy with you. You take one side of the coin, you get the other. Even if you don't necessarily want it. Otherwise, you reek of corruption by trying to hedge your bets and make the people you owe things to happy, even at the cost of your political legitimacy. Which brings me back to the philosophy behind republicanism. One of the major tenets of this philosophy is that corruption is never stood for. Sorry, ladies and gents of the Republican party, but you would have gotten your asses kicked out of the Republican Party of 1854 before you could bat an eye. You simply don't agree with the founders of your own party.

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule

You aren't allowed to preach from a sidewalk if you ain't got no pancake mix.

Freedom Day??? I think not.

2011-07-04T23:52:00.002-04:00

Today is July fourth. Independence day. The celebration of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. That much I don't have a problem with. However, I do have some qualms with this holiday, from the pretenses under which it is celebrated to the manner in which it is celebrated. But I'll get to those later. Right now, a little history on this day of historical significance.

The fourth of July, 1776, was the day that the Declaration was officially adopted in its current wording. The exact date the Declaration was signed is unknown. It is assumed by most knowledgeable on the subject that the signing occurred after its adoption. Various copies were printed and spread throughout the colonies, and copies were quickly sent to England and across Europe. The official one, now known as the Declaration of Independence, was preserved and is now in the National Archives.

Now to why this paper was so significant. The 56 men who signed that document were officially committing themselves to a cause that had never even been attempted before. They were signing a paper that signed their lives away to the gallows if they were to lose the war. And they knew that the likelihood of winning the war was slim at best. I cannot stress how brave an act it was to put their names on this paper. That is what makes this day so significant: the commitment of these men and those they represented to do all they could to gain liberty, even if the consequence of their actions was death.

Here's why I think that Independence Day is celebrated under false pretenses: people celebrate it as the birth of our nation, when it was only the mutual commitment to fight for our right to a nation. The United States of America did not gain national status until another nation would recognize it as such, and that did not happen until after the adoption of the Constitution over ten years later. People also celebrate it as a sort of "freedom day." That day would be the day that the American Revolution ended, as it was the point that freedom was truly achieved. I know, I'm a cynical bastard.

I hate the way this holiday is celebrated. With all those fireworks, kegs of beer, and flags, marches, and celebrations of our current and former servicemen and women, we forget all about the true meaning of the holiday. The fourth of July is, like Christmas, New Year's, Valentine's Day, Halloween, etc., far too commercialized. This day should be celebrated with reflections on national history and pride; it should be a solemn day in honor of those men who made our struggle against tyranny and oppression meaningful. Bells and whistles are for parties, not in honor of the biggest turning point in American history.

Daily Myfacewhen

Pure spite towards the holiday.

New Rule

You need to stop tanning when you're naturally white and your skin tone is significantly darker than your off-white tux.

Political Philosophy

2011-07-04T02:00:00.000-04:00

I have previously stated my allegiances in politics time and time again. However, I have never really explained the philosophy which I support. In today's convoluted political system, nothing is as it really seems, and nothing seems to be in support of the things its name would suggest. While my views on politics are wide-ranging and hard to contain within any one philosophy, the political ideology I identify most with in its purest philosophical form is republicanism. Most people will have difficulty believing this, as I support such "anti-Republican" views. It is true that my views are almost constantly at odds with those of Republicans, but not republicans. You may be confused, so let me explain.

Republicanism is a political philosophy in which (1) individual rights and liberties are greatly stressed. This country was based around freedom; that means freedom to do that which they may please, assuming it does not come at the cost of another's well-being. This does not, however, come at the detriment or lessened of government, as you will see through the next few stands made in republicanism. It also looks to (2) defend against the "tyranny of the majority" (Alexis de Tocqueville) by granting the government power over the masses so that the more knowledgeable and less prejudiced may make wise, cool-headed decisions. At the same time, (3) John Locke's "Social Contract," widely accepted by republicans old and new, calls to make a stand against a government once it abuses its rights, thus providing a balance in power. Another stand it makes is for (4) the government promoting the common good. One of the most conspicuous views of republicanism is that of heavily encouraging, if not outright demanding, that (5) capable citizens do their civic duty. This includes (5a)serving in the military, as one expects, but another thing is emphasized here: (5b)giving back to the nation that which you do not need so that others may benefit. (6) Corruption is one thing not tolerated in republicanism. Ever. Lastly, (7) republicanism calls for totally equal treatment of all citizens under the law and justice system. For the full story on republicanist views, go to the wikipedia page on it.

I believe that people deserve far more rights than they are already afforded, and that none should be taken away. In fact, I support more rights than the people who wave banners for individual rights. I also support the republican idea of checks and balances, not just within government, but between government and the people. My support of the view on supporting the common good is one reason I will fight so strongly for public health care for all. After all, how is it bad to provide someone with the means to stay alive whenever capable? Doing one's civic duty is very important to me. I believe that anyone who joins the military out of a patriotic love for their country is deserving of the utmost respect, but I fear that most do so under false pretenses or out of hatred for a certain people or group and thus are joining because of malicious intent. That is not the intent of civic duty. The second part of civic duty is giving back, or as JFK said, "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." This means spreading the wealth from those who can afford more than what they need to those who cannot afford the basic necessities. While republicanism asks that it be done willingly, in today's greed- and wealth-based society, some amount of additional giving by the rich is only logical when it can improve the lives of millions. As to corruption, I feel disgusted whenever I hear of anyone, politician or otherwise, to be found of corruption in personal or political matters. On the last point: Rod Blagojevich deserves life in prison, simply because what he did was immensel wrong and illegal, no matter what side he is on. Hm. It seems that I agree almost fully with the core ideals of republicanism. Whodathunkit?

The modern Republican Party supports the first part (to a degree), disagrees almost entirely with the second by taking the third to heart on a level that is nearly treasonous, e.g. threatening to have the country default on loans and totally collapse because of a disagreement with the current administration and majority party in the Senate. They fight constantly against the fourth, and use the first part of the fifth point as a rallying cry while trying to bury the second. The sixth leaves many on both sides of the Congress floor and elsewhere scrambling for cover. In the meantime, they are always doing their best to make sure the people who make them rich and get them elected stay out of legal trouble, no matter if they deserve it. I don't know about you, but the Republicans don't seem very republican to me.

Gotta love America, the home of illogical bullshit. Happy fourth, and happy treason.

Daily Myfacewhen

Yay spite!

New Rule

As a service to the nation, no illogical and/or non-factual bullshit may be spewed by Michele Bachmann ("You're the state where the shot was heard around the world at Lexington and Concord" in New Hampshire) or Sarah Palin (too many to choose just one ridiculous thing she's said- see her Politifact page)

Teh interwebs

2011-07-03T02:53:00.000-04:00

It's almost 3 AM. I got online four hours ago with two things to do in mind, and a plan for brevity so I could read some. I didn't do one, I can't remember what the other was, and I didn't even open my book. This is what the internet does to your brain. I'm not going to say anything else because I have nothing else to say. G'night, all.

Forgiveness

2011-06-30T23:38:00.001-04:00

Forgiveness is a powerful thing. It's not always easy to just say, "I accept your apology," and mean it. One of those things just happened to me.

I had a swim meet this evening, and I felt good going in. I had eaten all the right foods and rested up before the meet to prepare me in advance, I had two 32 oz bottles of Powerade in my swim bag to keep me energized, and I wasn't goofing off too much during the meet. Looks good for my performance in the meet, right?

Well, my first individual event was a 100m long course butterfly. The 100 fly is, in any pool, a grueling and exhausting event. In most pools, however, it is 100 yards and you have three turns to help maintain your speed. Here, it's 100 meters (a solid 30+ additional feet) and has one turn. All in all, it means around an additional 50 feet or more of stroke work.

So, around the 75 meter mark and the point I would normally be on my last few strokes, something inside me went wrong. All at once, my arms began to drag in the water, my hips refused to budge, and my rhythm went completely. In butterfly, your speed is completely dependent on your ability to keep your rhythm, kick hard and even from your hips, and pull yourself through the water with your arms.

Short story, I nearly drowned. In three and a half feet of water. I honestly don't know how I managed to drag myself through those last feet of water. Once I reached the finish, I totally collapsed on the pool wall. I had to get dragged out of the water, couldn't support my own weight for about 15 minutes, and had no strength left to swim the rest of the meet, including my two favorite events.

I waited for the meet to end and cheered for my teammates, more and more raucously as I recovered, but I never felt quite the same for the rest of the evening. I still managed to have a decent time with my friends on the team and whatnot. It just really sucks to have to watch your friend narrowly win a race that you would normally had in the bag with ease. All because of one race that takes the very life out of you.

Now, to the point. After the meet, as we began to head home, my mom said something to me. She said it didn't really look like I was trying. After all, in her reasoning, I would do butterfly all the time at the high school I used to swim for. Like I said earlier, that race is a totally different species in this pool. I was infuriated at first; how could she say something so insensitive?! I work my ass off every day in practice and then nearly drown in the hardest race I've ever had to swim, and she says I don't look like I'm working hard enough?

I sulked in silence for the rest of the 15-minute car ride, and then something else happened when I got home. My brother asked how the meet went, and I stated loudly that he not ask. Not three seconds later, I hear my sister begin to describe what happened. Her excuse: she didn't hear me say that. Has she also never heard of common courtesy? I gave in to my pent-up emotions. I shoved her, not very hard, but I still did. It didn't really hurt her more than a few seconds of, "Ow! What the hell?" sort of pain, but it doesn't change what I did. My mom started yelling at me for that, and I don't blame her now. However, in my infuriated state, it really didn't help me start thinking straight.

So I got even angrier and headed to my room. My mom took away my laptop and tried to take my phone away by force, but my strength was enhanced so greatly by my adrenaline rush from the anger that she couldn't do anything to make me let go of my phone. By this point, my anger is starting to give way to feelings of distraught, so I was crying as well. My mom gave up and had me turn off my phone instead, after sending one goodnight text to the person I had been texting.

I then completely broke down. I felt so... betrayed by my mom; she's always been my biggest supporter and the one to make me feel better after a poor performance. I mean, I started to feel like there was no reason to continue on in the sport I love and have loved for seven years now, all because of that one thing she said in the car. I just let it all out. I was a blubbering, bawling wreck for a solid five minutes. Once my mom had cooled down, she came up to talk to me. She sat down on the edge of the bed and offered her full apology.

After having a short talk with her, I felt that I better understood why she had said it and I knew she really felt horrible for saying it. I don't feel the need to get into specifics here. The big thing is, I went from this total wreck who hated his life to a total acceptance of her apology. I don't feel mad at all now. I'm still rattled from the words themselves, and that wound may take time to heal, but I don't hold any of that against my mom, and that literally feels like a load off my chest.

Forgiveness isn't easy, especially when something deep inside you is hurt, but once you can forgive, you feel a lot better about yourself. I try to live my life that way. I know Christianity tells of God's infinite forgiveness; who's to say we can't be the same way?

WOOT two full posts in one day! I feel accomplished now! No myfacewhen or new rule; I got those earlier.

Now why I don't like Microsoft...

2011-06-30T13:18:00.007-04:00

Microsoft: maker of computers. Always going for compatible, user-friendly software, where could they go wrong? Its founder, Bill Gates, is a computer genius. Microsoft started out as a proud maker of high-quality, cheap computers that you could use for anything. Sounds like Google's story, but with computers instead of the interwebs, right? Well, Google was just being a Microsoft imitator. They were also taking after Microsoft with the bad things they did.

Microsoft does the programming for computers, and leaves the hardware specs to the computer manufacturers. Google did the same thing with Android, leaving almost everything except the bare bones to the phone makers. They did this because they can make more money off of a combination of selling the software and getting royalties off the the computers sold than off the computers themselves. They also are able to leave the manufacturers to make things as cheaply as they want, swamping the market with droves of different kinds of computers. They're trying to take out their competitors.

Then they started being lazy with the software. Vista was an over-simplified, ridiculous OS that should have been developed alongside another as a computer beginner's OS. Windows 7 is much better, but then again, they had YEARS to develop it. Instead, they rushed out Vista, and made a fool of themselves.

Their most recent facepalm move is Bing. Why, Microsoft? Why? You know you're losing serious steam when you start imitating the company that's practically been hero-worshiping you for over a decade. It's not as complete a web browser, the formatting is a bit clunky, and it has an overly complex appearance. Google made none of those mistakes.

All of these things are why I have more respect for Apple as a company. While Microsoft tries to do anything and everything they can to be successful, Apple sticks to what they know and do it well. Over the years, Apple has become one thing: a technology-making company with disproportionately high-priced items that are ALWAYS reliable, easy-to-use, and are guaranteed to meet the standards expected of them.

Apple has iMacs, hugely expensive computers with screens the size of TVs and a very easy-to-use but not overly simplistic OS. Macbooks? expensive, but reliable, attractive, and always easy to use. iPods and iPhones? On their own, iPods outsell all other music players combined, including Microsoft's Zunes. iPhones are by far the best-selling single smartphone out there. Android points out that they have almost double the market of the iPhone, but they have about forty different phones out there, with a varying degree of quality. You always know that Apple's products will do exactly what you want them to, and they will do it well.

All this said, I am still a PC. But I like Apple's style of sticking to what they do, and doing it well. Just like I still use Google and all of its products. It just pisses me off that these companies would try to expand out of their comfort zones into areas where they shouldn't tread. Yay for hypocritical rants!

Daily Myfacewhen

I couldn't decide. They're both so cute.

New Rule

Star Wars is, forever and always, the best thing to ever happen to American nerd culture.

Just a little rant about Google

2011-06-29T15:02:00.006-04:00

Google needs to realize that it shouldn't be about trying to make a "better version" of what already exists. Google+ equals their attempt to replace facebook, but everybody interested in social networking already has one site they're already happy with. Google Wave was a brilliant idea, with most of the dynamics of email and IM, and some of social networks. However, people already have an email if they want one, an IM account if they want one, and facebook's features of chat, messages, and statuses allow people to communicate just as well without having to have a fully separate site to do those things.

Google became a giant in the web industry several years ago by finding a niche that hadn't been taken yet- a dynamic, simple search engine with unique algorithms that provided the best results of any out there. They found a way to make results prioritized so that the most useful thing you would find from any search would almost always be in the top five results. Everything about it was better than any competitor's search engine- innovative and easy.

They improved it by adding numerous search engines within the search engine such as Google Images, News, and Videos, all tapping into their massive and ever-growing databases. They expanded into email, providing a simple, ever-evolving email site. They added the first decent online word processor and made it compatible with all kinds of files for easy download. They built a fast, easy online atlas with several different modes for easy use, no matter what kind of map you needed to be looking at. They made Google earth for the ultimate 3D map experience. They acquired blogger and made it totally free and more user-friendly. iGoogle made it quick and easy to check the news, or you could while away the hours playing with features on your page. These things are what Google is about.

More and more in recent years, however, Google's innovation pool seems to be running dry. They have begun to look at other successful start-up sites, and if they can't acquire them, they try to emulate them. The thing is, trying to imitate a start-up does not make you a start-up. Google was a start-up for years in several categories, but now they have just become the very thing they have always been against- a corporate giant looking to subjugate their opponents or simply outright destroy them. For that, I can't help but lose respect for Google: the Microsoft of the past decade.

Daily Myfacewhen

New Rule
This isn't really new, but Michele Bachmann needs to go away. She's fantastically insane. Like, she's probably the only person I would fear more than Sarah Palin in the President's office.

Me, in a nutshell

2011-06-19T15:07:00.005-04:00

This will be an expository piece, rather than my usual rants about how I think things should be.

The Basics

My full name is Michael Dmitri Chemey, born 16 October 1994. Since I was a baby, I have gone by the name Misha. Over the years, I have had many unique and often extremely strange life experiences. Those, coupled with my rebellious nature have made me who I am. Who I am is what I will describe, in around 1300 words, in the following paragraphs.

Personality

Scientifically, I am a type 7 adventurous, sexual variant in the Enneagram personality test, with types 8 (aggressive) and 9 (calm) as my next strongest types. This would suggest that I'm a passive-aggressive, obsessive thrill seeker. I think that's a fair description. My Jungian Archetype is ENTP, although in the 4-5 times I have taken the test over several months, I did once have an exact tie between ESTJ and ENTJ (S is sensing; N is using intuition). Every other time, it has been a solid N, so I still consider myself ENTP. More info about this stuff can be found in my previous post
From a less scientific perspective, I am very outgoing, not very politically correct, passionate (some would say obsessive), very rebellious, passive-aggressive with the need for occasional physical outbursts or I explode randomly in accidental violence, and most of all, strongly opinionated with very uncommon views and a love for voicing them.

Stuff I Like

If you want to find out what I like, just go to About the Author. The list is by no means exhaustive, but it's pretty good.

Political Views

This is where it becomes complex and supremely unusual. I believe that a strong central government is necessary to the success of a country. Without one, extremely shady business techniques and flat-out stealing would be more possible, and maybe even legal. This said, I also believe each person has several basic rights: those outlined in the U.S. Constitution and its amendments, plus some extras: the basic right to tax-funded health care, emergency services, law enforcement, abortion (it is their womb, their body, their choice), and FULLY equal rights for anyone and everyone, citizen or not. Some are publicly accepted by nearly everyone. If a person has the right to be protected by armed men and women with government salaries, saved from a burning home by well-trained men and women with public salaries, and have their lives saved in even the most gruesome emergency situations by skilled medical professionals who often are partially or fully paid through the public, why can't they count on the same helpful, easy service from hospitals when they need an operation or even basic checkups? Saving lives shouldn't be a business, just a professional commitment. The very principle of for-profit hospitals goes against the Hippocratic oath, which states that doctors should do whatever it takes to save a person's life. It makes no mention of ability to pay. Also, when I say I want fully equal rights, I mean it. This means full rights for any person to marry whomever he or she may choose, full custodial rights between such couples, etc.
These things being said, I believe that full government funding in these sectors should not overlap into the business sector. I believe that businesses should definitely remain private, but with much stricter regulations on companies to make them think twice about screwing an innocent citizen over just to gain a few bucks. This especially applies to large corporations with powerful lobbies trying to prevent anything that will stop them from using scummy actions to give more money to the CEO and other executives. I also support raising the minimum wage at a rate EQUAL to that of inflation, imposing tariffs on foreign-made goods to make industrial giants think twice about outsourcing and to increase revenues without putting more of a strain on American citizens. This would help fund government projects AND definitely help job growth, and with the heightened regulation, companies wouldn't be able to "downsize" so easily to save the richest scumbags' ill-gotten booty!
So, basically, I am an odd combination of true libertarian fighting for individuals' rights and socialist fighting for a strong central government with certain services paid for through taxes. I also believe in pure communism (nowadays they call it communalism to show the difference between it and Marxism) as a good foundation for a community, but certain difficulties prevent it from working on a national scale.

Religious Views

I am a Christian, but not your everyday Christian. I don't look at a book full of ancient religious essays, letters, and stories and just accept that everything in there is true. Certain parts are no longer relevant; others can be disproven; others contradict each other. This is a fact. So, I have slowly pieced together what I believe to be history and what I believe to be myth, even as they share pages, and this is the basics of that which I have found to be true, subject to revisions as new science emerges.
God exists as neither a male or female presence, and is truly all-loving. The Holy Spirit is God's presence in all of us, whether we believe or not. A day in the life of God is not at all the same as a day to us; a day to God is millions of years or even billions of years to us. As a result, the creation story can go along, for the most part, with the fact that is evolution. God created the universe at the beginning of time, and through a combination of natural occurrences and nudges from God, the universe became what it is today. The main contradiction is that God did not create man and woman; God saw the need to have a sentient race on Earth and caused one of those nudges to help evolve a common ancestor we share with chimpanzees (which had already independently become what it was through fully natural evolution) into several new species, picking one, and helping it advance to full sentience to become Homo habilus, Homo erectus, Homo heidelbergensis, and finally, Homo sapiens, our current species.
As for Jesus, the last main part of Christian belief, I believe him to be human and divine, as the Bible says, but still constrained in his actions by HUMAN limits. He also was born to a young woman named Mary, not a virgin. The original texts never specifically say virgin; the word for virgin is the same as that for young woman in the originally Hebrew writings that are used to claim that. Claims that Jesus could heal with a touch are ridiculous. Perhaps he had enough informal medical training to have legitimately cured some people of their ills, but he could never have used a touch to heal blindness or lameness. He also never really said, "only through me can you gain passage to heaven." He was a humble man, and the fact that only one book (if I remember right, it's Thessalonians) brings that up tells me it needs to check it's sources again. Christ should be celebrated for his real deeds as a charismatic, loving, wise preacher whose life should be chronicled in a way that celebrates his true deeds, rather than making a farce of them by twisting them to make them magical and used for hate. As a last religious remark, I want to say that I believe everybody goes to heaven, as the only devil is the flaws in human nature, and because I believe that God could never force someone to spend all eternity suffering in the fiery pits of hell for their wrongdoings when it says multiple times throughout the Bible that God is all-loving and all-forgiving.

Conclusion

If you want to discuss anything further, please bring it up. If you want to debate, be prepared for my full wrath and all the sources I can throw at you. Hope this was as insightful for you as it was for me!
Daily Mood

Sorry, no New Rule today.

My Personality. For any creepers who might want to know.

2011-06-12T23:02:00.000-04:00

Jungian Archetype

ENTP - "Inventor". Enthusiastic interest in everything and always sensitive to possibilities. Non-conformist and innovative. 3.2% of the total population.

Take Free Jung Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

Enneagram Type

Main type	Variant

Take Free Enneagram Personality Test
Personality Test by SimilarMinds.com

Enneagram Test Results

Type 1	Perfectionism	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	33%
Type 2	Helpfulness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	43%
Type 3	Image Awareness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	53%
Type 4	Sensitivity	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	46%
Type 5	Detachment	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	33%
Type 6	Anxiety	\|\|\|\|\|\|	26%
Type 7	Adventurousness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	76%
Type 8	Aggressiveness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	70%
Type 9	Calmness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	66%

Your main type is 7
Your variant is sexual

Take Free Enneagram Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

Crazy Ideas, Part 3

2011-05-19T21:31:00.002-04:00

The birthers have been talking this whole time first about how Obama was obviously not a citizen because he wasn't producing his birth certificate, then how the one inspected by numerous government officials and approved was obviously a fake. While I have been saying they need to shut up, I will revise my statement. Rather than shut them up, which would be illegal under the constitution as it would suppress freedom of speech, the news media should simply ignore the idiocy that comes out of their mouths. It may boost ratings, but it only plays into their hands, allows them to gain support, and lowers the sensible viewers' opinions of the news station broadcasting that shit.

I realized the flaw in my views this morning as I was writing an essay for my English 10 ECA, or graduation requirement test. The essay was on censorship in libraries, and it reminded me of an article I recently read about the author of a book pulling his conspiracy theory-filled publication on President Obama's ineligibility to be President. Due to the freedom of speech and press, nobody could legally force him to remove the book from bookshelves everywhere. Luckily, the author saw that nothing was to be gained from writing such a hook that would only create commotion.

This outrageous myth about our President, while spoken by the people who are crazy enough to believe it, was spread the same way as many others: through news media acting as loudspeakers for the few who actually do believe it. In the end, it is the conscious decision of the news media to support controversy whenever it will boost ratings, even if the controversy is totally ridiculous and unfounded, that makes our nation so stricken with treasonous thoughts. If this were any other nation, or even here before the Revolutionary War, speaking like this would get you hanged. While treason is not illegal in America, it is still very low. I beg the leaders of CBS, NBC, and ABC to realize that there is nothing to gain from this: they might make more money, but at the cost of the reputation of one of the greatest men in the world? Please, don't feed the beast.

Daily Mood

New Rule
Android can't claim to be better than Apple technology until they have even one individual phone OR tablet to remotely compete with the iPhone or iPad. Think about it: Apple makes one kind of phone, and it manages to outsell many Android phones combined. The iPad has several new competitors, many getting at least twice as much advertisement as the iPad, yet the iPad still dominates the tablet community. I personally have never seen someone with an Android tablet, and I have seen several people with their own iPads. These facts are self-serving: Apple wins in the innovation/awesome/non-computer technology department hands down. Their computers are also great for certain purposes, so you can't diss them either.

Crazy Ideas, Part 2

2011-05-18T22:01:00.005-04:00

Taxes need increased. "In this struggling economy?" one might ask. Taxes are not what is causing peoples' personal coffers to be running low. It's massive inflation and ridiculous rates on services by almost totally unregulated corporations. Regulate the corporations and take some of the money (not all, but some) that people are saving by not having to pay so much for things and put it towards better causes than lining the pockets of the rich.

These could include: education- Indiana has ridiculously low public education funding because what little funding the state education budget has is prioritized to go first to charter schools with unqualified educators; infrastructure- it would be nice to have well-paved highways and modern facilities across the nation; healthcare- the nation that was once first in everything has one of the worst medical systems in the developed world; or foreign aid- America has always been proud of helping developing nations in need, so we need to actually do something to support our claim.

Daily Mood

New Rule
People need to see reality. Tea Partiers especially fit the bill. As a character in the show "1776" said, "People would rather cling to the possibility of becoming rich than face the reality of being poor." This is a major problem because most people can't get rich without lying, cheating, or stealing. I think that is the ultimate reason the members of the Tea Party support deregulation of corporations: it would make it more legal for them to so thoroughly crummy stuff to gain wealth and thus, in a mercantilist mind, power.

Crazy Ideas, Part 1

2011-05-17T14:24:00.003-04:00

I'm going to start this off brash, and I'm only going to get worse. I figure I need to make a multi-post series of ideas that would work, but are seemingly insane.

President Obama needs to have an affair, and he needs to let news of it leak to the press. Yes, I meant it when I said crazy. Just hear me out. Ultra-conservatives would instantly ignore everything about him except this one issue, and in the meantime, he would be able to work behind the scenes to fix our nation.

While Republicans in congress will be on the news talking about how it proves he is a terrible person, democrats could take advantage of the cover story to fix our nation. With all the news focusing on this totally irrelevant story, Obama could pull a Clinton and make America great again.

It worked once; I say it's time to do it again. Hell, Obama could fake an affair with his wife's knowledge and build a story. He just needs to distract those clingy five-year olds who make up the Republican base.

Daily Mood
I'm going to start a new tradition of telling my mood through a myfacewhen.com picture. Today is:

Not going to explain it; just what I'm feeling.

New Rule
Today's new rule is the new rule of today.

Misnomers

2011-05-10T09:40:00.005-04:00

I've been meaning to get this post in for over a week, but I've never found the time.

If there's one thing I hate about society, it's the blatant and constant use of misnomers utilized to mislead people about the purpose or intent of a group or thing. Political and governmental groups are definitely not innocent of this offense. In fact, I find more among those than perhaps anywhere.

For example, the Democratic and Republican parties' names are backwards. I think I've already covered this, so I won't go into too much detail. Also, the Tea Party. Named to remind us of the great Boston riot in the Revolutionary War, they protest against all taxes and support the screwing over of anyone and everyone who can't support themselves.

This is true on a global scale, too. Democratic Republic of the Congo, anyone? That nation currently has no established government, and the patched-together military is constantly having to fight poachers, particularly those killing gorillas. And the People's Republic of China? They got that name while under a dictator.

You see, just like you can't judge a book by its cover, you can't always trust a name.

New Rule
Unwanted silliness should be more accepted. People always judge me when I get high on life. I just like bein crazy! Leave me alone to my awkwardness!

Birthers: Really?!

2011-04-28T18:07:00.000-04:00

Before I get into all the serious stuff about politics, I just wanted to put this here because it's cool.

So Obama released his birth certificate (again: he first released it back in 2008). The question in the media is, "Is it real?" The question among logical thinkers is "Was it really necessary the first time?" You see, title 8 of the U.S. Code includes in its definition of a natural-born citizen this clause: Any one born outside the United States, if one parent is an alien and as long as the other parent is a citizen of the U.S. who lived in the U.S. for at least five years (with military and diplomatic service included in this time). (Usconstitution.net) My interpretation of this is that anyone with one parent who is an American citizen and has spent at least five years in America before the aforementioned person's birth, with time spent serving the US as a diplomat or in the military also counting toward the five years.

Therefore, Obama meets the requirement to be the president, even if he was born on Mars!

Donald Trump says Obama should have released it long ago. I say to see above where I mention the year 2008.

New Rule
You should never publicly write an article about how stupid it is for the media is to talk about such things when there are more important things going on. You're the media, and you're talking about them. Redundant. Just ignore them. You know what kinds of things I'm NOT talking about right here.

Easter

2011-04-24T19:31:00.003-04:00

So I've noticed something about growing up in a fairly well-to-do family. As I get older, I expect (and eat) more. My parents provide less and have me do more. For the most part, that's ok, but holidays are an exception in my mind. I can't buy candy for myself; I have no money and no way of getting a job because I still can't drive. Yet, my parents have gone from buying me chocolate bunnies the size of my head and completely filling my Easter basket (yeah my family still does Easter baskets) with plastic eggs stuffed with candies. And a box of peeps. This year I get a bunny the size of my palm and four eggs kinda full of candy, and no peeps.

*sigh*

Well at least I get to eat literally as many oranges as I want; I had seven a couple days ago just because I could. I LOVE ORANGES!

So I've found that I complain about my life way too much. I know my problems seem silly or even ridiculous, but to me they are very important. My solution: start looking for the positives, and avoid my dad as much as possible. That sounds both good and bad, but since I usually start feeling depressed when he's around and my attempts to mend our strained relationship have failed, I'll just try to not cause problems with him and stay in my room when he's around.

No politics or New Rules today; nothing much to talk about.

Happy Day

2011-04-21T12:05:00.002-04:00

So I've decided that I should do a completely superficial examination of religion. This coincides with the early end of my school week, and it isn't an accident. So today, I'll put the three non-scriptural reasons I love religion in general.

1. Holidays!
Having a nation largely populated with one religion means nations protecting religious holidays and no school on those days. Thank the Gospels for Good Friday! Now if it were only socially acceptable to wear a skirt around on Fridays outside of the Indiana Academy.

2. Getting Stuff!
Christmas means presents. Halloween and Easter mean candy. Valentine's day means chocolates and ridiculous amountof cherry candy (and those nommy candy hearts). Need I say more?

3. Happy!
Practicing your faith, even if it isn't part of any one religion or if it doesn't have a name or specific practices, makes you feel good about yourself. The soul exists, even if it isn't necessary to life. Doing what you think is right makes you get a warm fuzzy feeling inside. That's your soul smiling.

Pretty much the only two reasons I don't like it is that religion causes prejudices, which can lead to war, and that so many people follow their religion blindly or interpreting their religious texts literally, rather than following their true faith. The latter often causes the former, so they go hand in hand.

New Rule
I never thought I'd say this, but the Tea Party needs to keep talking. The more they talk and the more Republicans listen, the less people will have respect for them. The Tea Party has such radically conservative views that no "moderate" will ever vote for a Tea Party candidate now that their true nature is being revealed and Republicans keep trying to woo them.

No Politics Day!

2011-04-18T22:06:00.005-04:00

I'm kinda tired of always doing politics. Instead, I'll explain why I have continued posting on my blog well after I lost the interest of, well, all of my original 3 readers. It's because I have no life.

I'll go through a typical week: Monday I have school, then about half the time I go to Teen Court in the evenings, which is a program where teenagers sentence real juveniles for minor crimes.

Tuesday I do absolutely nothing after school.

Wednesday I have youth group at my church in the evenings (more like I hang out with my friends in my church basement and do nothing).

Thursdays I do nothing after school.

Fridays I get yelled at incessantly to get my chores done so I'll be less busy Saturday.

Saturday I (kind of) do my extremely excessive chores, sometimes have something for school or a school-related event like lifeguarding, then leave for Fort Wayne as I get dragged to yet another of my dad's concerts. He's been forcing me to come to about 80% of the Fort Wayne Philharmonic's performances (he plays viola in the orchestra) since I was six. Classical music in general bores me like nothing else; my music has to have a catchy beat, words, or both.

Sundays I go to church then get dragged to go shopping, and I do nothing for the rest of my day.

You would think that with three to five empty evenings a week that I would be able to hang out with friends a lot, but I have only once ever in my life been allowed to go to a friend's house when my parents didn't directly benefit from it somehow.

New Rule
The Winklevoss brothers need to stop being snooty rich Harvard douchebags for one time in their life. Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss just settled with Facebook for Mark Zuckerberg supposedly stealing their idea. The catch? Their idea was different, he just used some of the concepts they had thought of to include to form a site with much more potential than what the Winklevii had in mind. Yet they settled, and yet the twins now are appealing for more. When you settle, it means you are willing to accept that dollar amount in compensation for how you feel you have been wronged. Why would you settle for less than you are willing to settle for? They're whiny attention whores.

Immigration: not a problem

2011-04-15T08:27:00.005-04:00

The immigration debate is still going, just in the background. I don't see why people consider it to be so much of a problem, personally. Yes, Mexicans are illegally crossing the border every day into the US. Can you blame them? Most are trying to escape the hopeless state Mexico is in. With drug cartels running day-to-day life down there, it's all people can do to get away. Admittedly, some of the people sneaking across the border are carrying drugs into the country. But most are honest people trying to make a life in the great, historically welcoming to immigrants United States.

Security along the border should be better. I have an idea how that could happen: pull the military out of costly, futile missions in the Middle East and bring them back to the US. Put bases along the border and patrol it better. It would put far fewer men's lives at risk, and would cost a small fraction of what we are spending on our war in Afghanistan.

That would deter many people from trying to cross the border illegally, and then we should also make our border crossings more open to immigrants. They aren't hurting anybody by entering the States; in fact, crime has gone down in Arizona since the immigration topic first became a big deal. Open our borders, and make obtaining citizenship easier. We can't lose like that.

New Rule
*brain broke* sorry I have no ideas for a new rule today.

Stubbornness annoys me

2011-04-14T22:48:00.004-04:00

So the Senate made an agreement on what their budget would be last weekend, and one question has been bothering me this whole time: why did Republicans almost make our entire federal government shut down over approximately .01 percent of the budget? That's right. They were whining and complaining because democrats wanted poor people to get sex ed and condoms. Query: how can you bitch about spending a little bit on a genuine service when you refuse to back down an inch when it is suggested to cut spending on military research projects a hundred times more expensive that have no practical use? It doesn't add up.

And stop saying "Abortion should always be illegal no matter what because it's killing a baby that could become the President or something really significant, unless it was conceived through incest or rape." Don't those illegitimately conceived children technically have just as much potential as the rest? Sorry, but supporting something halfway is like waiting till the end of a baseball game to decide who to cheer for. You're just fudging your words so you come out looking better in the end. Well, you just look like someone afraid of getting criticized for being on the losing side. And if you're curious, my opinion is that abortions should be legal to obtain but to get one you have to go through counselling to make sure you understand the full weight of the situation. I will never support someone's decision to get an abortion, but I believe that it is a pregnant woman's right to decide if she is willing to put her body through carrying and giving birth to a child.

New Rule
Don't fight with people over stupid stuff. If someone says something to you with a negative connotation to their words, don't get mad. Just roll with it and respond in a way they weren't expecting: with humor. That takes the edge off things, and it helps you have a better personal relationship with the person who first insulted you. It works.

Elections

2011-04-11T22:39:00.004-04:00

It's spring of 2011 and we're already catching election fever for the fall of 2012. Isn't it a bit early to get hyped about anything that far away? I only know of one person who has officially announced he is running for president in 2012, and that's President Obama! It just seems ridiculous that people would start worrying that far in advance. I'd like to announce, however, that I am officially starting my exploratory campaign committee for the goal of seeking the presidency in 2032!

Seriously, though. The reason Republicans have been dominant the past couple of years is they have new people to impress specifically: the Tea Party, a bunch of aging rednecks who refuse to back down an inch from what they consider to be right, even when they contradict themselves. The Democrats had been sitting pretty in their superior intellect for years before these teabaggers came along and started making fun of them for their fancy high-school diplomas. Now, they have to develop a new strategy. It's simple, really.

You come to a debate or a speech with a sheet for each talking point full of facts and statistics supporting your opinions, and every so often you rattle one off and explain. Then you can either laugh silently at your opponent as he fumbles to understand what you just said or give a well- structured response as to how your view better gets things done than his. If the latter doesn't work, bring up a way his party's platform is contradictory.

On issues, take a leaf out of Republican's books and rename things (but intelligently) to make their views look bad. For example, tax cuts to the wealthy don't do anything but cost the government money. That should now be called "tax spending" (that name was Bill Maher's idea, not mine). Also, Republicans hate Obamacare; we can hate "rich man's healthcare." Republicans pride in their military; we can call the war in Iraq "Iraq-gate."

And on the topic of military, don't back down when they say they refuse military funding cuts. The military puts the biggest hole in our nation's wallet but doesn't have to answer for it at all. That's just wrong. Spending on things like education and planned parenthood hasn't really gone up. Spending on the military has. Republicans want to cut spending, but they won't cut the things that should be. Instead, they prefer to fight problems plaguing this country like good health, education, creativity, and environmental friendliness.

I know, it sounds hard. Sarah Palin has proved to be one thing: an excellent dog trainer. Now they bark when she wants, and they bite if challenged in the least. That, however, is exactly the problem. When a small portion of people form the loudest voices, people will listen and their crazy ideas will spread. We have to put out the roaring fire before it spreads too far and becomes too great. So I ask you to stand against the uneducated, hillbilly, over-the-hill masses who will be wishing they hadn't fought so hard to repeal social security and Medicare in five years' time, before it's too late.

New Rule
Politicians need to leave gays alone. Studies show that a majority of Americans want gay marriage, and if Republicans want to continue to claim to represent the people, they should actually LISTEN to them. The LGBT community is only asking us to treatthem like everyone else. Is that really so hard? God created man and woman. All people are men or women. God loved all his creations. End of story.

Back in business!

2011-04-07T10:32:00.005-04:00

I'm back.

So you may have heard about some stuff going on in Libya. Apparently, we had like a two- day war with Libya, then left the UN or whoever to take over. Personally, I like this approach. It allows the conservatives who believe that America is supposed to police the world to rest knowing we went in to show who we supported, and it helps people like me to rest knowing that we aren't going to meddle in the world's business for any longer than we are asked.

Donald Trump seems to be the leading potential Republican nominee for the Presidency. He has done so by bringing back the "birther" rants. This point is moot. Even supposing he was born in Kenya, his mother (Ann Dunham) was from Kansas. If a child of American citizens is born abroad, he or she is technically considered a natural born citizen, and can therefore hold Presidential office. He meets that requirement perfectly. End of discussion.

Gabrielle Giffords has made a remarkable recovery. Nobody seems to care about that, though. It was a perfect chance to get legislation on gun control passed, and Democrats blew it. I don't want guns to be illegal; I want automatic pistols and assault rifles, which are made specifically to kill people, to be illegal to obtain no matter what.

New Rules
Companies can't complain that Google is pulling the reins on their droid software to tell them not to modify it too far. With no real standards, phonemakers can take this programming, shoot it to hell, and still market it as android right alongside amazing droid phones. Also, iPhone has the app store and a built-in iPod. It wins.

Health Care Holds Up!

2011-02-04T10:33:00.007-05:00

The suit challenging the constitutionality of the health care bill has been denied, thus upholding the legality of the Affordable Care Act. I am proud about this, because it will only help the President's poll numbers and hurt the Tea Party's (they have been challenging its constitutionality since before it was passed). Also, I was watching the movie "Supersize Me" in health class and one statement made a significant impact on me. Our current system is not healthcare: it does not help to ensure the good health of the people. It is sickcare, where people only get attention to their health once an issue has arisen.

Change of subject: political parties! Democracy is government of the people, which is what Republicans want (or so they say). A republic is representative government, which is what Democrats prefer. See any problem here? This exemplifies the complete switch in positions and relative orientations since the two parties began competing for power. Originally, Democrats were the more conservative party, and its mainstays were in the South. However, the southern states jumped party lines in the early 60s after civil rights were passed into law by a Democrat. They brought their ideas into the Republican party, and as the incumbent Republicans had no desire to associate themselves with the ex-Democrats who had only left the Democratic Party to show that they were against equality for all people, so they joined the more liberal Northern Democrats to form the modern Democratic Party.

Mission: not impossible!

2011-01-27T19:52:00.015-05:00

Drug legalization is an "entirely legitimate topic for debate," President Barack Obama said Thursday during his online YouTube town hall, in response to a question from a former deputy sheriff who has turned sour on the drug war.

In endorsing such a debate, Obama went further than any president has since the start of the war on drugs, which can be traced back at least to President Richard Nixon, but more realistically to the early 20th century, when the federal government began criminalizing drugs that had long been legal.

Obama, who said again toward the end of his answer that drug legalization is "worth a serious debate," lent legitimacy to a policy area that has long been relegated to the "unserious" corner of American political discourse.

His answer indicates an evolution in his administration's approach to the question of legalization. In the past, Obama has not treated the issue with the same respect.

In 2009, during a similar online event, the president paused to address the hundreds of questions that had been submitted regarding marijuana and drug policy. "Can I just interrupt, Jared, before you ask the next question, just to say that we -- we took votes about which questions were going to be asked and I think 3 million people voted," he said to aide Jared Bernstein. "I have to say that there was one question that was voted on that ranked fairly high, and that was whether legalizing marijuana would improve the economy -- (laughter) -- and job creation. And I don't know what this says about the online audience -- (laughter) -- but I just want -- I don't want people to think that -- this was a fairly popular question, we want to make sure that it was answered. The answer is no, I don't think that is a good strategy -- (laughter) -- to grow our economy in 2009."

His answer Thursday was hardly an endorsement of legalization, but it was nonetheless a marked turnaround. "I think this is a entirely legitimate topic for debate," he said. "I am not in favor of legalization. I am a strong believer that we need to think more about drugs as a public health problem."

The president's comments came in response to a question from MacKenzie Allen, a member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition and a retired deputy sheriff with law-enforcement experience in Los Angeles and King County, Washington. In this year's YouTube poll, Allen's question garnered twice as many votes as the second-most popular question online.

LEAP head Neill Franklin, a retired Baltimore narcotics cop, applauded Obama's comment but called for him to turn the words into action. The White House is preparing a budget to submit to Congress in the coming weeks, and how much priority it gives to drug treatment versus incarceration will be an indication of the direction the administration plans to take.

"The president talks a good game about shifting resources and having a balanced, public health-oriented approach, but it doesn't square with the budgets he's submitted to Congress," Franklin said in a statement. "The Obama administration has maintained the Bush-era two-to-one budget ratio in favor of prisons and prosecution over treatment and prevention. It doesn't add up. Still, it's historic that the president of the United States is finally saying that legalizing and regulating drugs is a topic worthy of discussion. But since the president remains opposed to legalization, it's clear that the people are going to have to lead the way. Police officers and innocent civilians are dying every single day in this drug war; it's not a back-burner issue."

Who is it really committing "out-of-control spending" techniques?

2011-01-27T08:11:00.010-05:00

Michele Bachmann needs to get a grip. In her response to President Obama's State of the Union Speech, she seems to have all the answers. In fact, she knows exactly how to fix our problems! According to her, we simply need enact an "all of the above" policy to lower gas prices while decreasing our dependency on foreign oil and by increasing American energy production. It sounds nice, but so does communism. When you think about it, you will realize that she wants the government to fund billions of dollars for development of American oil rigs. She also suggests that reducing our dependency on foreign oil will not interfere with the lowering of gas prices. That is dually wrong in that foreign oil, just like labor, is cheaper than processing and refining it here, so prices will go up due to that; she also seems to think that gas stations can just lower prices when they can't because it is the oil companies making the massive profits and vastly overcharging the gas stations to further gouge for profits, and the gas stations have to charge more to even stay afloat. She doesn't seem to have a problem with the oil companies causing a large portion of the world's problems. These include, but are not limited to, promoting global warming, destroying ecosystems, costing people massive amounts of money in order to line their own pockets, and lobbying against renewable energy research. Bachmann, get your hands outside the lobbyists' pants and into a massive amount of black, toxic sludge that could easily have completely killed almost all life in the Gulf of Mexico several months ago. This sludge is called OIL, which you are fighting so hard to defend.

New Rule
Cut military spending. It's very simple: we are fighting wars in the middle of the desert, and some Tea Party-backed members of congress worry that ending funding for the development of a $14.4 billion amphibious landing craft/tank will endanger our troops when they raid suspected terrorist hideouts in the middle of a city. How, might I ask? It simply makes no sense whatsoever to spend $550 billion a year on the Pentagon's to research technologies which will go completely unused, and this spending doesn't include the $150 billion spent a year on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan!

Republicans: the anti-smart party

2011-01-21T10:37:00.013-05:00

Republicans really hate the world, and Democrats are afraid to fix it.
I finally got the HTML table tag to work! Now I can put my mind on more important stuff like school! The Republicans have finally announced what they want to cut from the budget. They refuse to cut a cent from the defense budget, instead preferring to cut funds to educational and environmental organizations. A few of these organizations and endowments they want to cut funding to are: Corporation for Public Broadcasting- $445 million in cut funding National Endowment For the Arts- $167.5 million National Endowment For the Humanities- $167.5 million Technology Innovation Program- $70 million Department of Energy Grants to States for Weatherization- $530 million Applied Research at Department of Energy- $1.27 billion Energy Star- $52 million So basically, they're quite literally trying to destroy the world and not provide any means for the Democrats to clean up afterward.	New Rule The Democrats need to stand up more to the Republicans. Proof? They have been a little more the past few months since the elections, and their approval ratings have gone up. The people like to see a strong, idealized person who will stand up for what they believe in. That got Barack Obama elected President! His recent return to this form also has helped his approval rating go above his disapproval rating for the first time in over a year! Not only does courage to stand up against a stubborn opponent help in the polls, but it also helps push an agenda you want. When you are afraid to suffer harsh words from the other side for taking a stand for what you believe in, you will receive harsh words from both sides for being a wimp. By standing up to fight, the other side will take you more seriously, and perhaps listen better to your arguments rather than filibuster just to show who's really in control. Furthermore, by standing up to the opposition in Congress will lead to more of your party's ideas and less of the other party's in legislation. I only wish rules around the house worked like that: the more I challenge my parents, the less restrictions they can put on me! That would be the life. stop to daydream about that:) then check facebook Democrats, grow a pair and get shit done.
Thanks, Misha

F*** Westboro.

2011-01-11T09:35:00.005-05:00

Today, I am back. School got back in session a while back, but I had a continued lazy period and didn't post anything. I have a tirade against Westboro today, because they are the supreme voice of douchebaggery in the universe.

Westboro Baptist Church has stunned me once again with their gall and lack of compassion by announcing that they would be picketing the funerals of the six shot dead in the shooting that grievously wounded AZ Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and that they supported the shooter, asking for more shooters and more dead bodies. In response, I wrote a song to the tune of the children's song " Jesus Loves Me" from their perspective.

"Jesus hates me, this I know.
For Westboro tells me so.
Rather than preach of God's love,
They say He smites from above.

(chorus)
Yes, Jesus hates me.
Yes, Jesus hates me.
Yes, Jesus hates me,
Westboro tells me so.

They are right about all things.
Else, why would they say such things?
"You're too faggy", "you just smell."
All of Sweden goes to Hell.

(chorus)"

Everything I said about Westboro (except the smelly part) can be found on the WBC-owned website cheerily named godhatestheworld.com. Yes, they literally think all Swedes go to Hell.

A longer version of this is on facebook, but as there isn't much else to write about these days, I copied and pasted the rough draft straight into here.

Also, I be happy because it be likely that my school day will be cut short.

*sigh*

It's a regular blizzard out right now, and the radar says it won't stop for hours. Hoo-rah! On days like this, we will often leave school early before the roads become undrivable. Me happy.

New Rule
Palin needs to stop being the symbol of violence in America. She puts crosshairs over someone, and next thing you know, that person has been shot in the head. Coincidence?

I be back now!

2011-01-05T08:55:00.005-05:00

I decided to take a break from this during Christmas break, partially because I couldn't work on it while bored in class and partially because I've been really lazy as of late. However, I'm back in school and my work ethic has a pulse again. I probably would have gotten back to working on it yesterday or the day before if I had Internet, but my dad didn't set up our new computer or our router (which he pulled the plug on three days before for whatever reason) until yesterday evening.

Today is going to be a bunch of short rants to get stuff off my mind that I've been wanting to talk about for a while. Just bear with me.

Now to serious stuff. Bristol Palin recently bought a house in Maricopa, AZ. To most, that is no big deal, because it is Arizona after all. It's big to me. A few years ago my family bought a vacation home. In Maricopa, AZ. Just knowing that a member of that family owns land in the same city as my family makes me sick to my stomach. I'll still go there, if only because I love the desert.

Football! It was a down and up weekend for me as football goes. Michigan lost 52-14 in the Gator Bowl to Mississippi State as all five Big Ten teams with new years day bowls lost. However, I got to see the Colts win in an emotional game against Tennessee to secure the #3 seed in the AFC.

I'm sitting through my German III final right now and am really bored because I finished 20 minutes ago. I did not study, this is my weakest class, and even my final for this was ridiculously easy. I had some matching definitions to words and then I had to speak four times in a socratic seminar. I was one of the first ones done.

I only have one final left, and it's algebra 2. I remember how to do everything except vertex form in parabolic functions. I'll be fine.

I would have put two hours of work into my academy application yesterday, but thanks to my dad never letting me do more than get settled in to work before pulling me away to work on a "project" with him several times, I got one sentence written. I want to finish it within two weeks, but at this rate it'll take two lifetimes. Sometime soon it will be on facebook so it can be peer edited. I want it to be good enough to guarantee I'll get in.

I love my christmas presents more every day. I'm wearing a shirt that is basically made of LOST references. I love that show. My school stuff is in a folder that looks like an old school "my documents" folder for windows. I translated my /dev/ blanket and it's all jibberish except two lines that say "blanket." my life is awesome right now.

New Rule
Norwell High School is heavy on the high. Not only because nearly half the school has gotten high at least once and at least a quarter are serious druggies, either. The staff seems to be on drugs too, because our last three finals are scheduled like this: period 7 today, period 2 tomorrow, and period 4 Friday. That comes after the schedule changing four times in two days the week before break. Shrooms on me, baby!

Christmas!

2010-12-25T19:42:00.001-05:00

So, today is Christmas, and as a present to those who follow and yet never seem to read my blog, I'll not really do anything. I'll just sorta talk about stuff I got.

Being a serious nerd, I am proud to say my geek cred was solidified today. I received a blanket- covered in binary code front and back- and that wasn't the nerdiest thing I got! Definitely the most nerdy thing I got was a tshirt. It has a built in wi-fi detector and displays it all on the shirt. The most fun thing I got was a magnetic accelerator cannon that shoots metal balls, all thanks to the power of potential energy and magnetism. I also got a lightsaber lamp, a camera, and a laptop case that looks like an old-school "my documents" folder from a PC. I don't even own a laptop, but who really cares? It has a pin on it that looks like the "waiting" hourglass from old PCs.

Engineering is fun.

2010-12-23T12:22:00.004-05:00

These are some views of the house I designed using Autodesk Revit software for my civil engineering class. pretty cool, no?

Cancellation!

2010-12-22T21:19:00.002-05:00

In celebration of school being cancelled today, on what would have been the last day before winter break, I will cancel today's post. This is all there is for today.

Final(s)y

2010-12-21T10:13:00.004-05:00

Finals week!

So far, I've had an essay for English, a German II test, and a work-together-in-class worksheet for Civil Engineering. I have a Chem exam at the end of the day, and tomorrow I'll have my Algebra II and German III exams. I'm pretty worried about the vocab for the latter, but otherwise, I feel fresh and ready to do well on all my tests (I fell asleep in second period today). My brain will surely be fried with my face frozen in a derp position by the end of school tomorrow, though, so never fear.

Now, to Wikileaks. Julian Assange is no sex offender. How could he keep something like that a secret? This is a guy who has built his life on telling secrets, and people are accusing him of doing something that he would have to cover up. He doesn't know how! When you accuse the worst secret-keeper in the world of sexual offenses, you know they're just looking for excuses to get him away from his contacts before he can expose something about you.

And while Wikileaks uncovers that which governments and corporations don't want you to know, and that attacks the integrity and reputation of those people or groups. It could even cause major disputes against other countries! Oh no! Or how about this: countries start using Wikileaks as their new mode of warfare, uncovering and exposing their enemies' secrets, and having a third party determine winners of battles (rounds of secret uncoverings) and, eventually, a winner upon the dropping of an intel 'nuke' or just the overwhelming upper hand on one side? Sounds pretty good to me!

New Rule
Police don't need to try to find Lindsay Lohan's stalker. She's being charged with battery! Just let him make the mistake of coming close to her and he'll feel swift and painful justice between the legs. Then, arrest Lohan and just put her in an institute somewhere.

America the Bigoted

2010-12-20T23:12:00.003-05:00

I know, I already posted today, but I have to post this link. It perfectly demonstrates how we American Christians aren't on the high ground at all.

Westboro.

2010-12-20T07:59:00.003-05:00

Today's whole post is one very long new rule, and I wrote it a while back but just found it this morning when I was browsing some files.

New Rule

The people of Westboro Baptist Church need to understand something. First, you cannot say that soldiers are only dying because we allow homosexuality in our country. Then, it is inexcusable to be trying to use the bible to explain the hatred and persecution of another. Third, the lord God is a loving God and that is proven in the entire Bible. Last, please quit your inbreeding! These points can easily be proven in a few short paragraphs.

First of all, soldiers die because they are getting shot at! God's wrath has nothing to do with the direction bullets fly. If soldiers only died in countries that allowed gays, then the crusades would have been bloodless wars, as all nations back then had the closed-minded idea that man lusting for another man was a curse, and dealt with those men in gruesome manners. Thus, my point is proven.

Next, it should be noted that the bible calls for peaceful actions. Does it tell of God smiting the sinners? No. It tells of useful lessons, like 'love your neighbor as yourself' and 'blessed are the peacemakers'. Yet these fanatical people are convinced that the wrath of the Lord is behind this, even though God loves all and would never kill for wrongdoings. You can say, "he punished Adam and Eve, why wouldn't he punish us"? Well, you see, Adam and Eve had no courts to punish them. They were alone. This proves my point in both their argument of God's wrath and their defense of their discrimination.

Now, to the easy one. When a church's population primarily chooses to marry within the church and most of that church is from the same family, you will end up with Westboro Baptist Church claiming that gays are the source of all our problems. That sound familiar? Oh, wait. That's right. The Nazis used that ploy on the Jews in order to gain popularity. It's so simple that even the members of a church whose spouses are also their first cousins can get it. You pick a minority that is generally disliked, find a feature about it that causes the discord, then find some texts or other sources that supposedly 'prove' your point. Wow. That's pretty pathetic.

Overall, their claims are extremely outrageous. In fact, they are so much so that they are considered to be too conservative even to Sean Hannity (yes, he looks like a commie next to these people). These examples show that the members of Westboro deserve to be in a mental facility, not preaching and protesting on the streets. So, the last thing to be said about these psychopaths would have to be, "WTF?!"

Thanks,
-Misha

Blergh.

2010-12-17T07:48:00.008-05:00

Ugh. I feel awful. And I'm even at school today despite that! Grr.

Why might I feel awful?

Well, I had a swim meet last night. It was against a mediocre team, but we were no match for them. My team is terrible. And, we were already sore when we started, because our guys did our traditional "speedo run." If you can't tell what that is from the name, then I'll tell you. A speedo run is where all the guys on our team run around outside in the snow in nothing but speedos and have snowball fights, etc. This is what we call fun. Then, during the meet, I personally had the worst meet of my life because I was so tired and we hadn't had any practices this week. I added 13 seconds in the 200 yard Individual Medley and 7 in the 100 yard breaststroke. Hoo-rah! Not. >:(

And in politics, many democrats are berating President Obama for his (finally) reaching of a bipartisan bill. He got elected in 2008 largely because he was good at keeping everyone satisfied, if not totally happy. He gained large amounts of support for his willingness to "go across the aisle" and make deals with any willing to listen. Now, as President of the United States, he isn't allowed to? I had previously thought that partisanship was mainly in the conservative end of the spectrum, but now I know the democrats are just as bad. They just haven't had the guts to speak up! But yesterday, Roy Sekoff, editor of the Huffington Post, went on the 'Ed' show and said Obama "is just not that into forcing the wealthy to pay their fair share." Wrong. He wants to, but he knows that without giving certain concessions to republicans, who are taking control in less than two months, nothing will get done and passed into law in the next two years!

You know this is the most partisan congress since the time of fistfights on the floor of the House when liberals are filibustering a liberal- led bill! At this point, things aren't divided by party lines, it's every man or woman for themselves in congress! The only people who seem to stick together on everything are the people who don't want to think for themselves: the Tea Party.

New Rule
People cannot say President Obama is a Muslim or that he's a terrorist. Barack attended a church within the United Church of Christ, Trinity UCC in Chicago, until moving to D.C. You probably recognize the name from the election, when Obama took a lot of flak thanks to his pastor's words, in which one phrase was taken out of context and used against him. Jeremiah Wright was the pastor, and within a sermon about the wrongs America had done in the years before, he said "God damn America." Of course, people took this the wrong way.

On terrorism, many people think that Obama has ties to Muslim terrorists in the Middle East. Stupid. His one (possible) tie to anyone who has ever utilized terrorist techniques is William Ayers, a former bomb-setter for the "Underground Weathermen," a terrorist group he (Ayers) was a leading member of in the 60s and 70s. No real evidence can be found to support this connection, as Obama was just a child during Ayer's terrorist career. Also, since then, Ayers has become an upstanding citizen, college professor, and even won Chicago's Citizen of the Year Award in 1997! Obama sure has some dangerous friends, doesn't he?

Thanks,
-Misha

Byah!

2010-12-15T22:13:00.005-05:00

This post will be just a lot of stuff about me, because I want to get to bed soon.

First off, the days I haven't posted over the last couple weeks have almost all been due to swim meets. So I've decided to announce that on days I have meets, I will have no posts. I'm just too tired afterward.

Also, at my meet yesterday, I got to hang out with my girlfriend because she is Bluffton's girls swim team manager (we were swimming at Bluffton). I felt really good and had great times. Coincidence? I also have a lot of friends at Bluffton because they're only about 10-15 miles from us and a lot of them swim for the same summer team I do. Good times.

Finals are coming up. Luckily, one of my 6 classes (should be 7, but I have a study hall) aren't having any finals, and I feel very confident about three of them. I'm not so sure about German III, because I'm taking it at the same time as German II. Still, I feel like I'll do fairly well even on that test. I can't wait till I'm out of this hellhole of a school. My other tests are in Algebra II, Project Lead The Way Civil Engineering and Architecture (CEA) and Chemistry I. I don't have a test in English Honors.

New Rule
Today's new rule is that there is no new rule for today.

This just fits perfectly!

MAS*H

2010-12-13T20:51:00.004-05:00

The past couple of days, I've been watching a lot of the show M*A*S*H (I have all 11 seasons) and some have had very interesting underlying messages. For example, the episode "Peace On Us" brings up an interesting point: why negotiate peace? The end of a war shouldn't mean the working out of every little possible technicality in the peace treaty? If you're losing ground, be happy with what you still have. If you're gaining ground, don't be greedy. You shouldn't have been fighting in the first place! Hell, instead of arguing over who gets what, if you don't belong there, then leave. It really is that simple. What, are you afraid that the people you were fighting will hold a grudge over you not killing their people anymore?

Also, I saw on the news today that a judge has ruled the requirement for all citizens to have health insurance to be unconstitutional. This brings up a scary thought: there are actually people who want the right not to have access to decent healthcare? Literally, it says that if you can't afford private health insurance, then you can get public insurance for little to nothing. How is that bad? People just don't want to pay the government to do them a service because they think that government is, by default, bad. Without government, we would still be what we were in the early 1780s: a joke with no respect. That is what the republicans are trying to do. Sound like fun?

New Rule
As Sharron Angle said to Harry Reid in a debate before last month's election, I say to John Boehner: "Man up!" Enough said.

Wow, I have to say I'm quite impressed.

2010-12-10T19:30:00.005-05:00

This blog, while not the most famed on the web, has gotten attention from some... unexpected sources. Some examples:

Pageviews, by country:
United Kingdom:10
Singapore:9
Croatia:5
Russia:3
Denmark:2
Netherlands:1
South Africa:1

I have also received pageviews from 6 browsers and at least 4 different operating systems. I would not have expected that. XD So anyways, my post today is going to be different.

How?

I am going to side with the Republicans on something.

You ~~heard~~ read right.

The new tax cut bill, while unsavory to me in some ways (such as extending tax cuts for the wealthy), will do what the democrats want. And yet, many democrats are unwilling to vote for it. This seems strongly reminiscent of the debate over health insurance reform, but with the roles reversed. In this case, more leading republicans are in favor of it than are democrats, despite President Obama's fervent advocacy of said bill.

So, for nearly the first time since I began following politics to any degree, I am proud to say that republicans are finally showing willingness to put together and support a bipartisan bill. On that note, I am thoroughly disappointed with the democrats' inability to be as unified as the republicans in support of this bill. Yes, some republicans are against it, but as a whole they are supporting it.

In the end, this bill just needs to be passed, and quickly, so we can move on to fixing another problem in America. I mean, seriously? After two years of nothing taking less than like six months of debate due to constant filibusters in the Senate, they get it done well enough to serve both parties' agendas to a degree, and now the democrats are against it? Come on.

New Rule
Sarah Palin needs to get a grip. She's back to talking about "death panels" once again. These "death panels" she speaks of are, according to her, where government officials get to decide whether or not a person lives or dies.

The real effect they can have is that government officials will sit down with patients living on life support or with uncurable and/or terminal or their families if the patient is unable to conference and the doctor primarily in charge of that patient's care and discussing costs, realistic views on life expectancy, and other intangibles in order to come to a conclusion on what their position on the end of that patient's life would be.

The decision would still lie solely in the hands of the patient or his/her family, and would provide a simple and reliable structure to some currently and previously sticky situations such as the case with Terri Schiavo. It would save both hospitals and patients/family large sums of money, both in legal cases and in the hospital itself.

Sarah Palin, I dare you to come up with a way to call that death panels, when it's the family making the decision.

Thanks,
-Misha

Post-Hiatus!

2010-12-08T21:16:00.006-05:00

Hey.

I took a short break from my blog because I have had a really crazy schedule recently and the past couple of days I have basically just done my best to do nothing when at home.

Why?

To make up for relaxation time lost at other times. I have averaged about a half hour at home between 7 AM and 8 PM on weekdays for the past week and a half. Technically my dad says I should go to bed at 8:30, but I can't get to sleep that early, so I'll just get on facebook or my blog till at least 10:30.

Now you know why I was inactive, I'll get to the meat of my post.

I was reading an article posted by on a friend's blog (thanks for posting this, Chris!) on Sarah Palin, and while I found it wildly entertaining, I won't say any bad things about her. Instead, I'll talk about what wimps the (ralatively non-prejudiced aka not FOX) news media are. Many republicans call such networks as CBS, NBC, and ABC the "liberal media."

They need to take a stand. I don't care if they deny those claims and continue their unbiased news or if they start openly supporting the left as FOX does the right as much as I do that they choose one stance (although ideally I would want one to go liberal, at least a bit, and have the others stay neutral), because right now FOX can say whatever they want, and with no response whatsoever from the other news channels, it really seems as though they are just giving in to the accusations and lies being told against them.

That being said, I think the so-called liberal media needs to take a real stance. Otherwise, I'll know that the real reason they are considered liberal is that they refuse to stand up to a fight! And yes, that was a slight toward the party that more closely compares to my values and opinions. You see, the democratic party seems to have a strategy of " let's let them show for themselves how stupid they are and we'll win that way" strategy. The problem is, with nobody to stand up against them and make a firm statement with prepared statistics about how wrong they are, people will follow the group that makes the better (sounding) promises.

Modern republicans are idiots; modern democrats are pussies. Enough said.

See, I didn't make any direct references to Palin!

I was saving it for my new rule! :D

New Rule
Sarah Palin is truly a national traitor. Anyone with such obvious goals of polarization of our government and offensive overreactions to harmless jokes and (mis)quotes had better be prepared to tell exactly what they are wont to change, down to exactly what they would cut or other ways they would decrease spending, because what she is saying about President Obama would have been treason, a capital offense, in the old English system. In a time when our country needs to be able to be unified, in the midst of one war and the end of another, as well as a massive ongoing economic crisis that is just beginning to recover, she is telling her followers to resent anything done by Obama and to be completely disestablishmentarian. If you had to choose, would you call that unifying and peacemaking or dividing and aggravating? If you still need more evidence, go here.

Thanks,
-Misha

3,017 words

2010-12-05T15:51:00.012-05:00

I always hear that a picture is worth 1,000 words. Well then, here's 3 pictures=3,000 words.

Thanks,
-Misha

Socialism FTW!

2010-12-02T23:20:00.008-05:00

Politics. Mmm. Not many words bring more pain to the heart of the average citizen than that. And too many teenagers have 'who cares?' on their info under "political views" on facebook. Who cares? I do, and you should! Sure, it's hard to pay attention to something that will play a major part in your development as well as the country itself! But still, what sounds like meaningless bickering is really debates based on opposing morals and views in which the winner of the battle can directly affect the country as we know it. Important much? Now, I said that to prepare you for a rant about what I want our political situation to be and how terrible ours currently is.

This country needs socialism. Why? Many people think socialism is just watered down communism. It's not, by a long shot. In socialism, you take the best of capitalism, including free enterprise and ability to earn as much as you are willing to work for, and communism, where everyone has the right to public services such as healthcare and others already covered by our nation and restrictions to keep pricing from getting out of control. So basically, you take the things most loved about each, mix them together and if they clash at all then they mix to form a reasonable combination of both. Where capitalism calls for total corporate deregulation, socialists realize that this is a bad idea because prices can easily spike for no apparent reason. Likewise, where communism relies on total equality in pay and other parts of life, socialism merely looks to cap maximum earnings and raise minimum earnings. And, socialists see the need for everyone to have access to healthcare, which capitalists do not.

Our current system is terrible. We currently have almost $14 trillion in debt, and it is not President Obama's fault. The biggest thing he got done was the TARP bailouts, and every cent has been paid back. Besides that, the unemployment rate has stabilized, the military has almost no presence in Iraq anymore (hooray for peace!), and legal discrimination against homosexuals in the military is near its end. Under Bush, we got into two wars, gave away more tax dollars than we had in the treasury, failed to address major economic and ecological disasters promptly or effectively, and doubled our national debt. Sure, the debt has gotten worse over the last two years, but who can expect things to turn around immediately? Obama isn't perfect, but he's much closer to socialist than Bush, and he has begun to rebuild our collapsed nation.

Fact is, our economy started taking a nose dive when Bush decided that it was smart to decrease federal taxes while fighting two wars (which have bloated our spending dramatically).

Fact is, our economy has stabilized and is beginning to return to normal.

Fact is, in a socialist nation we would have never gotten into the mess we are in now because the business sector wouldn't have collapsed, we could have quickly and effectively dealt with any disaster such as hurricane Katrina or the BP oil spill, and there would be lesser unemployment because of stability in businesses.

Fact is, I can prove socialism works by pointing to Europe, to Canada, and especially to Sweden (yes, I know Sweden is in Europe). Sweden is currently one of the happiest nations in the world, and they have a socialist system. Can it work in a country this big with so many variables that smaller nations don't have? Canada.

Need I say more?

New Rule
Christina Aguilera needs to realize nobody cares about her anymore. When you're starring in a movie where you're playing an erotic performer, you're over the hill. When you're willing to costar in that movie with Cher, you're desperate. When you're not even an actress and you're just doing this to show that you're diverse or whatever, you're just sad. Come on, a burlesque dancer/singer? Cher as your mentor or something? Go back to singing your bad music. At least then people only had to put up with your voice.

Thanks,
-Misha

HTML!!!!!!!

2010-11-30T10:14:00.016-05:00

Yesterday's's post comes to you from the power of HTML! Rather than be boring and do all the formatting using 'enter' and the 'bold' button, etc., I hand-typed all the formatting in with HTML coding. I actually am typing this intro after I finished the rest of the post, to explain what's different about the post (even though you, the reader, can't tell), and to get your minds on the topic of HTML. I was bored during school, so I decided to expand my vocabulary in this ever so fun programming language. Today's lesson: columns! I learned that columns are much more difficult than I thought, requiring no less than 5 kinds of tags. As a bare minimum. There is one to create a table, another to specify how many columns you want, and yet another to tell the width of each column (you must repeat for each column you use). Then you have to tell it that you are creating a row, and then you have to use another tag to tell it you are beginning to input the data for that particular info box. Herp derp derp. But hey, it looks really sexy when you're done! I would use it in this post, but I'm still figuring out some of the formatting. So anyways, I'm hoping to learn some HTML5 if I have the time. It's not the programming that matters so much to me as it is the challenge and benefits to come out of it.

Yesterday was crazy. I was only home for about 15 minutes (just long enough to shove some food in my face) before heading back to school for a swim meet. Against the best men's team in the region. I'm the best in both of my individual events for my school. Knowing that, you'll know just how good the other team is when I say I didn't beat any of them, and the only reason I didn't get last in everything is because I swam one of my teammates in the individual medley. In that race, I finished 28 seconds behind the race winner. I did better in breaststroke, coming within a quarter of a second of the worst Carroll swimmer in that event. After the meet, I had to pick up my sister from her ballet rehearsal, which happened to run an hour late. I crawled back into my house at 10:15, checked my facebook, and fell asleep. Sorry. I'm sure I left you devastated. But life is life, and while I haven't been very diligent about posting, I often find myself thinking about topics to cover in my next post.

New Rule
Words can't mean one thing and be another. For example, fancy is such a plain word. Boring. Well now, I have a new word for it: optomolojingjong! It may appear to be complete gibberish, but that's how all words started. Isn't it just an optomolojingjong word? Another is abbreviate. Such a long word to mean "shorten," isn't it? It should be replaced by aber. It's based on the original word, unlike my previous word, and it is appropriately short. Not to mention, your tongue won't get tied just trying to get across that you are trying to shorten a word.

Thanks,
-Misha

Best. Weekend. Ever.

2010-11-29T22:17:00.006-05:00

Sorry for not posting Saturday or yesterday; I was too busy on Saturday and had a completely blank mind all yesterday. Today I don't really have anything too meaningful to talk about, so I'll just talk about my weekend.

Let's start with Thursday: Thanksgiving. It was a huge rush; I was up by 7:30 to help prepare dinner. By 10:30 AM it was ready, so we ate. We left at noon for a 12:45 showing of Deathly Hallows. Best movie ever.(although it is challenged by The Social Network). The movie ended at 3:15 and I promptly went to Best Buy. From then til 5 AM Friday I was out in the cold (and often rain) and I didn't leave the parking lot for another hour after that. Awesome day.

Friday: I didn't go back to sleep Friday until my normal time, but I didn't do anything special either. Great day.

Saturday: lots of cleaning. We picked up my girlfriend at her house and brought her to our place to watch the Michigan-Ohio State football game. She's a big OSU fan. I love Michigan. These two schools are hated rivals. Problematic? Not at all. Michigan lost by 30, but I was barely paying attention to the game (I had better things to look at (and yes my girlfriend and I were both fully dressed the entire time)). :) needless to say, best day in a long time (it helps that I hadn't seen her since mid-October).

Sunday: slept in. Watched football. Did nothing. Visited the Academy when we were takin my brother down there! Chatted with one of my best buds there:) Hung out for a while. Colts got owned. I didn't care. Flippin' awesome day!

New Rule
Lady Gaga needs to donate her wardrobe to a museum when she's done with a particular costume. Why? They're the only ones who will take that shit! But please, just a photo of the meat dress is more than enough.

Thanks,
-Misha

Grey Squirrel

2010-11-26T21:12:00.003-05:00

Hello all. Before the rest of my post today, I'll tell a short story that I'll be making up as I go.

Once upon a time, there was a grey squirrel smarter than the rest that realized "what if we were to share our extra food with those who have less so that all of us survive better as a whole?" The rest of the squirrels liked the idea, so they started spreading it to the other animals of the forest. As the idea started to grow, a group of foxes heard. They were particularly territorial and didn't want to share, so they began spreading the story as well, but with one seemingly small addition: that the squirrels would try to take over the whole forest.

Many animals got angry and supported the foxes. While some remained open thinkers and kind to the less fortunate, about as many took extra care to prevent any others from getting to their food supply and made up horrible rumors about the squirrels and their new ideas. These principles started showing up everywhere: the squirrels and their supporters would help any other creature of the forest if it was hurt, but the foxes' side would only help those who could pay with extra food. However, the foxes promised prosperity and total individual freedom. The foxes knew that their way was suited to them, but most animals could not survive like that. Still, they spread their way so they could be powerful. To be continued... (not really)

I wrote this to be intentionally similar to today's politics. What would have happened if the foxes' side were to outnumber that of the squirrels? And vice versa? Now apply these concepts to politics. Which side will leave us better off in the end?

New Rule
Nobody is allowed to be as creative as Sarah Palin. Here I was thinking I'd have nothing to put in my new rules section for two posts straight, but then I read something that I knew I would have to talk about. I thought Palin had run out of ways to be stupid. I was dead wrong. She brought cookies to a school, and while that doesn't seem bad, the purpose of this action does: she brought them in protest of the fight against obesity. She was angry at some school district in PA for considering banning sweets at school (they actually weren't). First of all, what's so bad about being required to eat healthy? Is she afraid that they'll begin brainwashing us through our food?! Also, I don't really get how someone who eats a low-calorie diet and runs daily can logically support the right to get fat and die of a heart attack or type II diabetes.

Thanks,
-Misha

Thanksgiving

2010-11-26T10:27:00.005-05:00

Sorry about not posting yesterday; I was busy from the time I woke up until, well, I didn't sleep. I hope I didn't disappoint my loyal follower. You see, I got up at 7:30 AM and immediately began helping make thanksgiving dinner so we could eat at 10:30 in the morning. I then left home before noon and saw the 12:45 showing of Deathly Hallows. I went straight from there to Best Buy, and I spent the next 15 hours out in the cold and the rain waiting for the store to open at 5 AM today. FUN!

So my post today in lieu of yesterday's nonexistent one will be about thanksgiving. Not about what I'm thankful for; that stuff is for elementary school projects and shit like that. Instead, I'll talk about what thanksgiving means to me and some other stuff. So, let's start with the first thanksgiving. It started with a bunch of natives sharing their food with cold European pilgrims, and it was remembered as thanksgiving because they were thankful that they had even survived. Everyone knows that; I just wanted to bring it to the forefront of your memories.

To me, there is a day called Thanksgiving in which we eat turkey and other foods people traditionally have on that day. Then there is thanksgiving itself, which should be celebrated every day. I'm not saying something like 'count your blessings,' I'm just saying that you should never be sad about your place in life. Be thankful for what you have; don't mourn over that which you don't. America these days is very ungrateful as a whole, myself included. We have come to take nearly everything for granted. And yet, we never seem to give back to nature, which provides us with our sustenance, our shelter in some cases, and even medicine.

We mine for minerals simply because they are there with no thought towards the ecosystems there. We drive cars and assume that the rising temperatures here on Earth are natural. They're not. Earth takes over a million years to go through one natural hot/cold cycle. Our last hot period was 10,000 years ago. What are the odds that we just happened to naturally get hotter again? Science would suggest that it's nearly impossible. How is this happening, then? Hmm?

This is why I say we should start out by being more grateful to nature by taking less and giving more. It may be too late to save our planet, but it's never too late to try.

Thanks,
-Misha

A little outdated, but it works.

2010-11-24T21:57:00.006-05:00

My previous posts have all been new and off the top of my head, but today I am tired and I already have a sufficient argumentative essay for today's subject. I wrote it to be a speech as part of a research paper this spring, but it works well alone. It is outdated; I wrote it in March over what was then a recently-passed bill. So here it is, entitled, "A 15-year-old's Case for Health Care Reform."

"First off, let me say that I am ecstatic about the passing of Health Insurance Reform. It only saddens me that Senator Edward Moore Kennedy did not live to see it become a reality, and that it took so long to get it passed. It will save millions of young adults and elderly people from having health care costs burning holes in their pockets at times when they can barely afford a living anyways. I tell you, this reform is an excellent idea, which is why nearly every non-monetarily corrupted health care worker in the nation wants a better health care system. This is the reason that Republican politicians hate it: it does not allow the doctors to be greedy, and they feed on greed. Of course these are the same people who are walking, talking oxymorons: they seek to gain federal power to take away that very same federal power. Now, the bill that just passed is important, but as President Obama said before he signed it into law, it only constitutes being considered Health Insurance Reform. This bill's passage makes me optimistic about what may be done soon, but scared at what happens if we cannot finish the whole thing once and for all.

Why should we not have Health Care Reform? As it is, America spends the most as a percent of GDP of all the developed countries in the world. Also, our Native Americans and military veterans get a health care system equivalent to that of Britain- Government-paid doctors and free medicine, all paid for out of tax dollars. This is what Kennedy's life was devoted to: passing health care bills that would continue our nation's image as a world leader in all aspects, and keeping our nation happy and healthy. Alas, so many people find that it is not what they want, which is why I tell you the following tragic story.

My mom is a nurse in the surgical trauma intensive care unit at Parkview Hospital in Fort Wayne, IN. On Saturday, February 13, 2010, she had a patient admitted who had been out handing out flyers for his Jehovah's Witness church as recently as that morning. Later, he went to McDonald's. While eating there he had a massive hemorrhagic stroke. He was a good man with high blood pressure, and because he had been laid off recently, he could not afford his blood pressure medicine in the current health care system. That proved to be the death of him. Keep that on your minds. Do you want to be the cause of these people who are not old enough to be covered by Medicare but old enough that they are considered expendable as employees? I think not.

He had been making plans to start eating better, exercising, and taking his medicine after he started a new job. The punch line: his new job would have started on Monday, February the 15th. Because the 41 Republican members of the Senate have sworn to prevent the President from getting anything at all done during his time in office, this man died of a stroke that could have, and should have, been prevented. This is not politics, this is a matter of saving the lives of millions of Americans who cannot afford to pay their own health care because they were laid off at no fault of their own. This is a cry out to all Americans. We should not and cannot allow our country to die. If you have any heart at all, you will support any coming Health Care Reform bill, and you will pray that someday, we will have a functional health care system that is not letting people die of easily preventable causes. Remember, this 54-year-old man may have gone on to live to a ripe old age, had he been able to get his medicine.

This reform was the life's work of a great man, and we owe it to Sen. Kennedy to pass all healthcare bills we can, and once we have, we should continue to fight for more, until his dream is completely and indubitably fulfilled. When that day comes, I will walk with pride, knowing that our country had done the right thing, and when that day comes, I will be singing triumphant praises to the heavens; I may even sing the Hallelujah Chorus Handel's Messiah. But, until that day, I wait and pray for sense to come to those who need to realize that individuals do not come before the greater good in precedence, nor should they.

Don't let America die."

A lot of the statistics are off now because of recent changes, and the info on the bill itself is really outdated but still true, but overall the message is still there. Remember, I wrote this eight months ago, and it was the first persuasive writing piece I had ever really done. Tell me what you think!

Thanks,
-Misha

Three Religions- One God

2010-11-23T22:50:00.005-05:00

One of my biggest pet peeves is ignorance. Not that I think everyone should do extensive research on everything before they ever track about it; I just hate when people get very emotional or begin debates over subjects in which their knowledge extends as far as that subject's recent morning news coverage. To me this is just ridiculous.

One big gap in the majority's knowledge is in religion, particularly between the three Abrahamic religions: Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Most think that they are all 100% different and many think that in Islam, for example, they worship Mohammed like we do Christ and that acts of terror and whatnot are called for within the Qu'ran. Both are completely wrong.

How are these views wrong? It's very simple. Muslims see Mohammed as we see Moses or David: as a revered prophet and excellent example of what we should live up to, but not as a living extension of God whose powers were seemingly endless. On terror, the men bombing mosques and other important buildings (but mostly just Mosques) are part of a religious cult with a completely different view on their religion as compared to the average Muslim. They are Islam's equivalent to Christianity's Westboro Baptist Church: psychos who take misinterpretation of their religious texts and act in a way frowned upon greatly by the rest of their religion.

The main thing separating our two religions is tradition: the lessons taught are, for the most part, the same, and our holy scripts actually share some scripture but with slight modifications. Sure, Islam says to pray towards a big black cube. Crazy? Non-Muslims think so. Christians think that the son of God was born to a virgin and then died and rose again and then ascended to heaven. Crazy? Non-Christians think so. And Judaism, well, it's Christianity but they don't believe Jesus was the son of God so they take different routes to teaching the same lessons, and they believe the Messiah will come someday. Crazy? Non-Jews think so. We have our differences. So what?

Three religions? Distinctly. One God? Obviously.

New Rule
Republicans can't blame President Obama for getting so little done. A ways back, leading Republicans in the House and the Senate swore they would do their best to block any legislation supported by Obama. Their strategy was highly effective: they used the filibuster clause in the Senate more than ever before, and in the House they simply shouted at the (for some reason very timid as of late) Democrats until they got their way. Ok, so the second one is an exaggeration, but the point I make is this: nothing is happening because that apparently is the Republican way of helping the nation out of a massive recession and then they blame Obama for it. He can't directly influence anything until it reaches his desk!
And it gets worse: John Boehner, soon to be Speaker of the House, announced on national TV that the Republicans' biggest goal for the next two years that they control the House will be to get Obama out of office, all the while sitting back and enjoying the view of a crumbling nation which Obama will take the fall for. I understand that they don't like our current president, but taking direct control of half of one of the three branches of our national government should not be done just as a political, in-your-face move. I'm ok with them trying to further conservative ideals and bills, but they seem to have no plan whatsoever for our nation's future. Out nation depends on them passing legislature to help us get out of this crisis. So do something- anything! Just don't destroy our nation with malice specifically in your mind. Leave that to kids playing vido games and little tykes on the playground playing War using finger pistols.

Thanks,
-Misha

No Pain, No Gain

2010-11-22T17:11:00.005-05:00

I've had a bad hip since February of 2009 thanks to my rigorous swim regimen. I tried everything: taking Ibuprofen pills like candy, extended rest, and I even quit my year-round club swim team, leaving me with a school winter team and a summer team. Neither provides nearly as much training as my club did.

Even after that, by early October this year, I still wasn't anywhere near better. So, I went to an orthopedic center and got some tests done. Turns out the left side of my pelvic cavity was rotated in a way that was putting stress on my tendons.

So, my doctor gave me some strong anti-inflammatory pills and prescribed physical therapy. I went in not having any idea what I would be doing, and was a little nervous. It's all right, but some of the things I've had to do are pretty painful. One example: putting my entire weight on my left thigh on a 8" diameter cylinder that is perpendicular to my leg and moving so it rolls and basically crushes the muscles and everything else on the outside of my leg to the bone.

Swim practice started two weeks ago. This definitely slowed my progress down a bit, but it has also helped in some ways. The aforementioned exercise and various other stretches and exercises, while leaving me worn out and in pain, have almost completely healed my hip which was the cause of so much pain over the last two years, and it has taken just over a month. Not only am I in less pain, I am stronger thanks to my swimming, and I'm more flexible because of my stretches.

No pain, no gain? In the immortal words of Jon Stewart, "You're absolutely motherf***in' right!"

New Rule
Sarah Palin can't run for President.

When you quit your job as Governor of Alaska to get more news coverage, to spend more time at home (supposedly), and to get more money, you don't deserve the highest office in America. And now, she has her own reality TV show?! I don't know about you, but this doesn't say, "I'm a serious politician who should be considered to be President," it says, "I'm a news-whore who will do anything to get as much attention as possible" and, "I'm Glenn Beck except I don't know anything whatsoever about the real issues so I'll just talk about being a hockey mom for a while!"

My proof that Palin knows even less than Beck: She used to be a journalist before her political career, so she should have a reasonable mastery of the English language, right? Wrong. She made up a new word, "refudiate," and put it on twitter. Now, most people got what she was trying to say (to stop), but really? She's telling terrorists to refute and reputiate? Those words mean, respectively, to "to prove something wrong or deny its truth or accuracy" and to "to refuse any connection with something or reject it as untrue or unjust." How do either of these have anything to do with "stop doing that!?" From what I can tell, it would make sense (assuming it was a real word) only if she was asking them to deny their participation in bombings!

Thanks,
-Misha

Oh yeah... introduction:)

2010-11-21T20:40:00.007-05:00

I feel like a fool. I forgot to introduce myself.

I'm Misha, a 16-year-old high school student/ swimmer/ amateur nerd.
I'm pretty liberal and a proud member of the United Church of Christ. I know a lot of people are like, "Wha?" when they hear about my denomination, because it isn't exactly one of the more well known. The UCC is one of the most progressive denominations of Christianity with a motto of "No matter who you are, or where you are on life's journey, you are welcome here."

I'm ~~pretty~~ extremely strange for a teenage guy: I read, I don't own any gaming system besides a computer, I don't try to fit in with everyone (I act like I would around anyone and they can choose to like me or not), and I ~~like~~ love to talk about politics. This can be problematic: I'm in one of the more conservative counties in one of the most conservative states in the country, and I am fully in support of things like nationalized health care, gay marriage, etc. Don't get me wrong: while I am pretty much a socialist, I believe that a blend of conservative and liberal fiscal policy is best for this nation.

Don't forget to look at my post before this, found here

Thanks,
-Misha

New Rules

2010-11-21T08:33:00.006-05:00

I'm a big fan of the HBO show "Real Time with Bill Maher." It's a fascinating show where the host, Bill Maher, brings on a very famous and influential opening guest, then a panel of usually 1-2 Republicans and 1-2 Democrats. Throughout the show, he talks about politics in America, making sarcastic remarks about everything that could possibly be tied to American Politics and hilarious references to pop culture. At the end of each show, He has a segment called "New Rules." In this, he makes up things we should have to do. Some are very silly; others are very serious. But all have one thing in common: they are heartfelt and hilarious. I'll do my best to make my own.

New Rule
Libertarians can't claim to be fighting for individual rights. They either have to change their views or the banner they wave of 'individual rights.' If they are so much in favor of individual rights, then they should support the legalization of gay marriage, marijuana, and abortion, in addition to their fight against regulation and "Obamacare." Otherwise, they're not the party fighting for rights, they're the party fighting for the right to screw themselves over and die young!

New Rule
The Tea Party needs to shut up about decreasing "out of control spending." If it's really so out of control, then you must have an idea of what you would be willing to cut or decrease in the budget, right? (awkward silence) I'll take that as a no. Well, here's how I'd cut spending: try the defense budget, which is spending billions of dollars each year on R&D for things like fighter jets. I understand: we need to keep replacing the ones we lose in dogfights with the Taliban with faster and better armed ones! Wait... The Taliban has no fighter jets and we aren't having dogfights?! Then what the f*** do we need to keep making them for?! We don't. But somewhere along the lines, somebody decided that it was important to have the best equipped military in all branches, even if it meant wasting huge amounts of our money on things we'll never need. That's what I'd cut, America.

Starting now, I'll try to come up with a new "New Rule" every day (but no promises).

Thanks,
-Misha