The Inaugural Post
January 14, 2007
I have apparently been recently elected to the position of new contributor here at HooahWife and Friends. It is truly an honor to be invited to post here. And by invited, I mean pestered into it by my dear friend and fellow contributor Brainhell. He threatened to beg me, and I just didn’t feel good about that karmicly, so I signed the dotted line and got the keys just a few days ago! Throw down the shag carpet and light up the disco ball, cause it’s about to get fun!
Ok, not really. I’m a goody-two-shoes nerd, so my idea of a good time is creating a budget with my overseas husband via webcam… on Christmas Day. Oh, how I love a good Excel spreadsheet… (True story).
Anyway, I’ve been trying to decide what to write about for days now, and I think I have settled on pissing (Greta, can I say “pissing” here?) everybody off by telling you my views on some fairly hot topics. What better way to make an entrance than to open myself up to the slings and arrows of the opinionated folks around here? I won’t feel like I am really one of the gang until I’ve been properly initiated with an onslaught of slightly humorous, dully witted extremist political barbs… so I think I’ve provided each of you with an opinion you won’t like.
I hereby declare open season on Sis B!
Why I’m a Bad Democrat
If someone comes into my home and tries to hurt me or my family, I will shoot them without a qualm. My only debate will be whether to use the shotgun or the .45… I probably wouldn’t consider the rifle.
Abortion is morally wrong.
Certain violent criminals deserve the death penalty.
Chapel Hill annoys me. (You’d have to have visited there to know what I’m talking about, but I’m guessing other centers of the far left would be the same).
Supporting the arts is not the responsibility of the government.
Hunting for food with a firearm is more honest than hunting for food with a shopping cart at a meat counter.
I shave my legs and armpits.
Affirmative Action is a crock.
Why I’d be a Worse Republican
No civilian needs a fully automatic assault rifle “for hunting,†“home defense†or anything else.
Abortion, to the point in pregnancy when the fetus could viably live on its own outside the womb, is not murder, and should be legal.
The system for doling out capital punishment is corrupt and should be mended before death penalties can occur.
Gay marriage doesn’t decrease the value of my marriage. If it did, my marriage was in trouble already.
My reliable news sources are NPR and the BBC.
I have never, and will never, eat Freedom Fries.
I believe in socialized healthcare.
Leave Alaska and its oil alone.
Abstinence only education is a crock.
Why I Could Never Be a Libertarian
They’re just too dang fruity, ya know?
Posted in Democrats, Republicans, Sis B, This & That
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January 14th, 2007 at 10:43 pm
Welcome girl. Hey – I like libertarians! I wish we’d drill in Alaska already, I think abortion is not the governement’s decision to make, NPR & BBC – need to balance that, and socialized medicine – UGH!!! Otherwise, we see eye to eye on some things:). I embrace diversity – so enjoy the insanity that is HW & friends!
January 15th, 2007 at 12:02 am
Welcome aboard, Sis!
I agree on the shotgun.
I’d love to have some freedom fries!
(Oh, and I suppose you want HITLER back in power?!)
January 15th, 2007 at 9:05 am
Sis B,
Welcome and a great big Hooah! So glad to see you posting and I look forward to reading more posts in the future. I agree with almost all of your views…abortion, the death penalty, abstinence only education, libertarians, firearms, gay marriage, etc.
As for socialized healthcare, I think it would be nice if the government could actually do it right – but I’m not sure that’s possible. As for affirmative action, quotas are wrong but all things being equal I do support a school or business’s right to promote diversity.
What a great post to start with. Way to put it all out there!
PS You didn’t mention the war…will that be your next post?
January 15th, 2007 at 10:35 am
Ah, now Silke, I suppose YOU want Hitler back?!?!!!
January 15th, 2007 at 11:19 am
Welcome to the madhouse, Sis. May I recommend an hour a day of Fox News? And as a Canadian, I have to say you are out of your mind with the socialized medicine thing (I have already put you on the waiting list for psychiatric care – you should be contacted circa 2042). But welcome nonetheless.
RG – Cotillion Sistah and Token Canuck.
January 15th, 2007 at 11:49 am
Greta, I bet you laughed at the baby seals during the Exxon oil spill disaster. Drilling in Alaska is just one big party for you, huh?
BH, I can forgive you for wanting freedom fries, but that’s just because I think things probably don’t taste so good through a stomach tube. I’m so glad you were able to read through the lines to my real message about wanting Hitler back in power, though.
Silke, I’ll do a post in the future about my in-depth feelings about affirmative action. And there’s a war? What rock have I been living under?
RG, I don’t get cable. I thought I was diversifying my news source by reading this blog daily. Not that I’d call it “news” per se, but it is my daily dose of right-winged fascism, nevertheless. BTW, as the token canuck, are you here as a result of Affirmative Action?
Indian Chris: I know you’ve read this because you fixed it for me. If you don’t get on here and insult me I will NOT feel properly welcomed. So dig out from under that little “blizzard” thing that’s going on out in OK and say something mean to me.
January 15th, 2007 at 12:05 pm
‘Socialized’ medicine … feh. But government-mandated universal coverage, perhaps single-payer, with bulk pricing bargaining, may be a good idea.
I would eat the freedom fries by mouth.
Sis, it may take a while to comment. He’s de-icing his statue of … Goebbels.
January 15th, 2007 at 12:40 pm
I admire your spunk Sis B. As a matter of fact, I used to be a proud supporter of Greenpeace. I am an animal lover and vegetarian. I just think we should become more self-sufficient as a nation & unfortunately that is the way to do it. Don’t be so defensive. Part of the fun of blogging is talking without getting too hostile (right Brainhell?). Tolerance, tolerance, tolerance & no affirmative action please. We can agree to disagree!
January 15th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
Greta,
Grrrreat… You want Saddam back … grrrrrreat …
January 15th, 2007 at 1:07 pm
BH – are you hung up on scary men like Hitler & Saddam today?
January 15th, 2007 at 1:35 pm
Greta,
Simple question: You’re NOT scared of them? You want them back in power, I bet, huh? It’s typical of Libs like you who hate America. Libs and Dems like you…
January 15th, 2007 at 2:00 pm
Greta, dear, I’m not being hostile. I’m making fun of some of the ridiculous debates that occur in the comments here. I’m usually the one calling BH and IC out for being unduly hostile.
As far as Alaska goes, we need to put more resources into being not so reliant on oil–there’s where our self-sufficiency will truly emerge. Alaska is a short-term, extremely bad solution to a very real problem. It’s throwing a bandaid on a spurting artery and thinking everything’s going to be ok. You ruined a perfectly good bandage and the patient’s going to bleed out anyway We have to find a way to stem the flow. Btw, you never told me whether I could say “pissed” here… I was teasing about the baby seals and the oil spill. My tongue was planted firmly in my cheek for that one. I am rather surprised that you’re a vegetarian, though.
Brainy, if you’re going to risk being taken out by food, please don’t let it be a freedom fry. PLEASE. And you’re making me laugh today. Thank you.
January 15th, 2007 at 3:28 pm
They should drill in Alaska because every barrel we get from there, does not have to be purchased from the Mideast. They should just impose major fines for oil spills.
If single payer health like they have in Canada is so wonderful, why do people there come down here to get tests and operations they dont want to wait for months if not years to get up there
January 15th, 2007 at 3:39 pm
I honestly haven’t researched socialized medicine enough to be for or against it. I do know that our system, as it stands, is broken and we need to find a way to fix it. Ya’ll have inspired me to dig further and have a more intelligent opinion about it. I was looking more to the Swiss, anyway, and not Canada. Although I don’t know what their healthcare system is called, or how it works.
I do know, however, that we’d have to raise them taxes. Which would make me a very bad Republican, indeed.
January 15th, 2007 at 4:27 pm
I’m glad it was all in fun Sissy. You can say whatever you want here – pissed included. There aren’t any rules.
January 15th, 2007 at 5:38 pm
>They should drill in Alaska because every barrel we get from there, does not have to be purchased from the Mideast.
Six months at best, I’ve heard. Every extra hair of the dog dose we take helps continue our addiction to oil.
> There aren’t any rules.
TOJO will be very pleased to hear that!
January 16th, 2007 at 7:01 am
Hi Sis,
I am not morally opposed at all to drilling there; I just think it doesn’t represent a solution to our oil dependence (aka slavery to Middle East/Venezuelan thugs).
I actually used the term “band-aid” about ANWR drilling myself last week, so imagine my surprise to see a lefty using it (or should I say, horror?!)
I’m with you on finding alternative energy solutions all the way, even if it’s for different reasons (?).
I just die a little inside every time I put gas in the car, knowing it’s putting more money in the hands of people who fund terror.
“Hair of the dog” (what brainhell said) is an apt description. And y’know what? It’s something on which the right and left should work together.
With ya on “abstinence only” education (stupid, and doesn’t help prevent abortion!). Socialized healthcare? No way. It’s OK (at best) for healthy people, but if you’re not healthy, you might as well start picking out your tombstone. I’ll pass, thanks.
January 16th, 2007 at 7:57 am
I would eat the freedom fries by mouth.
MOUTHIST!
BTW, I have never seen “Freedom Fries,” and I live in Bush Country, where everyone flies a flag and still proudly sports the W sticker on their cars. No freedom fries here?! Who actually DID have them? Maybe we didn’t have them because everyone here has some Fwench blood in them? I dunno. I feel so culturally deprived. (Errr, not.)
January 16th, 2007 at 8:14 am
The biggest problem with the growing cost of the medical system is litegation. As Shakespeare said, “kill all the lawyers”
BH’s statement of “six months at best”, presumably refering to the amount of oil in Anwar, is wrong. For one thing he is talking about our total imports, but even then no one knows for certain how much is in Anwar, except it is probably more than the North Slope
If we produced everything we could get from Anwar, and used legislation to penalize oil spils, rather than block production, and if we drilled off our coasts, rather than letting China and Cuba be the only ones producing oil off the Florida coasts, we could do a LOT to reduce our imports of foreign oil.
January 16th, 2007 at 10:29 am
>BH’s statement of “six months at bestâ€, presumably refering to the amount of oil in Anwar, is wrong.
I commented “Six months at best, I’ve heard.” I guess I heard wrong. Can you cute the reputable study that estimates more oil in ANWAR?
>…we could do a LOT to reduce our imports of foreign oil.
And continue addiction to oil?
January 16th, 2007 at 12:14 pm
This says The companies that want to get at that oil estimate there’s 16 billion barrels waiting to be pumped south – or about 30 years worth of Middle East oil imports. U.S. government geologists have estimated a likely reserve of perhaps 10.4 billion barrels in the 700,000-hectare coastal plain region at the northern end of the ANWR. That’s the only part of the refuge where the U.S. government has considered lifting the ban on development.
But it would be economically feasible to pump out only a fraction of that reserve. A 1998 study estimated that about 1.9 billion barrels could be recovered at a price of $24 per barrel. Environmentalists and other opponents of opening the area to oil exploration argue there’s no way to know how much oil is there.
Only by producing will they learn for sure how much is there. Oil is certainly a lot more than $24 per barrel, so it will be economical to produce more than the 98 study recommended.
We should still look elsewhere. I read that the Israelis came up with a way of economically processing oil shale, and we should try that, along with other sources like corn, wind, and solar.
January 16th, 2007 at 1:13 pm
According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_Refuge_drilling_controversy#Estimates_of_oil_reserves), the estimate you cite is credible. Wherever I heard that six months must have been a biased source,
donsingleton, I know that you don’t feel that global warming is due to human consumption of fossil fuels, so I think that in your mind, continued burning of fossil fuels is OK, as long as we can cut out imported oil.
January 16th, 2007 at 3:53 pm
Thank you BH for acknowledging that.
Actually the source I quoted includes The Union of Concerned Scientists suggests there may be enough oil to fuel vehicles in the United States for six months. It argues that making vehicles more fuel-efficient will save far more oil than Alaska could ever produce.
And I am not opposed to making vehicles more fuel efficient. I am just opposed to forcing people to buy them. Encourage the auto companies to come out with better fuel efficient vehicles, and then let the people decide whether they want to buy them.
But regardless of how fuel efficient they are, I believe they should run on domestic production, not middle east production, and if China is going to drill off the coast of Florida, we should also.
January 16th, 2007 at 6:12 pm
> Actually the source I quoted includes The Union of Concerned Scientists suggests there may be enough oil to fuel vehicles in the United States for six months.
Thank you for acknowledging that.
> …China is going to drill off the coast of Florida…
You got a source on that?
January 17th, 2007 at 8:56 am
I referred to it here and I thought I had blogged the news item when it appeared, but I could not find it.
China and Cuba were teaming up to drill in the water between Florida and Cuba.
January 17th, 2007 at 10:38 am
> …I thought I had blogged the news item when it appeared, but I could not find it.
Oh. If it were in the real news, I think I would have heard of it.
January 17th, 2007 at 4:49 pm
BH What is real news? Here is a transcript from CNN. Here is item from St Petersburg times. Here is Palm Beach Post. Here is Capitalism Magazine. Here is an item from Gas and Oil Magazine. Here is story from Washington Times. Here is something from AmericanFreePress.
January 17th, 2007 at 5:36 pm
donsingleton,
Thanks for educating me about the possibility that Cuba and China may drill for oil off the coast of Cuba. I think we should reduce our consumption of fossil fuels.
January 17th, 2007 at 6:55 pm
We should try to conserve but at least let us produce domestica;;y rather than import as much
January 17th, 2007 at 7:07 pm
Thus enabling the habit.
January 17th, 2007 at 10:39 pm
Beth,
If you look up Freedom Fries at Wikipedia, you can get the whole background. They actually changed the names at the lunchrooms for the House of Representavies. I guess those morons didn’t have anything more important to do, even in light of the recent attack on American soil and the impending war in the middle east. They changed all the menus to read “freedom fries” to show the french just what they thought of them. A few places in the south did, too, from my recollection.
BH and DS,
There’s a huge issue here that is not being addressed as far as ANWR and reducing our dependence on all oil, not just foreign imports. Forget global warming, since DS doesn’t “believe” in it (it’s not a religion and it doesn’t take faith to recognize the scientific evidence, but I’ll try to leave that alone for now…)
Oil is OBVIOUSLY a limited resource. The reserves are being depleted, not just here but overseas as well. What happens when we run out? Maybe it won’t be in your lifetimes, but it could very well be in mine. If not mine, the life of my children. What happens when the entire transportation system of the West comes to a horrible grinding halt? The economic ramifications of the depletion of our oil resources will be astounding. The problems of high prices at the pumps will be a fond, if distant, memory. This is an economic issue as much as an environmental or homeland security one.
A crucial part of the foundation of our economy is resting on the availability of oil. When that part crumbles, our entire economic system is going to fail. We need to plan ahead for once, actively seek to reduce our reliance on oil and meet all of our goals: promote a healthy and stable economy, protect the environment, and stop funding nations which harbor terrorists. No one goal is greater than the other, and the only way to meet the three together is to reduce our reliance on oil.
As I said before, ANWR is a bandaid. The funds that would be spent there should be re-allocated for a longer term solution.
And besides, penguins are cute.
January 17th, 2007 at 10:56 pm
No penguins in or near ANWAR, I promise. None.
Oil dependence is like any other. “Just one more fix. I’ll quit tomorrow.”
January 17th, 2007 at 11:38 pm
It was a joke. It made me laugh, so I had to type it. LOL It still makes me laugh.
Have I mentioned that I’m sleep deprived?
January 18th, 2007 at 7:32 am
Sis B, if we continue sending our money to the middle east, to fund fanatics that want to destroy our entire civilization, you will not need to worry about there being enough energy for your children. They did not use that much energy in the 7th century, where these nutcases want to take civilization.
January 18th, 2007 at 7:37 am
Also now is not a good time to talk about Global Warming. We just went through three rounds of ice storms, and today is the first day the temperature is supposed to get above freezing for a few hours. It will be several days before the ice is gone. I would welcome a little global warming, or at least Tulsa Warming, about now.
January 18th, 2007 at 10:49 am
Meanwhile let;s not help them destroy our civilization by betraying what we stand for.
January 18th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
DS, why are you reluctant to admit that we must, for three majorly reasons, end our dependence on oil? It is one of our biggest vulnerabilities. Why not take it completely away from our enemies?
As far as your comment about ice storms in global warming, everyday weather systems cannot be counted as evidence. It’s a gradual warming, a trend, over a period of time. We shouldn’t take a few weeks of normal winter weather as proof of anything.
Are far as nutcases who are trying to destroy our civilization–we’re going to do it ourselves if we don’t end this oil dependence. It just might take slightly longer.
January 18th, 2007 at 2:02 pm
Sis B, in the 1970s the media was alarming us about the coming dangers of Global Cooling. Now they have changed their minds, and we need to worry about Global Warming. In another 20 years it will be back to Global Cooling and the next Ice Age.
I do propose taking our dependence on foreign oil away from our enemes through domestic production
If you want to help by buying a more fuel efficient vehicle, that is fine with me. Just don’t block domestic production because we dont take other steps you want to see taken
January 18th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
> Sis B, in the 1970s the media was alarming us about the coming dangers of Global Cooling.
Zouns! What were scientists saying then? And now? Is there no way out of the media yo-yo?
January 18th, 2007 at 3:45 pm
Scientists then were predicting another Ice Age. They are as cyclic as the weather itself. Although there are some Russian scientists predicting Global Cooling even now, I suspect it will be 20 years before the drumbeat of Global Cooling exceeds that of Global Warming.
Until then I understand some scientists have shown that cattle flatulence is contributing more greenhouse gasses than automobiles. It looks like the hunters that killed most of the buffalo may have been doing the ecology a good thing.
January 18th, 2007 at 3:53 pm
> Scientists then were predicting another Ice Age.
Got any evidence that major scientific organizations did?
January 18th, 2007 at 6:34 pm
Don, I don’t listen to the media. They’re a bunch of fact obscuring sensationalist morons. I’m with BH, show me any major scientific organizations who supported the theory.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:26 am
Back in the 70s there were several. Not as many as are jumping on the Global Warming bandwaggon, but then they did not push something like Kyoto through which would destroy the US economy if we can be persuaded to adopt Kyoto, and there are a lot of countries that would like to see us taken down because they are jealous of us (they have adopted socialist economies, and cant seem to figure out how to get out of the socialist morass.)
If Kyoto was going to do good for the environment, it would be one thing, but with China and India both being exempt even if every other country cut back on emissions, those two countries would add more than the decrease back in.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:59 am
Sources, please.
January 19th, 2007 at 10:38 am
> Back in the 70s there were several.
Please name one.
January 19th, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Back when this came up before I dug up a couple from the 70s, and also one Russian scientist that was predicting cooling in the next 10 years, but I don’t have the time to spend digging it up again. If you choose not to believe them, that is fine with me.
January 19th, 2007 at 2:52 pm
Now that you mention it I recall you finding one or two individual scientists, and the Russian. That hardly compares with now, where most every major scientific organization finds Global Warming to be human-driven. If you choose not to believe them, that is fine with me. But I will continue to note the scientific consensus, of course.
January 19th, 2007 at 6:15 pm
Even BP America is getting on board.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16708004/