My Soap Box

At once one of the most pressing issues of the day, yet ultimately the most difficult to deal with. Do the Muslim extremists really want a religious war? How can you fight a war that has no battlefields, no front lines and no Geneva Convention to limit tactics? Terrorist activities are carried out... Sign in to see full entry.

Captors threaten to burn hostages, release film of atrocity. What does this say about the captors? It says they are cruel beyond any measure. If the coalition were to pull out, would the factions then turn this cruelty into a civil war? I just saw a reporter slated to go to Iraq state, “If I am... Sign in to see full entry.

Will humankind ever outgrow the scourge of war? Practically speaking, we in the U.S. are by and large past the need to resort to war, so why do we find ourselves so enmeshed? By staking a claim in the regions of the Mid-East we allow ourselves to stoop to the necessary methods to deal with violence.... Sign in to see full entry.

Dinner theater, rural style. One of the local Granges stages an annual dinner theater as a fund raiser for the Grange. The actors are all Grange members or families of grange members. The Grange is a left over of rural American life from the first part of the century. The Grange served as a social... Sign in to see full entry.

The UPS radio spot. We hear a boss praising a worker because, “you’re always on time and you know what to do.” Thing is, the “employee” is a UPS driver. Is the point that UPS drivers are dependable. The boss goes on to offer him a raise, but is dismayed when he replies, (I work for someone else).... Sign in to see full entry.

Defacto conspiracies. These are situations that arise as if there were a deliberate conspiracy, when in fact no one has gotten together to plan and execute them, they just work out that way, and are perpetuated by those that benefit. For example, in small towns the wages paid (generally in retail)... Sign in to see full entry.

You know the one: Chances are that you or someone you know will have cancer in their lifetime. A small spot under my eye was diagnosed as basal cell carcinoma. The prognosis is good, we caught it early and outpatient surgery is all that will be required to excise those nasty bugger cells. It is not... Sign in to see full entry.

The downward economic spiral, or how I learned to loathe Wal-Mart and hate the Chinese. As I mentioned in the Wall Street diatribe, the population of the U. S. is slowing and as it does, the increasing customer base that fueled the economic boom that was the ‘50’s and ‘60’s is a thing of the past.... Sign in to see full entry.

It should be "they make us crawl" street. Considering the impact it has on the economy, and the fact that it has deteriorated to an exclusive club where no one really invests in companies, but rather buys and sells stock just to make a quick buck, the stock market should be separated from the... Sign in to see full entry.

No explosions. No special effects, well not many. I liked the movie, I must have because I had a dream with the same feel as the movie. I was in Canada on a drive and pulled into a roadside café. Inside all the people were laughing, talking and in general being boisterous in that Italian zest for... Sign in to see full entry.