DADvocate

Blogging less comes from focusing on my kids. Sometimes blogging hardly seems worth it. Close to an exercise in futility, like spitting in the wind.

Blogging and reading blogs reminds me of my early experiences in college. When I entered college, I assumed college students were, as a group, honest, intelligent, caring people focused on becoming better educated and improving the world. Such naivety was short lived.

I see much the same in bloggers as I found in college students and others almost everywhere. While there are at least a few honest, concerned bloggers, there are plenty that cling to their prejudices, spread their hate and communicate through insults and incivility. In the mean time, I raise my children to practice the virtues of fairness, reason, compassion, hard work and excellence.

My youngest son is standing in the middle. The oldest, on the left, is 6' 1" and 200 lbs. It's easy to see why the younger son excels on the football field. My daughter loves basketball. Naturally all are exceedingly intelligent. :-)

I'm thinking about getting my sons in touch with their inner femininity and my daughter in touch with her inner masculinity. Hah!

On Sept. 12, Bill Sparkman, a 51-year-old part-time Census field worker and teacher, was found hanging dead from a tree in Clay County, Kentucky. Some liberal bloggers, Southern Beale and Sean Braisted for example, were quick to accuse his death on right wing hate.

SB headlined her post "Another Victim of Right Wing Hate?" She concludes:

It will be interesting to see how this investigation unfolds. Suicide seems unlikely, and the fact that Sparkman’s body was found on 9/12, the day of the big Tea Party rally in D.C., is suspicious.

She does admit it may be a coincidence.

Braisted (known as Brainstem to some) asserts

I'm sorry to say that given the political environment created and fomented by the Republican party and its media counterpart Fox News, I wouldn't be terribly surprised if this was some Tea Bagger going off the reservation.

Today police announce, after a lengthy investigation, that Mr. Sparkman's death has been ruled a suicide.

The census worker found dead with the word “fed” written across his chest in remote Clay County in September killed himself and staged the act to look like homicide, the Kentucky State Police said Tuesday.

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But State Police Capt. Lisa Rudzinski said at a news conference Tuesday afternoon, “Our investigation, based on evidence and witness testimony, has concluded that Mr. Sparkman died during an intentional, self-inflicted act that was staged to appear as a homicide.”

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But Rudzinski said his hands and feet were loosely bound, and that his body was found in contact with the ground “almost to his knees.”

“Mr. Sparkman's wrists were bound loosely in front of his body, shoulder width apart, allowing considerable mobility,” Rudzinski said. “Mr. Sparkman was not blindfolded, as has been previously reported.”

She said duct tape held his glasses in place, and his mouth was stuffed with a rag and covered with tape.

“No defensive wounds were located on his body,” Rudzinski said. “And a rag was found in his pants that was consistent with other rags scattered at the scene, including the rag that was in his mouth. The victim’s clothes were found undisturbed in the bed of his pickup truck, which was also recovered at the scene.”

Moreover, Rudzinski said a “credible witness” told investigators Sparkman had said he planned to commit suicide.

I wonder how many of the liberal hate-mongers will face up to their erroneous ways.

Following the Ft. Hood shooting, much has been said about Nidal Malik Hasan contacts with questionable persons with terroristic leanings including an imam, Anwar al Awlaki. Awlaki, an American citizen born in New Mexico in 1971, is identified as a jihadist.

Apparently, for some, jihad means to "struggle in the way of God" or "to struggle to improve one's self and/or society." Doesn't sound much different than much of what is taught in Christianity. But, for Awlaki and others like him, jihad takes a much more sinister meaning.

An essay by Awlaki, 44 Ways to Support Jihad, tells us pretty much all we need to know.

Point 2 is: Praying to Allah to award you with martyrdom.

Some other highlights:

...encouraging others to participate in Jihad was an act of worship we were specifically asked to do.

What Jihad needs is mujahideen who have the ability to walk for long hours, to run for long distances (important for guerrilla warfare), to sprint (important for urban
warfare),...

Arms training is an essential part of preparation for Jihad.

Our children need to be raised up with the love of Jihad and the mujahideen. ... They need to be taught to be proactive rather than passive. Al Zubair bin al Awam – one of the ten given the glad tidings of Paradise – used to take with him to the battlefield his son Abdullah when he was still a child. But since Abdullah was still a child and therefore couldn’t fight, his father would have him carry a small knife and go around the battlefield searching for injured disbelievers in order to finish them off.

To me any military person and certain others having unauthorized contact with a person espousing such beliefs need checking into.

The FBI is now performing full fledged cover our asses procedures.

But the bureau has hit back, arguing that since the Hasan-al-Awlaki exchanges were "explainable by [Hasan's] research and nothing else derogatory was found, [investigators] concluded that Major Hasan was not involved in terrorist activities or terrorist planning." (Hasan had been conducting research into the attitudes of Muslim soldiers at war with other Muslims.)

It appears the FBI, and probably others, are stuck in the "it must fit the traditional definition of terrorist activities or terrorist planning" mode. The idea of someone influencing others to commit acts of violence and others committing violence without actual collusion seems beyond their scope of comprehension.

General Casey might be more interested in preserving "diversity" than stopping killers. “Our diversity, not only in our Army, but in our country, is a strength. And as horrific as this tragedy was, if our diversity becomes a casualty, I think that’s worse.” Tell that to the families of the victims.

What functional purpose does diversity serve the Army? Except for having a few interpreters plus people capable of communicating with and understanding the culture of natives of lands in which the Army may be, I can't think of any particular benefits. (Of course, this diversity doesn't include gays.) Casey's words give a hint of the PC world that probably helped Hasan fly under the radar.

We need to consider the possibility that individuals who act alone can be influenced into this action by others such as persuasive imams like Awlaki.

The other day I received an email from one of my Senators, Sherrod Brown. You may remember him as the senator who claims diabetes makes you more compassionate and fair. The subject line of the email reads, "Health Reform: Ends Industry Discrimination Against Women, Protects Ohio’s Seniors."

I have my doubts about it protecting seniors but now the discrimination against women part is my focus. First, I wonder if women ever tire of being the perpetual victims. Do women ever tire of being portrayed as helpless and impotent, as needing the constant assistance of men and government to be able to survive day to day life? Apparently not as one of the actions of feminism has been to perpetrate this image and insist on special government programs and laws to benefit the powerless, downtrodden female.

Secondly, how much discrimination do women face from the health care industry? To answer this question, I've explored the services available at hospitals in the greater Cincinnati area.

On the home page of the University Hospital of Cincinnati you'll find links for Women's Community Health Centers and Women's Services plus a Lactation Internship Program(??).

At Christ Hospital, where my two youngest children were born, you can click on the "Departments" menu, go down to "Women's Services" and find: Birthing Center, Breast Health, General Health Information for Women, Prenatal Clinic, Reproductive Services, Women's Health Today Magazine and Women's Surgery Center. Bethesda North and Good Samaritan Hospitals have women's programs that include Maternity Services, Breast Care, Specialized Gynecology Care, Fitness, Programs and Classes and TriHealth Nurse Midwives. The Mercy Hospitals conduct a The Spirit of Women program.

Across the Ohio River in northern Kentucky, St. Luke's Hospital's services include Birthing Center, Breast Health Center, Nurse Midwives, Perinatal Centers, Physicians for Women and Women's Heart Health. St. Elizabeth's in northern Kentucky provides a Women's Wellness program. (St. Elizabeth's and St. Luke's are affiliated at some level.)

Deaconess Hospital has no obvious special programs for women or men. Jewish Hospital links to a Breast Center.

This is not to say that any of these programs are not legitimate but none of these hospitals has any apparent similar programs for men. No prostate cancer centers or programs, no men's health centers, etc. If the result of discrimination against women is having the health care industry catering to your every need, we need more of this, not less.

Of course, Sherrod Brown is another mindless liberal parroting the same drivel liberals have repeated since the mid-Sixties. The real issue is that the liberals want to control ever more of our society in every way they can. Freedom means that people, and organizations, can act in ways that liberals don't approve and we can't have that. And, do women ever get tired of being treated as helpless little things that can't possibly make it on their own. The chauvinists of decades ago held women in higher regard than today's liberals.

Other health care related items courtesy Instapundit:

Unemployment tops 10%, let's wreck health care

Flu shot favoritism, is this how health care will work?
"Buried in Nancy Pelosi’s health-care bill is a provision that will partially repeal tax indexing for inflation, meaning that as their earnings rise over a lifetime these youngsters can look forward to paying higher rates even if their income gains aren’t real."

Buy a policy or go to jail.

Can't remember where I found this one: CBO: Republican health plan would reduce premiums, cut deficit