Part of being a good citizen of the blogosphere is visiting, reading and, most importantly, taking the time to leave a comment on other’s blogs. It’s all about the conversation. In the interest of setting an example I’ve decided to link to those blog posts that have compelled me to leave a comment.
I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog chuckle I present: From My Dad.
My name is Jeff Hess and I’m a biblioholic. I own hundreds of books. Not valuable books, mostly Science Fiction paperbacks and text books, tomes rescued by the bag from library book sales. A few years ago, in the interest of not burying myself, I began reading more books from the library and taking notes. My electronic chapbook was born.
This is a passage I copied from Story: Substance, structure, style and the principles of screenwriting by Robert McKee.
Minimalism/Miniplot – Tender Mercies and Shall We Dance: open ending, internal conflict, multi-protagonists, passive protagonist.
For decades British citizens have fled their native land to avoid paying the high taxes in that country (why do you think John Lennon was living in New York?) so it’s no great stretch to think that if we close the capital gains loophole in the current law, that Equity Fund managers will just take their money off-shore.
Well Robert Reich has an answer to that, and it’s buried in the current immigration bill.
I”ve been thinking a lot about the immigration bill now pending before Congress – especially the conditions undocumented workers will have to meet if they want to become American citizens. One of them is to pay all the taxes they owe.
The new immigration bill may not make it through Congress, but that provision about paying taxes that are owed in order to be a citizen serves as a reminder that paying taxes is one of the major obligations of citizenship. After all, if we didn”t pay the taxes we owe, we wouldn”t have public schools, police and fire protection, national defense, homeland security, roads and bridges, Medicare and Social Security, and other things we need.
So when the super-rich use offshore tax havens to avoid paying what they owe in taxes, they”re reneging on their duties as citizens. It seems only fair to me that the consequence of that kind of tax avoidance ought to be loss of citizenship. If it”s more important to someone to avoid paying what they owe in taxes than to continue being an American, then let them keep their money. They can become a citizen of the Cayman Islands or Bermuda or wherever else they store their wealth, and come here on a visitor”s visa – if they can get one.
Maybe we should all go back and read Edward Everett Hale’s tale of Philip Nolan.
I’m constantly tossing interesting websites into what I call my blogpile. Some of them find their way here in the form of regular posts, but more often than not they languish and get buried deeper in the pile. The end result is that I have to go back and do a bit of shoveling. Today’s item is Woodstock, Day 2.
RN Clara Hart: I knew Monday was not going to be one of my finer days when I put both contacts in the same eye then had to spend 20 minutes prying them apart. In the end it turned out to be one of those days that was overwhelming, irritating, exhilarating and heartbreaking all at the same time. Tired from a busy weekend packed full of “must do” chores, I came…
Sunday was my last day of teaching my 9th graders for the 5767 school year. They were my best class ever. I wish I could clone them all. As we wound up our discussion I told my students that what they thought and believed is not as important as how they struggle with those thoughts and beliefs.
This morning I get another lesson in how important this is from Terry at I See Invisible People.
At 17 he doesn”t agree that the personal is political and the political is personal. Maybe it”s his youth; maybe it”s being male. Maybe it”s a combination of both. Maybe he”s just more objective than I am. He definitely has more faith in the process than I do.
He would like politics to be a coolly impersonal process, operating strictly on the intellectual level. Those passionately involved in the issue should not be able to influence decisions. On one level I can see where he”s coming from. He”s a moderate, though by community standards he”s a raging liberal.
He”s upset by classroom discussions that get derailed and overrun by students spouting the Neo-Con line with no regard for logic. He wants intelligent discussion without ignorance playing a role and without appeals to emotion. I understand his frustration.
But politics happens to real people. Real lives are affected by the decisions of our government, and those who would lose or gain rights must have a place at the table. Yes, it”s messy, and sometimes it gets ugly. But I believe it”s vital to the process.
At 17 he’s thinking. And that is truly a wonderous thing.
I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog chuckle I present: From My Dad.
My name is Jeff Hess and I’m a biblioholic. I own hundreds of books. Not valuable books, mostly Science Fiction paperbacks and text books, tomes rescued by the bag from library book sales. A few years ago, in the interest of not burying myself, I began reading more books from the library and taking notes. My electronic chapbook was born.
This is a passage I copied from Story: Substance, structure, style and the principles of screenwriting by Robert McKee.
Classical design/Archplot – Citizen Kane and The Seven Samurai: causality, closed ending, linear time, external conflict, single protagonist, consistent reality, active protagonist.
How is it possible to live and work in Washington, D.C. and be so cocooned that you’re surprised when something like this happens? What kind of people are we sending to our nation’s capital to represent us? Is it any surprise that despite majorities in both houses of Congress that Karl Rove and his minions continue to taunt and laugh at us?
From the blog of Representative Tim Ryan (D-Ohio):
I was doing SO well! I had everything rationed out perfectly and knew that I was going to be able to stretch my food out until the end. That was of course, until the TSA decided to step in.
[Snip]
When I arrived I decided just to carry my bag on so I ran over to the security gate with my carry on. I step up to the metal detector, take my shoes off, place my bag through the scanner and come out the other side to the most dreaded words in travel, “Bag Check!”
I walk over to the table where the TSA agent put on rubber gloves and started unzipping my bag. At this point I had about 10 minutes to get to the gate and I was already kicking myself for getting to the airport so late because I was in the “B” group.
As the agent sifted though my bag, I tried to recount what could possibly be in there that was threatening… my mouthwash? Toothpaste? Yeah, it was those two, but it was also my peanut butter and jelly.
Sure enough the very nice TSA agent explained to me the 3-1-1 regulations for liquids. As a public service I”ve decided to link you to them. He politely put the peanut butter and jelly to the side, closed my bag and gave it back to me. I was too astonished to talk.
This is what I mean. Why the feck should Representative Ryan be astonished? Has he been hiding in a secret bunker with Vice President Dick Cheney?
I took my bag and walked towards the gate thinking about the 4 or maybe 5 meals that she had taken from me. What am I going to do now? It”s not like I can just go to Safeway and grab another jar. I have .33 cents and a bag of cornmeal to last today and tomorrow.
Sigh
I’m constantly tossing interesting websites into what I call my blogpile. Some of them find their way here in the form of regular posts, but more often than not they languish and get buried deeper in the pile. The end result is that I have to go back and do a bit of shoveling. Today’s item is Woodstock, Day 1.
Authors are judged by strange capricious rules. The great ones are thought mad, the small ones fools.” Alexander Pope
I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog chuckle I present: From My Dad.
“Oh, go soak your head!” said Narcissus
To his image. “Some love affair this is!
I find little surprise
In your watery eyes
And your all too predictable kisses.”
From Assorted Pentastiches by X.J. Kennedy.
My name is Jeff Hess and I’m a biblioholic. I own hundreds of books. Not valuable books, mostly Science Fiction paperbacks and text books, tomes rescued by the bag from library book sales. A few years ago, in the interest of not burying myself, I began reading more books from the library and taking notes. My electronic chapbook was born.
This is a passage I copied from Story: Substance, structure, style and the principles of screenwriting by Robert McKee.
Classical design means a story built around an active protagonist who struggles against primarily external forces of antagonism to pursue his or her desire, through continuous time, within a consistent and causally connected fictional reality, to a closed ending of absolute, irreversible change.
I’m constantly tossing interesting websites into what I call my blogpile. Some of them find their way here in the form of regular posts, but more often than not they languish and get buried deeper in the pile. The end result is that I have to go back and do a bit of shoveling. Today’s item is 15 Coolest Firefox Tricks Ever.
LT Carl Goforth: The Al Asad Airbase is located just a few short clicks from the Euphrates River about 180 kilometers due west from Baghdad. The base is built on an historically biblical site: The local population has maintained for thousands of years that Abram, Sarai, and Lot stopped here and camped for a short time while travelling from Ur to Haran. This spot is…
Part of being a good citizen of the blogosphere is visiting, reading and, most importantly, taking the time to leave a comment on other’s blogs. It’s all about the conversation. In the interest of setting an example I’ve decided to link to those blog posts that have compelled me to leave a comment.
0819 Careful, the kids are watching
0809 Sorry, letting you walk is “medically unecessary.”
I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog chuckle I present: From My Dad.
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