Rant: Since when is pet ownership a "right"?

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San Francisco City Council wants to pass a resolution making it ILLEGAL for landlords to specify "no pets" in San Francisco. Another typical SF Madness resolution.
The main reason that this is being brought up was that the tenants are being forced to "downsize" their rentals, and the new rentals don't take pets, thus, the shelters are overwhelmed, and lots of pets are "put to sleep". And apparently, this is anathema to some of the SF Animal Care and Control Commission members.

Frankly, this is backwards reasoning. In this economy, people can't afford both pets AND a nice place. The lack of "pet friendly" rental is just an excuse. The REAL TRUTH is people can no longer afford mortgages, and have to rent. If they own their own house, they can have pets with no restrictions. If they rent, they have restrictions. That's something they have to live with. If they want pet ownership right, they need to own their own house.

Do you put bumper stickers on rental cars? Of course not. When you "rent" or "lease", your rights toward that property is naturally more limited than if you owned it. Basically, you accept whatever the landlord says... unless you are discriminated against.

What exactly is a pet? Clearly, it means more than cat or dog... So where do you draw the line? Mouse? Hamsters and gerbils? Lizards like iguanas and dragons and such? Chameleons? Snakes? How long? How about horses, pigs, birds, and others? How big or small? Insects? If you include one, are you going down a slippery slope toward anything? How about a "human pet"?

Then since when is pet ownership a "right"? Pet is a LUXURY, like wine, jewelry, bling bling, and such. It's a PRIVILEGE! There is no such thing as "right to companionship" either. So this whole thing is a joke.

Artificially increasing the so-called "pet-friendly" rentals will cause a severe backlash against the city government.

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Rant: Occupation of buildings as protest?

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A bunch of students have taken over several University of California campus buildings at UC Berkeley and UC Santa Cruz, as well as other campuses. The students are "outraged" by the increase in fees, to over 10000, roughly 32%. So what exact did these student "protest" this lack of funds? By causing massive police presence, occupying buildings, forcing police to break in, trespassing, and destroying rooms and general vandalizing. They were finally evicted by police, charged with various misdemeanors and infractions in some cases.

Their protests actually COST the university system more money.

They claim they are expressing their outrage over the fee increase, but they are actually contributing to the problem by causing general mayhem, thus causing the school to lose even MORE MONEY.

Also, if the classes would be cut due to lack of funds, wouldn't you want to get your money's worth NOW, instead of cutting class and join this "protest" that actually costs the schools MORE money?

So in other words, it's like protesting lack of civil rights by beating up African-American people.

Tell me how is that logical?

What's more, a bunch of yahoos then messed up the UC Chanceller's RESIDENCE building, and vandalized the entire front porch, plus throwing a TORCH at it, essentially trying to firebomb it! That's completely OUTRAGEOUS! These are ****ing terrorists, not student activists!

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How could the Ft. Hood shooting have happened?

Ft. Hood, Texas
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By now, the entire nation has probably thought about why did a Major in the US Army opened fire on other soldiers in the deployment processing area of Ft. Hood, Texas.

Strangely, I actually think I have an answer for that.

In my opinion, the problem here is Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan is depressed, either covertly or overtly. The depression, along with other stressful events, lead him to believe that 1) he must 'save' others from getting deployed, and 2) in doing so, he can 'save' himself from getting deployed as well. It is just unfortunate that he chose two pistols and more ammo as his tool to do the saving. And there are many factors that lead to his present day.

One such factor is his ethnic background. Some reported him as "Jordanian-American", though he seems to have identified himself as more of a Palestinian, according to his local mosque former Imam, even though he is born in Arlington, VA. His parents have long since passed away and his brothers and cousins are living here in the US. Reports say that his family "has Palestinian roots". It is likely he grew up with the stories of the difficult lives of his parents, whom eventually fled to Jordan, then emigrated to the US.

More environmentalism bullshit

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Just learned that Sprint and Samsung is launching the "Reclaim", "a phone made out of 80% recycleable materials". I was surprised though that it wasn't the first "eco-friendly" phone. Motorola was actually first with "Renew" for T-mobile.

Well, *sounds* impressive, but how much of the Reclaim is really WORTH recycling? In general, the best way to "recycle" a cellphone is to donate it to a cause like battered women's shelter, so they can call 911 where-ever they are. Recycling electronics is often just not worth the time or money. They are simply too small to get much useful material out of them. The outer plastic shell is certainly recycleable.

Why are some religious people so... literal?

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Religion, Darwin, and Evolution

Why must some people take the Bible so... LITERALLY? It's obvious that the world was NOT created in six days, and the world was not created in 4004 BC (ref: King James Bible).

In fact, St. Augustine, VERY famous Christian about 400 AD, wrote a book called "True meanings of Book of Genesis", where he specifically stated that the Bible should not be taken as the literally truth, and Bible is NOT SCIENCE< but myth and allegory. Bible are a collection of lessons and messages from God, and some concepts can only be explained metaphorically, such as creation of space and time.

So why does some people insist that the Bible is the literally truth? That started in the Reformation. Basically, the reformation claims that the Bible, NOT the Pope, is the true leader of Christianity. Rather than having the Pope telling you what the Bible means, each reader of the Bible should be able to decide what the Bible meant to him- or herself.

Is representative democracy obsolete?

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Controversial Idea: Is Representative Democracy obsolete?

Thnk about it... the Greeks invented democracy, where any one who cares enough to argue policy can go down to the forum and join in the debate. But then, Greece back then are small city-states, each a government onto themselves.

Then comes the republic, when the distance prevents people from voicing their opinion directly, so representatives are chosen to speak for the people, so you don't have 10000 people stampeding into the capital just to get their voices heard.

Now, with the advent of telephone, TV, and advanced communications, it is possible to practice full democracy again... You no longer have to go physically to the government to be heard. There's e-mail, fax, phone, and so on. And if you care enough, you can always go physically.

So is representative democracy, i.e. republic, obsolete?

Malpractice suits: who really pays at the end?

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Did you know that in New York City, 92.2% of OB/GYN doctors have been sued for malpractice at least once? And the average is 3 times each? The effect is OB/GYN driven out of the city altogether, or just GYN, no more OB.

Another OB/GYN doctor remarked: in 1981 his medical malpractice insurance is only $8000 per year. Now it's $155000 (2009). His practice can't pay for the insurance, at about $50 per appt, so he's getting out of the business. Average malpractice insurance for non-OB/GYN doctors in NYC is $40000.

Stats show that less than 30% of the malpractice suits actually have a chance of winning. The rest are frivolous.