DISH NETWORK BEATS CRIPPLED MAN

A quadriplegic* man was FIRED by Dish Network for using medical marijuana OFF-THE-JOB. He sued, Dish won, and went after the wheelchair-bound man for legal fees. ARE WE GOING TO ALLOW A US BUSINESS TO ACT LIKE THIS? A BOYCOTT of Dish Network might teach them that the CONSUMERS will NOT allow them to beat up the disabled.

The Colorado Appellate Court found that Dish could fire the man, but could not get legal fees.Because of federal laws, the court was right. (See Coats v. Dish Network, LLC, 2013 COA 62) But are WE the CONSUMERS, going to allow this kind of behavior?

If you are using Dish Network, please find another provider. If there is no other provider, please pay Dish Network at the last possible moment. If your college is using Dish Network, feel free to protest loudly.

While you are still angry about this, you should call your congressperson and ask them to take marijuana off schedule one, and at LEAST allow a doctor to prescribe marijuana.

BTW, I do not know of ANY valid study that says use of marijuana off-the-job can cause productivity problems on-the-job. I am CERTAIN that a comparison of marijuana the next morning to a hangover from alcohol the next morning will show that ALCOHOL IS MUCH WORSE FOR PRODUCTIVITY.

*Quadriplegic means that the man does NOT have the use of his arms and his legs.

AUSTERITY, DEBT and LIES

It is clear that two Harvard professors used incorrect data and insupportable math formulas to help conservatives "sell" austerity. I believe that governments should be able to borrow money just like corporations borrow money. Just as some badly run corporations may not be able pay their debts, some badly run governments may not be able to pay their debts.

Harvard Professors Reinhart and Rogoff published "Growth in a Time of Debt". They used a speadsheet to "prove" that government debt over 90% of GDP stops economic growth. Too bad the paper is total bull dung. The professors used an incorrect math formula and failed to put in data that disagreed with their theory. No other economics professor was willing to say more than that (s)he could not replicate R&R's results. It took Thomas Herndon, a brave grad student, to disprove R&R's results.

So now we know that people are homeless, starving, unemployed and angry due to totally unnecessary austerity programs.

How do we decide how much debt is too much? Make the analysis as if a country is a corporation. You look at management, ability to repay, debt to GDP (instead of equity), past repayment history, reputation, and current interest rate being paid. Honest economists can help with this problem, but, in the end, it is up to the persons lending the money to decide if the interest being paid is worth the risk of not being repaid.

Please note that the US is paying record low interest rates on its debt.

I THINK SYRIA IS USING CHEMICAL WEAPONS

Britain, France, and Israel, all believe that Assad is using chemical weapons in an attempt to win against the Syrian rebels. As you know, I think the rebels have very good reason to be rebelling against Assad.

This situation is different from the Saddam fake weapons of mass destruction. Assad is not letting in inspectors. Saddam allowed inspectors pretty much everywhere. France stayed sane during the Saddam imbroglio  Now France is sounding the alarm about probable use of sarin gas. Israel believes that Assad is going to use more chemical weapons as Assad seems to believe that no one can stop him from doing whatever he pleases.

Last time, a CIA agent was exposed because her husband would not cover up the Bush administration's lies about Saddam and radioactive material.

Please remember that no one believed that the Nazis were exterminating people until the Allies liberated the concentration camps.

President Putin, can you please think of how history will view your support of Assad?

CISPA, THE IRS, AND DANGEROUS OVERKILL

The proposed new "cyber security" law could allow mass information sharing between banks and the IRS. The IRS is a governmental agency and not paying your correct taxes could cause damage to the United States.

We need to leave "information sharing" in the hands of judges who grant warrants. Data sharing, with personal information removed, might be something to examine. But JUDGES need to be the persons in charge of deciding whether the threat demands the intrusion into our civil liberties.

I am not surprised that the lobbyist for CISPA is the US Chamber of Commerce.

I believe that the United States Chamber of Commerce has become a kind of political donation "laundering" organization. Certain kinds of charities can lobby for passing a law. These charities are also allowed to keep their donor list secret. Sometime people like the Koch Brothers want to keep their names from being associated with a stupid idea. Under our current laws, they can pay an organization like the Chamber of Commerce to do their dirty work for them.

RUSH TO JUDGMENT

The people in the Boston videos may be WITNESSES not PERPETRATORS. Remember that in the US, people are INNOCENT until PROVEN GUILTY.

I know that the news people are desperate for a scoop. But we need to keep in mind that a frightened person does not make a very good witness. If a witness is scared, the witness is MUCH less likely to remember important details which might solve the crime.

I can easily imagine a credible scenario where an innocent is told, "Please leave my street clothes near the finish line so I can get dressed after my race."

If you have not sent your photos and videos to the Boston Police, please do it NOW. It is obvious that "crime solving" amateurs do not have the discipline to solve this horrible crime.

It is also horrible that carelessness regarding safety regulations caused the death of even more innocents in Texas. Government regulators are a real pain until your friend dies from an industrial accident.

WE CAN HELP STOP EVIL

If you have not already sent your Boston Marathon photos and videos to the Boston Police, please do so NOW!

Google could help by setting up a website where it would be easy to upload the video and photos. If it was a public website, we could all use our technical knowledge and human skills to slowly piece together a photo and video timeline of the event.

This would be possible because modern cameras have time, date, and GPS embedded in them. "Following" one person though a crowd is something that humans do better than computers, but it takes a LOT of humans.

The Boston Marathon is OUR event. It is up to us to help keep our street parties safe. It is WAY too late to report abandoned bags. But this event happened close to the finish line, so there must be numerous photos and videos.

Of course, if the FBI tells us to "stay out of it", then all you can do is send your stuff to the official place.

It is really too bad that I could not find the official place to send a photo when I looked on line.

SENIORS KNOW WHO TO BLAME

Seniors know that the Republicans forced President Obama to offer cuts in Medicare and Social Security  I have decided that I am probably willing to go without medical care and eat cat food in order to help stop the cuts to programs helping babies, children, and science research.

My personal philosophy and constant goal is to leave the world a better place because of my actions during my relatively short life.

Therefore, I have decided to support the President, and save my fighting energy to ensure that Republicans are voted out of office for their support of the rich and disdain for the sick and the poor.

If you agree with me, then you need to START NOW to ensure that good candidates run against the Republicans, especially the Republican members of the US House of Representatives.

WHEN MAJORITY DOES NOT RULE

The majority does NOT rule if the majority is unfair to minorities. Majorities can sometimes be bullies. The majority sometimes decide that they are going to stop minorities from exercising their rights, especially the right to free speech and the right to chose their religion.

An excellent example is when the US decided to provide funding vouchers for religious schools. This idea lost much of its impetus when a group of Wiccans decided to open a school and applied for funding vouchers. Most people decided that they did not want tax money going to Wiccans. Of course, they also realized that the Wiccans did have a right to request and receive funding for their school.

Minorities are allowed to talk about ideas even if the majority believes the minority ideas are WRONG. Free speech is a difficult concept. In the US you can say anything you want, except that you can not make threats of violence against a person(s), you can not deliberately start a riot, and you can not advocate the violent overthrow of the government. If you advertise something, you can not lie about what the something does or does not do.

These are simple ideas that can be extremely complex when applied to a set of facts.

NUTTY FOOD FANATICS

Less than 1% of the population is allergic to gluten, peanuts, or nuts. For some reason, it has become "way cool*" to eat gluten free food. Of course, doing this may seriously affect your nutrition  For instance, not eating nuts, such as walnuts, seems to be contributing to low sperm counts in men with Northern European ancestry.

This is part of what I call the OVERBOARD phenomena. For example, the people who can not eat gluten wanted a label on food to state whether or not it contained gluten, a very nutritious vegetable protein. In order to get this done, they had to run a PR campaign explaining to people why this was important. Since the symptoms of the rare gluten allergy are the same as some of the symptoms of stress, LOTS of people decided they must have a gluten allergy without asking for a medical confirmation.

Another, more serious example of the OVERBOARD phenomena is addiction to drugs. Less than 5% of the population is addicted to an addictive substance. (An addictive substance means anything that the DEA believes can cause addiction, including heroin, alcohol and the use of the non addictive marijuana.) But we are using more and more draconian measures to try to stop people from using  non alcohol addictive substances even though 95% are not addicted to ANYTHING.

The heroin problem affects me on a daily basis as doctors refuse to prescribe needed medication for pain because I might be one of the small percentage of people who are addicted. I do not blame the doctors, but blame the DEA for their harassment of doctors who help people in real pain.

* "Way cool" means that WAY to many people are doing something because other people are doing it.

LEGALIZE HEMP FOR FUEL, CLOTHES, PAPER

US Senators have introduced the first bill to legalize hemp, which is a VERY useful plant, and is NOT a drug. Hemp was made illegal so that we would buy plastic and so we could cut down forests to make paper. Legalizing it seems like a "no-brainer*". 

I have NO idea how the plastics and wood industry conned people into making hemp illegal. I think they said they could not get marijuana convictions unless hemp was made illegal. (Hemp is a plant cousin of marijuana, but you can not use hemp to get high.**.) Modern forensics has removed any problem regarding confusing hemp with marijuana. 

Hemp is extremely promising as a bio fuel. Hemp is extremely easy to grow. Growing hemp does not require pesticides. Hemp makes excellent paper. (Did you know that the Declaration of Independence was written on hemp?) Hemp makes excellent marine rope that biodegrades if lost at sea.

Lets get this bill passed and signed. Just say, "Please legalize hemp."

We can make this happen in time for Spring planting of hemp. Call your US Congressperson NOW!

* No-brainer is slang for a decision that is easy to make because there is NO valid reason not to do the proposed action.

** High is slang for marijuana intoxication.

OOGOO DEFINED

Oogoo means "you can not find this information using Google." It derives from the Swedish "ogooglebar", which is too long. Oogoo is used as an adjective as in, "This search is oogoo." An example of oogoo is a search for wide, flat, Chinese Mary Jane shoes. This is an oogoo because all of the search terms are used too often, so you end up with way too many results.

Another oogoo is searching for any legal decisions which cite statutes. For some reason, no search engine can handle the way judges and lawyers refer to laws. (Note that oogoo can also be used as a noun.)

Google will be forced to fight the word "ogooglebar", as all companies have to defend their trademarks or they will lose them. Ask Zerox and Kleenex how hard defending a trademark can be.

But oogoo does not violate any trademark. You can use it with pleasure, and a certain amount of laughter.

We should start with the term, "oogoo search". That way, it will be easier to explain to the uninitiated. 

There is a prize for the first time I see oogoo in an online, mainstream newspaper.