Vaccinations and Autism

I get in heated arguments, in person, and on blogs about this subject. Two disclaimers. I have an autistic child (now an adult). I'm nowhere near rational about the subject.

Dr. Andrew Wakefield was one of the first to suggest a link. He is now cast as a villain. I ask all who have an opinion to read the following short link.

http://www.anh-usa.org/vitamin-d-fluoride-and-vaccines-the-common-theme/

No need to get into any further arguments. I'm done debating this issue.

Stupid is as Stupid Does - A Car Story

Is there a “Stupid” scale? Two local brothers are master repossession agents. They also do bail enforcement and are meticulous in doing their work “by the book”.

One of their repossessions had been hard to find. They were paying me to do some sleuthing to help them out. I found the debtor’s new job location and the brothers visited the employee parking lot mid morning. They got the car and, per procedure, called the local dispatch number with their information. About thirty minutes later, the brother, Boyd, driving the repossession, was pulled over and then two more police cars pulled up. Boyd realized they were doing a felony stop. He totally cooperated.

Seems the debtor had seen the car drive away. He called 911 and said he was car jacked at gun point.

Slowly the facts came out. The call to dispatch. The repossession documents. The pat down with no weapon found. When asked if he minded if the car was searched, Boyd readily agreed. A revolver was found under the drivers seat. Oops! Soon the trunk was opened and more guns were found. It wasn’t long before some were linked to recent burglaries. Drugs were found.

The car was impounded and it took Boyd a few days to get it released. Two officers drove to the debtors job site to “get a statement”. The debtor was waiting. His first words, “When do I get my car back”? Not sure of the answer, if any, but the hand cuffs and seat in the back of the police car probably was a definitive answer.

Just how stupid are you to have the police out looking for your “dirty” car?

Well Regulated Milita

Now we have a "professor" claiming the 2nd Amendment mandates "gun control".

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/01/13-1

At Ludlow, CO a "Well Regulated Milita" was the perpetrator of the massacre of women and children. April 20, 1914.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/rockefellers/sfeature/sf_8.html

The killing stopped when citizens armed with their private weapons made it stop.

Asshats! Do they ever learn from history? Guess not. Can't happen now in these enlighted times, I suppose.

SPIFFS

So once again I’ve been asked to write another car lot story. This is a “spiff” story. The term goes back to the late 1800’s and refers to monies paid for specific performances. An example would be for selling a car in inventory too long, the first sale of the day, three sales in a day, etc. This is paid above and beyond the regular compensation.

In the late 80’s to early 90’s My employer was a large Ford store selling 1200 cars a month with fifty or so salesmen. A productive salesperson, selling 180 to 200 cars a year, could make over $10,000 in spiffs alone. The competition was fierce. I’ve seen NBA and NFL alumni who couldn’t take the pressure.
The General Manager had a series of fines, called “stop spiffs”, for various infractions. If levied against you, you paid taxes on the earnings but the spiff went to charity. Don’t like it or think it is fair? Work at “down the road motors”.

About every six weeks, the GM went over the stop spiffs for the benefit of new hires. $25 for parking your car on the lot. $50 for missing a meeting, etc. He also had three, called Substantial ($200), Major ($500) and Legendary ($1,000). Threats to coworkers might be a Substantial. A fist fight might be a Major. After he went over the program, he would announce, “And in the room today, we have two double Legends, Pritchmeyer and the Tank”. John and I would then stand up to be cheered/jeered, etc.

There was no stop spiff for theft of any kind. Immediate termination, end of story.

Some may be curious as to how the Legends attainted their status. In the case of the Tank, it was for informing insufferable tools the precise nature of their tooldom, on two separate occasions. For the Pritchmeyer, the first was parking a full sized Bronco on it’s roof in the adjacent bus transit parking lot.
The second was for selective editing credit reports faxed to a bank too cheap and lazy to pull their own.

Of fifty salespeople, seven made 40% of the total salespeople earnings. John and I were in that group.

The car business has lost the warrior spirit. Depending on your point of view, that is good or bad. In my years in the business, I met exactly one car company “Suit” I would have hired for my team. The rest wasted my time.
You want stupid? One training seminar they brought in Jane Fonda as a motivational speaker. When a dozen or so of us walked out, the factory men went nuts. One man, not me - too slow, told them, “We will be at the bar until the bitch is gone”. Nothing happened at my store. The owner was an ex Flying Tiger.

So there you are, my anonymous friend, another car lot story.

Globull Warming

Just finished the fourth application today of shovel and broom to the several inches of global warming on the deck, stairs, walks, and vehicles. So far, this has been a dry winter on the plains and this moisture is needed to fill local aquifers and irrigation reservoirs.

As storms go, this is nothing for this area. Guess it is the other parts of the country getting hammered along with Alberta. Still, it validates why I keep a 4x4 on hand.

Coal Trains

Two BNSF coal trains waiting for a clear track. The steam clouds are from the generating plant they serve. Standardized at 110 cars and two locomotives at each end, they run from near Gillette, WY to where the coal is needed. They can be seen at every hour. Not very "green" but lots of jobs and lots of electricity being provided.

Birther One Term

Lets start the year with some controversy. My buddy, Dirty Al, wants me to stay away from politics. Sorry Al, I’m like the scorpion riding across the river on the coyote’s back. In any case, I’m already on too many shit lists to worry about it.

Interesting angles on the “birther” issue now with Democrats talking about it.

http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/democrats-force-birther-issue/?singlepage=true

Here is scenario that makes sense to me. To get on the ballot again, Obama will face many state election officials demanding he proves he is a “natural born citizen”. There is a major embarrassment in his records. More on that to follow.

The Democrat movers and shakers will decide he can’t win and will try to give him an “out” carrot with the birth certificate stick.

As to the embarrassment, what is the name of the father on his long form birth certificate? Remember, Obama has said more than once his father served in WWII. His purported father was seven years old when Patton was in North Africa. There is a chance he made a mistake, a misstatement.

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/27/obamas-staff-corrects-wwii-story/

Certain of his detractors question his parentage. They don’t produce any proof. What is known is his mentoring by a clique of openly Communist professors at the University of Hawaii.

http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=114359


We have a precedence. Imagine, right after Watergate, Nixon had made this kind of statement. “Certain overzealous members of my reelection staff have caused a crime to occur. Since I hired them, the responsibility is mine. I apologize to the Democratic Party and to my opponents.” Within a week the whole affair would have blown over and Nixon would have appeared strong.

If Obama is hiding something, it is too late now to come clean.

Our citizens love a rags to riches bootstrap story and admire those who overcome humble beginnings and adversity to become successful. Just look at the way Michael Vick’s public image has been rehabilitated. Personally, I think he still is a puke. Had Obama been forthcoming from the beginning, many people who dislike his politics would still admire him as a person.

He will be a one term president. Now if we can just survive the rest of his term.