Getting on With Life

John McCain's choice for Vice President has inspired some very interesting comments from the left-wing blogosphere:

i'm outraged that mclame piked a chearleeder

Well... actually... she was point guard for her high school basketball team and hit the winning free throw that clinched Alaska Small School State Championship.

another big oil stooge

Well... actually... she raised state royalties on oil drillers and gave every Alaskan a $1,200 energy credit from the proceeds. I understand that to the current crop of Neo-Socialists, tax credits that provide direct cash are anathema. After all, it's the responsibility of the state to confiscate earnings and profits then provide "services" designed to dictate behavior and promote a utopian society--while providing huge monetary gains for state-supported cronies. This is the culture of corruption in Alaska politics that Governor Palin was elected to combat, and did. Any comments from Mr. Obama--an extortionist for ACORN as well as willing accomplice to the Chicago corruption cartel--would be greatly appreciated.

once again an attractive woman gets picked ahaed of qualified women

This one is especially amusing. First, because it suggests that a woman with nearly a decade of executive experience is less qualified for Veep than a man with barely three years in the Senate and not a single legislative achievement on his resume is for President.

And second, because this feminist tactic confirms Rush Limbaugh's contention that:

"Feminism was created to allow unattractive women access to the mainstream media."

Okay, here we are. Many comments, very few surprises--until this little gem after it was made known that Governor Palin has a four-month-old child with Down's Syndrome.

she should have had an abortion and gone on with her life.

An isolated kook, right. Wait, there's more.

any woman who would give birth to a down sindrome baby isn't smart enough to hol office

she should quit her job, stay home and take care of her family; what's she doing having five kids anyway

Yes, I do agree with population control, and would want it guaranteed by
mandatory sterilization after one-half a live birth per person. Both people involved get the knife. And any guy who gets more than one woman pregnant at a time loses his nuts.

These vitriolic blatherings should not have come as a surprise. As I was reading these thoughtful postings my "Horrid Comment" memory chip kicked into gear. Years ago when an acquaintance from work gave birth to a Down's Syndrome child a highly-evolved colleague suggested that she should: "Leave the kid at the hospital."

Some turned away while others nodded.

And in fairness, even on the Leftoid message boards there were expressions of disgust from many posters. But that didn't keep the whackos from posting on.


I think it is dumb to have a kid that you know will be born all messed up. Period.

Actually, Trig's biggest problem isn't that he has Down's Syndrome it's that he has a repuke for a Mom.

Granted, as an adoptive father I'm biased. When our son was born, the inseminator (referred to euphemistically as the birth father) believed that his responsibility ended with an offer to pay for an abortion.

Our daughter was born three years later and our legal liaison relayed the same story.

But then, when I proudly showed her picture to a group of professional associates at an Upper West Side cocktail party I was left speechless (not easy) by a comment from a complete stranger who proclaimed with an unassailable aura of authority that:

"Foreign adoptions are a conspiracy to depopulate the Third World."

As I said, none of this should surprise me.

Staring at the Ceiling Fan

I'm sullen, confused, depressed. My normally cheerful outlook on life has been dragged through the depths of despair. All of the poisons that have lurked in the mud for millenia... well... never mind.

Every once in awhile I see, hear or read something that makes me want to go straight to the nearest cliff and throw myself to the mercy of gravity.

That was my reaction recently when I happened upon this essay written by a young gentleman, Ken Ilgunas, from Niagara Falls and published in the Buffalo News. The whining ruminations of Mr. Ilgunas are reproduced below in Bolshevic red.

I am 24, live with my parents, can’t find work and am floundering in a sea of debt five figures high. I think of myself as ambitious, independent and hardworking. Now I’m dependent, unemployed and sleeping under the same Super Mario ceiling fan that I did when I was 7.

How did this happen? I did what every upstanding citizen is supposed to do. I went to college. I took out loans so I could enroll at Alfred University, a pricey private school. The next year, I transferred to the more finance-friendly University at Buffalo, where I could commute from home and push carts part-time at Home Depot.

I related my forthcoming debt to puberty or a midlife crisis — each an unavoidable nuisance; tickets required upon admission to the next stage of adulthood. But as interest rates climbed and the cost of tuition, books and daily living mounted to galactic proportions,

I realized this was more than some paltry inconvenience.

Upon graduating, I was helplessly launched headfirst into the “real world,” equipped with a degree in history and $32,000 in student loans. Before ricocheting back home, I would learn two important lessons: 1) There are no well-paying — let alone paying — jobs for history majors. 2) The real world is really tough.

Desperate times called for desperate measures, and I had no intention of living in a society that was as unfair as this one. To seek a haven devoid of the ruthless 9-to-5 ebb and flow of contemporary America, I moved to Alaska.

As a liberal arts major, I dreamed of making a profound difference in people’s lives. Instead, for a year, I lived in Coldfoot, a town north of the Arctic Circle that resembles a Soviet Gulag camp. My job as a tour guide for visitors temporarily alleviated my money woes because it provided room and board, but when the season ended and I moved back home, I was again confronted with the grim realities of debt.

Desperate, I browsed through insurance and bank job descriptions. I had hit an all-time low. Could I surrender my soul for health coverage and a steady income? Could I sacrifice my ideals by falling into line?

Suddenly, living at home didn’t seem nearly as degrading as selling out. But sadly, other graduates don’t have any choice but to work for temp agencies and retail stores to eke by.

That’s the tragedy of student debt: it doesn’t just limit what we do, but who we become. Forget volunteering. Forget traveling. Forget trying to improve your country, or yourself. You’ve got bills to pay, young man.

Unfortunately, the recent passage of the College Cost Reduction and Access Act doesn’t portend that times are a-changin’. The act reduces interest rates on Stafford Loans and increases Pell Grant awards. Whoopty-do.

There’s no question that this is a step forward. But we’re still talking pennies and nickels when we need to completely revolutionize the government’s role in financing post-secondary education.

College is a wonderful experience and something every young citizen should pursue. But without help, a college education is becoming an unaffordable rite of passage and a privilege of the affluent.

My loan payments can’t wait much longer, and soon I must leave home to find work that doesn’t compromise my integrity. Although I sometimes wonder what it would be like if I had declared as an accounting major and got a cushy job punching numbers somewhere, I’ll take my history major, my debt and my mom’s cooking any day of the week.

Being a heartless windbag I'm probably the last person who should be commenting on this doofus' ramblings, but I can't help myself.

HEY MR. ILGUNAS... A COLLEGE DEGREE DOES NOT GUARANTEE A LIFETIME OF COMFORTABLE, RESPONSIBILITY-FREE ADOLESCENCE!

Wanna travel? Get a job.

Wanna help your fellow man? Earn your own way and set a good example.

Wanna get out of the basement?

Stand on your own two feet and quit the whining and self pity.

America's future? I hope not.