Thursday, August 21, 2008

Video games are your friend, college presidents may be too and a chance of a lifetime for an Iraq veteran....or not

- File this under the heading of tragic, terrible irony. A woman in Houston is going to face some serious criminal charges after leaving her 3-year-old son locked inside her truck in 90-degree heat while she went to work her shift - at a freaking hospital. Yes, this idiot works at a hospital and yet she seems to be ignorant of how dangerous it is to leave anyone, let alone a toddler, locked inside a vehicle with the windows up during a hot summer day. The best part of the whole situation is the woman’s explanation of what happened. The mother of Cameron Thomas Boone says she simply forgot to drop the child off at day care prior to going to work. Are you freaking kidding me? You forgot to drop him off so that means you’re totally ignorant to his presence in the vehicle? Did the kid become invisible after you thought you dropped him off at day care? Do you automatically become oblivious to his presence any time you think he’s not with you? Who can be totally oblivious to their kid being in the car and forget all about them like that? He was three years old, for God’s sake, there’s no way that kid was quiet the whole ride. Chalk this up as more evidence that just because you are physically able to have a child doesn’t mean it’s a good idea for you to do so. A lot of people are just far too big of a moron to be a good parent…..

- Protests and protestors can be awesome for a wide range of reasons. You don’t need to have a solid, viable, rational cause to be a good rioter, protestor or social dissident. You don’t need to be smart, well-educated, reasonable or logical - in fact, it’s almost better if you aren't. While a highly organized, powerful mob of people clashing with police and threatening to burn down a government building or torch some police cars is great, so is a nutty group of 20 pro-sovereignty activists in Hawaii protesting for their state’s right to be a free and independent entity. For the second time this year, these whack-a-doos seized control of a state palace in Honolulu and posted signs reading “Property of the Kingdom of Hawaiian Trust.” They also locked the gates forced a few local cops to scale the gates and take back control of the historic Iolani Palace. What their quasi-hostile takeover accomplished, I don’t know. But that’s part of the greatness of protests, riots and other acts of social dissidence: they’re largely subjective. What one person deems a failure another person sees as a wildly successful riot. Also adding fuel to this fire is the fact that these activists are fighting for someone fairly irrational that will never, ever happen. There’s no war going on, no major political conflict and no mass push toward their goal. They are standing alone, a couple of dozen loonies against the world. Protest on, sovereignty rights activists of Hawaii, protest on…..

- In case you were wondering what you were fighting for in Iraq, American military personnel, allow me to remind you. Okay, so that’s not fair, none of us knows what the hell our troops have been in Iraq for, other than following the orders of idiotic leaders who fabricated evidence to justify the war with the American public. But as a reward for his efforts in that unjustified war, one fortunate veteran will receive….wait for it….a guest spot on ABC’s daytime soap opera “All My Children”! It’s true, no joke. The show has issued an open casting call for all Iraq war veterans to fill the role of a character named Brot. A quick aside….Brot? What the hell is that? Brot is something you put on the grill (spelled differently, but same sound), not a human being. Is that the best name you could come up with? Brot? A guy risks his life on the battlefield and he gets to be Brot? Brot’s story line will be as a wounded war veteran whose love interest believes is dead. He will allow her to think that and remain in hiding, which I’m sure matters to someone…somewhere….maybe. Theoretically the story line will put a spotlight on the difficulties many veterans face after returning for combat. Those looking to audition for the role can contact the show’s New York casting director. Of course, after serving with W. as your commander-in-chief, working for the knobs who run soap operas is actually a massive upgrade….

- College students, your president might not be as much of a tool as you think. No, seriously, the guy in the suit who seems to do nothing but attend luncheons, ribbon-cutting ceremonies and make long-winded speeches may be on your side, at least when it comes to one important issue: drinking. College presidents from nearly 100 colleges and universities have joined a group called the Amethyst Institute, an organization pushing our nation’s lawmakers to lower the legal drinking age from 21 to 18. The belief of the Amethyst Institute is that the current laws encourage underage drinking because the majority of college students are under the age of 21 even as alcohol is just about the most omnipresent thing on every campus, everywhere. “This is a law that is routinely evaded,” said John McCardell, the former president at Middlebury College in Vermont and a man with a talent for stating the obvious. No kidding, ace, college kids under 21 routinely break the law by drinking? What are you going to tell me next, that college students also like to sleep late, procrastinate on assignments and smoke weed? Next week, you can announce that the sky is blue and grass is green, those would be equally stunning revelations. Predictably, Mothers Against Drunk Driving (M.A.D.D.) isn't down with the idea to lower the legal drinking age, saying it would cause more deaths. On the opposing side are presidents from schools such as Duke, Dartmouth, Ohio State, Syracuse and Colgate. So think long and hard about your stance, M.A.D.D. You’re going up against some freaking smart people, even some Ivy Leaguers. Not that lowering the legal drinking age is going to make a difference one way or the other, of course. Kids who want to drink will find a way, law against it or not. If someone who is 18 or 19 wants booze on a college campus, he or she will find it. That will be the case whether it’s legal or not. So this whole debate is largely irrelevant, just don’t tell that to those fighting the battle…..

- Could video games actually be a valuable tool in helping students develop and refine their reasoning and cognitive processing skills? If you believe the cumulative results of several recent studies that were presented at the American Psychological Association’s convention in Boston this week, the answer is yes. According to those studies, students who play video games develop reasoning and planning skills that could help them throughout their lives. One study conducted by researchers at Fordham University asked 122 fifth, sixth and seventh graders to think out loud while playing a video game for 20 minutes. The study showed that many students, especially the younger ones, developed a series of problem-solving skills to help them succeed in the game. Creating these short-term goals could translate into other areas of life, thus making them more well-rounded, intelligent people. So I can safely say that I am correct in assuming that the game these kids played was Grand Theft Auto IV. After all, what better prepares you for life than stealing car, slapping ho’s, robbing people and sexing it up in the back seat of cars with hookers? Who doesn’t develop better reasoning and problem-solving skills during that type of activity? So parents, next time your child wants to keep playing video games instead of doing their homework, think twice before pulling the plug on them…..

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