MESSAGE TO RED STATES

Dear Red States:



We've decided we're leaving. We intend to form our own country, and we're taking the other Blue States with us. In case you aren't aware, that includes California, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and all the Northeast. It may even include Florida and Ohio, they are seriously considering it. We've given them until Nov. 4th to decide. We believe this split will be beneficial to the nation, and especially to the people of the new country. Since we're dropping the middle states we're calling it United America, or simply the U.A.
0A


To sum up briefly: You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states. We get stem cell research and the best beaches. We get the Statue of Liberty. You get Dollywood. You can take Ted Nugent. We're keeping Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel. You get WorldCom. We get Intel and Microsoft. You get Ole' Miss. We get Harvard and 85 percent of America's venture capital and entrepreneurs. You get Alabama. We get two-thirds of the tax revenue, you get to make the red states pay their fair share.



Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the Christian Coalition's, we get a bunch of happy families. You get a bunch of single moms, and the highest concentration of pregnant unwed teenagers. Please be aware that the U.A. will be pro-choice and anti-war, and we're going to want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need people to fight, ask your evangelicals. They have kids they're apparently willing to send to their deaths for no purpose, and they don't care if you don't show pictures of their children's caskets coming home. We do wish you success in Iraq, and hope that the WMDs turn up, really we do, but we're not willing to spend our resources in Bush's Quagmire. We'd rather spend it on taking care of sick people, and educating our children.



With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80 percent of the country's fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation's fresh fruit, 95 percent of America's quality wines, 90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools plus Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT. With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88 percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs), 92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia. We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.



Additionally, 38 percent of those in the Red states believe Jonah wa s actually swallowed by a whale, 62 percent believe life is sacred unless we're discussing the war, the death penalty or gun laws, 44 percent say that evolution is only a theory, 53 percent that Saddam was involved in 9/11 and 61 percent of you crazy Redies believe you are people with higher morals then we Bluies..



Finally, we're taking the good pot, too. You can have that dirt weed they grow in Mexico.



Peace out,

Blue States

QUOTES

'If you don't read the newspaper
you are uninformed, if you do
read the newspaper you are
misinformed.'
Mark Twain

Suppose you were an idiot.
And suppose you were a member of Congress....
But then I repeat myself.
-Mark Twain

I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.
-Winston Churchill

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.
- George Bernard Shaw

A liberal is someone who feels a great debt to his fellow man, which debt he proposes to pay off with your money.
-G Gordon Liddy

Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.
-James Bovard, Civil Libertarian (1994)

Foreign aid might be defined as a transfer of money from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries.
-Douglas Casey, Classmate of Bill Clinton at Georgetown University

Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.
-P.J. O'Rourke, Civil Libertarian

Government is the great fiction, through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.
-Frederic Bastiat, French Economist (1801-1850)

Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.
-Ronald Reagan (1986)

I don't make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts.
- Will Rogers

If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free!
-P.J. O'Rourke

In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one party of the citizens to give to the other.
-Voltaire (1764)

Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn't mean politics won't take an interest in you!
-Pericles (430 B.C.)

No man's life, liberty, or property is safe while the legislature is in session.
-Mark Twain (1866 )

Talk is cheap...except when Congress does it.
-Unknown

The government is like a baby's alimentary canal, with a happy appetite at one end and no responsibil ity at the other.
-Ronald Reagan

The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery.
-Winston Churchill

The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin.
-Mark Twain

The ultimate result of s hielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools.
-Herbert Spencer, English Philosopher (1820-1903)

There is no distinctly Native American criminal class...save Congress.
-Mark Twain

What this country needs are more unemployed politicians.
-Edward Langley, Artist (1928 - 1995)

A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have.
-Thomas Jefferson

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FRED REED

October2, 2008

I frankly don’t believe John McCain’s medical records, or at any rate the portions released to the New York Times. The man was held in solitary for years, tortured until bones fractured, until he confessed to war crimes, until he tried to hang himself.

That he broke can’t be held against him: Almost anyone would have. (In my view GIs should be told to confess to anything whatever right from the start.) But the assertion that he came through unscathed, warm and humorous and psychically sound, just isn’t plausible. It doesn’t happen that way.

Now, PTSD. A lot of people, including vets, don’t believe that PTSD exists. I didn’t. One reason is that they tend to think of it as something verging on the psychotic, as for example seeing nonexistent snipers in the hedgerows of suburban Philadelphia. The other common notion is that those who have it dive under tables at the sound of a backfire. Vets tend to think, “I don’t know anybody like that. I certainly don’t see snipers in the rafters. This whole PTSD business sounds like a crock.”

So it does. But it isn’t.

And of course many people, chiefly men, regard with suspicion anything that smells of psychobabble, anything touchy-feely. To them PTSD sounds like Can’t-Get-a-Date Personality Disorder—something for Oprah to talk about to bored housewives. So they dismiss it.

Let me de-babble the discussion and state a simple fact: A lot of guys come back from wars really, truly messed up in the head, and it doesn’t go away. They aren’t going to talk to you about it. They figure it’s none of your goddamned business. If you push, they will tell you so, angrily.

If you weren’t in those forsaken paddies, they think, if you didn’t go through what they did, you’re off their radar screens. They’ll talk to you about football, the weather, and whatever happened in the newspaper yesterday. Just don’t even try to talk about Viet Nam. Or whatever war it was. They don’t want to think about it, and talking about it to weenies feels like being naked in a train station.

There are a lot of these brain-burnt guys out there. They don’t want your pity. They don’t pity themselves. They just don’t want to expose that part of themselves to you. They put a wall around themselves. You can’t see it. It’s there.

Often they seem like fairly normal guys with three divorces who drink too much and their children say, “It was like he was somewhere else.” Perfectly normal guys who have had seventeen jobs because their bosses are always useless bastards. Perfectly normal guys who live out in the desert and do serious scuba or hang glide because they just don’t give a fuck.

Not all. Some manage to hold it together and become things thought to be respectable, such as senators or writers or defense attorneys. A subsurface lode of hostility can be useful in a trial lawyer. Anger is energizing. It can fuel a career.

With PTSD, or whatever you want to call it, the anger is the giveaway. These vets carry a load of subterranean fury that you don’t want to look at. As they would say, I shit you not one pound. I know a lot of these guys. A buddy of mine—two tours in bad places, killed a whole lot of people up close-- now has no tolerance for frustration,. He's ready to spread your teeth over a wide radius if you even seem to think about getting in his face. Admirable? No. But don’t make the experiment.

Sounds like McCain. His explosiveness is notorious.

Another guy I know, writer, freelanced all his life because he couldn’t get along with people in offices. A writer can package this as sturdy independence, as being a colorful maverick. The fellow is approximately sane, or at least apparently sane. Get three drinks in him, bring up the war, and his voice starts shaking and it’s time to change the subject right now.

A fair few PTSD guys become writers: It’s solitary, you don’t have to put up with bosses, and you don’t have to be stable.

How do these vets get this way? Not by anything you want to hear about, anything that you will see on the nightly news. The RPG hits your tank, the cherry juice cooks off, and three of your buddies burn to death screaming because they couldn’t get out fast enough. You lose a leg and half your face to a mortar round. You just see things: A Chicom 122 cuts a cyclo driver in half and you watch him trying to crawl with his guts hanging out. He doesn’t crawl long. You get shot down over Hanoi and spend years being tortured. The military is a fun place. You have all sorts of unusual experiences.

It messes your head up. I promise.

I said anger—yes, but anger at what? At whom? Here I’m on soft ground because vets don’t talk much about this stuff among themselves. At least those I know don’t. But, to the extent that I am competent to judge, they aren’t mad at those who shot them, or shot at them. “The VC were only doing their job.” They hate those who sent them to a pointless war, who exposed them in thousands to Agent Orange, knowing that it was poisonous and carcinogenic, at those posing fat-ass pols who sent them to die for nothing while they ate prime rib in DC.

Or they just hate. Psychologically the verb can be intransitive. They don’t know what they hate, but don’t get in the way of it.

Not all respond this way. Some choose to intensify their patriotism—it avoids admitting that you have been suckered—and direct their hatred at the hippies, the liberals, the press, all of whom they figure lost the war. But the anger is still there. Most of the time, you don’t notice it. They turn off, often seem emotionally cold. But that explosive venom remains. We’re not talking about a fiery Irish temper. We’re talking half crazy.

Those who seek help, typically from the VA, end up on Thissa-dol and Thatta-dol, on antidepressants and calmants and even antipsychotics. They sorta help. Sorta isn’t good enough with men who control carrier battle groups.

From the New York Times story, “Mr. McCain also learned to control his temper and not to become angry over insignificant things, the doctors said.” I don’t believe it. It doesn’t fit accounts of people who know him. It isn’t how heads work.

McCain is well known for his violent and irrational temper. A friend of mine, Ken Smith, was flack for Governor Mecham of Arizona during a meeting with McCain. The governor somehow irritated McCain. Says Ken, “McCain was leaning forward with a clinched fist. I reached out my left arm, as politely and as non-threatening as I could, and I pushed McCain back. What I remember is how taut and hard his body was, not from working out and lifting weights, but rather from anger and adrenalin. I made an excuse to leave and get them apart.”

For what he went through in Vietnamese jails he deserves sympathy and admiration. It isn’t qualification for the presidency.

HINTS FOR THE KITCHEN

Peel a banana from the bottom and you won't have to

pick the little "stringy things" off of it. That's how the primates do it.

Take your bananas apart when you get home from the store.

If you leave them connected at the stem, they ripen faster.

Store your opened chunks of cheese in aluminum foil.

It will stay fresh much longer and not mold!

Peppers with 3 bumps on the bottom are sweeter and better for eating.

Peppers with 4 bumps on the bottom are firmer and better for cooking.

Add a teaspoon of water when frying ground beef.

It will help pull the grease away from the meat while cooking.

To really make scrambled eggs or omelets rich add a couple of

spoonfuls of sour cream, cream cheese, or heavy cream in and then beat them up.

For a cool brownie treat, make brownies as directed. Melt Andes mints

in double broiler and pour over warm brownies. Let set for a wonderful minty frosting.

Add garlic immediately to a recipe if you want a light taste

of garlic and at the end of the recipe if your want a stronger taste of garlic.

Leftover snickers bars from Halloween make a delicious dessert. Simply

chop them up with the food chopper. Peel, core and slice a few apples. Place them

in a baking dish and sprinkle the chopped candy bars over the apples. Bake at 350

for 15 minutes!!! Serve alone or with vanilla ice cream Yummm!

Reheat Pizza

Heat up leftover pizza in a nonstick skillet on top of the stove, set heat to med-low

and heat till warm. This keeps the crust crispy. No soggy micro pizza. I saw this on

the cooking channel and it really works.

Easy Deviled Eggs

Put cooked egg yolks in a zip lock bag. Seal, mash till they are all broken up. Add remainder of ingredients, reseal,

keep mashing it up mixing thoroughly, cut the tip of the baggy, squeeze mixture into egg. Just throw bag away when done easy clean up.

Expanding Frosting

When you buy a container of cake frosting from the store, whip it with your mixer

for a few minutes You can double it in size. You get to frost more cake/cupcakes

with the same amount. You also eat less sugar and calories per serving.

Reheating refrigerated bread

To warm biscuits, pancakes, or muffins that were refrigerated, place them in

a microwave with a cup of water. The increased moisture will keep the food

moist and help it reheat faster.

Newspaper weeds away

Start putting in your plants, work the nutrients in your soil. Wet newspapers,

put layers around the plants overlapping as you go cover with mulch and for-

get about weeds. Weeds will get through some gardening plastic they will not

get through wet newspapers.

Broken Glass

Use a wet cotton ball or Q-tip to pick up the small shards of glass you can't see easily.

No More Mosquitoes

Place a dryer sheet in your pocket.

It will keep the mosquitoes away.

Squirrel Away!

To keep squirrels from eating your plants, sprinkle your plants with cayenne pepper.

The cayenne pepper doesn't hurt the plant and the squirrels won't come near it.

Flexible vacuum

To get something out of a heat register or under the fridge add an empty paper towel

roll or empty gift wrap roll to your vacuum. It can be bent or flattened to get in nar-

row openings.

Reducing Static Cling

Pin a small safety pin to the seam of your slip and you will not have a clingy skirt

or dress. Same thing works with slacks that cling when wearing panty hose.

Place pin in seam of slacks and ... ta da! ... static is gone.

Measuring Cups

Before you pour sticky substances into a m! easuring cup, fill with hot water.

Dump out the hot water, but don't dry cup. Next, add your ingredient, such

as peanut butter, and watch how easily it comes right out.

Foggy Windshield?

Hate foggy windshields? Buy a chalkboard eraser and keep it in the glove box of

your car . When the window s fog, rub with the eraser! Works better than a cloth!

Reopening envelope

If you seal an envelope and then realize you forgot to include something inside,

just place your sealed envelope in the freezer for an hour or two. Viola! It unseals

easily.

Conditioner

Use your hair conditioner to shave your legs. It's cheaper than shaving cream and

leaves your legs really smooth. It's also a great way to use up the conditioner you

bought but didn't like when you tried it in your hair.

Goodbye Fruit Flies

To get rid of pesky fruit flies, take a small glass, fill it 1/2" with Apple Cider Vinegar

and 2 drops of dish washing liquid; mix well. You will find those flies drawn to the

cup and gone forever!

Get Rid of Ants

Put small piles of cornmeal where you see ants. They eat it, take it "home," can't

digest it so it kills them. It may take a week or so, especially if it rains, but it works

and you don't have the worry about pets or small children being harmed!

INFO ABOUT CLOTHES DRYERS

The heating unit went out on my dryer! The gentleman that fixes things around the

house for us told us that he wanted to show us something and he went over to the

dryer and pulled out the lint filter. It was clean. (I always clean the lint from the fil-

ter after every load clothes.) He told us that he wanted to show us something; he

took the filter over to the sink and ran hot water over it. The lint filter is made of a

mesh material ... I'm sure you know what your dryer's lint filter looks like. Well ...

the hot water just sat on top of the mesh! It didn't go through it at all! He told us

that dryer sheets cause a film over that mesh that's what burns out the heating unit.

You can't SEE the film, but it's there. It's what is in the dryer sheets to make your

clothes soft and static free ... that nice fragrance too. You know how they can feel

waxy when you take them out of the box .. well this stuff builds up on your clothes

and on your lint screen. This is also what causes dryer units to potentially burn your

house down with it! He said the best way to keep your dryer working for a very long

time (and to keep your electric bill lower) is to take that filter out and wash it with

hot soapy water and an old toothbrush (or other brush) at least every six months.

He said that makes the life of the dryer at least twice as long! How about that!?!

Learn something new everyday! I certainly didn't know dryer sheets would do that.

So, I thought I'd share!

Note: I went to my dryer and tested my screen by running water on it. The water ran

through a little bit but mostly collected all the water in the mesh screen. I washed it

with warm soapy water and a nylon brush and I had it done in 30 seconds. Then when

I rinsed it .. the water ran right thru the screen! There wasn't any puddling at all! T

hat repairman knew what he was talking about!

A LITTLE STORY

One day a farmer's donkey fell down into a
Well. The animal cried piteously for hours as
The farmer tried to figure out what to do.

Finally, he decided the animal was old, and the
Well needed to be covered up anyway;

It just wasn't worth it to retrieve the donkey.

He invited all his neighbors to come over and
Help him. They all grabbed a shovel and began
To shovel dirt into the well. At first, the
Donkey realized what was happening and cried
Horribly. Then, to everyone's amazement he
Quieted down.

A few shovel loads later, the farmer finally
Looked down the well. He was astonished at what
He saw. With each shovel of dirt that hit his
Back, the donkey was doing something amazing.
He would shake it off and take a step up.

As the farmer's neighbors continued to shovel
Dirt on top of the animal, he would shake it
Off and take a step up.

Pretty soon, everyone was amazed as the donkey
Stepped up over the edge of the well and
Happily trotted off!

Life is going to shovel dirt on you, all kinds
Of dirt. The trick to getting out of the well
Is to shake it off and take a step up. Each of
Our troubles is a steppingstone. We can get out
Of the deepest wells just by not stopping,
Never giving up! Shake it off and take a step up.

Remember the five simple rules to be happy:

Free your heart from hatred - Forgive.

Free your mind from worries - Most never happen.

Live simply and appreciate what you have.

Give more.

Expect less

NOW ...........

Enough of that crap . . The donkey later came back,

And bit the farmer who had tried to bury him.

The gash from the bite got infected and

The farmer eventually died in agony from septic shock.

MORAL FROM TODAY'S LESSON:

When you do something wrong, and try to cover
Your ass, it always comes back to bite you.

You have two choices...smile and close this
page, or pass this along to someone else to
spread the fun.

I WILL NEVER COMPLAIN ABOUT MY JOB AGAIN