Thinking Mama

The L.A. City Council: Fighting Freedom AND Jobs

2011-11-27T15:18:00.001-05:00

Nobody I've heard has complained about pot stores in L.A. I've heard some comics sing their praises, of course, but I've never heard anyone complain about them. And I live in the midst of San Fernando Valley suburbia. So, who's behind the L.A. City Council's plan "to ban medical marijuana patients' cooperatives and collectives outright"?

Evidently, it's not enough that they limit the hours and control the prices and close down marijuana collectives, as they've managed to accomplish in the past year or so. For instance, the cool pot store at the edge of my neighborhood was closed down a few months ago, after the LAPD took all their marijuana edibles (a good alternative for those who don't ingest the herb by the more dangerous method of smoking it), inquiring about how much to eat to feel the effects. No, I'm sure that the LAPD won't be taking any of that stuff back to their families. They're just inquiring, I'll bet, out of curiosity, just because they care about medical marijuana and want to know more. Yeah, I'm sure that's it. I guess that's why the LAPD also took the store's security system. The owner, a really cool guy in his 70s, had invested his 401K retirement plan money into the dispensary. It was a great store and very convenient. It employed 8 to 10 people. After the owner lost $25,000 in the first shutdown, and more in the second, the store closed down. So much for jobs and putting people to work and such.

The elite who run the government seem really to want to control us. Is somebody funding this L.A. city council effort who stands to gain from selling illegal marijuana? I do know that the L.A. city council is messing in people's business and trying to destroy jobs, in the midst of a recession. One such councilperson seems especially against freedom. I'm guessing that Jose Huizar's ancestors, as with most Americans' ancestors, came to this country for more freedom. Ah, the irony that Huizar wants not only to take away that freedom, but also to take away, by his own admission, a "multimillion-dollar industry." Are taxpayer-funded Obamajobs going to take care of all those unemployed people?!? Why is Huizar so very content to destroy L.A. business? Here's a quote from the wise one himself.

"It will mean shutting down over 300 dispensaries but I don't see we have any other choice," Huizar said in a telephone interview after the City Council hearing, reports AIDSOVERSIXTY. "If we do nothing, we will see dispensaries pop up all over the city."

"What we're doing is putting a multimillion-dollar industry out of business in the city of L.A.," Huizar said.

It's hard to believe with such quotes that he was actually elected to any American office. Unfortunately, he's not the only politician I've heard lately who seems to pride himself on restricting freedom. Hey Jose, you've already closed down a bunch of dispensaries. And if pot stores are indeed popping "up all over the city," maybe you should let the people of your fair city reap the profits of this industry. What's wrong with a multimillion-dollar industry in the midst of a recession?!? Apparently Jose needs some basic Economics 101 lessons. And fast.

I saw a worker being trained the last time I was in the pot store. I guess she'll be out of a job soon, if Jose and his taxfeeding comrades lay their iron-clad fists on this industry. Maybe she can go down to Occupy L.A. and sit with the rest of the un- and under-employed. Jose's idea of L.A. restricts freedom from a God-given plant. How much longer will we be able to grow tomatoes and other veggie fare without the L.A. Council coming down on those things as well? Or is Jose's plan simply a plan for the illegal drug trade to thrive? I'm not sure what Jose's strange freedomless line of thinking comes from or is going toward, but I sure am sorry that it seems to be infecting the minds of the other L.A. City Council members. It's a real shame that the Occupy L.A. folks aren't protesting this loss of freedom with the same fervor that they are protesting, well, whatever it is that they are protesting. Apparently, allowing people to buy a natural herb freely is as threatening to the L.A. City Council as ending the Federal Reserve is to a Senator. Government positions everywhere are all about ending freedom for the people who pay the salaries of those who limit our freedom. Elected folks such as Jose Huizar are more than happy to oblige.

Pre-Thanksgiving Horror

2011-11-23T14:18:00.001-05:00

I have been absorbed in the story about Mary Ann Holder, from Pleasant Garden, right outside Greensboro. She was a mother, yes, and someone who looks a lot like me, i.e., she was white, she had children, she was chasing a guy who'd gone back to his wife. I can certainly understand her anger toward the guy who went back to his wife. And on a more personal level, one could argue that if BtL and MSG were forced to look down the barrel of a shotgun, it might do them both some good. I am not, however, the person to make that happen. In fact, as much as it hurt me to have what I thought was a friend from high school treat me like total dog poop, the extent of my anger was to leave them alone. That's not to say that I didn't pass by his house while I was in N.C. or that I didn't go there twice to dump off his stuff, but I never thought about doing physical harm either to BtL or to MSG. What good would that do? And even though it seemed like the end of the world at times to have what I thought was such a good friend betray me in such awful ways, I never ever thought about harming myself or my children. Never ever. In fact, I would have to say that as much as I want to live and love living, if I felt like it was all a wash and I needed to kill myself, which I pray I will never feel, I can't imagine doing any harm at all to my children. I brought them into this world, thank God, and if I don't feel like living anymore, I certainly want them to remain alive.

And so, like the Guilford County sherriff's office, I am totally flummoxed by this whole thing. I guess that most normal people can see how she'd want to shoot the guy she was seeing, Randy Lamb. He was hurt the least, by the way, of all her victims. And surely I can somewhat understand that she would want to kill herself. Not that I would do that or want to or condone either shooting in any way, but both of those shootings make a lot more sense than her shooting her two sons; her niece and nephew, who'd been living with her since her sister died a few months ago; and her son's girlfriend, a truly innocent bystander in all this mess. Really, there was no need to kill those children and killing someone she gave birth to seems like one of the most awful sins there is. Or as we used to say when I was growing up, "People's getting mean." And they are. One of Holder's sons went to the same high school that one of my adoptive cousins went to. Pleasant Garden, every time I've been near there, certainly lives up to its name. And that is one reason that this whole story is so very bizarre and tragic. It happened in a place and to people that normally these kinds of things don't happen to. What was wrong with Mary Ann Holder? How could she possibly pick up her son from his sleepover, after having killed his brother, his cousins, and his brother's girlfriend? Why, oh why, didn't she just leave him at the house where he had his sleepover before she killed herself? I read a timeline of the shootings and apparently, her 14-year-old son, a little while before his mother killed him, wrote a thank you text to the people who had the sleepover. What a polite young man. What a shame that his mother killed him.

People are going to want to prevent this kind of thing in the future, of course, and they'll do so by creating more of a police state. Probably, more than anything, the government schools are somewhat responsible for this mess. I think of what John Taylor Gatto said about government schools producing a bunch of addicts and people who have incomplete lives and it makes sense to think that there will be more of these kinds of tragedies in the future. I understand that she was in pain and that she may have thought her pain would never end, and I understand that government schools are often a source of pain for so many of us. I remember one of my favorite government school teachers talking about suicide one day and telling us that no matter how bad we may feel, things will always get better if we give it some time. He'd probably be fired for saying that today.

As a parent, you really have to work hard these days to get rid of the conditioning that the "public" schools give your children, eight or more hours each day. I have no idea what Holder's background is like or what her childhood was like, but I can almost guarantee you that she went to a government school. I'm not saying that everyone who goes to a public school will snap like this (let us surely hope not), but in an atmosphere where pharmaceutical drugs are lauded, guns are banned, and there is zero tolerance for any misbehavior, some kids won't make the cut or some, like Holder, will make the cut and one day, will do something tragic such as this. Government school students are so very often treated like lab rats and so, it's likely that some lab rats won't fare as well. My guess is, and I hope I'm wrong, that just like school shootings have escalated, the kind of crime that Holder did will also escalate. Boy, do I hope I'm wrong.

Sure, she learned somewhere to be so selfish and in despair that she felt she needed to kill some innocent children before she killed herself. It would be wrong to blame only the government schools, but if Gatto's theories are correct, the government schools must receive some of the blame. Perhaps she was indeed mentally ill and she, along with her boyfriend's wife, had some anger issues to deal with, but shooting children?!? Her children?!? Sorry, but there's really no excuse for this kind of thing. I think that Holder's tragic actions show problems with our society, problems that have their origins in a school system that is all about mediocrity and conformity and no longer much includes God in anything. Students spend over 12 years in these institutions and most kids are more heavily influenced by schools than by their parents; according to Gatto, this is by design. When people look at such tragedies, the media often blame things on lack of gun control, but it is the people who have the guns, and their lack of morals is the problem.

Some have been saying on message boards that Holder was mentally ill. As my kids would say, Well, duh! Of course, she was not thinking clearly. The first thing I thought of when I heard about this crime was that the shooter was probably on some kind of pharmaceutical drugs, an anti-depressant or something such as that. I'm curious to know if she was on pharmaceutical drugs, but I know that often, when mothers do crazy things such as this, as in the Andrea Yates case, the mom is on pharmaceutical drugs that affect her brain. I'm not saying that all people who take anti-depressants are in danger, but I ain't planning to take those things myself. I do know that when I took them, a few years ago, they made me half crazy. Luckily, I did no harm. Perhaps I am trying too hard to find meaning in this tragedy or some kind of reason for it. It is indeed so very awful. And yes, it is highly unusual for an area such as Greensboro. Although there's right much crime there, there's never been anything like this. There might be again, though.

People will yell about preventing this kind of thing in the future, but you really can't. At least, not by increasing the police state. Already, the TSA is working on predicting who will be a terrorist by facial expressions. How long will it be before people's houses and minds will be invaded to find out if the government thinks they're going to commit a crime? As tragic as this whole situation is, I'd rather not have more government intrusion into my life as a result of it.

You can often prevent this kind of thing by teaching children right from wrong and by keeping families together, physically and emotionally. But that is not our world today. I recently wrote in my Comic Mom journal about an acquaintance who had sex with a stranger at the swimming pool of a hotel. I also heard about someone who was having sex outside a bar with a stranger. As much as I am for freedom, and as much as many would condemn lots of my actions, I can't help but wonder why somebody who's in their 40s, as both women were, would do such a strange and crazy thing. With a stranger. How did sex get to be such a throwaway public performance instead of the intimate sharing between two people that God seemed to intend?!? Look, my life ain't perfect. And I sure don't have this whole thing figured out, especially the sex thing. But I don't go around f'in' strangers in public. Having said that, at least nobody was harmed with the sex stuff, except for the people doing the act. Still, it shows a disrespect for sex that I believe is connected to the same lack of morals that Holder had to have. In Holder's case, sex and her inability to deal with its consequences led to murder and suicide. Could such moral-free thinking be developed in our God-free government schools, by teachers who have been brainwashed in psychology and such, and by curricula developed by a rather God-free federal government?

Families are all spread out and people often die alone because their families have left them. The government schools are all about breaking up families, as Gatto says, and our society shows that they are doing that part of their job precisely as designed. Holder was certainly all alone in a lot of ways and certainly, it was fabulous that she took in her sister's children. It's just too bad that she killed them.

Please keep this family, especially the dad who lost two sons, in your prayers.

Police State Happenings

2011-10-10T02:22:00.001-04:00

What kinda sorta bothers me about stuff these days is that the police are so very, well, omnipresent. People think that's a good thing, but people should be concerned. Well, people aren't much concerned these days, though. Not at all are most people concerned. I am, which makes me a nut. Until tonight. Some of you may have read about MMan, although I think under the name PRMan, or some such, on my pink blog. Let's call him MMan tonight and the "M" is for minister. He is one of those, btw. And yes, I was a friend of his in high school. And so, last week, MMan had something "exciting" happen to him, at least according to his message to me on FB. I guessed that he'd made his wife pregnant, that they'd gotten a new puppy, or that a new refrigerator had been delivered to their home. The last one, MMan and I both agreed, would be awesome for him; I, having recently experienced life without and then, miraculously, witha refrigerator, know the absolute thrill and excitement of food in a new refrigerator. Although what MMan experienced was indeed exciting, it was not good in the way of a new refrigerator, or puppy, or baby. No, MMan got arrested. Yes. In the Back of the Car Arrested. He's not the kind of guy who should be arrested. Ever. He's honest. I can tell you that. And a Christian. And the dispute that somehow led police officers in a tiny North Carolina town to arrest him at 12:45 in the f'in' morning, for goodness sake, was over $167 that he supposedly owed a customer of his (he has an on-line business). He had told this woman how to receive a refund, but somehow, she thought that talking to the police was better than waiting and doing what MMan had asked. MMan was roused from sleep and the situation freaked him out and I told him that this kind of arrest thing can happen to anyone.

MMan now believes me and said that the criminal justice system is so very awry that he would have trouble convicting someone now, if he were on a jury. This is just one person's opinion, of course, but let's assume that everything is true of his account. Anecdotal evidence about this kind of thing has been going on around the Internet for a while. But to actually hear firsthand the evidence of a man who has, as far as I can tell, told a woman how to get her refund, but she didn't want to wait and go through the proper channels and so, she called the police. And the police listened. And they arrested. Somehow that's hard to hear about. It really scares me that everyday people can so easily get arrested. I remember hearing some woman on NPR one time talk about how she'd been incarcerated for two years for some really strange charge due to her position as a journalist. The whole thing sounded quite strange to me and I could not believe that she spent two years or so in prison, away from her family. One thing that she said, however, is that what happened to her can happen to anyone. That's a scary thing indeed. And when you have folks like MMan being arrested in the wee hours of the morning, awakened from bed, because of a customer dispute that he has tried to resolve, it's easy for me to see that we've got a police state, my friend. MMan tells me that the court has retained a lawyer but he is thinking about starting some kind of legal defense fund. Perhaps we should all look into some kind of insurance policy or some such for that kind of thing. I'm very fortunate in that, so far, I have had extremely good relations with the police. I'm thinking here of the police officer in Texas who let me go with a warning ticket only after he saw that I was trying to get to a hotel, which was only a few miles from where I was stopped. And many thanks to the officer in Greensboro, North Carolina who did a similar thing once, when the boys were tiny things and slept through the entire episode. I'm thankful for good police officers in both instances. But what if the police knock on your door at 1 a.m.? Unfortunately, it could happen to any of us.

Sperm Donation: Just What It's Meant To Be

2011-09-06T14:27:00.003-04:00

In L.A., it's hard to spit without hitting a comic, an adopter, or some woman who's used a sperm donor. And so, I haven't written much about the whole thing lately. Btw, I know many an adoptee or sperm-donor-created comic who is trying to turn tragedy into comedy by standing in front of people and working out issues for laughs. It's really a pretty good way of dealing with losing a parent or parents, considering the options. But the truth is that between adoption and sperm donation, many of us are losing our genetic heritage, and suffering because of it. Nonetheless, the elite want this kind of genetic confusion, or else it wouldn't be celebrated in all kinds of magazines and newspapers all over the world. Try printing an anti-adoption article in your local newspaper; let me know if they'll print it.

Nonetheless, every once in a while, we see some kind of article that touches on the bad stuff about adoption or sperm donation or such. This particular article, for instance, tells about the problems of sperm donation. But it does not say that women should be smart enough to avoid anonymous sperm donation altogether, which would put these places out of business. No, that would be against the genetic confusion that so thrill the elite. It is only in such a state of familial confusion, without natural family to help, that people will be thrilled to turn to the state for help. And that's where the elite really thrive: Getting people to turn to the government instead of their families for help.

Therefore, the government wants not to end sperm donation, but to regulate it, to control it a bit more. Ah, yes, more government control on something that's going to affect generations of children, many of whom will never find out one whole side of their family.

Critics say that fertility clinics and sperm banks are earning huge profits by allowing too many children to be conceived with sperm from popular donors, and that families should be given more information on the health of donors and the children conceived with their sperm. They are also calling for legal limits on the number of children conceived using the same donor’s sperm and a re-examination of the anonymity that cloaks many donors.

One wants to say that if donors are dumb enough to give away or sell their sperm and if a woman is willing to have her child lose one whole side of the family, well, then let them go ahead. But then again, it's not either of these adults who will suffer, but the children that they spawn. And their children's children. And their children's children's children. And so on.

The Open-Minded

2011-09-06T13:23:00.008-04:00

I know that I haven't written as much on my Thinking Mama blog as I have the others, but frankly, I read so much about the government's taking away of our freedoms and our money and I am personally experiencing the latter, that I feel as though, sometimes, it's no use to even write about things anymore. Adoption will continue as long as people envy the babies of others. Forced taxation will continue as long as people are brainwashed to believe that they have no other choice. I love Ron Paul, but he's one man. How much can he do?!? The most I can do, really, is to teach my children the truth and help them to learn to think for themselves, which includes looking at all sides of an argument, as I used to encourage my students at North Carolina State University to do.

And yet, every once in a while, I can't help but open my freedom-loving mouth when someone mentions how wonderful the FDA and EPA are, especially when I am having to drive over one hour to buy the raw cow's milk that God and nature intended us to drink--this milk is illegal to buy where I currently am. And the government goons are treating it as though it were meth and raiding stores, even in California, where it is supposed to be legal to buy.

So, I made a comment on this guy's FB post. His name is MW and he wouldn't have done well in my NCSU freshman English class. He was obviously a little taken by what I wrote, questioning the FDA and EPA. I'd love to write exactly what I wrote, but he not only defriended me, he made it so that I can never find him; therefore, I don't see my original post. Such is the post-Oprah world in which true deep thinking and debating has been replaced by name-calling and all the other cheap shots of argument that would drive Aristotle crazy these days. Here is MW's first response to me, which I was able to copy from my e-mail:

"Duped and taxed to fund these agencies"? Tricia, ALL government functions are provided by tax dollars. And yes, they are "all about" safe food and medicine, and clean air and water. EVERY regulation is aimed AT MAKING US SAFER! The rest is Tea Party bullshit! There's a reason you paint with a broad brush, yet give no specifics! Are there too many regulations? Probably. Are some more harmful than good? Almost certainly. So it is with all things created by mankind! We are not perfect, nor are the things we create. If perfection is your standard, then we will always fall short. But clean air and water, and safe food and medicine are the REASONS we live longer, and are healthier than any generation before us. There's not even a sane counter to that argument. The LA skyline is visible BECAUSE THE FREAKING AIR IS CLEANER! Nobody who's ever cracked a science book, and no one who visited there in the '70s and again today could deny that. No sane person could deny that USDA inspection results in safer food...meat that isn't spoiled, vegetables that aren't contaminated. We can shop in confidence that our food IS nourishing, because, by law, the labels clearly list what is inside...every ingredient, and it's nutrutional value. That is what government is for! Establishing standards for things like food and drug safety, clean air and water...building roads and bridges...sending police or the fire department when we call 911...providing a safety net for the poor, sick, and elderly...men and women in uniform fighting those who would harm us, to keep us safe and secure. These are the functions of government. What has government done for us? Oh, not much. Broken the sound barrier, split the atom, sent men to the moon and spacecraft to the edges of the universe, photographed echoes of the Big Bang, created the internet, cured diseases like polio, made possible technical advances like personal computing and microwave ovens from space-related research, built infrastructure that makes it possible for farmers in California and Iowa to grow crops sold in supermarkets in Maine and North Carolina, mapped the human genome, constructed a power grid across the entire country, not just the most populated parts, protected humanity from Facism, Communism, and Terrosism, made it possible to affordably send a package or document from any point in the US, to any other in the world, and other advances too numerous to count. And of course government has made some enormous blunders along the way. There is good and bad, strength and weakness, in every human endeavor."

And then, he wrote this little gem, which also came in my e-mail. He has evidently written me off as spam, so threatened is he, I suppose, by an opinion that is different from his. Note that he, unable to fathom that I may be thinking more or less for myself and not associated with any particular -ism, i.e., conservatism, liberalism. His brain really wants to place me in a category, however, and he placed me with the Tea Party folks, although I've never been to one of their meetings and don't fully know what they're all about. I imagine that they are just as corrupt as the others, however. Anyway, here 'tis:

"And to conclude...buh-bye, nutjob! How'd you squeak past? Be seein' ya'..>NEVER!"

What argumentative prowess, indeed. It's no wonder that raw milk raids are okay with people these days, even though 100 years ago, they would have been unheard of, as most everyone drank raw milk, or country milk, and if you bought it from a clean dairy, it was never contaminated. People are so very busy with the liberal/conservative dichotomy these days that they don't see the very freedoms that are being taken from them each day, with their taxpayer money paying for those very things.

Many thanks to Karen DeCoster, btw, who is not at all afraid to write about the FDA or the EPA, for keeping me abreast of what's happening with raw milk. I also wrote a bit about this on my Comic Mom blog.

Even Here, There Is Adoption

2011-06-23T13:12:00.001-04:00

And so, I have returned home. Well, I guess you could call this home. I was born in Richmond, Virginia, but my mother had no ties there. She was sent there, hours away from her home in Wilmington, North Carolina, so that she could give birth to me and then give me to strangers. I was supposed to be born in Wilmington and it felt really weird once, when I was at my mom's house, looking at a picture of the hospital where my half-sister, born almost three years after me, was born. I was supposed to have been born there, but I realized, looking at that picture, that even knowing where my mom and the rest of my natural family were would not heal the pain of being separated from her. Just as I could never be physically born again in this life, I could also never recapture all the years lost from being separated from my parents. Adoption results in an emotional pain that the non-adopted never have to deal with.

This pain makes throws some people into denial, as it did me for many years. A number of adoptees, and even some moms who've lost a child to adoption, have chastised me for expressing my feelings, and for stating the obvious: breaking up families through adoption gives an emotional pain that can never heal. What really gets to me is that so many adoptees have written about that pain and yet, they can't seem to help but end by saying that adoption can be beautiful. Yes, like rape can be beautiful, I suppose. What can be more lovely than taking away an infant poised to nurse his or her mother's breasts, an infant just born, an infant used to the smell of his or her mother, and give the child to genetic strangers. Lovely, isn't it?

Yes, many Bible thumpers claim that they are saving a child from being thrown into the dumpster or whatever, but that claim is simply not true. Bible thumpers often love to tell the story of Moses and use that to justify taking another woman's child. But as my loyal reader Jim stated previously in a blog comment, the next time I see a baby floating down the river, I'll consider it okay to take it.

Many attempts are made these days to make adoption seem as though it were saving a baby from floating down the river. The China system is currently the absolute best to promote this mythology. In the 70s, after Roe vs. Wade, the agencies that supply infants saw their supply beginning to drop. They began marketing the U.S. in Korea, Vietnam, and other countries that had vulnerable populations. They told the moms that their children would have a much better life in the fabulous U.S. of A. and the moms, often desperate, believed them and sent their children with social wreckers. I wonder how many of those social workers, sent specifically to find children for Western adopters, gave money to the mother and family and tried to keep the children with their families.

Adoption agencies must have been having orgasms when the whole China thing came down. I'm not exactly sure when China started its ridiculous one-child policy, searching for diapers and other evidence of more than one child, even in remote rural areas. Whenever it was, the adoption agencies really scored. Children came into orphanages, creating a need for somebody to take these supposed orphans and give them a home. Westerners began adopting them and it became a status symbol of sorts to have a little China girl in a home. Don't believe me? Ask Angelina Jolie, who, even though she has no China doll, has a whole rainbow of children under her roof.

I can't tell you how many Gymboree and MyGym classes I've sat through in L.A. with some white adoptress pretending to be the mom of one of these little China girls. As to why they're often girls, it's because the Chinese culture so reveres males, and males are to help with parents in old age, that the girls are most expendable. I guess most Westerners think that moms in China have no feelings or that they easily take their children to the orphanage. Whatever the case, most Western adopters these days are as happy to have a China doll as they are to grab a healthy white infant from a teenage mom. The latter is in low supply, however, partly due to the fact that many moms who have lost a child to adoption are telling it like it is and talking about the loss of adoption, a loss from which mother and child can never fully recover.

And now, here I sit in the library of the small town in northwestern North Carolina where I grew up. It is not Wilmington, where most of the rest of my family resides, and where the Smiths, from whence I came, are known for our blue eyes. One of the reasons I am back here right now is because I want my children to experience the genuineness and honesty of most people here. As I sit in the library, however, I watch an adoptress who has taken a China doll as her own. I watch the child call the adoptress, who looks nothing like her, "mama." And I think about how much this child has suffered in her few short years on earth. More than likely, the little girl will not grow up knowing her native Chinese language and more than likely, she will not ever find her mother and father. To take their place, she will most likely create an elaborate scheme of lies, started when her adopters began calling her their "daughter" and asked them to call her "mama" and "daddy." Do you really think that China will change anything when Western adopters are spending so much money to take away the children that the government will not allow? Do you really think that God wants us messing with nature this way?

More importantly, however, I wonder what this kind of thing is doing to this child. And to the other children taken away from the native land and families by Westerners envious of children. I know that not all adopters feel this way (there are posts much earlier in this blog about an adoptress who is trying to teach her China girls the truth), but most do. Each time I looked in the mirror, I wondered who I looked like. Imagine how much more complex this process is when the child is not even the same nationality as the adopters. My guess is that the little China girl in the library today will have to fill herself with lies for the rest of her life to overcome the pain of what has happened to her and to cover for the lies that she has already been living with. She will probably never ever find the truth, as most families take these children to the orphanages anonymously. She probably will never know her family. To say that this kind of life, filled with life, will never affect her is to be in great denial. Then again, adoption is all about denial, isn't it?!?

Even here, in this relatively quiet town, there exists the ugliness of adoption, the lies created when family members are separated by do-gooder social wreckers, the pretending that I grew up with, the empty hole that is never filled when one loses his or her family. Adoption has touched every corner of our nation, from the suburbs of Los Angeles to the small mountain towns of North Carolina. Its ubiquitousness is nothing to brag about.

The Humorless Black Guy

2011-05-26T04:15:00.000-04:00

So, tonight, I did a comedy show right down the road from the Gingerbread House, at the Liquid Zoo. It's a pretty cool place. I've done a ton of shows there. And Ron Swallow is a very gracious and wonderful host. For the past few weeks, I've tended to do a comedy show there every Wednesday night. Everybody has been very nice there and I've had no hecklers. Btw, I was explaining, just the other day, to my 8-year-old that hecklers must be dealt with. It's been a long time since I had one.

I am not going to go into as much detail I could with this entry. Suffice to say that tonight's episode was the emotional equivalent of the time I was at the Hot Wired Cafe, which, fortunately, no longer exists. I went in there, after Ten and Eight was born and before Six was born, to do some comedy. So, I had two wonderful sons and this guy on stage talked about someone molesting my children. Yeah. Really. It sucked in a way that I cannot describe adequately with words right now. Fortunately, tonight's insult was not about my children, but about me. In that way, at least it was easier. The kind of pain I'm feeling as I write this is the kind of pain I felt in 8th grade, when this guy (let's call him non-dancing-guy (NDG)) absolutely loved putting his arm around me on the bus ride home from elementary school, but refused to admit that I existed at the 8th grade dance. OMG, that was one of the most painful nights of my life. I still feel the pain of NDG's rejection, when I think hard enough about it. Turns out, I need a man who can dance, but of course, I had no idea then. The pain from NDG's ignoring me was almost too much to bear at the time, though.

Back to the Humorless Black Guy (HBG), and, therefore, to present day: So, I was in the middle of "White Girl Rap," with a Jewish/European-American Guy (I'm guessing here) who was laughing at me, and a couple of other people in the bar. There were two white-ish guys in the bar and one guy who seemed to be part black. Look, when I sing "White Girl Rap," I'm automatically admitting that I don't have the rhythm of a stereotypical black guy. In fact, I was making fun of myself, a white girl. I said nothing about a black guy, as I recall, until I said something like, "the black guy walked out; what does that tell you?!?" and yes, I making fun of myself, HBG. I was making fun of the fact that I have no rhythm, but no, HBG somehow thought that making fun of white people (from which I descend) equated with making fun of black people. Evidently, a$$holes do that kind of thing. Needless to say, he had no humor. I have no idea what he was doing at a comedy club.

And so, in the middle of "White Girl Rap," which makes fun of white people, especially moi, for any a$$holes who may be reading this, HBG leaves the audience, goes out the door, and says something that I won't repeat here, but I will say is much like the above-mentioned molestation thing on stage. Well, at least HBG's insult didn't include my children. Oh, the generosity of HBG, in that respect. Look, I'm the one who told my students (when I taught) that if one says African-American, then one should say European-American. After all, how equal is it if I'm called white and an African-American is not called black? I'm all about equality for everybody, even though none of us are created exactly like another and we are all individuals; when I make fun of white people, I can certainly do it, because I am white.

So, yes, I am at home crying about this incident. But I will get over it. And I will realize that the HBG is an asshole who is not a typical black male. Btw, black males normally love my $%it and realize that when I talk about white girls, I'm talking about myself. As much as I'd like to think that he isn't typical, however, he might well be typical of what is to come.

What has caused HBG to be humorless?!? Well, it could well have been merely too much alcohol. Or it could have been something in the air, this thing about white guilt. I know that white people are supposed to feel extremely guilty about everything these days, even though most, if not all, of us have never actually held slaves or seen a "whites only" water fountain. Things have become ultra-serious with race and apparently, with some people, it's not good to even talk about differences. I read the other day about a comic in Canada who was fined thousands of dollars because some lesbian got offended about whatever the comic was saying; according to the comic, she was heckling him, but still, he received a fine. So much for that free speech. In a world that needs much more humor, it's becoming dangerous to talk about real differences between people. I was always taught in comedy that I can make fun of myself or anything that has to do with me, but not of other people. Insinuating that I as a white woman have much less rhythm than most blacks has become something that is insulting to some, evidently, even though I've always considered it a compliment to blacks and an insult to myself. One of the many reasons that I do comedy is because it's one of the last places where truth can be spoken. But with people like HBG in attendance, I'm wondering how long that will last.

Why I Might Defriend You

2011-02-02T08:06:00.000-05:00

The other day I added somebody on Facebook whom I'd grown up with. I didn't know her and her sister very well, but I remember them fondly. I also remember their mom as being a very nice person. Let's call the person I added Adoptress X (AX). Looking through her pictures, I was sad to find that, although she and her husband look not at all Asian, she had a small child with her who looked pretty darn Asian. There was also an older boy who matched AX and her husband more in looks, but still, I wasn't sure about him. He might also have been adopted. I'm not making a huge leap here to say that at least one of the children she was holding in her picture is an adoptee, not really her child. So, I think I got the name right, Adoptress X sounds exactly right. It's rather easy to avoid adoptresses in L.A. It's rather easy to avoid most everything in L.A. In fact, avoiding stuff is how we survive in L.A. Since I left the relatively upper middle-class enclave at Gymboree, I've run into fewer adoptees. Granted, please allow me to explain myself here: No, I'm not for abandoning babies in the streets; but also, I am not for pretending to be a baby's mama if I didn't give birth to a particular baby. This kind of thinking--i.e., that the natural parents count and are not merely demeaned to "birthparent"--which has been going on for millenia, has now been replaced by adoptionspeak, in which baby mamas all over the world are encouraged and coerced into giving away their children to people who want to pretend to be parents. Look, am I lucky to be a mom? You bet! I am extremely grateful and thankful. But if I weren't a mom, I wouldn't be pretending I was someone else's mom.

Having said all that, there are women that I grew up with whom I would call mom, or grandma, or aunt, or whatever, because I am that close to them. I grew up in a small community--thank God!--and everybody sorta helped to raise everybody else's children. I don't have a problem with an adoptee who wants to call his or her adoptee "mom" or whatever. But I do have a problem with adoptees who beg us to call them real parents of their adoptees. Because they are not. They never will be. We may love them and need them and be eternally grateful to them, but to pretend that they are our real parents is a lie. Unfortunately, it is a lie that most adoptees deal with every day, whether or not we realize it. A very few enlightened adoptees and adopters are on to the whole lying thing and one adopter who has written to me and has seen the truth is creating a very honest and loving atmosphere for her adoptee. If only more adopters would do so.

And so, we now come to "Single Dad Laughing," a blog that you can google and find yourself, if you like. I really enjoy the writing style of this adopter, but his plea for us to call him a real parent to his adoptee is just as sickening as those who may misspell words and be totally boring writers, and yet, beg us to call them real parents. The truth is, no matter how great your writing style, I really totally and completely disrespect you if you beg me and others to call you something that you are not. Unfortunately, the woman who posted the blog link of FB, an adoptee, seems to have a whole different meaning of parent than I and most of the world throughout history have ever had. Part of the changes that have been happening in this country over the past century or so have included changing families. Adoption and adoptionspeak, the renaming and redefining of words to support and encourage the ever-growing adoption industry, have changed the way that we think about families. There is so little respect for natural families these days; birth and genetics seem not to matter to the media types who support such adoption propaganda. In this brave new world, families can be created in any way possible, not in the way that God and nature intended. So, we have the story in the previously-mentioned blog, of Noah, whose rather young male adopter seems to have relationship problems (I can relate!) and yet, has been given a child whom he evidently "loves" so much that even when Noah spills M&Ms in the car, the adopter is simply filled with joy. Of course, the adopter gives lip service to the boy's baby mama, i.e., his "birthmother," which Male Adopter looks upon as the proper name for someone whose baby he has taken from the baby's mother's breast. Y'all know how I am about natural breastfeeding. Evidently, Male Adopter and his then-wife (that's all changed in Noah's short life, btw) were so anxious to snatch the child that they were in the delivery room when Noah's mom gave birth. How extremely awkward.

And of course, Noah's mom is a candidate for sainthood, according to Male Adopter, because of the "gift" she gave him and his then-wife. Noah's suffering a lot of pain with his Male Adopter's failed relationships, but then again, that's so very much better than if he were with his real mom, right?!? You know, the saint. Yeah, it's a good thing that Noah's Male Adopter is giving him such a stable life, right? And how many of us can feel the pain of Noah's real mom, whose heart must break every time she thinks of the baby she gave to someone else.

I ain't linking to the Male Adopter's blog, if that's what you're thinking. And yes, I defriended the person who passed along the link, not so much because she gave the Male Adopter publicity, but because she defended him and called him a parent, when he clearly is not. That kind of thing is triggering to me and adoptee or not, the person who passed along the link clearly does not get the truth of adoption. And right now, I'm not so sure I need those people in my life.

Nicole Kidman's Rented Womb

2011-01-30T22:07:00.000-05:00

Oh, how I do ever dislike the whole rent-a-womb crowd. It shouldn't surprise me that Nicole Kidman has joined that particular bunch. Nicole, when she was married to Tom Cruise, took two children from their moms. Word has it that one of the children has a dad who fought to keep his child, but Tom Cruise had more money and won. I'd really like confirmation on this story. Either way, it has always seemed like to me that celebrities who adopt would more likely help the child by giving the child's parent(s) a huge grant, something that would allow the mom, for instance, to stay with the child until the child is five or six. But no, this kind of do-goodering would not allow the celebrity to have a child to be raised by a nanny and plastered all over People Magazine and such. (See Sandra Bullock, whose supposedly good samaritan deed has rarely gone unpublicized by magazines these past few months.). And so, Nicole, who saw no need to bother with helping two natural families stay together, could not have possibly had qualms about growing her eggs and Keith Urban's sperm in somebody else's womb. Paying someone else to gestate. Lovely.

I think that Nicole actually had a child of her own a few years ago, but I'm not exactly sure. Either way, it sure is easy to work as an actress when somebody else is carrying your baby. Having said that, Nicole may have desperately wanted to do the honors in the baby-carrying department and it is indeed sad, as always, when a woman wants her own child and is not able to carry it. Still, it seems oh-so-ever wrong to hire someone else to do the carrying.

Is God Really in Control of This?!?

2010-11-30T00:38:00.001-05:00

First, let me say that I do consider myself a Christian, although not a very good one. I believe it's dangerous, however, to attribute things to God's will when I am probably not wise enough to know what is in God's will and what isn't. Having said that, I contemplate my own life quite often and sometimes, in hindsight, I try to figure out what was God's will. But I do that in my own life, not in the lives of others, especially not babies. Nonetheless, there is a group of religious folk that, despite their protests, profit quite nicely from adoption. They are a bit more modest, of course, at least when it comes to adoption:

Obviously we are not in control of this process---God is! When you try to rush things and get a baby in your time instead of His timing then things never work out. God is COMPLETELY SOVEREIGN and He has been and will work in your lives for your good and His glory. If you try to put the puzzle together yourself you will miss the work that He is doing in your heart and life.

and then there's this lovely passage:

But in the end when you place yourself in the center of God's will for growing your family, then it is time to sit back and enjoy the ride. If it takes one month or one year for that child to find his/her way into your family realize and accept that God's timing is perfect! Don't try to worry about tomorrow or be envious of those around you who have what you want. Place your trust in God who already has your future planned out. He knows the desires of your heart to be a parent to a child through adoption.

Funny how the adopters are not supposed to "be envious," but if they really weren't envious, they'd be helping a mom to keep her baby, don't ya think?!?

And I really super duper love the way these supposed Christians act as though they're not making money on adoption transactions. How much does God will, I wonder, for the adopters to pay the agency for their "gift," i.e. infant? See what happens when you try to figure out what's God's will as you play some kind of strange chess game with infants and their natural families? See how it seem as though God has a big chessboard and is moving around children like pawns. Attempting to save some supposed queen perhaps?!?

Someone passed along this Web site on Facebook and I really appreciate it. Adoption propaganda such as this used to really bother me, but it doesn't so much anymore. I do marvel, however, at how far some Christians have come in swallowing the adoption lies that a greedy industry has been perpetuating for years. It's a real shame, isn't it?!? Even though this "Christian" agency's social workers are matchmakers for adopters and children taken from the natural mothers that God gave them, it is God, of course, who's in control. So, God is not only taking away a child from his or her mother, the only mother who can custom make milk for the baby that has grown inside her, but God is also, if these folks are to be believed, responsible for finding the right strangers to take this child from the mother. I don't remember reading about such a God-oriented ritual in the New Testament. Even the Old Testament's story of Moses illustrates that in the end, the child goes with his or her natural family. At least that's how I'd interpret that story. But the adoption industry, a $1.6 billion dollar biz in the U.S., has laid claim to Moses as well, passing him off as the world's first Biblically-sanctioned adoptee or some such.

Anyway, I'm having an especially difficult time with Christians who think that it's okay to break apart natural God-created families to fulfill some kind of strange Orwellian scheme. I'm sure that the Christians, if they read this blog, would think that I'm crazy for suggesting such things. But those of us who have thought deeply and circumspectly about adoption would think I am more or less sane.

Adoption and the Real World

2010-09-20T13:10:00.000-04:00

It's so very easy for those of us who have been separated from our natural families by adoption to theorize and publicize and whatever-else-icize our feelings about adoption. It's easy for us to pontificate about how horrid adoption is and how terrible it is to separate children from their families. Sooner or later, however, most of us run into adoption in the real world and there, most of us disconnect from the brave souls that we are on the Internet.

Yesterday, that disconnect happened to me. I was talking with someone here in N.C. who also happened to be a Facebook friend and she was holding a baby. We were talking about some stuff from high school and, even though I didn't remember her precisely, I guessed her to be about my age. "Is that your daughter?" I asked, thinking it was so very cool that someone had a daughter when a part of me has not yet given up on having my own daughter. "Yes," she said. "She looks like you," I said, because the child did have the same hair color as the woman holding her. "She's adopted," the woman continued, making a comment about how the child actually looks more like her husband. There I was, in the middle of a church baptizing, dealing with what I was going to say to a woman who felt it was okay to take away a child from her mother. I did the only polite thing I could think to do at the time, "Oh," I said. Then, I left as soon as I could.

It's sometimes more than a little strange being in North Carolina, facing people who know me only as "Beauford's girl" or "Ann's daughter," when the reality is that I am no kin to Ann or Beauford. As much as I dislike California, I really enjoy the freedom I have there to live with the truth. I can talk about my real dad or mom or any other members of my natural family and I can be who I really am, not as the little girl whose natural identity was changed by the horrid Children's Home Society of North Carolina. I have a really strong desire to be in the place where I grew up, to live here and to raise my children here. There is so much comfort in this place. And yet, there are so many people who view me as something I am not: the daughter of Beauford and Ann.

In many ways, with the adoptress I met yesterday, I acted the only way I could in a polite setting. It would have done little good to tell her how I feel about adoption or to explain to her that I was not going along with her little fantasy and that I would not call the child she was holding her daughter. I'm not going to lie. But it felt awfully wonderful to know the truth inside me and to hold that truth, even if I don't openly proclaim it on every street corner. I felt a little more at peace with things yesterday than I did just a few years ago, when I would feel and take on a child's hurt from being separated from the mother.

The truth is that as long as adoption agencies make money, adoption propaganda will prevail and adopters will think of taking another woman's child as something to be desired, as crazy as that sounds to so very many of us. On this blog, I can voice the truth and if and when adopters find it, so be it. In the real world, I will not lie to perpetuate the adoption fantasy. Nope. I just won't do it.

I know that many people look at me here as Beauford and Ann's "daughter," although I have never been and never will be. And I know that some of them have an antagonistic attitude toward my real parents, thinking that I'm being somehow disloyal to Ann and Beauford by acknowledging my natural family. So be it. I know the truth and I am becoming more comfortable with it every day.

Nomenclature: Oh, So Very Important!

2010-07-26T02:10:00.000-04:00

A kind and gentle reader left this comment on a previous post:

I was curious about your input on the following situation.

I know a family who adopted a little girl about a year ago now.

The child's natural parents are both white-collar professionals. They have two other children, both early school age. Stable jobs, stable home, stable life. And yet they decided not to parent their third child.

Why?

The child has Down syndrome, and they did not want to parent a special-needs child.

Thoughts?

I certainly do have some thoughts about this situation. Evidently, this kind of thing, in which parents disregard a child who is less than perfect, is becoming quite the trend among upper-middle-class white professionals. A friend that I grew up with is raising a child who has severe autism because his parents did not want to deal with him. I realize also that I am coming from a perspective in which I have three very healthy children, for which I am extremely thankful. So, I haven't had to face the decision of whether or not to keep a less than perfect child or give him or her to someone else to raise. Still, I can't help but wonder why parents would give away this or any other special-needs child. It seems quite crazy to me. An important part of this post, however, seems to be the nomenclature itself, i.e., "they did not want to parent a special-needs child." (emphasis mine) Here's a news flash for those parents: You've already parented this child! And thus, I am thrust, once again, into the ugly world of adoption nomenclature.

Adoption nomenclature, decried by many as unimportant, shapes the way our brains think about adoption. Many people think that calling natural parents "birthparents" or using parent as a verb, i.e., She has chosen not to parent her child, is not a big deal. Hey, I was an English teacher for five years; I know the power of words. Why did the United States government change, for instance, the Department of War to the Department of Defense? It was, of course, so that we could have perpetual war and feel good about it. We're defending the country, of course, not making war. Yeah, right.

Nonetheless, the social wreckers who seek to separate natural families find it absolutely essential to talk to young-moms-to-be and tell them that they can decide whether or not to "parent" their child. No, you're wrong, social wreckers. If a mom-to-be is pregnant, then she and the father have already parented, whether or not they are ready to raise the child. Indeed, adoption would be tons more honest were it stated that yes, you are already a parent when you contribute to the child's DNA. No, you cannot decide to "parent" or not because that decision has already been made. You can, however, decide to let someone else raise your child. And if you decide to allow someone else to raise your child, the child is still yours, no matter what the legal documents may say. After delving into this adoption industry mess, I've discovered that legal documents are often a bunch of pure crap. After all, my fabricated birth certificate says that I was born to two people who never had a child. If you can believe the government after realizing what it does to birth certificates in this country, you are much more tolerant of lies than I.

Is there something strange about parents who don't want to raise their special-needs child? I think so. Then again, I've yet to walk in those particular shoes. Does giving your child away make those who take the child into parents? No, sadly, it does not, even though the adopters may well do many things that are parent-like.

If we were all only honest about adoption, realizing that each child has two and only two natural parents and that the natural parent-child relationship should be respected--ah, then the world would be a much more honest and less adoption-friendly place. And that kind of world would be just fine with me.

Visit from a Census Worker

2010-07-13T18:43:00.000-04:00

He came to the Gingerbread House door today and just stood there, waiting for me to open it. Yes, we have a tight schedule today and no, I didn't have time for a census worker questionnaire, but my schedule should not have mattered because we filled out the form and sent it in. Nonetheless, "Joe," as he asked me to call him, even though his nametag said "Joseph," told me that they had no received it. It was a scary thing to have him at the door; I didn't know him from Adam's housecat. But because he was wearing his official census worker jacket (which looks like the official road worker jacket, i.e., the yellow and orange safety thing), I was supposed to trust this guy. I told him that five people live in our house, he asked me if I wanted to say their names and ages and I told him "No." "Constitutionally, that's all you need to know," I told him, after telling him there were five people here.

According to Joe's story, he needed to confirm he'd been here or we'd be getting even more visits, even more interruptions to my yoga or our book reports or our blessing before the meal or whatever else they are willing to interrupt. Mr. Thinking Mama said to give him his name, which I did (no, his real name isn't Mr. Thinking Mama and no, that's not what I told Census Joe) and a phone number (not our home phone) so that Joe will not get into trouble. I kinda liked Joe, actually; I felt as though he was probably some displaced social wrecker or computer programmer. And it really was hard to tell which with Joe. He complimented me on our flag as he was leaving, after he'd written down "5" and my husband's information, and he told me that not many people fly flags these days. I felt somewhat bonded with Joe by that time and told him that we'd had it up since July 4th and that we indeed need to take it down.

"Just shine a light on it at night," he said, as he walked down the Gingerbread House walk and onto the sidewalk.

"Thank you!" I said, and I really meant it. Joe's just doing his job, which is more than I can say for many people. I felt a little sorry for him, out in this heat doing the Constitutional and unConstitutional bidding of the government, but I did not give him information that was unConstitutional and I hope that I made him think: I'm a homeschooling freedom-oriented mom that doesn't like to be bothered by Census workers who ask unConstitutional questions. Maybe I'm the only one of those that Joe encountered all day.

Gary Coleman, Adoptee. Surprised?

2010-05-29T04:18:00.000-04:00

As with so many other Gen-Xers, I grew up watching "Different Strokes." I felt close to Kimberly, and figured that both she, and the actress who played her, Dana Plato, whose birthdate is very close to mine, had lives that I would only ever envy. Then came the 90s, and Plato became a real person with real problems. She died around Mother's Day, supposedly of suicide, leaving a son who, 11 years later, would kill himself around Mother's Day. As is the case with far too many stories like this one, adoption may well have been the seed for the destruction that followed. Turns out, Dana Michelle Plato's real mom was a 16-year-old with an 18-month-old at Dana's time of birth. Dana lucked out in adoptionspeak by getting herself hooked up with a couple who had no children of their own. Dana's adopters may well have been nice folks, but even nice folks cannot wipe away the pain of adoption.

The actress who won the hearts of so many with her portrayal of Kimberly lost custody of her own son to his father, but she seemed to influence her son enough that he desired to die as she did. Dana Plato also flirted with lesbianism, another trait I've noticed among adoptees. There is something about losing family members that really seems to screw people over sexually. I may write more about the sexuality stuff later. In this case, however, the pain of adoption spanned generations.

As I was reading about Gary Coleman's untimely death today, I read that he was also an adoptee, taken in by two people who were genetic strangers to him. Some of us adoptees handle the rejection by our natural families better than others, at least on the outside, but we all have a pain that will never go away: the rejection by our mothers. I'm not sure why I am here and Dana Plato is not, but it may have something to do with the fact that I wasn't on a sitcom as a child. Not for lack of wanting to be on one, mind you, did I miss out on child sitcomhood. There's an enormous amount of pressure on child stars and I'm now quite thankful that the opportunity wasn't presented to me when I was ten or so. Molly Ringwald's done okay for herself, but Dana Plato and Gary Coleman had the extra albatross of adoption on their backs, of being separated from their natural parents and given to genetic strangers. The adoption brainwashed will tell you this kind of thing doesn't matter. We adoptees, deep in our broken hearts, know better.

It's not a fabulous thing for most children to be thrust into the spotlight at such a young age, as both Plato and Coleman were, but it's even worse if that spotlight is preceded by separation from a child's natural parents. What really gets me about both Plato and Coleman is that the adopters were both called "parents" by the media. Fortunately, Plato's real mom is mentioned in Wikipedia, but nothing about Coleman's mom or dad seems to be in any obituary that I've read. I can't help but wonder if his mom is out there somewhere, watching all that is going on. Perhaps she feels ashamed and afraid to speak up.

Like many male adoptees, Coleman seemed to take out his angst on women. He hit a woman in 1999 and he and his wife seemed to have many violent arguments, according to what I've read. He also sued his adopters at one point, claiming they had defrauded him. It's so very sad that this kind of thing happens and that child sitcom stars so very often end up with crappy adulthoods. However, when you add the pain and lies of adoption to a childhood sitcom career, the results are so very often disastrous.

An interesting note is that Coleman had some kind of autoimmune disease that affected his kidneys; my own mother has an autoimmune disease and I remember a female adoptee that I grew up with who died of leukemia at 7. Many moms who've lost a child to adoption died of cancer. What I'd like to find out is if the pain and trauma of losing a parent or child to adoption so affects our bodies that we are more susceptible to certain diseases. I've never heard of this kind of thing being studied, but I'd sure like to know what truly unbiased researchers would find out about the effects of adoption trauma on those of us who are separated.

Why Most Adoptees Really Dislike Me

2010-05-16T20:43:00.000-04:00

Hate might be a more appropriate word. I used to seem to attract adoptees to me. Then, my dream came true. I found my mom. Adoptees, even one I'd been friends with for more than a decade, dropped me. Suddenly, I was pissing them off or they were pissing me off or something. Now, when I learn that somebody's an adoptee, I know to be careful. I have learned that most adoptees really dislike me. And so, it shouldn't surprise me that when I posted a comment to this blog regarding Sandra Bullock's new adoptee, I received this comment:

Tricia, your comments are completely uncalled for. She did not take a child from his mother. She chose to open her loving heart and home to a child who was either not wanted or unable to be cared for by his mother. You don’t know the situation. Most likely, her money would not have helped that child’s biological mother. Some women do not have the emotional maturity to be able to take care of a child and choose to give that child up for adoption for that child’s well-being. I myself am adopted, and have NEVER wanted to meet my [parents]. To me, my parents (sic) are the ones to were there for me, cared for me, loved me, etc. Not some woman who gave me up. Sandra Bullock is giving this beautiful baby a chance at life! Would you rather this baby be raised by the foster care system? Clearly, you do not understand much of anything about adoption, even though you claim you were adopted.

Enough of my rant. Your comment truly angered me.

Yeah, I often really wish that claim weren't true for me. But it is. The pain of adoption is something I've had to live with since before birth. And physical separation from my mother is something I experienced at two months old. Still, I don't find myself steeped in adoption brainwashing, as, apparently, TB is. I'm not sure why what I said angered her so much. TB's opinion is certainly that of mainstream media and her words could easily be printed in the ever-declining New York Times. Mine? Those of moms who've lost a child or more to adoption? Those of adoptees who've gotten past the brainwashing? Oh, not so much. In fact, I've witnessed an incredible suppression of our point of view. If it weren't for the Internet, views against adoption would be hard to find.

Perhaps my view threatens most adoptees because it is indeed very difficult to change what you've been told as long as you can consciously remember, i.e., when I go back home to the place where I grew up, I'm transported back to being "Beauford's girl," which I may have been, but I certainly was never his natural daughter. And yes, he and his wife loved me very much and I still miss them and they did very many parental-type things for me. But does it make them my natural parents? And did it take away the desire for me to find my natural family? And as much of a ruckus that my reunion with my natural parents caused in my life, do I regret being able to tell my own flesh and blood who their flesh and blood maternal grandparents and other family members are?

Adoption itself, the falsifying of birth certificates, and the taking away of one's parents and natural family to be replaced by genetic strangers are to blame for the often-permanent separation of families by adoption agencies. Every time a celebrity adopts, I think of all the public relations money that the adoption industry, a $1.6 billion business, has saved. The very white Sandra Bullock has taken the money that we've paid to see her and used it to buy herself a baby from some black mama who's probably been coached to be thankful that her baby can be raised by Sandra Bullock's nanny (don't fool yourself into thinking that Bullock is really doing this as most single moms do, without help). The mama who lost her baby to Bullock will never ever get over the loss of her baby; the child will never feel quite right at Bullock's house (although the child will sing the prai$e$ of Bullock as a "mom," no doubt); and the child's natural family will feel the loss for generations. Still, it makes a fabulous People cover story. As you can see from the comments, People's coverage of Bullock as "America's sweetheart" these last few months is certainly making a hero's journey out of her four-year attempt to take away a mother's child (remember that there is currently one adoptable baby for each 40 adopter hopefuls, i.e., the demand for adoptable babies far exceeds the supply). Note also that the natural mom was as completely absent from this story as the adoptress was present. And that, my friends, is what mainstream magazine adoption stories are all about. I dislike those biased stories greatly, almost as much as most adoptees dislike me.

Questions Re: "Taliban in Burbank"

2010-05-10T00:29:00.000-04:00

I didn't think my article was yet published and I came to write a comic friend about a show that I may do tonight and I discovered these e-mails, both of which raise important points. I don't write to answer all the questions, but to raise other questions and to help myself understand better. I was so angry about the government's slap on the wallet that I plain old didn't think about something I should have. I was pretty darn rebellious, as I often am. When the government extracts money from many people, we are busy focusing on the punishment and not on the gravity of the situation: Is it safe to talk on the cell phone? If the officer in my escapade had treated me to these couple of paragraphs and let me go, sans padding the coffers of Burbank, I would have been much more likely to listen and to do the safe thing:

With all due respect and a hatred for citations which have more to do with raising revenue than anything else, may I suggest you hang up and drive? You can chit chat with your friends when you're watching the T-ball games. With three kids in the car and the LA traffic you already have a tough job, multi-tasker or not.

When I was a working cop (who gave out tickets only to people who compromised others' safety and financial standing-like red light runners, lane weavers and people with no insurance) I scraped up a lot of people parts and car parts that were put there by people texting and talking while driving.

Sage advice indeed from a retired police officer. I plan to take it. After all, I make sure that my children wear seat belts even though I think that law is just as ridiculous. I received this e-mail that questioned quite a bit:

[W\here were you when they passes the stupid seat belt laws? [W}here were you when they increased the d.u.i. laws to the point of hardship? [W]here were you when they passed the stupid non-smoking laws?? and on and on--and----"they finally came for you"---you have to protect other peoples rights,even though you may not agree with them, to protect your own.

Let's take these questions one at a time:

[W\here were you when they passes the stupid seat belt laws? I was taking a public speaking class as an undergraduate at North Carolina State University. It was one of the first libertarian moments of my life; I remember thinking that seat belts are a fabulous idea. My mind hasn't changed on that one. And I remember thinking how horrid it was that a law had to be passed. After all, nobody had to tell me to wear a seat belt and I didn't grow up wearing one. I had become educated on how wonderful seat belts can be. And I'd even had a good experience with them. But like motorcycle helmet laws and other things that are supposedly for our own good, I couldn't see the point of making a law of it. I wrote a speech about why seat belt laws should not be passed and shared it with my class. It seemed like common sense to me that seat belts and other things inside a private vehicle are the business of that vehicle's owners, but now, only a couple of decades later, everybody accepts the law without question. It's quite sad indeed how much freedom we have lost and nobody seems to care.

[W}here were you when they increased the d.u.i. laws to the point of hardship?
Oh, I wasn't happy about that change either. I was not Internet savvy, being that the Internet had not yet been passed out of government hands and into the hands of so very many. I must admit that at this time I was under the brainwashing of the media, believing that there was really some kind of huge difference between Democrats and Republicans. I was probably not alone in this, but politics became more like a football game to me. Then again, other than writing letters to the editor, which I did from time to time, what was I to do?

[W]here were you when they passed the stupid non-smoking laws??
Yikes! I'm still incensed (sorry!) about this one. I heard on National Propaganda Radio the other day that Arkansas has banned smoking in private cars. I really hope that I was hallucinating. As with seat belts, I'm not much for smoking. In fact, I rather hate it, having grown up in a house filled with secondhand smoke. People, especially women for some strange reason, welcome these laws as if they were warm apple strudel. I can't explain why.

I'm open to ideas on how to protect the rights of myself and others.

You Don't Have To Go To Arizona To Be Treated Like A Terrorist

2010-05-07T09:47:00.001-04:00

Be careful in Burbank, California: the city needs revenue.

Driving from the baseball field, where I'd dropped off Nine, to the place where Five and I were supposed to go to Nursery Rhyme Dance, I saw the police officer's motorcycle in my rear view mirror. I didn't think about it at the time, of course, but now I remember how Claire Wolfe, one of my favorite freedom writers, talked about not having a car and how wonderful it was to have freedom from the blue light in the rear view mirror. Ah, but our government taxfeeders do love to make us late for things and to miss things all together, just for the privilege of driving on their roads, of course. Here I was, a law-abiding mom just trying to get my children to where they needed to go, and totally and completely following the rules of the road. Except, of course, for the cell phone use rule. I've written about this ridiculous law when it was first passed in California, but now, things have really gotten out of hand. On a day when the stock market took a strange plunge, I began to see what our country is coming to: a totalitarian mess in which little old ladies, moms, and other innocent folks can be stopped, detained, asked for identification, and treated like a criminal. I did, of course, sign the document that said I was guilty of the crime, with no jury trial; not doing so may have gotten me arrested and harassed even longer by the people whose salary my tax dollars pay.

What really got me about this particular stop, my first in California (although I have gotten a camera ticket), is that the officer was so very polite in his zero tolerance mess. I was very polite back to him, of course. The officer seemed void of intuition, as if his common sense had been politely brainwashed out of him and he even had to give a ticket to someone who probably is a lot like his own wife. If you're not familiar with zero tolerance, it's this crazy thing that's all the rage in government schools these days. In fact, I read the other day that a kindergartner or first grader (I forget exactly which) was expelled for hugging another student. I help to manage and coach a t-ball team and yes, the children can get a bit huggy sometimes; and sometimes, they can hit each other too much. However, I always let them know, very gently, that hugging and hitting and all those touchy feely things aren't allowed on the t-ball field. We're there to play t-ball and that's it. I don't expel them, but I do warn them that if they continue behavior that has nothing to do with t-ball, they'll have to sit out the rest of practice. This kind of thing has worked (so far!) every time and the t-ball players generally stop whatever annoying distracting behavior they're doing and get down to business, at least for a couple of minutes. In the zero tolerance atmosphere of the government schools, however, there is indeed no room for common sense. Thus, the student who brings a knife to school, or who hugs another student, or who hits another student is now being shown the open door back to his or her parents house for a few days, where students belong in the first place.

I mention the zero tolerance atmosphere of the government schools because it is one that we are all slowly going to have to get used to. The last time I was pulled, for speeding as we were going through Arizona to North Carolina, the officer saw that I was an innocent mom, driving while my husband and sons slept. I told him that we were trying to get to our motel that night (it was after midnight). He very nicely gave me a warning ticket and I went on my way, extremely careful about not speeding. That was a couple of years ago, however. If you're expecting this kind of common sense behavior to continue from those whose loins are girded with tax money, you need to wake yourself out of your stupor.

I was woken up yesterday, as I was very nicely treated as a criminal in front of two of my children. The very polite officer, who was, of course, just doing his job, was more than likely fulfilling a quota. He had been sitting and waiting for someone like me, someone who believes the cell phone law is ridiculous and hasn't bothered paying to get a hands-free device or didn't want to put the phone on speaker, neither of which makes talking on the cell phone much safer. Make no mistake: if I'd told him that I was trying to get a sick child to St. Joseph's Hospital and I'd called the dad to tell him, this officer would not have budged. After all, he had a quota to fill. No doubt, Burbank revenue is now declining in this economy and the tax-feeding officer was up front about telling me that they are now ticketing heavily for cell phone use. In fact, when I finally made it to ballet and tap classes (unfortunately, we missed Nursery Rhyme Dance), I found that another mom had received a cell phone ticket just three weeks ago, with the same line from the officer about how Burbank is now ticketing heavily for cell phone usage. Translation: Burbank needs money and will extol it from those who drive within its confines, all the while making innocent people, in the supposed comfort of their own private property, into lightweight criminals.

I'd heard, as have others I talked with, that the cell phone use fee was $25 or so. But he told me that my ticket would be $130; the other mom I talked with told me that her ticket was $141. As our car registration is due this month, the officer reminded me that I must park my car after May 10th and not drive it until I receive the proper registration information. Yeah. Right. Mr. Thinking Mama, btw, said that we have until the end of the month. There is no doubt that the taxfeeding* officer saw what a target I really was and took it upon himself to remind me that I could become even more of a victim by the state of California. Having said all this, the taxfeeder did not pull me out of the car and frisk me or anything like that and in these days of Amerika as a police state, I should certainly be thankful for that. Still, it was a humiliating experience and the thing I've learned is that I now have to buy the more cumbersome "hands-free" device, which I was trying to avoid, and that I need to use the speaker and put my cell phone in my lap or in my console. A very well-meaning Facebook friend suggested that perhaps Burbank is trying to eliminate cell phone accidents, and I'm sure that any taxfeeder will tell you that's the case, but I don't believe that for a minute. In fact, I can tell you that if he'd been trying to do that, he would have done exactly what the officer in Arizona did: Give me a warning ticket. A good p.r. campaign could lower those accident rates, but the government would have to spend money to do it; by giving tickets, the government prospers.

On a related note, I happened to be going the wrong way on the very confusing Chandler Blvd. in Burbank the other day. A very sweet woman pulled up beside me and made me aware of what I was doing. I quickly got into the correct lane and continued, promising myself to be more careful in this neck of the proverbial woods. And yet, what would a police officer have done? Give me a ticket, no questions asked or answered. I'm thankful that zero tolerance has not yet creeped into the general population and the woman was helpful to me. When my father-in-law tells me, as he did just the other day, that the government is just trying to protect us, I almost have to laugh out loud. If the government were trying to protect us, they wouldn't be fining us at every opportunity. It's hard to believe that there was so little going on in Burbank at 5:30 p.m. that the officer had nothing better to do than give a mom a ticket. As more and more laws are created by those we elect to serve us, this situation is only going to get worse.

And so, if I'd been eating a hamburger or putting on make-up, I would have been okay. But talking on the cell phone with my husband cost me $130 and took away Five's and my Nursery Rhyme Dance class for the day.

I know that a lot has been said lately about Arizona and its new draconian law that allows anybody at anytime to be asked for papers please, but you don't have to go to Arizona to be treated like a terrorist. If your particular jurisdiction hasn't yet come around to the revenue-boosting zero tolerance attitude yet, it certainly will. Remember this: The government is not there to protect you; it's there because you pay it to be. I'm becoming more and more disgusted with the way it's treating its customers.

Just Say No to the National Biometric ID Card!

2010-04-20T06:39:00.000-04:00

Within a week of Mr. Thinking Mama's and my having to pay a humongous federal income tax bill because of his successful self-employment this past year, I shouldn't be surprised that the elites who run the government have come up with a new way to treat us like chattel. After all they extract money from us; why shouldn't they also try to control how we make that money? In many ways, they already do; I remember when employers were forced to start the ridiculous required showing of social security card and other i.d. in order, simply, to be employed. According to this article by John W. Whitehead, however, things can get worse. Much worse. The REAL ID concept has frightened me for years; however, Internet awareness caused citizens to raise quite the uproar against the bill authorizing it and many states protested, as I hope will also happen with Emperor O's magical-health-care-for-all. Congressional timewasters have found a new way, however, to monitor our every move. And this particular bill has bipartisan support, showing that, indeed, congress critters are united in their desire to take us to new socialistic heights. Of course, the mere mention of this country's lengthy but sure descent into socialism makes me a "moron" to the supposedly enlightened and progressive "left," otherwise intelligent people who can't quite seem to make an intelligent argument against the idea that Emperor O's magical-health-care-for-all plan. When one fails to make a cohesive argument, it is always a good idea, evidently, to resort to the same thing that my 5-, 7-, and 9-year-old too often attempt: Call the opposition a bad name. Nonetheless, all will suffer if this bill is passed:

A centerpiece of the immigration bill as proposed by Senators Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) is a requirement that all U.S. workers, citizen and resident alike, be required to obtain and carry biometric Social Security cards (national ID cards under a different name) in order to work within the United States. Attempting to appease critics of a national ID card, Schumer and Graham insist that "no government database would house everyone’s information" and that the "cards would not contain any private information, medical information, or tracking devices." However, those claims are blatantly false. Indeed, this proposed biometric card is nothing more than an end-run around opposition to a national ID card.

When I was growing up, not so long ago, I heard preachers talk about a "mark of the beast," although I don't often hear about it in today's government-sponsored churches. Yes, it seems like something of sci-fi novels and the wet dream of Big Brother come true, but however fictional it may seem, the reality is that it's the elite's way of controlling the chattel:

The time to resist is now. If we don’t, eventually, we will all have to possess one of these cards in order to be a functioning citizen in American society. Failing to have a biometric card will render you a non-person for all intents and purposes. Your whole life will depend on this card – your ability to work, travel, buy, sell, access health care, and so on.

What we used to call science fiction is now reality. And whether a national ID card is the mark of the Beast or the long arm of Big Brother, the outcome remains the same.

Or, you could be like my otherwise intelligent father-in-law. We were having a telephone conversation the other day and the subject came up of the TSA's pornographic X-rays of those who choose to fly these days. Mr. Thinking Mama's father assured me that this invasive step was necessary to stop the evil terrorists that anxiously await the opportunity to create a new 9-11. He also told me that the government is just trying to protect us. Ah, and I had so much respect for him. Evidently, his many years of working in mainstream media has brought him fully in line with what the elite would like for him to believe. However, I'm teaching his grandchildren the truth.

Adoptress Seeks Refund

2010-04-11T00:57:00.000-04:00

Recently, someone I have known since elementary school found me on Facebook. When she added me, I looked on her Facebook page, found her phone number, and gave her a call. It was great talking with her, and I don't think I'd talked with her since graduation. One of the first things that she mentioned on the phone, however, was that she remembered my telling her that I am adopted. I'd forgotten I told her, but that's not so unusual; I've probably suppressed a lot of memories regarding adoption. She told me that she'd never heard of anyone who was adopted and that she went home and asked her mother all kinds of questions. True, those of us who are adoptees are kind of hatched rather than born, or so it seems to us, especially prior to finding our natural families. Hearing about the day of my birth from my mother, after being thought of as being hatched for so very long, was a true miracle. I'm so very thankful that I found my parents, even though my mother and I no longer speak to each other. Finding my natural parents has been a huge blessing, despite the hardships of trying to get to know family members that I didn't grow up with. There's no doubt that I have harbored a bit of anger about being taken from my mother, deprived of breastfeeding, and given to strangers. Fortunately, I'm learning to deal with that anger, release it, and move on with my life.

Look at the comments on this blog, however, and you'll find some in which adopters accuse me of all kinds of things, including needing therapy. It's really difficult for many, although not all, adopters to come to terms with the fact that a) they may act in a parental role, but they are not their adoptee's real parents; and b) adoption is not going to solve the child's huge problem of being separated from his or her parents. Therefore, many adopters believe that they are actually helping a child by taking the child away from his or her extended family and country and bringing said child to the overstimulated Western world, where the child can have everything that his or her family has always dreamed of, except, of course, for the family that God and nature gave the child. Sometimes, adoption fantasies grow so large that adopters believe they can actually have the child of their dreams. As those of us who are fortunate enough to be natural parents know, sometimes our children are nightmares. When this kind of thing happens to me, I may want to be mad at my child, but when all is said and done, that child is often merely a little mirror of his dad or of me or of someone in our families. Oh, how it really hurts to see so much of myself in my children sometimes! Adopters, being genetic strangers to their adoptees, must often feel as though they are trying to do the impossible: Make someone who doesn't belong in their family belong in their family. Sometimes, this arrangement works just fine and everybody's more or less happy, at least on the surface. I grew up pretty much that way. Deep inside, however, many of us adoptees, no matter how successful and wonderful we may look on the outside, suffer an almost intolerable pain on the inside. To me, it's fascinating when a young adoptee, cutting through all his or her pain, can vent that pain. Like so many others, I hid a lot of my pain and internalized it, sabotaging mainly myself. Boys, however, are often a bit more sensitive, interestingly enough, about this pain and will sometimes act out, as this little guy did. In no way am I condoning his behavior, but let's face it: His adoptress took him away from his family and his native land and expected him to be grateful, no doubt, for the opportunity to be raised in the greatest empire-building country in the world.

He wasn't much for it:

The grandmother of an adopted boy who was sent back to Russia alone on an airplane says the child was violent and angry with his mother in the U.S.

Nancy Hansen told The Associated Press on Friday from her home in Shelbyville, Tenn., that she put the child on a plane to Russia with a note from her daughter. She says the family paid a man $200 to pick the boy up at the airport and take him to the Russian Education and Science Ministry.

Hansen says the boy, known as Justin to his adoptive family, was sent back to the ministry because the family thought officials there could take care of him. She says it wasn't child abandonment because a stewardess was watching the boy on the flight and a reputable person picked him up in Russia.

Again, I'm not at all condoning his behavior, but at least he can use for his excuse the fact that he's a little boy. The adoptress did something I can't imagine doing to any child: She stuck a scared little boy on a plane alone and sent him back to Russia. It appears as though he wasn't the child she'd hoped he would be. I guess the whole forever family thing that adoption agencies so love to tout didn't quite work here.

Note that the article itself calls the adoptress his "mother" and the adoptress' mother his "grandmother." It sure doesn't take much these days for the media to form a pretend family.

Welcome to Amerika!

2010-03-22T11:55:00.000-04:00

As we raced Pinewood Derby cars with my Bear and Wolf scouts and their little brother, a self-proclaimed "nothing scout" yesterday, I felt helpless. As an American, I am supposed to have some say in what my representatives do. At least that's what the Constitution seems to call for. For the past 100 years or so, the Constitution has been ignored more and more until finally, yesterday, we became conscious vassals of the state, of a federal government that is primarily owned by China, a country that has bought most of our debt. What was I supposed to do to stop this mess? None of the calls I've made to Congress seem to work. My well-meaning self-proclaimed "liberal" friends cannot stop name calling long enough to stop and look at what this health care bill is going to mean for them; and those on the dole are simply ecstatic that the government will be giving them something seemingly for free. People have been fooled by the government schools for so long, believing them also to be free, that most are economically ignorant, an excellent position for the government to take over care of their bodies. So-called liberals who campaign vehemently for abortion as a woman's right have no idea what kind of control they're giving to the government with their whole bodies. My well-meaning self-proclaimed "conservative" friends dislike this bill but I've heard some of these so-called conservatives more than willing to compromise and have a bill with which the government still controls their health, just with lower costs or more of an illusion of freedom. Many of these conservatives are also fine with paying taxes to kill people in other parts of the world, but are quite aghast at the supposed death panels that will eventually come via rationing as a result of this bill. There's hardly anybody anymore who truly believes in individual freedom. The person who wishes to eschew mainstream treatments and take care of his or her own health is f'ed by this bill, as are people who choose not to have health insurance. Emperor Obama is now marching down the street with no clothes on and people are cheering him on, as they did his predecessor, King Jorge. No doubt the people are, for the most part, not the same for Emperor O. as they were for King J., but the crowds are still cheering nonetheless. Those who cheer for this health care bill are as ignorant as those who support our empire's reign in other countries. It's a sad day for everyone in the United States, but just as the elite have been planning in the New World Order, instead of impeaching the president, people are cheering him on.

I've written a bit more about this on my Comic Mom blog, in "Spring Equinox and the Pinewood Derby."

The besmirched-and-ignored-by-media Ron Paul has also written an excellent essay, "Healthcare Reform Passes."

And here's a good article on what we have to look forward to, "What Soviet Medicine Teaches Us."

We're living in a new world, folks. The media are correct when they call this health care bill "historic." Indeed, it is. As with the so-called Patriot Act, No Child Left Behind, and other socialist bills and unConstitutional Executive Orders, this bill will erode freedom in the United States. Let us embrace the socialism that so many have sought for so long. For me and my house, however, we will fight for freedom.

Marie Osmond's Adoptee Dies

2010-03-02T15:22:00.000-05:00

Look, I used to like Donny and Marie, and especially their little brother, Jimmy. Actually, I have nothing against Donny and Jimmy, the former, in fact, is in one of my favorite Weird Al videos: White and Nerdy. No, it's not the Osmond boys I have a problem with: It's Marie. A few years ago, after I'd awakened from the brainwashed adoption slumber that I'd been in most of my life, I read that Marie was proud of the way that she so was in denial about the pain of mother and child separation that was pretending her adoptees were her own child, making the three that were truly her own equivalent to those who are adopted. Those of us who are adopted know how ludicrous this plan is, laughable at best and tragic at worst. I grew up with a lot of well-meaning people who accepted and propagated adoption lies. Therefore, I tried hard to pretend that I was related to people who are more or less genetic strangers to me. The pretending part is what really sucks; in addition, it's quite harmful. I wish that adopters would stop pretending that adoptees are their children. I wish that moms who've lost a child to adoption would tell the world how terrible it is to lose that child. I wish that adoption agencies thinly veiled as pregnancy crisis centers would cease to exist. Well, that's the way things used to be. However, in the last 100 years or so, adoption brainwashing has so pervaded public thinking that the average person is looking at Marie Osmond and saying, "Isn't it sad that she lost her son," when in fact, some other mother, his real mom, lost a son a long time ago and now, that son is dead. And no, Marie, with all her money and therapy and religion, could not save her adoptee from the fact that he and his mom were separated and the havoc that wreaks in every child who's ever been thus separated. I'm not pretending that he was her son. And I am extremely thankful for the sentence in this article that alludes to the problems he was having, simply from being separated from his mother: Osmond did say one of the issues troubling him was the fact that he was adopted. Gee, Marie, you think so?!?

Until I had my first son, I did not realize how much boys depend on their moms, for everything from nursing to nodding off into dreamland at night. I'd heard that boys have more of a problem with being separated from their moms than girls do, but I did not really believe it until my sons were born. Seeing that mother/son bond made me realize that Mr. Thinking Mama and his mom have a similar bond, and that since Mr. Thinking Mama's mother died unexpectedly almost four years ago, there is a real sense of loss for him and his brother. Because Mr. Thinking Mama is an adult, however, he is much better equipped to handle the loss of his mother than an infant boy. Marie Osmond's adoptee lost his mother as a child--he may have never even seen her. Yes, this kind of thing can have a huge effect. And yes, mental hospitals, prisons, and graveyards have many men in them who've died from loss of mother via adoption or death.

I'm so sorry for the loss of Marie Osmond's adoptee; it is an extremely sad ending to an extremely sad life. It's too bad that Marie, with all her money and fame, couldn't have found a way to support both the children that she adopted and their mothers.

Just Another Reason Not to Move Back to North Carolina

2010-01-20T05:11:00.000-05:00

Well, there's the raw milk thing. And the complete lack of legal pot stores. Sure, L.A.'s city commissars are trying hard to shut down pot stores--business could hardly be better for pot stores--but the truth is that California is looking better all the time, especially when the North Carolina government has deemed me incompetent to choose whether or not I should drink raw milk, and whether or not I should smoke or otherwise ingest some weed.

But really, this story amazes me. I'm not much for cigarette smoke, but when the North Carolina legislature starts delving into the business of private business owners, I get a real icky feeling. Sure, they've already outlawed smoking here, but in N.C., in the supposedly independent South, businesses have been doing fine regulating things by themselves. For example, Charlie Goodnight's comedy club, which I've performed at a few times, has its own smoking ban and has for years. Why should the North Carolina legislature feel the need to make all businesses operate this way? Why aren't they trusting business owners? Ah, but it's for the common good, eh? As were the Nazis, of course.

Giving Your Baby Away: It's the RIGHT Thing to Do!

2009-12-08T11:08:00.000-05:00

When I think about the fools and idiots that the government schools are producing, I can't help but to think about my own parents at 17. My dad seemed to think it was the best thing to give away his firstborn; my mom believed social wreckers, even though she knew in her heart that she did not want to give away her daughter. Both believed the idiotic lie that giving a baby to strangers is the right thing to do. If there's one thing that government schools do an excellent job of, it's teaching people to go against their instincts.

Despite the maternal instincts of my mother, social wreckers took me away and I never saw my mom again until I was 34 years old. In the meantime, my mom and dad and the brother and sister who didn't consciously know about me, suffered very silently. If I complained or even talked about wanting to find my real parents, I was usually told something to the effect of: Well, it's great that you were adopted by such wonderful people! And yes, I'm quite glad that they weren't serial killers or some such. They were, indeed, pretty nice folks. The problem is that they weren't my family. I've developed some really great relationships with the people that I went to school with and grew up with; however, nothing, nothing at all can make up for the loss of the family that God gave me. I don't even try to write this kind of thing for mainstream media anymore; nor do I write letters to producers telling them how terrible it is to glorify adoption. Nor do I hope anymore that some television show will show a mother who lost her child years ago and still grieves for that lost child. But you can bet that these moms are well represented on the Internet. And they are often quite pissed. And not afraid to say it. Showing adoption as anything less than lovely, of course, would hurt the profits of the fabulous adoption industry, a $1.6 billion business and counting.

Therefore, it's okay when the hip MTV shows a couple's strife and crying as they give their firstborn to adopters (from North Carolina, no less) who promise to write and send cards. Of course, the parents are not allowed to know the physical address of their child in North Carolina. And they're already being demeaned to "birthparents," or breeders. Nor are they allowed to be sad for too long, because, never fear--there is grief counseling available! It hardly seems that any tragedy these days can go unattended by a grief counselor, but my question is: Where were these counselors when they could have prevented the tragedy of mother and child separation?!? And part of me really wants to horsewhip some sense into these idiotic new parents and I'd certainly like to horsewhip the idiots in North Carolina who gladly took a baby away from her mother. If the adopters were so very concerned about the welfare of the child, why didn't they provide financial and emotional support to the parents? No, in this case, the adults all acted like children, with everyone believing all the adoption lies; my parents did the same thing, evidence that in the 60s as with now, the government schools are working just as planned: separating families, one child at a time. It's interesting that the man who adopted me came from a family in which most of the women were married and having children by age 16, which used to be more or less the norm. Read John Taylor Gatto and you'll find that one of the jobs of the public education system in the United States is to keep children as children as long as possible, and to turn them into childish adults. In other words, one of the jobs of the government schools is to make our society into a bunch of spoiled adults who act like children. What better way to control a population?

Of course, the real loser in this situation is the little girl, Carly, who'll grow up surrounded by the lies of adoption and with four adults who seem fully to support those lies. She'll be confused and perplexed and be shown pictures of her real family but no answer she'll ever get will satisfy her as to the reason that she isn't with them. The mother, with her leaking breasts that are supposed to be feeding her baby, will go on pretending as long as she can. No matter how many children she and the father have, no child will ever replace the child they lost by adoption and their family will have a huge hole in it, as if someone died and yet, no one has physically died. That the MTV circus makes money off of this tragedy through advertising, and that people will watch it, is further proof that our society may as well bring back the lions den.

Of course, things will get better for the parents, as they negotiate a new season with MTV: Life Without Baby, perhaps? And one wonders where the parents of Catelynn Lowell and Tyler Baltierra are. Why are they so supportive of losing their grandchild? With adoption being glamorized thusly, one wonders how many other pregnant teens are waiting in the proverbial wings, hoping that they will also get a reality show moment if they decided to give away their baby. And how many will google the very unChristian Bethany Christian Services, a very unChristlike organization whose social wreckers separate many families each day, often by lying to and otherwise misleading the mothers, from what I have read and heard from mothers who've been lied to and misled by this agency. This MTV moment is great advertising for everybody involved, but it grossly neglects the only innocent victim here, the baby who is, as I write this, wondering where her mothers breasts are; the baby who will never understand why she was given away; the baby whose psyche has been permanently damaged by parents who achieved their fifteen minutes of fame and adopters who believed themselves to be such good parent material that they took a newborn from her mother. Let's remember that there are also sponsors willing to pay MTV to be a part of this tragedy and there are people willing to watch it without demanding that it stop. All of which lead to the conclusion that the government schools are working exactly as planned. B.F. Skinner and all his behaviorist friends, who believe that children are blank slates and that a child needs not his or her mother but merely an adult of some sort, must be doing some kind of special victory dances in their graves. Or in their ivory tower offices.

Supporting the Serial Adoptress: It's All About the Gifts

2009-12-06T17:03:00.000-05:00

Recently, a female comic that I'd heard of, although never met, died. She had lung cancer and I don't think that she smoked. She was only in her late fifties and from all accounts, she was quite a funny comic. Someone on a comedy list passed around a video of her and in the interview, she talked all about how unfair comedy is to women. "We've already got a woman comic," she said that so many producers tell her regarding shows. Her whole thing during the interview video seemed to be about providing a voice for female comics who would otherwise have no voice. I've been doing comedy in and around Los Angeles for over six years now and I've yet to have anyone say any such thing to me. I'm not saying that it doesn't or hasn't ever happened, but I've experienced only shows in which funny women were just as respected as funny men. Of all the things that I wish to solve in this world, female victimization in the comedy and job world isn't one of them. Frankly, I don't see enough of it to find it much of a problem, and I say that as someone who took her then-infant around to many comedy shows only five years or so ago. Sure, I was thrown out of the Laugh Factory for breastfeeding, but that was certainly not because I was a woman per se. When I was pregnant, I was wholly welcomed into the Laugh Factory.

I mention this kind of thing because I find the taking of one woman's child by another woman, deemed to be superior, as one of the greatest insults to women ever. I'd much rather fight that battle than the supposed prejudice regarding a job or comedy show. For those who wish to discriminate against women or whomever, there are always other jobs or comedy shows or whatever. However, taking away a child from a mother is usually an event that has permanent implications, both for the child and mother; and there's no replacing a child. Taking a child from his or her mother is one of the cruelest forms of degradation to women and my unadopted and un-adoption-brainwashed friend, E., easily recognized this easily after reading my blogs, as do others unaffected by adoption. However, Parade, America's Fabian Socialist magazine, tries hard to brainwash the common folk. With propaganda sheets in almost every major- and medium-market newspaper, Parade tries hard to focus on the globalist agenda, which has, for many years, included the breakup of natural families and the recycling of children to families deemed more worthy by the social wreckers who place themselves as gods over the lives of children whose parents are willing to listen. Therefore, it does not at all surprise me that today's installment of socialist propaganda includes an article by adoptress, mother, and "Contributing Editor" to America's Fabian Socialist rag, Jacquelyn Mitchard, entitled "The Richest Woman in Town."

The article goes on to show what lengths this serial adoptress will go to in order to prove how worthy she is of other people's children. Mitchard, who through "birth and adoption," claims ownership and parentage of seven children, although she is not clear on which children are actually hers and which she's taken from another mom. Interestingly, Mitchard has so much control over her financial situation that her assistant must tell her that she and her husband--who, like most adopter husbands, simply goes along with his wife's indulgences--are broke. I can't help but wonder if some of her adoptees have parents who are doing financially better than she at the moment. Nonetheless, Mitchard and her DH are bound and determined to take two more children from their country and their mom, whom Mitchard has already demeaned to a mere "birth mother." The mother's sin, in this case, was not necessarily having children out of wedlock, as was the case when my own mother was robbed of her firstborn, but rather, the new adoptees' mother contracted AIDS. Oh well, too f'in' bad, at least according to Mitchard. Or to put it more appropriately: I, American adoptress, deserve to be called mommy much more than some African woman who has untreated HIV. Even if she weren't broke, I doubt that Mitchard ever considered sponsoring the mother and children so that the family could stay together, perhaps bringing the mom for some medical treatment in the United State. Nah.

Unfortunately, this kind of I'm-entitled-to-your-child attitude pretty much sums up American adopters who see themselves, even flat broke, as far superior to real mothers, especially those dying in other countries. Yep, Mitchard, who claims to not "really know how we're going to make it," has opened her home to two more children who'll have a much better life with a trampoline and used dolls than they would with their mother and extended family. Yep, it's all about the gifts, even if they're slightly used. Interestingly, the same out-of-money excuse has propelled many a mom to give up her child both in the United States and abroad. Oh, but I guess when you're the Contributing Editor of Parade magazine, and you have no idea that you're about to be broke (of course, she blames it on those nasty investor-types who take your money and make bad investments), you're still a good candidate to take two children from their dying mom (hey, I guess maybe she'll die more quickly now! I certainly would if someone took my children). Of course, Mitchard insists that her two new adoptees conform to the positive adoption language that America's Fabian Socialist Magazine uses. Natural family ties are gone and all the Mitchard household children are the two adoptees' "brothers and sisters." And of course, Mitchard will insist on replacing the mom, even before she dies, by asking the girls to call her and her husband "mom and dad." Ah, adoption: the lies of it are lovely, aren't they?!? Meanwhile, I and many other good writers (see my list of links) are not heard in mainstream media because of our outlandish views on adoption. It's worth remembering that the LaLeche League canceled my appearance at their national convention and a book publisher canceled my book contract because I support natural families' staying together. In a globalist village, don't ya' see, everybody is everybody else's child and nobody has any real natural family ties. Funny how I used to teach B.F. Skinner's Walden Two, which supports the concept in the previous sentence, to my first-year English students at North Carolina State University. My students were appalled by the idea of recycling children and severing natural family ties. Ah, but that was ten years and many pro-adoption articles ago. I'm sure they've mellowed into a more politically-correct and globalist way of thinking by now.

One of the Many Reasons that I Despise Government Schools, Even the Good Ones

2009-11-27T04:08:00.001-05:00

Let's be clear on nomenclature here: the "public schools" are no more for the common good of the community than adoption is good for natural families. And since they have been bought by the ridiculous "No Child Left Behind" act, a federal cap and trade scheme that basically places ALL public schools, including those fancy schmancy charter schools that are all the rage, in the hands of the Emperor du Jour, in this case, Savior Obama, the public schools have indeed become government schools, more specifically, federal government schools. Of course, that makes me some kind of racist, homophobic, fundamentalist that the government will soon place on its terrorist list. Yes, right close to "is white and Christian" as a terrorist identifier, is "uses the term government schools" on the "New Trends in Terrorism" list, which will become an essay, which will become a book, which will inform the Feds who's not walking the politically correct chalkline for the common good of all subjects in Savior Obama's empire.

Speaking of empires, I hope to read Lord of the Flies to the boys in some relatively soon trip to the East Coast, but in the meantime, this classic book is being played out in schools across Amerika, even in Deerfield Beach, Florida. Now, Mr. Thinking Mama/Comic Mom is from Florida and you can certainly say that he is lucky to have escaped Miami relatively torture-free. However, I think that wonderful occurrence was due more to the timing of his departure, i.e., the 80s, than to the supposedly wonderful government school that he attended. Mr. Thinking Mama told me once, and I have written about it, that his first grade teacher made the class laugh at a little girl who'd peed in her pants. As the mom of a first grader, I can tell you that toilet training is certainly iffy at that age, even if things have seemed very normal and grown up for a while. More than one kindergartener/first grader in my children's dance classes has peed in pants, a relatively normal event for the child who's just learning to control the bladder and do other more fun things than go to the bathroom. It's not anything to be laughed at. And yet, Mr. Thinking Mama's teacher encouraged laughter at this particular little girl. She even required it, something Mr. Thinking Mama, and probably most of his then-classmates, has had to live with for many years. Yet, what becomes of children when they are forced to laugh at a child who makes the very childlike move of peeing in his or her pants? What becomes of that entire class? Of classes all over the country in which that has happened? Fortunately, Mr. Thinking Mama has had relatively strong moral guidance and the event did not cause him to become a criminal of any sort. Then again, his mom stayed home with him and he and his brother were expected to act, well, as young gentlemen. Things are bad enough for public school children who have good moral guidance at home. What happened to the children in Mr. Thinking Mama's class who weren't as fortunate in the moral guidance department? What happened to the children whose parents were divorcing during their child's first grade year? Did this incident become enmeshed and entangled with lots of negative energy and difficult emotions? What about the children whose families did not, for whatever reason, provide such guidance? Who knows?

Nonetheless, some of Mr. Thinking Mama's then-classmates have spawned children of the current school-age generation, i.e., the generation that grew up unable to bring a gun to school, but living in the shadows of Columbine and other destructive scenes in which morally decrepit youth shot and killed classmates with relative ease. Extremely disturbing is the latest Lord of the Flies trend, no doubt brought on by a generation of bored teenagers who have little guidance in the morals department, brought up by parents who may be too busy fighting over custody to figure out what's going on with their child. Thus, there should be little surprise when these bored youths who are barred by state law from working without a permit have too much time on their proverbial hands and a mess of tangled emotions sans morals developed mostly in the prison-like structure of the government schools do something as idiotic and morally disgusting as set fire to one of their classmates. Here's the story.

It's a bad one: Six weeks ago, 15-year-old Michael Brewer was "doused with rubbing alcohol" and "set ablaze." He's receiving the regular Oprah-watcher treatment by the media, with his heroic efforts praised, as they should indeed be. But should a middle schooler have to pay this kind of punishment for merely trying to survive the government's mandate of staying behind the chain-linked fence all day? There is scant mention of his killer in the article:
Three teens who attended Deerfield Beach Middle School with Michael Brewer have been charged with attempted murder in the attack outside an apartment complex. Police say the boys doused Michael with rubbing alcohol and set him on fire. Two other teens were arrested and released after prosecutors decided not to charge them.

Keep in mind here that all this occurred under the rubric of those fabulous middle schools that the government has been opening for a few decades now, under the guise of providing students of a certain age with a wonderful atmosphere in which they'll be able to grow and learn and make lifelong friends. Doesn't it sound just peachy?!? I'm sure that the middle school these boys came from is full of puzzled parents who just can't quite understand why their wonderful school was the backdrop for this horrendous event that Michael will have to live with for the rest of his life. And as with the recent rape that occurred in a government school setting, which had many onlookers and no one to actually help anyone, even by simply calling 9-1-1 on their iPod cell phones or whatever, this event seemed also to have onlookers. Could it be that the parents of these onlookers have allowed their children's teachers, under the guise of educating them, to somehow teach, as Mr. Thinking Mama's teacher did, that it is okay to kill people, or at least to set them on fire? Are government school students learning that experimenting with people's lives and their physical bodies is simply peachy? Surely, all this immorality can't be learned merely from television. I'd say the morally decrepit people who changed Michael's life and the life of his family forever will probably not suffer nearly as much as Michael will every time he looks in the mirror, for the rest of his life. Michael's parents seem to be reacting much better than I probably would in the situation and they certainly have a difficult road to travel, thanks to the school that they were told would help their son, would educate him, would give him a better life, all for free, of course. Ah, more government lies, indeed! For Michael, and the countless other victims that government schools create, to be bullied and burned and whatever by the bullies-sans-morals that the government schools churn out, the lies are no longer theoretical; for him and for the many other victims of government schools, the lies are showing themselves and many of us are beginning to see that yes, even in good public schools, bad things happen. In fact, any time that you turn your child over to the government all day, you can expect that your child, if he or she has any sensitivity at all, will receive a bit of training that will aim to desensitize him or her. Unfortunately, this training came at quite a cost to Michael and his family. Please keep them in your thoughts and prayers.

Cute Panda Bears and the Chinese Government That's Saving Them

2009-11-25T06:53:00.000-05:00

Sure, I've been busy lately, or maybe it's just that there's so much to write about. Emperor O. has said that we can have pot stores in California, for instance, and sure enough, the L.A. City Czars are trying to regulate the hell out of neighborhood pot stores and make sure that they make no money. I want to write more about this regulation weirdness regarding a natural herb that God gave us, but it's late and I need to go to bed and frankly, I'm afraid the subject of this entry will be eaten if I don't write about it soon. Yes, it's cereal!

Before I go on, please allow me to explain how cereal is handled here at the Gingerbread House. We buy three boxes of cereal per month. Granted, cereal is one of the greatest time savers ever, but nobody's ever convinced me that it's nutrituous. Not that I particularly cared about nutrition when I was scarfing down the yummy King Vitamin as a child. Nor did I care much when, in my first semester at North Carolina State, I had a cafeteria card and ate enough Captain Crunch to last many lifetimes. Gosh, was it ever good! And yet, when it comes to nutrition for my babies, I'm all about trying not to eat as much out of a box. Therefore, we've had yummy crock pot meals for breakfast and sometimes, we make skillet fried potatoes. Cereal is indeed a special treat and each boy gets to choose one cereal box per month.

When it came time recently for the November cereal--and I'm happy to say that with three birthdays in the Gingerbread House during this month (including mine!), that cereal was not even thought much about until mid-month--the boys were at Whole Foods. Therefore, we obtained cereal masked in politically correct boxes, which brings me to this entry, which you may have thought I'd forgotten:

The Envirokidz cereal box is clearly intended to make children think of the globalists' politically correct view of the world, i.e., that many animals are much more valuable than humans. Especially when those animals are cute giant pandas or some such. Now please don't misunderstand me: On my first trip to the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., on a Close-Up trip when I was in high school, I absolutely fell in love with the pandas there, although I don't know if they are technically "giant" pandas or not. Who can argue with the cuteness of a panda bear? Not I!

Reading the back of the cereal box (and what child of the 70s doesn't absolutely love to do that--why, I remember when there were actual records of songs by the Archies on cereal boxes!), I found this text, written, evidently, by a giant panda himself:

If you take a look at the map under my picture, you can see life has sure changed for us giant pandas. We used to have lots of area to live and eat in, but our neighborhood is getting pretty small. Luckily, the Chinese government and groups like Wildlife Trust and their partners are helping us by setting up places called Nature Preserves, where we can live safely; and Bamboo Corridors, so we can move around when we need to find more bamboo to eat. Some days I spend 14 hours eating--I need about 40lbs (sic) of bamboo every day! That's a lot of salad!

No doubt, this particular panda has better grammar than many of my former students at NCSU. He (I'm guessing the panda's gender from the picture and the text, but I might be wrong!) is certainly a good writer; maybe he should help me edit some NIH proposals. Nonetheless, Giant Panda Boy (GPB) said something that really bothered me: "Luckily, the Chinese government . . . " Now, I'm not saying that GPB or any of his giant panda friends have ever really bothered to go outside the U.S. and taste the relative freedom, say, of the National Zoo (and I'm not talking about Congress or the White House, in this particular instance, although I would also describe those institutions as zoos) in D.C., but really, praising the Chinese government?!? This is the same government that kills human babies and kidnaps them, all in the name of population control, of course, so that the survivors can be sold to adopters in the West. To praise the Chinese government for anything seems bizarre. But then again, GPB doesn't really know much about things outside China.

However, I can't help but think that Whole Foods does. Perhaps some witty writer at Whole Foods can explain to GPB that the Chinese government is horrid and has been, well, less than nice to children for years. From what I've read about the Chinese government, they're known more for killing people than for saving panda bears. Perhaps a Chinese government employee helped GPB to write his speech. I know that kidnapping and killing (or forcing the parents to kill) children is not nearly as sexy and attractive as GPB, but for my money, it's certainly important to tell that part of the story about China, especially when the cereal is marketed to children. It's a good thing that Peanut Butter Panda Puffs are so tasty. Otherwise, it'd be easy to get all caught up in thinking that the Chinese government is fabulous for saving GPB and his giant and extremely cute bamboo-eating friends.

In case the Federal Trade Commission is monitoring this blog, as they are wont to do these days, please note that I am disclosing in my somewhat review of this product, that I did not receive Envirokidz Organic Peanut Butter Panda Puffs for free. Gosh, I sure hope I have the receipt!

Swine Flu Fever

2009-11-01T14:25:00.001-05:00

Here at the Gingerbread House, we're doing what everyone should do to protect ourselves from any communicable disease: washing our hands, eating vegetables and protein, avoiding a lot of sugar, et al. However, we are avoiding the swine flu vaccine as if it were the plague. Evidently, not everyone feels this way, which is what the pharmaceutical industry is depending on to make those huge profits. After Emperor O. made the ridiculous statement the other day that his own children are not receiving the toxicity called the swine flu vaccine because they are in not in a high-risk group, this interesting article told us that some people who are not in high-risk groups are indeed as desperate to become inoculated with whatever it is that GlaxoSmithKline, et al. wants us to have in our bodies.

For the record, long before I had children, I was married to a man who worked for Burroughs-Wellcome--yes, they're the AIDS drug people that the many gay and gay-friendly types picketed because they thought that Burroughs-Wellcome (BW) should be giving the drug for free or some such; the company responsible for giving those with AIDS a chance (if you believe in the traditional AIDS story, that is--a blog post for another time) was wished by those it could supposedly help, to crashing down. Well, the crasher-downer-wishers sort of got their wishes when the Wellcome company, established in a trust that was supposed to last forever, was gobbled up by the greedy then-Glaxo, who then gobbled up other companies. First husband, a research graphics artist, and I used to eat at the wonderful and researcher-filled BW cafeteria for lunch; the building, probably still right there off the Durham Freeway in Research Triangle Park, was shaped like a molecule. It was also in the eighties film with Christopher Walken and Natalie Wood (she died just before the film's completion), Brainstorm. Nonetheless, BW's supposedly perpetual candle, along with its fabulous research scientists, went out quickly when its wick was trimmed by Glaxo. In the interest of full disclosure, I also worked a temporary job at Glaxo during my first semester of graduate school. It's hard to find a place filled more with true believers than Glaxo (now GlaxoSmithKline). I worked in its sales department and the poor woman that I worked for was an overworked yet gorgeous drone who didn't have time for a relationship because of her devotion to marketing Glaxo products; she and other Glaxo marketing people that I've met act as though their pharmaceutical marketing deeds are going to get them into heaven. I had never seen people like these at BW (although they may have existed), which was a much more research-oriented place to work, with a couple of really nice Nobel prize scientists on staff. Glaxo, with all its jogging trails that employees were far too busy and energy-drained to use, was a bizarre place that I really wanted to get away from. Fortunately, I did.

Nonetheless, GlaxoSmithKline, which gulped up BW as if it were a slurpee on a hot summer day, is now one of the few places profiting handsomely during this economic slump, not because of actual good, but because of the mass hysteria that the mainstream media have created. The gorgeous and freedom-loving Karen DeCoster, an excellent writer who has recently been so very kind to add me to her blog roll, has figured this whole swine flu thing out as well. Karen spends her time reading and thinking instead of watching Oprah and Dr. Phil attempt to solve the world's problems, one Jerry Springer victim at a time. People like Karen, who see through the mass hysteria, remind me that not everyone who has been government-school indoctrinated must remain so forever.

And so, here at the Gingerbread House, we'll use a lot of common sense and try to keep our immune systems strong; but we won't be taking the drug-company flu elixir, no matter what Emperor O. and his minions tell us.

The Government Hates Competition

2009-10-21T05:25:00.000-04:00

Really, it does. And that fact is one reason that I really dislike (read: hate) it when the government tries to eliminate its competition by using the laws that the elite have put into place to squelch any and every bit of competition anywhere, even if it's in a rural county in North Carolina. It also dislikes people who make a lot of money without reporting it to the IRS. Oh, how it does hate that kind of thing. I, on the other hand, believe in freedom, freedom to do what you damn well please if it doesn't hurt anyone else. Ah, says the government, but everything that you do can hurt someone else. Thus, when I flush with more than a 1.6 liter toilet--which can take up to three or four flushes to equal one 1.6 liter toilet---I have used your drinking water for a whole day or some such silly equivalent that the government uses to create some kind of water crisis, which is really about the government's taking more control of our lives. That's how government logic goes. Now, we crazy free market types believe that consumers and people in general, if given the chance truly to be free, would make some pretty darn good decisions. And would compensate the folks they'd actually hurt. Therefore, if, say, a father were to create a media hoax in which his son was reported floating in a Jiffy Pop looking container in the air and military helicopters were used to find said child, the father's hoax would not land him in jail. Rather, it would land him with a bill for all rescue personnel. And he would have to pay. Oh, but this kind of thinking is so very Old Testament to those who pray to land as many people as possible in the hoosegaw.

Thus, we sheeple should stop watching American Idol for a week and truly celebrate the arrest of people such as Roger Lee Nance of Wilkesboro; I have no idea of the true character of this man. For all I know, he may be a mean old hermit. But I do fully support his choice and business of making liquor. In North Carolina, where the government has such a monopoly on liquor that it is only sold in state-certified liquor emporiums, also known as ABC stores, it is easy to see why NC ALE czar John Ledford would brag about his find of a moonshine still on private property. In fact, Czar Ledford tows the statist line on alcohol, while bragging on his contribution to the state's ample coffers:

"This is one of the biggest seizures of white liquor I've seen come out of the mountains in my career," ALE Director John Ledford said in a press release. "I commend the agents who were able to make this arrest. While tax-paid liquor is regulated and inspected, illegal distilleries are typically made in unhealthy conditions that could possibly cause exposure to lead and other problems."

Really, Czar John, if all you have to worry about is lead when you think of liquor, my guess is that you skipped school during the many years that the ridiculous D.A.R.E. program to resist drugs and alcohol was foisted on North Carolina high school students. This bizarre program is probably still distributing pro-state propaganda, perhaps even under the same name. Some of us have had rougher experiences with liquor and honestly, lead poisoning from a private liquor still is not something I'd worry my statist little head about, if I were you, John. In fact, I'm guessing that you say the same thing about milk--trying to protect us supposed idiots from making decision based on our own good sense--being that raw cow's milk, a.k.a. country milk, which most of your ancestors grew up drinking, is probably given the same bizarre treatment; it is just as illegal to sell in North Carolina as non-state-approved liquor is. Here's a free market lesson for Czar John: Whether you're a dairy farmer or a moonshiner, you're not going to survive for long if you don't have clean, lead-free facilities. When I was growing up, we bought country milk from Mr. and Mrs. Burcham, a sweet Christian couple who ran an immaculate farm and house a mile or so from the house where I grew up. Your statist compadres, Czar John, would do the same thing to Mr. and Mrs. Burcham--were their sweet and pure hearts still beating--arresting them for selling the milk that God gave us to drink. The milk industry lobby in N.C. has made sure that your buddies have provided as little competition as possible for their shady corporate butts.

And then there's this little item, from a Raleigh lawyer who made the huge mistake of keeping cash in his home, or rather, of depositing in a bank. Or something. Surely, there's something real here that the feds are charging him with. When he tried to place his legally obtained and taxes-already-paid-on cash in a supposedly safer place, he was arrested for trying to evade a ridiculous law that says to look upon any large deposits as suspicious. Or something. It's really hard to tell what the feds are so pissed about here, unless it's that Gaskins has not spent his professional life kissing the ground that the Raleigh tax-feeders walk on. So, trying to evade a stupid law that lets the government put its hands into your pockets when it has no business is a crime, especially if the feds want it to be. Note that it is not a trivial crime. In fact, it is a crime that can punish a lawyer who's worked hard all his life by sending him to jail for all his retirement. This kind of thing is exactly why I'm not moving back to North Carolina right now. I'm not saying government extortion doesn't happen in California, but somehow, it's really hard to see it in a place where I used to live as a more or less free human.

Evidently, I'm not the only person who sees through this federal judicial travesty.

Okay, So Where's the Contest for Best Pissed-Off Adoptee Blog?!?

2009-10-16T15:11:00.001-04:00

I've really seen it all now. Adopters praising themselves and each other for gorgeously-written blogs that sing the praise of adoption. I'm not sure who's behind this contest and I'm not sure that I want to find out. But it does scare me that so many well-educated and well-written adopters are throwing around their weight on the Internet. Although they have every right to do so, and I totally support their freedom to do so, it really bothers me that there's no "Best Pissed-Off Adoptee Blog" contest or some such. Surely, I'd be a finalist in that contest.

Probably the biggest qualm I have with this contest, and with the bloggers who populate it, is that these bloggers have the gall, of course, to call themselves "parents" of the children they've adopted. Having said that, at least one of these bloggers recognizes her adoptee's real mom as the child's "first mother." There's something good to be said for that. Still, it really bothers me that so many white middle-class women (and make no mistake--most of the people who take other people's children and pretend those children are theirs are white and middle or upper-middle class) are feeling okay with pretending to be parents of other people's children. I guess these white women somehow feel they are contributing to society by taking the children of others, especially if those children look so different from them that people know the adults are adopters. Adoption has such a wonderful propaganda campaign going on these days that adopters are looked upon as wonderful and loving self-sacrificers, even as they call themselves the moms and dads of children that someone else bore.

Please let me say here that my own adopters were good folks and I still miss them, even though they have been dead for a few years. I am extremely thankful to have grown up in the community that I did, where people are basically honest and loving and everybody cares, but not in an Obama-Clinton-it-takes-a-village-of-government kind of way. So, in that sense, things have really worked out well for me. Things could have been a lot worse and I have heard many horror stories from adoptees. Most adopters who read my writing are just sure that I must have been beaten every day by my adopters in order to hate adoption as much as I do. There are people who've made rape into a positive experience as well, but this doesn't mean that those people desire for others to be raped. Separting a child from its mother and giving it to strangers is a horrid thing, for mother and child. Desiring for another mother to lose her child to adoption is bizarre indeed, but many white middle-class adopters-to-be are betting on it.

The blogs in the "Best Adoption Blog" contest perpetuate the myth that overall, no matter how difficult adoption can be, it's okay to take a stranger's child and call it your own. And no, no matter how wonderful my childhood was, this kind of myth is not okay to perpetuate.

Many thanks to fellow adoptee Marley Greiner for passing along this link!

In Case You Think The Federal Government Has A Monopoly On The Ridiculous

2009-10-16T11:05:00.000-04:00

My sons and I take a LOT of classes at a local city recreation center about 30 minutes from our house. This quarter's session, for example, we spent close to $1,000 for art and dance classes (thank goodness for my proposal money!), with some absolutely wonderful instructors. The boys' clay class instructor, for instance, is a brilliant artist who displays his own work; he, like the other teachers we've encountered, is also a nice guy. After spending well over $900 for classes, I placed two checks under the door of the administrative offices for two more classes. Students are supposed to be registered, for insurance purposes, for classes before attending them. I wasn't sure, because of soccer schedules, etc., if I could take the extra two classes before I actually signed up for them. Because we're often there after the office is closed, I placed the checks under the door after hours. Yesterday, I received the uncashed checks, returned to me by U.S. mail, with this note in all caps:

ENROLLMENT FOR THIS CLASS ENDED 10/01/09. OUR NEXT SESSION WILL BE IN JANUARY 2010. RECREATION GUIDES SHOULD BE AVAILABLE IN MID NOVEMBER.

Now, I'd heard that one mother had taken her child to a dance class with openings, left the child while she went to register, and the tax-feeders in the office would not allow her to register because it was past the deadline. Therefore, she had to go back to the class, taking her then-crying daughter out of the class for the quarter. But only when I saw the two ridiculous sentences in all caps, directed specifically at me, did I realize that local government and its tax-feeding minions can be just as, or perhaps even more, ridiculous than their federal counterparts. This particular city seems to want to miss out on revenue. It didn't matter to the tax-feeders that a little girl, who could have been easily added, was crying because the office had a rule that registration ended on October 1st, with no exceptions, even for classes in which the instructor approved the add and there were slots open. Nor did it matter to the tax-feeders that they were losing out on money. People come from all over to take these classes and one woman who works during the day and drives from quite far to attend her adult dance class was not allowed to mail in her registration, as she usually does. This quarter, the rules changed and anyone outside the city limits must now register online. Yes, these tax-feeders not only wish to stop revenue from coming in, but they also desire to cut down on the work of processing a few people's applications, forcing people outside of their city limits to register online, an arduous process that I couldn't get to work correctly.

So, this particular city's gatekeepers at the recreation center are just following orders and not common sense. It's rare when I make a comparison that makes the North Carolina state government look good, but I'll have to say that even at NCSU, where I both attended many classes and taught, there was a way of adding or dropping a class later than normally allowed. Sure, you had to obtain signatures from people, which was a pain, but it could be done. Nonetheless, the folks at this city's recreation center, which offers classes with no grades, seem too lazy to take in extra revenue when they could easily do so. Their excuse? From what I've heard, it's that their "books are closed," whatever that means. Unfortunately, with the Internet as what they seem to tout for registration, that excuse is ludicrous. In case you're thinking that what I've told you so far is ridiculous, here's the clincher. I actually received this note as well:

PLEASE DO NOT LEAVE ANYTHING UNDER THE OFFICE DOOR--IT CAN CAUSE POSSIBLE INJURY TO STAFF--OUR BUSINESS HRS ARE LISTED ON THE FRONT DOOR. THANK YOU

I guess somebody could have received a paper cut while picking up the paper that I slid under the door. And in these days of celebration of the victim mentality, I suppose that counts as an injury. However, in my many years in the shady corporate world, I have placed many notes under doors. I've yet to hear of anyone that I've injured.

Emperor O. Wins WHAT?

2009-10-09T12:22:00.000-04:00

I nearly fell out of my pink room chair this morning when I read that Emperor O., who has continued King Jorge's killing escapades in foreign countries, with absolutely no sign of stopping, is receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, supposedly because of his initiatives "to build momentum behind his initiatives to reduce nuclear arms, ease tensions with the Muslim world and stress diplomacy and cooperation rather than unilateralism." I guess those killed by his warmongering policies, which closely resemble the policies of his white predecessor, are not really factored in to the Nobel Peace Prize equation. Funny how, when I mentioned I was reading this story to my eight-year-old, he immediately said, "How can Obama win a peace prize when he's trying to start a war in Iran?" Well, I'm quite proud that my young son can figure out something that a lot of 60-year-olds seem to have trouble seeing. The Obamatrons, blinded by their worship, will take this elite-sponsored prize winning as an example of just how wonderful Savior O. actually is. And of course, no one will claim that King Jorge should also receive said prize, being that he was just as much of a warmonger as Emperor O. Dare I even ask why Ron Paul, who advocates the United States' getting the hell out of every country that we occupy, did not even receive a mention in this sweepstakes? Perhaps it is indeed like the Publisher's Clearinghouse Sweepstakes and the winner was chosen by random. Whatever the case, I'm really glad that my eight-year-old already has it figured out.

America's Fabian Socialist Magazine Delivers Again

2009-10-07T03:52:00.000-04:00

Sometimes, I think that I allow the Los Angeles Times to come into our home only because sometimes I need a bit of inspiration for writing. Whether it's failing to print my letters on adoption, relegating Ron Paul to the occasional negative article while he is running for president, or doing some other kind of statist grandstanding, the Times never does quite fail to make me angrier than an old wet hen, in some form or fashion. The question for me is: How long does it take to find something that is inane in the Times? This past Sunday's was a bit different; it took more than the usual 5 or 6 seconds. Saturday night was Cub Scout night at Dodger Stadium and we had quite a blast watching the Dodgers win the National League West championship, 5-0 over the Colorado Rockies. I'm not much of a sports fan per se, although with the every human in this house except moi of the male persuasion, I have to learn to enjoy games. I was more than happy to stand in line for hot dogs, no matter how long that task took. And of course, the full moon over the stadium made things much more lively also. A real plus, however, is that this morning's receipt of the Times into the Gingerbread House kitchen was all about the game; therefore, it took a while before I actually got to the pissing-me-off part. And in fact, being that I didn't look at much of the supposed news, which misses the real news, such as the fact that Obama seems to yawn at Israel's supposed hidden weapons while taking such a close look at countries that seem to harbor the real terrorists--as everyone knows , there are no terrorists in Israel--that he's as hot to take us to a war with Iran as Emperor Bush was. The names have changed, and the ethnicities, but not much else at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Nonetheless, it's important, even on such a slow news day, to hype up the unconstitutional United Nations. Crazy people like Ron Paul, and me, of course, believe that the U.N. has done a lot more to hurt the world than it has to help. Sure, in the public school patch where I grew up, the harvest I received regarding the U.N. was their humanitarianism, their contests and other propaganda regarding their Halloween ritual for all children of the 70s--Trick or Treat for UNICEF. Nobody ever told me that this organization had plans to force peace on an otherwise unpeaceful world, no matter how many people are killed in this peacemaking process. Certainly, no one told me that they planned to take away my guns or indoctrinate children to live in the supposedly diverse and wonderful utopia that they were creating, whether we want it or not. Nobody ever told me that this organization would attempt to set its own policy for the good of those who supply its money. Nope! I only heard that trick-or-treating for UNICEF was good for, you guessed it, the children. When you're a child, it's great to do something that you feel helps the children, even if it does more harm than good.

Therefore, only in the last few years have my previously clouded eyes been brightly opened to the sneakiness of the United Nations, including their push to make International Baccalaureate Studies programs across America the hot thing for those seeking supposed academic excellence for their progeny; this program is doing as much to revive the failing government schools as the rather ridiculous "magnet programs" of the 70s and 80s. It would be horrid, however, if Americans began to see through the stinky waste of the United Nations. Therefore, it's up to Parade: America's Fabian Socialist Magazine to give us a nice little public relations piece, in the form of an insightful article, of course.

"New [U.N.] ambassador Susan Rice" pronounces her faith in the wonderful glorious organization that tries hard to make all nations the third-world countries that despots so love to rule. Now, Susan's age is so close to my own that I am willing to bet my best 401K stocks that this "super-smart and personable internationalist" grew up listening to the same U.N. propaganda that I heard in North Carolina's government schools.

The article starts with a glorious declaration of how U.S. sanctions stopped a ship that may have been carrying military stuff, perhaps even (gasp!) "weapons of mass destruction, perhaps even nukes." See, isn't the United Nations wonderful? "The reason it couldn't land was a recently passed United Nations resolution that called upon any member nations receiving the ship to board it, inspect it, and seize any contraband found." In other words: Let's spread our unconstitutional searches around the world! I feel about as safe trusting the United Nations to save me and my family from perhaps errant ships as I do trusting the FDA to save me from supposedly dangerous medications.

Nonetheless, this propaganda piece will serve exactly what the elite want to promote the global government that they have sought for so very long: The United Nations is a helpful organization, an umbrella organization for the United States, and the only way that we can even have a sliver of hope for world peace. Ron Paul, of course, has other ideas. And I must admit that the free market concept seems so simple that it evidently flies right by the common sense of most people: "If we were really interested in democracy, peace, prosperity and safety, we would pursue more free trade with other countries. Free and abundant trade is much more conducive to peace because it is generally bad business to kill your customers." Ah, but who in this world isn't so brainwashed by NPR, government schools, and mainstream media that they can even begin to understand Dr. Paul's simplicity.

Meanwhile, I look at the Parade picture of the two mulattos, Rice and Obama, sitting together in some U.N.-sanctioned way, and I realize that they are no less willing to be one-world government puppets than their supposedly pure-bred white predecessors. It's a real shame that while people are celebrating Obama's being the first African-American president, no one's talking about how much this man of a different color is so very much like his European-American White House antecedents. People may look at Rice and think she's some kind of trendsetter, but unfortunately, she's merely one in a lengthy line of elite-sponsored one-world government drones that has been schlepping for the system. Lots of people see something new with the Obama administration; thanks to a bit of help from America's Favorite Socialist magazine, I see more of the same old freedom-taking-away crap, disguised as an in-depth article on the United Nations.

The G20 Thing

2009-09-28T05:50:00.000-04:00

Look, at its very best, and Savior O. admits as much, the whole G20 thing is about regulating the economy; it's all about a whole global regulatory thing for the world, one that Savior O. will be more than happy to implement per orders, or rather, suggestions, of his string pullers. I wish I could be more positive. I really do. Of all the presidents, probably I would have liked to sit down the most with Jimmy Carter, until he accused anyone who crosses Savior O.'s path of being a racist. Whether or not he was a good president (and he wasn't so hot, unfortunately), he was certainly a cool Southerner and he had a daughter around my age. It was fabulous hearing someone who was running for president and who talked kinda like me, too. I also liked that he claimed to be a Christian. I didn't realize, at the time, that he was just as much of a puppet as the rest of them. Or either he wasn't and they realized it. Unfortunately, I think it's the former.

Anyway, I've seen some really horrid video of protesters at the University of Pittsburgh being extremely harassed by the police. And the police look horridly scary, as if they are looking for trouble, all dressed in black with riot helmets on, as if they're marching across Runnymede or something. Ah, but trying holding a sword up to these scary taxfeeders and see what they'll to do you. They do horrid things to polite people who seem to be completely unarmed. Probably, many of Pittsburgh's finest have been trained in Iraq; many Pittsburgh finest-to-be, or rather, finest-in-waiting young gentlemen will probably be trained in an Iranian war. Or who knows where else, being that Savior O. is turning out to be no less a warmonger than his royal predecessor. My question is: What are the University of Pittsburgh students doing that they have time to protest?!? In the eighties, I was far too busy figuring out things such as, "Why do I like to spend so much time with my roommate?" and "Why do I like spending time with my roommate more than I do my boyfriend?" and such, life-wrenching questions, mind you, to give one bit of crap about political stuff. Actually, that's not true: I worked for the president of the Young Democrats at NCSU and I didn't much care for him. Well, there you go.

Anyway, my life has come quite a ways since those sexually-confused days of embryonic adulthood and now, I just can't help but wonder if things have gotten so bad in this world that students actually look outside themselves and care enough about the coming New World Order, which increased governmental regulations fully support, to protest. If so, we are really in some deep mud. In the eighties, there did not seem to be much to protest about.

China Babies Stolen? Ah, Surely You Jest

2009-09-20T13:15:00.000-04:00

Well, it's taken a few decades, but it seems as though the Los Angeles Times has finally come around to seeing that maybe, just maybe, babies are being stolen from China. As we all know, of course, mothers in China have been ecstatic about losing their babies. Or at least, you'd certainly think that if you were listening to the adopters on this side of the ocean. It's interesting that I was deleting some old e-mails just last night and sure enough, one of them was from adopter who called me "selfish" and "ignorant" and a bunch of other not so very nice terms, ending, of course, with the time-honored suggestion that I get "lots and lots" of therapy. Well, I've had lots and lots of therapy. And it's certainly helped me to see that I was screwed by being taken from my mom and the rest of my family. My mom was screwed and my adopters were lied to. But that was in the 60s; since that time, demand for infants has soared, especially with the increased demand from single people and gay couples. I'm not making judgments here, but I am saying that the more people who are allowed to adopt, the higher the demand. That's simple economics. And if there's one thing that adoption is about, it's economics.

Nonetheless, American moms started wising up around the time Roe v. Wade came on the scene and many started keeping their babies. Of course, adoption agencies, not wanting to miss a buck, started offering incentives, such as college scholarships, to moms who would give them their child. I have three degrees for which I am very thankful, but I can't imagine giving up any of those degrees for one of my precious sons. To increase supply, in the mid to late seventies, adoption agencies started marketing foreign-born children, children who would look not at all like the adopters. In the 60s, when I was born, it was in fashion for the children to look like the adopters and in fact, many people said that I looked like the woman who adopted me because we had the same coloring. People seemed to say it more when I was little and as I grew older, it was harder to lie and harder to believe that I was the product of the people who adopted me, much as we all may have wanted it to be true.

Adoption agencies were pretty savvy to this whole thing of decreased supply of babies and during the seventies, foreign-born babies were marketed. The agencies, hungry for profits, even figured out a way to increase demand for babies that would look nothing like the people raising them. Ah, but what if we make adopters into saints that are rescuing orphans from Asian countries? Adoption agencies pondered this marketing scheme for about a week, no doubt, and then began bringing airplane loads of children over to be marketed as orphans to Americans. With a fabulous public relations campaign, adoption agencies began increasing demand for children, marketing these supposed orphans to Americans who already had their own natural children. It became chic to have a little Asian child, tagging along beside older children who were really the children of the adopters. Therefore, real moms and dads began adopting children from moms and dads half a world away. The adopters were lied to and told that these children were orphans or unwanted and the parents of the children, in Korea, Vietnam, and other countries, were assured that the children had no family that would help them. The lies had changed in the decade or so since my birth, but the result was the same: Adoption agencies were making a killing financially, no matter how many families they ripped apart. If you doubt what I say, take a look at the documentary Daughter from Danang and you will actually see American social workers begging Vietnamese parents for their children. Of course, this social worker footage, to my knowledge, was never broadcast on the NBC Nightly News or any other media outlet, but it is clear that American social workers were there to take some children and market those children to Americans.

As a result of such marketing campaigns, it became chic to have a little Asian child cropping up in your family and many small communities had the one family that had gotten one of these cute little folks. The child was raised as if, as that horrid adoption phrase goes, the child had actually been born into the family, even though family pictures did not lie and it was obvious that the child was not a real member of the family. Adopters claimed that this fact was absolutely fabulous, believing that their altruistic desire to save a child from an orphanage far trumped the child's being separated from his or her parents.

Along came the Chinese government, not wanting, of course, to miss out on the profitable venture and easily able to supply babies, based on its ridiculous one-child policy. In the 90s, it became especially chic to have a "little China doll" (as I've mentioned before, I saw this phrase, written by an adopter on a message board). Everybody was doing it, from single women to couples who could not have their own child. This adoption agency-boosting trend has continued into the 21st century and it is hard to go into a trendy Gymboree or My Gym class these days without seeing a little China doll with its obviously non-mother. Nonetheless, adoptresses boast of their adoptees as if they're nothing short of a miracle. All the time, it's really hard for me to see these children, as I think of the trauma that the child and its natural family have gone through.

Now, back to the Times: Can you believe, in a $1.6 billion per year industry like adoption, in which China willingly supplies adoptees to Western adopters, that there may be people who will steal babies to sell to the Western market? I know--it sounds almost too horrible to be true, doesn't it? But sure enough, in the globalist adoption-promoting Los Angeles Times, which stopped printing my anti-adoption letters a few years ago, there is actually a story with the headline, "Chinese babies stolen by officials for adoption fees." The story actually includes a graphic that shows that China adoptions have been down the past few years. No worries, though, I'm sure that the adoption industry will think of another way to increase demand and supply.

Being the Los Angeles Times, of course, the horrible positive adoption language was used, as opposed to the honest adoption language that I much prefer. The Times may indeed require their reporters to call even parents whose children have been stolen "birth parents," but I and many of us who've been separated by adoption find this phrase to be insulting to us and our families, preferring instead use of the more honest "natural parents." Continuing the status quo, adopters of Chinese children were called "adoptive parents" and one adopter made sure that if her adoptee, whom she mistakenly called her "daughter," wanted to find her real parents, or as the adoptress put it, her "birth family," that she would be sure to allow her to do so. How very nice of her, eh? The Times continued the adoption charade, calling families whose children had been stolen from them the "birth families." It's great to know that when the state takes away children, the parents are reduced to mere birth things, breeders who've reproduced but who do not have the final legal rights to their own children. In bringing to the forefront the literal stealing of children from their families, the Times has not changed its adamantly pro-adoption stance.

Here are some excerpts from the article, written by Barbara Demick. I have found no evidence that Demick is an adopter herself, but she certainly seems to be aligned closely with the adoption industry, using language that is derogatory to natural families. There is perhaps a small victory in knowing that people may begin to doubt that the little China girls they see with their adopters may indeed be stolen, but the article ended by assuring everyone that the children would have a better life in the U.S., with a quote from a mom whose child was stolen:

"We'd never make her come back, because a girl raised in the West wouldn't want to live in a poor village like this . . . But we'd like to know where she is. We'd like to see a picture. And we'd like her to know that we miss her and that we didn't throw her away."

It's doubtful, of course, that these children will ever be reunited with their natural families and if they are, they will probably be unable to communicate with those families, having grown up speaking an entirely different language.

Here's a laughable quote from the U.S. Embassy: "The United States takes seriously any allegation that children were offered for inter-country adoption without their parents' knowledge or consent."

Evidently, the corrupt government officials who search villages, looking for signs of a newborn, are sometimes demoted or have warnings placed in their files. Oooh, the terror! It reminds me of police officers who shoot innocent victims in the U.S. and are placed on "paid administrative leave."

It's also interesting that adopters always chide me for not believing that their adoption fees are necessary: " . . . the money received from [adopters at one orphanage], $180,000 in all, went toward food, clothing, bedding and medical care for the babies and to improve conditions in the Social Welfare Institute. But most of the babies had been housed with families who were paid only $30 a month for their services, according to one [fosterer]. And there were no obvious signs of renovations at the institute, a grim three-story building where a couple of senior citizens could be seen through barred windows lounging on cots. Reporters were not permitted to enter" the orphanage in Tianxi.

Interesting also is the fact that the "[o]nce a child is taken to an orphanage, parents can lose all rights." One grandma was "babysitting her 4-month-old granddaughter one night in March 2003 when a dozen officials stormed her house. She said they took her and the baby to a family planning office, where a man grabbed her arm and pressed her thumbprint onto a document she couldn't read."

But rest assured, the Westerner(s) that received the stolen baby is convinced they are doing the right thing by adopting a baby who was unwanted. Even though that child was kidnapped, the Westerner(s) will insist that the child call them the parents and they will convince the child that they are the child's family. Unfortunately, nothing will really change as a result of this article, although the U.S. will probably make it seem as though it's regulating things a bit better in China. Savior O. will probably make some kind of proclamation or law that says we don't accept stolen babies from China and everybody will feel all good and gushy about adoption. There's way too much money involved for any true change to occur: Little China girls are worth way too much in the West for these horrible practices to cease.

Ye Olde Neighborhood Pot Store: Revisited

2009-09-14T23:45:00.000-04:00

Many people last year around this time--as Ron Paul's roaring-to-go yet futile delegation began slithering towards a better racehorse, or rather, one more assured of winning--began singing the praises of Obama. Disillusioned with Paul and more repulsed by McCain and his People-Magazine-worthy (but then again, who isn't People-Magazine worthy) running mate than by a guy who's just a wee bit socialist, who's proud of that wee bit, and who seems quite anxious to expand it to a more encompassing bit. Savior, people began to call then Emperor-to-Be Obama. He was certainly hailed as valiantly as Jesus on Palm Sunday, right up there with Martin Luther King and Monty Python. Now, however, as we creep toward totalitarianism at an ever-increasing pace, people seem to be questioning the motives of a man whose "change" seems to include fining people for not having health care. Ted Kennedy, may he rest in peace, is probably fondly smiling upon the Congress Critter who introduced a bill to do just that, fine a family $3800 if the family is uninsured. Can people who are fined have a bailout from the government? I can't help but wonder. And somehow, such a seemingly crazy move would be par for the proverbial course of Savior O. After all, health care plans involving the government are all about controlling the populace. If you're in doubt, read what these various and sundry health care bill candidates have to say about electronic records. Then, think about whether or not you want your private and personal medical information even slightly monitored or harvested by the government. Think about Farrah Fawcett and how some UCLA employee sold her private medical information. Think about how much more easily accessible your medical information will be if the government digs its grimy paws more into our health care system.

Stem cells will cure people's diseases, pot stores will give away free pot, and Savior O. will even pay your rent. As unbelievable as these things sound, I heard variations of them as Savior O. was being escorted to the Puppet-in-Chief's office. Well, I must admit that I didn't hear about free pot--now that part's simply a writer's exaggeration. But I not only heard a pot-ingesting morally upstanding actor and all-around good neighbor imply that Savior O. would all but close down the Drug Enforcement Agency, but our very own neighborhood pot store here (about as common out here as Baptist churches are in the South) had its own picture of Obama with some quote about how he would free people from the tyranny of the DEA. Okay, I'm exaggerating there, but it was a quote from Obama that seemed extremely pot friendly. In addition, pot stores have been cropping up all over Los Angeles, and making no bones about their green cross little selves (they usually have a green cross as a symbol). The neighborhood pot store had been a bit lazy with checking i.d.s and such and I was sure that of all the things I'd been right about with Savior O., perhaps I'd been wrong about the pot thing. Perhaps he would indeed lay off California and allow its over-taxed, stressed-out citizens a bit of relief via the legalization that the citizens voted for, in 1996, Prop. 420, as it's called.

Gosh, but I guess the DEA guys are afraid that somehow someway somebody in Iowa is going to find out that we can have pot brownies legally in California and get all upset that the DEA isn't out here taking away a right that we voted for! (Okay, I wasn't actually here then, but I thank all those who did vote for it. Boy, do I ever thank you.) And so, now, as of quite recently, our neighborhood pot store, I have confirmed, has gone back to its quite stringent policies. Evidently, five stores in Granada Hills were recently closed. Of course, the DEA (and I've written about this in a previous entry that I'm too tired to look up now) probably took lots of property from the owner(s), as they, unfortunately, have begun a tradition of doing in California, even though what the owners are doing is perfectly legal in California. Well, I guess Savior Obama isn't quite saving the pot stores, as he promised, is he? I wonder if that's the only promise he'll break.

Pot Info. in the SFV:
How hot is pot in California? "Medical Marijuana Evaluations," which provide the license to ingest and grow pot, are now down to $65. Some are still $100, as they were a couple of years ago, but prices are definitely down and competition is fierce. One promotional card features a gorgeous topless girl lying down, with her thumb in her bikini bottom. She is totally smokin' hot and yes, I wished to inquire more about her company's services after seeing such a fabulously sexy card. Turns out, that particular "medical center"'s price is $44 for renewals (those who already have a license) and $64 for "new patients." As I have said many times before, it is ridiculous to see why a natural and God-given plant such as pot is illegal in the first place. Human-created pharmaceutical Xanax, on the other hand, is probably being given out for free in the government schools.

As a comic, of course, I feel that it's a good idea to get a license. I know one comic who can pass a drug test and he's an LAPD officer. And so, I don't want to end up in some car of comedy with pot in it and no license. Well, and there are, on occasion, those delicious pot brownies.

Well, This Is Another Fine Mess You've Gotten Us Into

2009-09-09T14:13:00.000-04:00

This health care thing is about to drive me nuts. Frankly, I've always believed in health insurance, pretty much always had it, love it, want to keep it. But that's my personal belief. Health care is no more a right, however, than apples are. Sure, it's great to have food, great to have good doctors, great to have a house, but none of these things are a right. And yet, I know there's a big campaign going on telling us, all over Facebook and everywhere, that it's a terrible thing if someone dies because that person can't see a doctor. Well, yeah. It's terrible when anybody dies. For any reason. Does that simple fact make me want the government to mandate health care? Of course not. And what about the many well-meaning simpletons out there who've been public schooled to believe that health care is some innate right that we all should have? Honestly, what to do here! Can these people actually believe it's a good idea, as is now proposed, to fine people who can't afford health care?!? I mean, is this what they mean by right? That is, I have the right to pay $3800, even if the reason I don't have it is because I can't afford it? Even Puppet-in-Chief Obama said once that he didn't think it was fair to fine people who don't have health insurance. Of course, I'm sure he'll change his mind, as soon as his string-pullers convey to him the importance of getting everyone in the electronic health care system from which there will soon be no escape. But really, there are people who believe so strongly that we must have government-mandated health care that they will certainly call me some right-wing fundamentalist fanatic for saying that there are better ways to take care of people in a free country than mandating health care. Lots of the brainwashed populace believe that the reason we are in the health care mess we're in is because of the greed of the pharmaceutical companies. These folks don't realize that we can all turn off our televisions and choose alternatives to health care, right now anyway. And they don't understand that it is often the government regulations in and of themselves that makes health care so expensive these days, not to mention the government welfare that has, in one form or another, gone to pharmaceutical companies and doctors. No, they just think that only the government can save our health, our lives, our very souls. Unfortunately, they are strongly deceived.

And Yet, She Still Calls Herself His Mother

2009-08-30T15:29:00.000-04:00

My non-adopted friends and acquaintances seem to think that what I, as a reunited adoptee, have to say about adoption, is interesting. To most of them, hearing that adoption isn't the wonderful panacea that mainstream media, with the generous help of the $1.6 billion adoption industry, have portrayed it to be is a bit of a shock, considering that all they've heard seems to be the adoption-friendly propaganda that mainstream media spews. One especially open-minded friend, E., told me once, "But isn't adoption demeaning to motherhood itself?" I was pleasantly surprised that someone actually concluded this fact simply be reading my blog and doing some thinking. Of course, E. has children and grew up in a large family; natural family seems important to her, and I don't think that she, like most people, had ever really thought much about adoption, beyond what mainstream media tell us to think. I can relate. Until my own reunion, I pretty much believed the wonderful adoption myths, too, or tried to believe them. Most non-adoption-affected people seem to take natural family for granted, which is wonderful.

Nonetheless, there is a rather predictable story in today's Los Angeles Times, that pantheon of mainstream black and white thought that allows those who believe the supposedly right things to have as much say as possible. And quickly denies those of us who may vary from currently approved thought. I don't remember the last time I saw a disgruntled mom who'd lost a child to adoption portrayed in the Times, but I know there are quite a few of them in SoCal and across the country. Ah, but that wouldn't somehow be politically correct, would it? To allow these moms to talk might well hurt the adoption industry that may be one of the few industries still advertising in newspapers. In fact, p.r. is so good at these adoption agencies that often, the Times and other newspapers will write an article for free, encouraging everyone to think about the adopters and not so much about the natural families who've been broken up by adoption.

These are important things to keep in mind as we think about today's wonderful adoption story, "Adopted teen finds answers, mystery in China." Turns out, a now-teen renamed "Christian Norris" by the woman who adopted him, has, with her blessing and gentle encouragement, of course, returned to China and reunited with his natural family. Turns out that he, whom Julia Norris adopted only a few years ago, was not taken to an orphanage by his parents, but rather, happened to be lost:

He was born Jin Jiacheng in 1991 in Yinchuan, a city in the Ningxia region several hundred miles west of Beijing, to a couple who both worked in a hospital and already had a son. Because his parents could have been penalized for having a second child, he was sent as a newborn to his father's home village to be raised by his grandmother and a 23-year-old uncle, who pretended the infant was his own son. When he turned 6 and was ready to start school, they sent him back to the city.

He had lived only briefly with [his parents] when he somehow got lost, his family says. His father, Jin Gaoke, said they were on an excursion by bus and that he got off for a few minutes to buy food at a market, returning to discover that the bus had driven off . . . The family was wrenched apart by the boy's absence. His mother went into a deep depression. His father and uncle stopped speaking to each other, the younger one blaming the father for losing the child.

As I read this, I am trying to imagine what would happen if that tragic scenario happened to one of my friends or me and somebody's child were separated from their dad and mom and ended up in a foreign country calling some strange woman "mommy." This is, of course, an injustice that a mom and dad should not have to put up with, and the whole situation is tragic, indeed. In China, adoption facilitators must love this kind of thing, although I'm sure that they like it better when the child is younger, so that they may market more infants to the burgeoning Western adopter market. In fact, one might wonder what would happen in China if Westerners did not create such a high demand for children; perhaps the Chinese government would be forced to change their ridiculous policies. Already, some Chinese people are now able to have more than one child, a progression that has happened only in the last few years.

In some ways, this story reminds me of "Daughter from Danang," a documentary that I saw when I was pregnant with my now-six-year-old. In that film, a young woman returns to her home and mother; blatently shown are the U.S. social workers of the 70s, who were begging moms to give away children. If more people would see this documentary, stranger adoption would be a thing of the past. In this film, the daughter who found her mother had lived with her mom until she was five or six, then she was taken by social workers to the U.S. and marketed as an orphan. At this point, I want to ask all moms of small children, either currently or in the past: What would you do if your child was taken to a foreign country and told to be a son or daughter to someone? Would you feel as though there was some kind of injustice? Would you want to press charges against the people who took the child? Would you at least want to sue them? Just as we allow U.S. troops all over the world but would be quite angry if, say, the Iraqis placed their troops in the U.S., we encourage mothers in other countries to give up their babies so that they can be raised in the United States and pretend to be the children of U.S. citizens. U.S. citizens applaud this kind of thing, not thinking much about the families who lose the children. One wonders how many U.S. folks, well-meaning neighbors and acquaintances of Julia Norris, welcomed Jin, a.k.a. "Christian Norris" when he was forced to come to the U.S. and live with a complete stranger, separated from the only family he'd ever known: his natural family. The whole loss of the young Jin by his father was a tragic event indeed, made much more tragic by the fact that he was shipped to another country, away from all family.

One also may wonder what would happen to most of us if we claimed to "fall in love" with a nine-year-old child. I mean, even I, who am quite tolerant of many things, would think that falling in love with a nine-year-old is just weird somehow. While I am not at all accusing Julia Norris or any other adopters of anything inappropriate, there is something about the tone of that phrase and some strange adult saying it to an eight- or nine-year-old that is akin to something that doesn't quite feel right. How would it sit with the government schools, for instance, if some teacher said this to a student? Julia Norris is not the first adopter to publicly claim to have fallen in love with her adoptee, in her case, after "touring the orphanage on a business trip." I have read more than one adopter's claim to have "fallen in love" with some child at the orphanage. And from what I have heard and read, many adopters do indeed take advantage of this stranger relationship and act out on their feelings of falling "in love" with their adoptee, which is sad; again, I am not implying that anything inappropriate has happened with any adopter, but some adoptees have mentioned that sometimes, those kinds of things have happened. I mention this information to point out how different things are in the delusion of adoption. It's okay for a single U.S. career woman to fall in love with a child and take him out of his country and into her home? Doesn't anyone see anything remotely wrong with this? We're talking about a stranger boy who was eight or nine when she met him, not about an infant! It's absurd at best, but the Times, of course, celebrates it and treats it as though it's the most natural and wonderful thing in the world.

In fact, I wonder if the story would have even run if the natural parents of the boy, who have been without their son for over eight years, had demanded him back, with money for damages demanded from the agency that oversaw Jin's adoption. The story paints Julia as a "single mother," a real irony considering that my mom and many other moms have lost a child mainly because they were single moms. The writer is also careful to paint Jin's natural family with the demeaning "birth parent" term, which is one name that many parents who've lost a child to adoption appropriately find to be a proverbial kick in the groin. How would you like it if, after losing your four- or six- or eight-year-old, you found the child years later and you were called a mere birth parent, a breeder, the DNA donor?

Even though the circumstances of Jin's adoption are tragic, his parents are still demeaned to breeders and his adoptress who, in this case did not change his diapers (I say this only because so many adopters claim that they should be called parents simply because they have changed their adoptees' diapers.) is deemed the mother in this situation, the true real mother who has paid for most of his schooling and who will pay for his college and who has watched him grow up, while his family was torn apart by their loss.

Don't look for any Times articles from the articulate moms that I've met on Facebook and MySpace who have lost a child and continue to grieve, always think of themselves as their child's mother, and believe that stranger adoption is a "cruel" and "evil" practice. There are moms like that out there, but they ain't getting published in the Times--that's for sure. And there may or may not be anything wrong with someone to take care of a boy who seems alone, as Julia Norris may be quite good at, but she is not, nor ever will be the boy's true mother.

And so I shall end my soliloquy by saying that I could hardly care less that newspapers such as the Times are going the way of the dinosaur. I say that having just witnessed the layoff, after 43 years, of my father-in-law at another major newspaper. I wish him well, of course, but he's one of those real journalist types who believes in mainstream media as if it's God. His intentions are good, but he hasn't experienced rejection of his editorial letters, as I have from the Times because my letters spoke against the sacred adoption industry. Soon after the Times stopped printing my letters, around 2003 or so, I began to look at lots of other things they weren't covering, for instance, Ron Paul. I began to see that mainstream media are not necessarily liberal or conservative, but statist, and built to stay that way, of course. The state and the wishes of the elite, such as familial separation through adoption, is supreme in mainstream media; the Internet has rightly shown that people are sick of this kind of thing, being that so-called alternative blogs are enlightening people to all kinds of ideas; and this kind of idea-spreading via the Internet is so threatening to the elite that they have hired Emperor O. to, among other things, give the Office of the President the power to shut down the Internet. Until that time, however, those of us whose natural families have been ripped apart by adoption will continue to write about what adoption is really like.

Random Losses of Freedom

2009-08-18T05:20:00.000-04:00

Adoption
Celebrity adoption continues: "Sex and the City's Willie Garson Adopts" an 8-year-old. I have an 8-year-old and while, fortunately, there are other people who would be closer on my list to raise my children, were something to happen to their father and me, i.e., people I know, Willie Garson, and I'm saying this as someone who's never met him, is probably an okay person to raise a child. And many kudos to him and to Celebrity Baby Blog for mentioning the 8-year-old's natural mother, whom Garson plans to keep in the proverbial picture. But here's the problem I have with this whole scenario: You can't adopt a son! Either he's your son or he isn't. In this case, Willie ain't the dad. That fact doesn't mean that Willie can't take the boy in and raise him and love him and be a father figure to him. But Willie can never be the boy's father and he can never replace the father that the boy has, wherever that dad may be. That said, the father does not seem to be the in picture and no one mentions why. It's obvious that mainstream media likes to label adopters as parents, no matter what, as if you can sign legal papers, profess love, and suddenly be a dad. It's also interesting to read the comments and find that people are so very gung ho about adoption, just in general. Therefore, we can see that the adoption propaganda is working. Very well. I wonder about the 8-year-old's real dad and if he wants to be out of the scene or if he was pushed away. Dads are important, too, and yet mainstream media often like to leave the dads out.

Pot Stores
I have to say that while the economy is sucking, if I may so eloquently describe it, pot stores seem to be thriving. They're popping up all over the San Fernando Valley (SFV), and as I've mentioned previously, there's a discount pot store, the Target of pot (must be pronounced Tar-zhay!), if you will, in our middle-class, normal looking SFV neighborhood. The pot store in our neighborhood, like the pot store I used to visit from time to time in Eagle Rock, seems to have the whole Obama worship thing going. The Eagle Rock pot store was sure that the moment Emperor Obama came into office, there would be no more DEA tax-feeders standing at the train station, staring at what the state of California has said is a legal dispensary of marijuana. Our neighborhood discount pot store, which I have also visited (research!), has a picture of Emperor O. hanging high on the wall, near the ceiling. Accompanying said picture is some Emperor O. quote about leaving pot stores alone. Personally, I fail to genuflect before it. Nonetheless, pot stores have become much more relaxed in the past few months, though I can't help but wonder if the relaxation isn't a bit premature. After all, last Thursday's Los Angeles Times had a story on page A5 that shows what a liar Emperor O. seems to be. Unless I'm missing something here, "Pot stores raided in West L.A., Culver City" has little to do with the Emperor O. quote about leaving California's 420 marijuana dispensaries alone. Ah, but no. I guess it's kinda sorta like Emperor O.'s quote on war, that war with Afghanistan is a "war of necessity," alluding, I suppose, to globalist Richard Haass' War of Necessity, War of Choice: A Memoir of Two Iraq Wars. You know, I never did much like Emperor O., but his telling me, as I heard ad nauseum on NPR today, that the Afghan war is "of necessity" and expecting me to believe it has really gotten my dander all fluffed. I'm guessing that's as big of a lie as the quote about telling the feds to leave California the hell alone, as is prominently displayed in the pot store, although obviously, my words aren't the exact quote.

The pot store story, in fact, lists a whole cadre of characters, in fact, some of them paid by our gigantic California taxes, who helped the DEA to perform these raids, showing that Emperor O. can not only waste tax money for the nation, but also for individual states:
Federal authorities and local police agencies raided two Westside marijuana dispensaries Wednesday as well as the residences of the owners. . . . The DEA, FBI, Internal Revenue Service, Los Angeles County Sherriff's Department, Los Angeles Police Department, Torrance Police Department and Culver City Police Department took part in the raids.

So, you can see that these agencies grabbed a lot of loot, especially having a license to steal from the owners' private residences. I'm ashamed of every last one of these agencies, all of which I am forced to support. It sickens me to know that the LAPD, whose job should be to protect and serve, as their cars say, would be involved in such an unconstitutional raid. But the last paragraph of the story tells the real tale:

Law enforcement agencies have been cracking down on pot dispensaries for some time, but officials did not immediately say what prompted these raids.

Well, I can't tell you what prompted them, of course, but I can tell you who didn't stop them: Emperor O. I kinda doubt he's going to be ending any wars soon either.

L.A. Water
When we moved here, our first apartment manager, Scott, told us that there's always a big controversy about water in Southern Calfornia and SoCal is always fighting with Northern California about water, et cetera. Well, as it turns out, SoCal has used that fight, and the recent supposed draught (How can you tell? It never rains here anyway!) to have another reason for the government and neighbors to snoop and snitch on you. I am quoting here from a story in last Sunday's Los Angeles Times: Among the new Department of Water and Power (DWP) "limits on water use," are these dandy guidelines:
-Automatic sprinklers are limited to Mondays and Thursdays before 9 a.m. or after 4 p.m.
-Sprinklers must not run more than 15 minutes per watering station.
-Hand watering is allowed any day before 9 a.m. or after 4 p.m., but only with an automatic shut-off nozzle.
-Cars may be hose-washed only if a shut-off nozzle is used.
-Water may not be used to wash hard surfaces, such as sidewalks, driveways or parking areas, except for health and safety purposes.
-Runoff into streets and gutters is prohibited.

Now, Mr. Thinking Mama and I try to watch water consumption and we certainly read what's happening in our water bill. We'd read these guidelines--which went along with a changed tier structure, one that strongly encourages use of the guidelines--and I thought that they were mere suggestions, guidelines meant to be followed but not necessarily enforced. Or as my 8-year-old put it when we were discussing them prior to June 1st, when the guidelines went into effect: What are they going to do, give you a ticket? Not only was he indeed perceptively correct but the DWP has also tacked on a $100 fine. Here's the cautionary tale language that the Times reporter uses:
"Try as they might, offenders can't hide the evidence. The previous commodity is already flowing down gutters and driveways, glistening off blades of grass and rosebushes . . . "

In other words, resistance is futile. It's not nearly enough, evidently, that the LADWP is raising our rates. Nope! We must use this opportunity to provide more snitches, for something that used to be a common sight: runoff. Now, I'm not saying that we should waste water and, in fact, nary a drop of mop water here at the Gingerbread House goes to waste, as I take the mop water outside and give it to some needy plants. I'm not saying we shouldn't conserve water; I am saying that the government shouldn't have another excuse to step on my private property and give me a $100 fine for something that I am paying for.

Pot stores and private property are two things that the government should stay far away from. However, as the police state continues to infiltrate our lives, this kind of government and neighborhood snooping will continue:

Since the restrictions took effect, fewer than 30 water users have actually been hit with fines, which begin at $100 for a first offense. Most of the citations issued so far have been only warnings.

With water conservation officers patrolling only during regular business hours, some self-appointed vigilantes have stepped in. They watch for mysterious puddles, broken sprinkler heads and after-hours hand-watering across neighborhoods and business. Then they send complaints--more than 4,200 so far--via phone, e-mail and most recently on Twitter.

Yep, Twitter.

Doesn't it do my heart good to know that our fine L.A. neighbors may just be a Twitter away from having us fined for $100, or at least from having us snooped upon.

It's interesting that when I was growing up, I heard all this stuff at church about how lucky we were that we didn't live in the Soviet Union. We'd watch films and hear stories about those poor, poor folks under Communist rule. This kind of propaganda was a mere reflection of what was going on in our society at the time: A push to make us so very thankful for living in the free and wonderful United States when people in the Soviet Union, Cuba, and other Communist-ruled places were having such a hard life. No doubt, I'm extremely thankful that I don't live, today, in someplace like Communist China, which would have forced me to give away at least one of my children, or kill one, or abort one. And yes, I am thankful to be living in what I'm assuming is the freest country in the world.

But what happens when that very free country that you grew up thankful to live in turns itself into a state that's much like that of the former Soviet Union, with state-paid volunteer informants on every street corner and no respect for private property or the free market system?

I Probably Won't Be Doing Any Shows with This Guy

2009-08-09T23:29:00.000-04:00

I could certainly get a lot more work if I believed the adoption myths. I am painfully aware of this fact and sometimes, people remind me of it. I often am critical of celebrities who use the money that we pay to see them to adopt someone else's child. I am especially critical of comics who do this kind of thing. I used to think that comedy was the last bastion of truth and I really admired the comics that I have worked with who have been nothing but supportive when I talk about adoption. However, so many comics have adopted lately that I find myself wondering how much of a career I have in comedy. I am up front about my feelings about adoption with comics; there is one I worked with at Canoga Park Bowl who is determined to adopt a child. I told her that I was very much against stranger adoption. I will tell this to anyone who asks. It's interesting though that when I hear from people about what I write, there is a clear line of demarcation: Those who adopt hate me, except for a few, such as this one. They use ad hominem attacks and any other faulty logic to discredit me. Here's what adopter and comic Dana Gould wrote:

Dear Comic Mom,

I greatly enjoyed your response to the LA Weekly's article about Tom Fryckman and Cathy Ladman's adoption story. As an adoptive parent myself, one who has, in your words, "taken another woman's child," I am always interested in learning about other people's views on adoption, especially when they are breathtakingly ignorant and narcissistic.

Like yours!!

Let me just touch on one point. Briefly. A full refutation of your letter would take too long. But, one point, please.

Why do you assume that the decision to adopt is based solely on one's inability to biologically procreate? Can you not see children as anything other than a little genetic mirror? The world outside Brentwood is teeming with children who don't have parents. The "mother" for whom you pine is nowhere to be found. These children NEED a mom and dad. They're called "orphans". They live in big buildings full of other children in the same situation. These buildings are called "orphanages". I bet if you ever set foot inside one and actually exposed yourself to the plight of these children, you’d revisit your narrow, ego-driven worldview and maybe even throw up in your mouth a little bit.

All over the world, people like myself, Tom, Cathy and so many others, take these children into their lives, giving them a family and saving them (sometimes) from grotesque, tragic and unspeakable fates.

My children were in orphanages for the first year of their lives. They live in America now and have blossomed into healthy, luminous, beautiful girls. But you can't see photos my children on a website, Tricia. Because even though my children are from another mother, I value them enough not to pimp them out on the internet to prop up my flabby stand up act.

Like you do.

Dana Gould
Comedian
Adoptive parent

It'd be really easy to get down about a letter such as this one. After all, he's basically saying that I'm a bad mother because there are pictures of my children on the Internet, or something like that. And of course, he's a great adopter because, supposedly, there are no pictures of his adoptees? And yet, there are lots and lots of people, as Mr. Thinking Mama pointed out, who have pictures of their children on the Internet. And yes, I've pondered this question, and I think I'm doing the right thing. My children certainly love to see themselves on the Internet and usually, I don't talk much about them in my comedy routine, although I often, with their petulance and permission, allow them to do comedy with me. Mr. Gould, by the way, despite his supposed disdain for genetic similarities, talks much in the routines by him that I've heard, about how his family is so screwed up that they should not reproduce. It's funny material and as a comic, he has a lot of success. Again, this information is what I've heard from his videos. Gould also probably depends on comedy for his living; whereas, I do not. Therefore, I have much more creative freedom and I really appreciate that. I can be "flabby" if I want to be. He has, of course, more commercial success, but then again, I can live with myself and I sleep easily at night, both of which are great benefits for me. If I had to tour and that kind of thing, I'd find it difficult. However, I am fortunate and thankful to have Mr. Thinking Mama to help me.

It's easy for regular readers of my blog, many of whom are mothers who have lost one or more children to adoption, to see how Mr. Gould has fallen into the adoption myth trap. He truly believes that he has saved his little China girls (I think that he adopted from China; I'm assuming so, here) from death or some such and he fails to see how his demand, and the demand of other China adopters, are indeed contributing to the problem. There's a mom out there who longs for her child, or children, and Mr. Gould has them. Fortunately, for him, that mom was hoodooed by the Chinese government into giving her child to an orphanage. And it seems as though he believes that by bringing these children to the ever omnipotent America, he has saved these children from a certain doom.

For the record, people have suggested that I, mother of three boys, adopt a "China doll" (not my quote, but the quote of an adopter). I will not, however, increase demand for adoption by taking one of these children and pretending that the girl is my own. Mr. Gould's words are, unfortunately, quite predictable. Fortunately, there are many non-adopters who are listening to me and to the voices of moms in the U.S. who have lost one or more children to adoption. Perhaps the Chinese moms who have lost a child will be silenced, but those of us have lost family members and can speak up are beginning to do so.

Why Try To Make A Mother Out of Someone Who's Not?

2009-08-09T18:23:00.000-04:00

Well, those who've been reading my stuff for a while know that I really don't like the Los Angeles Times, and most other mainstream media outlets. At some times, I'm really reminded of my disdain for the Times. Yesterday morning's headlines "A sentence, and hopes, are lifted in '83 killing," started out as a story about a man convicted of murdering his "mother." However, there is now a question of perhaps his being convicted on "false evidence." Turns out, in one of the pictures at the top of the story, that there is a picture of "Mother and Son," but the caption under it says "Dorka Lisker was not keen about adoption at first but became delighted, her husband said." Ah-ha! We now find out that there is not matricide here, but perhaps a murder of the man's adoptress. The picture, by the way, shows that detached view that so many adoptresses have, that "I'm holding this baby and trying to look pleasant" view that I'd probably have if I were holding someone else's baby. Let's face it: Children are often somewhat disgusting if they're not you're own. In adoption, children are often given to strangers and the strangers feel obliged to love them. Many adopters these days will even say that they love their children as much as or more than if the children were actually their own. This is dubious. I can say, however, growing up with people who loved me a bunch did not make up for the loss of my family; no amount of love can do that. Although both murder situations are tragic, being accused of murdering someone's mother is different than being accused of murdering someone's adoptress.

Even though adoption seemed to figure prominently in the Times' story, according to the picture and its caption, the Times insists on making the adoptress into a mother, not even bothering to call her an "adoptive mother," which would certainly have been more honest. Nope, there are only mere shreds of honesty at the Times, which also eagerly tries to make mothers out of Jamie Lee Curtis, Joan Didion, and others. And so, it doesn't seem to bother anyone at the Times' offices when they fail to state the truth. I guess that's why Times readership, like that of its New York namesake, is going south. I can hardly wait until its readership is so low that it must go out of business. Sure, my father-in-law was just laid off, after 43 years as a photographer, from another big city newspaper. It's very sad for the employees, yes, but as for truth and diverse opinions, losing mainstream media's propaganda machines could hardly be better.

No Picture Necessary

2009-08-01T08:29:00.000-04:00

Usually, I'm a huge picture taker, but I hope that the following words will explain adequately what I have to say.

Some China adoption group recently caught wind of me, evidently. I received the usual "What the hell are you thinking, idiot?" e-mails from adopters, heard nothing from natural mothers and fathers who'd lost a child to adoption (not unusual when they're halfway across the earth), and nothing from those sweet China dolls (one of them described their adoptees this way) who may never know anyone in their natural family. The adopters, let it be known, speak for all of us separated by adoption. And if you don't believe that, well, you're in for a surprise. The adopters have the final say in everything. Nonetheless, one of them wrote me and asked what I would do with all the "unwanted" children, as if they were sitting in droves in China and the U.S. The first thing I'd do as adoption czar is to return all children to parents who actually want them. My guess is that, if we listened to the parents instead of, or even in addition to those who want to adopt, the adopters would have to return 95% of their adoptees to someone in the child's natural family. That leaves about 5% of adoptees who are truly unwanted.

My own personal story is like many others: Certainly, it's not one of being unwanted. It is one of being wanted by my mom and possibly even by my dad, who was shut out of the picture early in the process, but being coerced by the adoption industry, who assured my adopters that my mother had been given "two chances" to keep me. My mother was assured that if she loved me, she would give me away. Only in adoption is such faulty logic so steadily adhered to.

Nonetheless, we all believed the adoption lies, my mom and dad going on not to tell my half-sister and half-brother, respectively, that I even existed. I grew up knowing that I may well have a brother or sister and lots of other real relatives. I was contrary when it came to adoption, except for the times that I felt I had to lie to myself, and I eventually came to see through the $1.6 billion per year adoption industry, which buys and sells babies many times each day. Do you really think that all those babies in China are unwanted? And do you really think that continuing the demand from Westerners, from which 40 potential adopters currently wait for each adoptable infant, will stop the Chinese government from having their crazy and evil requirements on family planning?

Nonetheless, these adoptees will find it much harder to find their families than even I did. And it seemed, at one point, that I would never ever find them. While I am thankful to know who my family is, I cannot overlook the problems of having been separated from them for so very long. Earlier this week, I was dissed by a relative, I'll call Relative X, who blatantly and lovingly kissed and hugged my brother, got in her truck, and left me standing without so much as a wave. Later, my brother and father, who were supposed to be attending my sons' birthday party, called right before the party to tell me that they would not be attending, after telling my children that they'd be there. It would be very tempting for adopters to say at this point, and many will, "See? That's what happens when you have a reunion with people who didn't want you." But indeed, adoption in and of itself has produced these bizarre situations. After reunion, natural families experience a wide range of emotions for the rest of their lives. The family can never fully recover. And there are always scars. The alternative, of course, is living a lie, which I am thankful that I no longer do.

Please don't think that the elite are not aware of what they do in stranger adoption; this kind of thing has been planned for a long time and breaking up families is just one of the many distractions that we have to what's really going on in the world. I think about how much stronger my own natural family would be had we not been separated by adoption and while there would, no doubt, be pain and strangeness, I would be in the pictures of my family instead of in the pictures of a stranger's family, trying to fit in.

You can certainly bet that the New World Order currently being forced upon us would not be happening if our families were stronger. Adoption has probably broken up more families than divorce. And yet, mainstream media continue to tell us how wonderful adoption is. And many people continue to believe it. Those of us who have been separated must continue to speak out, or else the adoption nightmare will continue to expand to many more families.

You can also read a bit more about my experience with my natural family this week at my Comic Mom blog.

Adoption Myths Prevail

2009-07-11T11:41:00.000-04:00

When I was pregnant with Micah, the wonderful doctor who did my amnio, Drew Carlson, mentioned during the amnio that she had found, earlier that week, a baby with the genitalia of one sex and the chromosomes of another. She was a fabulous doctor (she died before Jadon was born, from breast cancer, at only 47) and she dealt with a lot of high-risk pregnancies (fortunately, mine was not high-risk). Therefore, you'd think she would have seen it all. Nonetheless, she seemed quite concerned and almost sad about what she'd found with that baby. She wasn't the kind of person to be shaken by things, but she did seem a bit shaken by her finding.

This morning, I came across this story about a woman who has the chromosomes of a man, with a condition known as Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome (AIS). This syndrome can come from the mother or occur spontaneously. Although it is rare, it does indeed occur and although it must be very difficult for the doctors to deal with, I imagine that it's especially difficult for the parents. Eden, the woman in the ABC News story, was told that she had "twisted ovaries," although the reality is that she had testes inside her body. Of course, this rendered her infertile. How very sad it is that she was lied to and even sadder is the fact that she cannot have her own children. I find it interesting, however, that the adoption industry has once again jumped to the rescue and Eden, unfortunately, has taken someone else's child and is pretending that it's her own. A "new generation of girls with AIS" seem to take pains not to lie about their condition, but their moms seem to be lying to themselves and the children about the devastation of infertility. Instead of helping her child to come to terms with the fact that she cannot have her own child, Jen Cole tells her daughter a lie:

"I just told her that she was special," Cole said, "and had to adopt other people's babies that don't have mommies and daddies."

It's so very basic to say that EVERY child has a mommy and daddy. EVERY child. Even Eden's adoptee has a mom and dad, despite the fact that it is truly sad and tragic that Eden cannot have her own child. I'll say this basic truth once again: Every child has a mom and dad. That's how we get here. And yet, in her zest to make herself and her daughter feel better, Cole has taken this basic fact--that every child has a mother and father--and made it seem as though some of us end up in the cabbage patch, popped up spontaneously amongst the vegetables. We don't. We ALL have a mommy and daddy, although some of us do not grow up with our natural parents. It bothers me that adoption is seen as the cure for infertility once again, in this case for a whole "new generation" of young women with AIS. Perfectly fertile women in their 20s yearn to adopt these days. That's how successful the $1.6 billion adoption industry has been with their propaganda.

The Uselessness of Our Elected Representatives

2009-07-09T14:06:00.000-04:00

Well, being that the REAL ID had so much success in the state legislatures--please note my italicized sarcasm here--we plebeians now have to worry about the PASS Act. Of course, as it was completely explained to me (along with an accusation that my "husband had just called," which was untrue) by the girl answering the phone in Sen. Daniel Akatta's office. Akatta is on the committee that's trying to pass (get it? there's a pun here, of great proportion) this bill. The girl assured me that if I would only read the entire bill, I would find that the Pass Act is actually dampening some of the effects of the Real ID act. I don't believe her, but boy, was she ever angry at me for not understanding things the way that she did. And no, my husband had not just called. For the record, I'd received an e-mail about this bill and decided to call the committee members and protest it. But at my second phone call, I decided I had better things to do with my day than have someone answering the phone at a senator's office give me the what for. Some say that senators are not supposed to be directly elected by the people and surely, that's the way it was, before the elite deemed the people more powerful than the Founding Fathers intended, around the beginning of the 20th century. Whatever the case, this senator's office was not very nice about things and led me to believe that the good senator was very much for privacy, which is why he's voting for the Pass Act. Why do I even bother?!?

Read Jim Bovard's account of this federal infringement of our rights. Then, think about how you are going to around this invasion of privacy, in which the government can track you wherever you are.

Dying with Lies

2009-06-29T00:33:00.000-04:00

Most adoptees live in a world of lies from shortly after birth. Some of us learn to love those lies, or rather, we learn to attach ourselves to those lies so intimately that we forget that they are lies. There is more, I'm convinced, to the adoption industry than meets the proverbial eye. After reading about the elite's plans and experiencing mainstream media's dissing, both of those of us who scream about adoption and of those of us, deemed "terrorists" who supported Ron Paul as the Republican candidate. In the past ten years, I have lost so much faith and trust in the things that mainstream media tell me to trust that I trust almost nothing. If the L.A Times tells me that something is good, I automatically look for the bad side, knowing that the Times, like most mainstream publications, has a globalist agenda. Many people mistake a lot of mainstream newspapers, including the Times, as having a liberal bias. The reality is that such publications have a statist bias that is extremely strong. Thus, the so-called liberals and the so-called conservatives seem very much to be at each other's throats. In reality, they are moving us all in the same government-controlled direction.

I ponder this kind of thing when I think about adoption. Recently, I received a comment on "Et tu, Maryellen Hooper?" a post about a comic that I'd worked with. If you'd asked me to, I could have hardly written a more mainstream-media-brainwashed comment for that post than this one:

WOW! I am the first comment and I pray that means no one else stumbled upon your ridiculous, ignorant blog about Maryellen. She "took the baby" from their mothers? Wait a second, isn't the premise of an open adoption that the [natural] mother has spent countless sleepless nights agonizing over her decision to give her baby up. [sic] You make it sound like Maryellen and her husband snuck into the hospital and kidnapped a child while it nursed from its mother. They were chosen by the [natural] mother as that child's best chance at a life that she decided she could not offer. There are countless women who cannot conceive and yes, have tried every alternative out there..and the move to adoption is one that is thought out and carefully screened by all involved. You are obviously ignorant to the entire thing and admit to only having met Maryellen for a few seconds...yet, go on this venomous diatribe about her, when you clearly no [sic] nothing. I can only assume, that you feel your [adopters] "stole you" from your [natural] mother. Does your [natural] mother agree, and where would you be without your [adopters] who stepped up? hmmmmm......

For future reference, I don't publish comments that use negative language about moms. It's not that I didn't want you to see this woman's ignorance; it's that I will only use language that is respectful of natural families on this blog. Therefore, I will not use the ugly b-word to describe my or anyone else's mom, whether or not that mom raised her child. The ridiculous "birth mother" word, which I just used for those of you who may not know what I'm talking about when I say the "ugly b-word," is a slap in the face to mothers, whether or not we've lost a child to adoption. It is demeaning indeed and yet, the La Leche League disowned me as their spokesperson because I support natural families staying together. Yes, what an irony.

Anyway, I can tell you that that the woman who wrote the snappy reply that I posted previously is more than likely an adoptress. She's probably from a small town and she's adopted at least one child and sees absolutely nothing wrong with adoption. I'm sure that she has good intentions, but as with the 92% of people who believe that adoption is just dandy, this woman sees only the lies that the adoption industry has bombarded her with, since before she was born. I'm not sure how she came across my blog but it was probably the first time that anyone had poked a hole in the balloon of lies that she's built for herself, an adoptee, no less, saying stuff that she's never heard before. I can tell that this woman is having a visceral reaction because, for one thing, she didn't read my post that closely. I said that I worked one whole week (one comedy week, that is, i.e., Wednesday-Saturday) with Hooper, not merely a "few seconds." This woman also believes that just because adopters are removed from the process, i.e., the social worker is often the one who does the taking of the child and hands it to the adopters, that adopters have no blood on their hands from taking someone else's child. It's probably really difficult for this woman to know that the demand for children is so strong that there are 40 couples waiting for each adoptable infant. Better that this woman believe she is saving a child, that the child would have died or had tragic consequences if the child had stayed with his or her real mother (as she somehow surmised from my own family, although she has never met my mom or my adopters), and that the mother thought it wonderful, albeit somewhat sad, to give her child to strangers. Ah, this woman thinks exactly what the adoption industry wants her to think. The $1.6 billion adoption industry is very proud of her and, in fact, depends on such people to continue its existence.

Now, back to the big picture: No doubt the elite find it extremely valuable to break up families through adoption. In fact, the elite absolutely love it when such obituaries as this one come up. I happen to know the woman who died and I know very well that she is adopted and that she was not born in Wilkes County. I also know that she was not born to her adopters, Elizabeth and Dean Holbrook. I also know that when Nancy was still a little girl, her adoptress died of a heart condition that she'd had for a very long time. In fact, the heart condition may have been why she could not have her own children. I used to play with Nancy when she and I were little girls. People thought that we may be sisters because we both had very dark hair and blue eyes. Fortunately, as I would find out years later, my mother lost only one child to adoption, moi! Therefore, Nancy was indeed not my sister. But she is also not the daughter of Dean and Elizabeth Holbrook and she certainly wasn't born to them. From the obituary, it seems as though Nancy went to her grave believe the lies that she'd been told since her own both. In that respect, she and the writer of the previously quoted comment have a lot in common. If Nancy had read my blog, she would have probably been just as pissed off as the writer above seems to be. It's easy to see how people get angry when there are lies that threaten what they've built their lives around. Unfortunately, Nancy, like so many adoptees, lived the lies so much that she wholeheartedly believed them. Even her obituary is a lie. If Nancy's real mother lives today, she is still wondering what happened to her daughter and she has no idea that her daughter is dead and that she has three grandchildren and some great-grandchildren as well. Nancy's real mom has probably suffered physically and emotionally since the day Nancy left her arms to go into the arms of strangers.

So, what do the elite gain by having adoptees such as Nancy and adopters such as the one who wrote the above comment? With $1.6 billion riding on the lies of adoption each year, there is much to be gained by the lies of the adoption industry. But even more important, there are families to break up. Nancy, no matter how much she lied to herself, her children, and her grandchildren, was never the whole person she would have been had she found her mother, or better yet, had she grown up with her mom and her natural family. Her mom's life, although Nancy never knew this, was torn apart by losing her daughter to adoption. There are two people that were so damaged by adoption that they could never lead a full life. Perhaps separation from her mother did indeed, either directly or indirectly, cause Nancy's way-too-early death. Either way, the elite win and another family is lost for generations to separation by adoption. The elite have much to gain by separating families by adoption, just as they have much to gain by electing Emperor Obama to office. Therefore, those who speak the truth about adoption, like Ron Paul supporters, are noted as crazy and we are dismissed by mainstream media. The lies continue and so do the problems of adoption.

May you rest in peace, Nancy, and one day, may you and your real mother (and father and the rest of your natural family) be reunited in heaven.

Et Tu, Maryellen Hooper?!?

2009-05-16T22:12:00.000-04:00

I've probably mentioned this before, but a couple of months before Mr. Thinking Mama and I left Raleigh, I performed for a week at Charlie Goodnight's Comedy Club. Granted, having just started to do comedy, I was the lowest proverbial man on the totem pole, the opener, but the experience was fabulous and I remember it fondly. My mom, whom I had recently found, came to see one of my shows and the headliner was Maryellen Hooper. Maryellen seemed very nice, if not dismissive, in the way that all road comics probably are from time to time. For Maryellen, the winner of some Stand-Up Comic of the Year award or some such, I was a mere local comic in a club in a medium-sized city. Having now lived in Los Angeles and been in tune with the L.A. comedy scene for a while, I can sort of understand the attitude. Nonetheless, I introduced her to my mom and Maryellen was very pleasant, which I greatly appreciated. Trying to be nice, she asked my mom, "Has Tricia always been funny?" Wow, what a question for a mom who'd just been found and for the daughter who didn't grow up with her. The world of adoption reunion is a strange one indeed and my mom and I just sat there, neither knowing what to say. Fortunately, Maryellen made some joke, which my mom and I greatly appreciated, and the air was indeed much lighter.

Although I've yet to run into Maryellen since our move to L.A., which is not that unusual considering that you can hardly throw a rock in L.A. without hitting a comic, I've often wondered about her. And I was curious if she'd ever had a baby. I think she's a bit older than I am, although not too much, and I just assumed that she was happy with her career and not that interested in bearing a child. Turns out I was right about the second part. Actually, after finding out only today that Maryellen is an adopter, I don't know much about what she went through to make her decision to take some mother's child; perhaps, like Sarah Jessica or the countless other celebrities who use their money to take other people's children or pay a womb to gestate, she'd had many miscarriages and failed attempts. In no way do I mean to understate or fail to recognize any pain, physical and emotional, that she went through before she became desperate enough to take a mother's child and claim it as her own. It is indeed sad and heartbreaking when a woman wants to have a child and it doesn't work out. I sincerely hope that more people, especially the celebrity types, visit Brandon. Brandon, Wendy, Steve, et al. are the folks when it comes to helping people have their own children. Perhaps Maryellen could have benefited from a few visits with the folks at the Eastern Center for Complementary Medicine. These people help your body naturally to work the way it's supposed to and if you look at their testimonials, you'll see that they've helped more than one woman conceive her own child.

How extremely disappointed I was, however, to find out that Maryellen has adopted not one but two children. Indeed, she is so supposedly grateful for her good fortune in obtaining a child by any means that she wrote this review of an adoption book:

...Your book really touched me. Especially the opening statement about how he is my son whether I gave birth to him or not. His soul was meant to be my son. I have said that since he was born!

Maryellen Hooper - 1998's Best Female Stand-Up at the 12th Annual American Comedy Awards

Now, isn't that just the sweetest thing. According to the review, Maryellen must have scooped up this baby from his mother right after birth. These days, adopters tend to do that very thing, claiming that they, not the mother, can bond with the baby more quickly. The mother, with her leaking breasts and sore groin, is much more quickly disposed of. Peachy, isn't it? I especially enjoy the way that Maryellen so completely disposed of her adoptee's mom in her review, failing even to mention her.

And then, I googled around a bit more and found this lovely quote from Adoptress Hooper:

If you really want to see some angry moms, take your 6-week-old in a jogging stroller to the park wearing a size 6 miniskirt. I don't know why people give birth when you can adopt. I love them way more. I've seen the video. You have to be holding a grudge. . . . Giving birth in bed with no drugs? I don't even want to conceive like that.

Yep, that's what passes for adopter humor these days. Maryellen has the audacity to fault those of us who are fortunate enough to become real moms for our sagging, leaky breasts and the extra pounds that a new baby tends to leave, unless one has a personal trainer, of course. But the real jewel in the previous quote is that Maryellen claims to love her adoptees "way more" because she took them from their mother. So, I guess I don't really love my little guys that much, even though my breasts bled off and on for two weeks after my first son was born, until we finally got the whole latching on thing right. There's no love there. Nah, I really don't care for my guys nearly as much as I would somebody else's baby who doesn't look like Mr. Thinking Mama and me and doesn't have any comparable traits. Why, perhaps I should have given my own firstborn to Maryellen; after all, she could love him "way more" than his real father and I, right?!?

Look, I don't know why Maryellen didn't have her own child and I'm very sorry that she didn't. But she need not try to make it seem as though taking a baby from the very mother that God and nature gave said child and pretending that baby is your own is some kind of act of love. Far too many of us know that pretending to be a parent is often much more an act of insecurity and desperation than an act of love. The real act of love in this case, and in most adoptions, is supporting the mother and baby in staying together. I can't help but wonder why adopters fail to choose it.

It's really disappointing to read about celebrity adopters. But it's extremely disappointing to find that a celebrity you've worked with has taken it on herself to take someone else's child. I'm really sorry that someone who seems as nice as Maryellen Hooper has gotten involved in the $1.6 billion U.S. adoption industry, contributing to its profits. How very sad indeed.

Another Adoption Propaganda Piece

2009-05-11T00:00:00.000-04:00

I'm sad but not surprised to report that the News and Disturber has posted another adoption propaganda piece, this time about the joys of open adoption. Did you realize that you could be a mother and not a parent? Gosh, I love how mainstream media are redefining family. And how the general public is buying it. Oh, isn't it so very good when an adoptee knows her incubator?!? And when those who, sadly, cannot have their own children can pretend they are parents? Isn't this a joyous Mother's Day story? About a mother who's extremely happy to lose her precious daughter and about a couple who was more than happy not to support the mother in raising her child, but to take said child away? Oh, Joy!

And, of course the adopters are singing the praises of adoption in the comments section of the article. Personally, I found it worth it to register and leave a comment.

Of course, Amy, the natural mother, is demeaned to a mere breeder and the message is clear: Adoption is a fabulous and gorgeous option to abortion; in fact, it's really the only option to abortion worth considering: Don't ever, ever consider keeping, breastfeeding, and raising your own baby. Oh, and lest we forget: A college degree earned on time with a scholarship is definitely worth giving away your firstborn. With such wonderful publicity, I'm sure that all beautiful little girls reading this article will one day want to give away a baby to a couple who can't have their own. Don't dare say anything about any pain that real mother Amy feels: she's certainly in the land of denial, smiling, as if giving your baby to someone else is the most wonderful thing in the world.

Look Who's Renting A Womb

2009-05-08T05:44:00.000-04:00

Wow, it's been about three weeks since I wrote in this blog; I must have been busy!

Nonetheless, I was sad to hear, via reader Jade, that one of my favorite celebrities, Sarah Jessica Parker, is renting a womb. Look, I've followed her ever since Square Pegs and even before, in Annie. What a life, I thought to myself, as she danced with Steve Martin in L.A. Story and dated the now-deceased John Kennedy. I read about how her mother sacrificed so that she could act and take all those artsy classes that I always wanted to take. Her artistic and creative life seemed so very wonderful, especially in comparison to my own, in which I, after many years of wanting to be an artistic soul as a child, finally, after the beginning of my first marriage, summoned the courage, money, and support to follow my dream of taking a writing class and an acting class. Ah, but it is indeed dangerous to compare and I'll take my own mommy life any day over Sarah Jessica Parker's; living with three boys each day sans a nanny or any of the crap that celebrities must do to continue to be celebrities is indeed worth it when I think of how much I like being there, every day, for my babies.

My admiration and respect for Sarah Jessica, however, continued, even through her being named as one of the "unsexiest" people and through Sex and the City, in which she played a writer. Wow, an actress playing a writer--what a dream role. A couple of years after my first son was born, and around the time that I became pregnant with my second, Sarah Jessica had her own son, James Wilkie, whose father was none other than Matthew Broderick. For those who spent way too much time watching television and dreaming of moving to Los Angeles and being on the tube, such as myself, you may remember the show Family, with the totally hot and butch Kristy McNichol as "Buddy." I watched this show, set in Pasadena, every week. How I yearned to have parents like Buddy's, with Broderick's real life father, James, playing the role of Buddy's dad on the show.

I must admit, however, that Sex and the City really began to get to me when Charlotte, who had gone to great lengths to conceive her own child, failed to do so and went looking for a little China girl to buy. I remember turning off the last episode about midway through and I have no interest in seeing the movie.

Now, however, real life has somewhat mimicked the show with Sarah Jessica Parker's hiring of a twenty-something female to have a couple of babies for her and Matthew. In googling this mess, I found some interesting articles, one of which rumored a Sarah Jessica Parker pregnancy around September 2006, shortly after my own first miscarriage. Evidently, she and Matthew had been trying hard to have another child, for quite a while. I can understand her desire to have another child. Whether you have one or twenty children, if you want one more and cannot do so, it is not an easy scene. I've also had a few people suggest that I adopt from China so that I will be assured of getting a girl. But it won't by my girl and I decided long ago that I would do no such thing.

Nor would I ever hire someone else's womb.

In my googling, I also found rumors that she and Matthew have had problems and that a few short months ago, their marriage was in trouble. Rumors had it that he was seeing a twenty-something himself. These things, however, are merely rumors and one never knows to what lengths Sarah Jessica Parker went to in order to give James Wilkie, whom she very openly breastfed, a little brother or sister.

What is even more disappointing than Sarah Jessica's hiring of a womb is her and the media's treatment of the whole thing; meanwhile, the surrogate is looked upon as a thing, a disposable womb that will be paid and tossed aside. Pregnancy, however, is an extremely important part of a child's life and having someone else do the work, regardless of the reason, seems wrong to me. Just plain wrong. This article states that Sarah Jessica is even acting pregnant, drinking water instead of liquor or wine. But isn't all that a little weird? After all, she hired someone to be pregnant for her. Why is she pretending to be pregnant herself?

The whole thing is extremely strange and illustrates the sad fact that celebrities often have more money than sense. I had really admired Sarah Jessica's breastfeeding of her first child and she might even try to breastfeed these babies after they come out of the rent-a-womb. However, the whole thing seems sad and wrong to me. I'm really, really sorry that Matthew and Sarah Jessica, for whatever reason, have not had a second child. However, I've lost a tremendous amount of respect and admiration for her after she jumped, however reluctantly, on the surrogacy/adoption bandwagon.

So, How Do You Like Obama NOW?!?

2009-04-14T12:51:00.000-04:00

First, it was marijuana; now it's tomatoes:

Chuck Baldwin, one of my favorite writers and Southern Baptist ministers, has written an excellent overview of the new Gardening Police legislation:

Self-proclaimed "conservatives" love to tout themselves as ardent supporters of the "free enterprise" system. In the name of "capitalism," they support any and every piece of legislation or governmental decision that caters to business--especially Big Business. Favorite policies of these folks include anything and everything that calls itself "free trade." Furthermore, these same "conservatives" will support just about anything and everything that is said to advance the so-called "global economy."

Needless to say, in the name of "free trade" millions of American jobs and thousands of American manufacturing plants have been outsourced to foreign countries and interests. And leading the charge for "free trade," outsourcing, and the "global economy" is the international cabal known as Big Business. But Big Business does not play this game alone. Joining Big Business is its pernicious partner, Big Government.

Together, Big Business and Big Government form a tyrannical tandem that is squeezing the breath out of our once-great republic. In fact, people need to understand that what is passing for "capitalism" in America today is nothing more than "Corporatism."

Corporatism has little to do with genuine capitalism or free enterprise. Freedom and federalism thrive when true capitalism and free enterprise are at work. But Corporatism has nothing to do with freedom and everything to do with tyranny.

Corporatism is the marriage of Big Business with Big Government. Corporatism uses the force and weight of government to create giant monopolies, which strangle competition and freedom. Rules and regulations are enacted that make it impossible for "little" guys to compete. The trade laws of nations are pitted against each other, forcing free nations to sacrifice their own peace and security to accommodate the economies of totalitarian regimes. And, of course, Big Business is the recipient of gargantuan profits in the process.

Please understand that the movers and shakers of Big Business have no national loyalty. They claim no country, salute no flag, and recognize no independence but their own. They are the travel companions of the bloodiest butchers on the planet. They have homes in every corner of the globe and are happy to share the beds of the vilest people on earth. They would gladly sell the heart and soul of America to the highest bidder, and have long ago sold their own hearts and souls to the devil.

And there is no limit to how intimately Big Business and Big Government can collaborate to steal people's liberties. A classic case in point is the burgeoning effort to control and regulate private, homegrown gardens.

In the face of a growing recession, thousands of people across America are planting and growing their own gardens. And this is not lost to Corporatism. Remember, Corporatism's great goal is to create monopolies and crush freedom, leaving the cabal controlling both Big Business and Big Government alone atop the world of prosperity and power. Therefore, it will use every tool at its disposal to protect any and all of Corporatism's favored players. And when it comes to America's food supply, Big Agriculture is that favored player.

Even as Michelle Obama plants a White House garden and encourages Americans everywhere to do the same thing, her husband is creating a brand new tool for the Big Business/Big Government powerbrokers: a new "Food Safety Administration" (FSA).

At the same time, Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Connecticut) has introduced H.R. 875 to "protect the public health." But it is not the public health that Ms. DeLauro wants to protect. It is the health of the demonic duo of Big Business and Big Government. Two other bills with similar machinations are S. 425, introduced by Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), and H.R. 815, submitted by Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colorado).

In a nutshell, when these bills become law, every homegrown garden in the country will be regulated, inspected, controlled, and taxed by the federal government. (No, I am not making it up.) In addition, small, independent farms would most certainly be put out of business. In effect, the great Nanny State is posturing itself to completely take over the food business in America.

First, the Big Business/Big Government Axis of Evil began taking over the banking and financial institutions. Next, it was the automobile business that was in Corporatism's crosshairs. Now, it is energy, healthcare, and even the food business--down to the smallest backyard, homegrown garden--that Corporatism is plotting to plunder.

It is an ingenious system: first, Big Government regulates legitimate business to the point that it can no longer function in a free and open market. Then it paves the way for foreign investors to gain influence or even seize control of those same businesses. Then it forces the mergers of smaller entities into international monstrosities. Then it passes laws making it impossible for the remaining small, independent businesses to compete. Meanwhile, the newly created super-wealthy collaborators in Big Business are more than eager to share their bounty with their fellow miscreants inside Big Government.

The obvious result of all this chicanery is the creation of a superior ruling class and the destruction of a free and independent middle class. If all this sounds familiar, it is because Corporatism used to be known by another name: fascism! And this is exactly what is being created right in front of our very eyes, here in the good old U.S.A.

If "conservatives" were more cognizant of and diligent to protect the U.S. Constitution and principles of liberty contained in our Bill of Rights and Declaration of Independence, they would be able to see through the façade of modern Corporatism that masks its totalitarian agenda under the guise of "free trade."

So, in the meantime, go ahead and grow your garden, because you are going to need it. But, at the same time, be prepared to give an account to your local FSA agent. He'll want to know how much you've grown, how much you sold or gave away, and to whom you sold or gave it. He'll want to inspect it; he'll expect you to fill out the appropriate government forms, including names, addresses, amounts, prices, etc. And this goes for all those church and social club potluck dinners as well. Oh, yes! He'll also expect you all to pay taxes on it.

Either that, or convince your State legislators and governor to do what the Thirteen Colonies did: tell King George to go to Hades! But if you don't have--and cannot get--a State legislature and governor willing to do that, you'll need to either move or start turning your entire life over to the new fascist America that Big Business and Big Government are creating, because the die has been cast, and it doesn't appear that there is any going back.

As someone who's currently got some fabulous lettuce in the Gingerbread House garden, with tomatoes and potatoes soon to follow, I am extremely concerned about this legislation. It's funny that lots of people are totally okay with the feds or whomever coming on to private property and confiscating marijuana plants. I'm guessing that the propaganda surrounding this bill is going to sway the worshippers of Emperor O. to welcoming the supposed authorities onto their land. Communism, anyone?

I don't know what Obama worshippers are saying to these things, and to the fact that Obama has now said that wireless wiretapping is just dandy. Really. Are Obama worshippers even aware of this blatent bitch slap to the Constitution? Do they even care? Obama seeks to expand the totalitarian state that Bush, et al. began. And guess what? You can't sue the government if they gather information on you. I guess that's okay. After all, Obama's not one of those awful white males we've always had as a president. That's all that really matters.

So, Obama is trying to figure out how to get onto our private property and he's expanded the totalitarian state that Bush started. Now, aren't you glad that you have no idea who Ron Paul is? Were he president, you'd be living in a less totalitarian state by now. But really, who wants that?!?

I can't help but wonder how many of the newly unemployed will be vying for a job with the local Garden Police Department. My guess is that lots of trained snoops from the government schools will be anxious to apply. Oh, and then, when they fine or arrest you for resisting, don't worry: They'll just be following orders, just as they did in Nazi Germany.

Who Cares About Socialism? Emperor Obama Rules!

2009-04-03T12:18:00.000-04:00

When one of the clients that I edit for wrote yesterday and told me the company is asking all contractors to reduce our rates by 20%, I was quite taken aback. After all, this company is quite solid, or so I thought, and they ask for government money all the time, often receiving it. I called a scientist that I work with and he said that everyone in the company has been asked to take a cut in pay. We chatted a bit and then he asked me with his thick Russian accent, "Tricia, whom did you vote for?"

"Not the one that's in," I said. He told me that he'd lived in the Soviet Union for over four decades and that he sees what's going on here. "Everybody's equal," he added, "equally poor!" He said he's gone up to all the company executives and said, "You got what you voted for," or some equivalent. And so is the country.

One can hardly see socialism more clearly than with the fabulously one-world government G-20 conference. Most people have no clue about what this conference is about. Evidently. If people understood what Emperor O. is doing, I would hope that there would be blood in the streets. On the other hand, people are too busy watching American Idol and such for that tired cliche to come true. I generally love French people and food, but this French President guy is really getting on my nerves:

A lot was at stake. If the leaders had failed to forge a consensus -- Sarkozy this week threatened to quit the talks if they didn’t back much tighter regulation -- it might have set back the world’s economy and markets just as they’re showing signs of shaking off the worst financial crisis in six decades.

What does it mean when things aren't socialist enough for the French?!?

The elite are smiling, I'm sure, as Americans yawn at this news and continue to hail high hosannas at Emperor O. As long as he plants an organic garden at the White House (as if he's going to be digging dirt any time soon), everything will, of course, be peachy keen.

Emperor O. has even proven himself to be more of a socialist than FDR. I know, it's hard to believe, but here's the proof:

[I]n 1933 . . . President Franklin D. Roosevelt torpedoed a similar conference in London by rejecting its plan to stabilize currency rates and in the process scotched international efforts to lift the world out of a depression.

More Conciliation

Seeking to avoid a repeat of that historic flop, President Barack Obama junked the at-times go-it-alone approach of his predecessor, George W. Bush, and adopted a more conciliatory stance toward his fellow leaders.

Therefore, Obama has proven himself to be the one-world government promoter and socialist dupe that many of us have thought him to be all along.

Funny how in such an economic crisis, as we've been led to by the elite and by government regulations, the answer is for the countries that don't have money to, well, print more money:

The U.S. did, though, take the lead in getting the summit to agree on an increase in IMF rescue funds to $750 billion from $250 billion now. Japan, the European Union and China will provide the first $250 billion of the increase, with the balance to come from as yet unidentified countries.

With the overly bankrupt U.S., of course, taking the lead.

As tempting as it is sometimes to think about how much housework and other stuff I could easily complete (supposedly:) if my children were locked in the government school prisons all day, stories like this one make me especially glad that we homeschool. When I explain the economy and the idiotic moves that the new Emperor makes, they ask really obvious questions, such as, "If the government can print more money, why can't we?" My guess is that in a government school concentration camp, they'd be learning not to ask simple questions that make sense, but rather, they'd be learning why they should embrace homosexuality or some such. On days when things aren't going well in the homeschool arena, I'm just thankful that they're not learning the stupid crap with which the government schools try to fill innocent and growing minds. How do I know that the stupid crap is being taught? Because it's rare to hear in the media or anywhere else such common sense questions as my children, who are only 4, 6, and 8, ask. The stupid crap and distractions, the bread and circuses of modern-day society, are working. Emperor O. and his world-government cronies are taking more control of our money. And no one really seems to care. Or to notice.

Why The Adoption Myths Continue

2009-03-26T10:39:00.000-04:00

When we first moved to Los Angeles, in 1999, I had just found my natural mother and father. The decision to leave North Carolina, after finally finding my family, was not an easy one. However, I now see that staying in North Carolina after finding my parents would have been difficult. It is extremely weird in a lot of ways to find your parents after years of not knowing who or where they are. As a Steely Dan song says, "All at once, I know who I am . . . " Knowing who I am not not having to look in the mirror is a huge blessing that most people take for granted. Most people look in the mirror and think, "I look like my mom or my dad" or whatever. Looking in the mirror for over 34 years and finding that you don't know whom you look like is a strange kind of experience that's hard to explain when you're not adopted. Sometimes, you just pretend that the people who adopted you are your parents. It's often so much easier to pretend when you're adopted. It's much easier to lie to yourself because your life is often built on a lie. There are some people, including this lovely woman, who have adopted a child and are honest with that child, or in M's case, children. M doesn't pretend that she's a mother to the children that she adopted; she is honest with those children and I am sure that the children are benefiting as a result of her honesty. Adoption has been sold as such a wonderful thing, however, and as a "creator of families," that people believe it. In addition, mainstream media perpetuates the myth. When we first moved here, the Los Angeles Times printed my letters regarding adoption. After three years or so, they started ignoring them and stopped printing them. Why? My writing was no worse. I responded to articles and followed the guidelines, as I had previously.

It is no secret that mainstream media spews the propaganda that the power elite want us to believe. This problem has gotten increasingly worse over the past few years, as I witnessed with my adoption letters. I saw the same thing happen with Ron Paul. He was also ignored by mainstream media, despite the lovely and Constitutional messages that he was spreading. Those of us who have been writing letters telling the truth about adoption have similarly been dissed, as the media dictates thought through simply ignoring us.

Ah, but in today's Los Angeles Times, there is a lengthy "Column One" essay by a "Korean adoptee." No doubt, this adoptee is telling a fascinating story, about a woman who did an experiment in which she asked her classes to pretend that people with brown eyes are superior to those with blue eyes, to show the difficulties of "racism." Throughout the article, the adoptee says the right things about adoption, just the way that the Times wishes. She claims to be the "daughter" of "white parents," which is impossible if you're Asian (although one parent could be Asian in a natural family relationship, of course). The adoptee, who calls herself Corina Knoll and is evidently employed by the Times, talks about how she spent years "yearning to be white." Evidently, this yearning came from racism, of course, and not from the fact that she grew up in a family that wasn't her own. In fact, the adoptee goes to great lengths to talk about her "grandfather" and "mother." "My parents were liberal Democrats," this adoptee says, as if she's not at all adopted, as if God and nature simply plopped her Asian body into a Caucasian woman's womb. That's not the way things work and when people pretend that people brought together by adoption are equivalent to natural families, as the adoption industry so very much wishes us to do (and with help from propaganda machines, such as the Times), the truth suffers.

This story reminds me of something I heard on a local WUNC (NPR affiliate) show one night while I was in graduate school. After I'd finished working at the YMCA, I listened to a Korean adoptee talk about being raised in a Jewish family. She said she was surprised every time she looked in the mirror, that all around her she saw Jewish people and she was surprised to see her face, that she was not Jewish but Asian. Corina Knoll states in her Times story that "Race was not something we discussed in my family," even though her adopters also adopted a Korean boy. Although Knoll's points about racism may be valid, her seeming denial that adoption has had any effect on her and that growing up in a family that was not her own, with people who are not only in a different family but of a different ethnicity, seems to say much more about adoption than the Times seems to cover. I've given up the futile effort of sending a letter to the Times, but I do hope that what I write on my blog will make people think about the lies of adoption and urge people to seek and speak the truth.

One more thing: A few years ago, before the collectivist-thinking La Leche League decided my views weren't right and they didn't want me to associate with them, although I have exclusively breastfed my children, they were all gaga over this essay that I wrote about breastfeeding. They ended up publishing it in a book, which I now have too many copies of. When I read the published essay, however, it had been edited and gone was the part about how finding my mom and indeed, being without her physically in my life for a number of years, influenced my decision to breastfeed. A few pages later, a mother who'd lost a child to adoption and then kept one and breastfed her second child told about how she was okay with losing the first child. Yes, part of the reason that the La Leche League dissed me and my first book contract was dropped (although I was paid!) is because I am for natural families staying together. Evidently, the La Leche League has a problem with that.

Therefore, the adoption myths, that adoption is wonderful and great and that people can be made parents by signing legal documents and taking in a child that God and nature gave to someone else, continue. Gone are the moms who lost children to adoption and are pissed about it. Gone are the adoptees who have found our families and are pissed about the time we lost with them. Even though some of us have had great childhoods, nothing can make up for the loss of our parents. But you won't hear these thoughts in mainstream media. Nope. Our thoughts, our words are as silent in mainstream media as Ron Paul, even though we (and he) have a lot to say.

Trouble at Rent-A-Womb

2009-03-22T02:16:00.000-04:00

I don't mean to sound insensitive here and I know that many people have strong feelings about surrogacy, and further, that my views do not quite align with mainstream thinking, but I really don't like the idea of a woman's renting her womb so that another woman can have a child. I really don't. I can make all kinds of excuses, but the bottom line, as out of vogue as that seems, is that it's wrong. I think that taking a baby from a mother, as is done in adoption, is wrong, although the parties involved have been led to believe they are all doing a good thing.

I have visited a fertility doctor, one who made a "guarantee." The whole process seemed a bit cheesy somehow and I am thankful that I did not have to follow his advice to have my three beautiful sons. I know some who have gone through IVF and while I'm pretty much against this procedure for myself, I know lots of people who've done it successfully. It's not my cup of tea, but as long as the dad is using his sperm and the mom is using her eggs and not pretending that someone else's sperm or egg is the dad's or mom's, respectively, I'm fine with it. It's a difficult procedure and it requires a tremendous amount of dedication for success.

To me, there's just something wrong, however, with a person who gestates another human being for someone. Nonetheless, there is a story in today's Los Angeles Times about some people who've lost thousands of dollars because of some kind of fraud in a surrogacy group, SurroGenesis USA. The article, "Fears over surrogacy funds," seems not to be available without having to pay for it online.

I don't think surrogacy or adoption or abortion or any of that stuff should be regulated by the government. That said, surrogacy costs can be close to $100,000 these days and it just seems to me that when you want a child so badly that you're willing to spend that much, well, it just seems sad somehow. I hope that all those who are thinking about surrogacy will instead become pregnant on their own. I know that there's a brisk business in the surrogacy market, however, and I know that so many people are desperate and willing to pay. Evidently, an unscrupulous person took advantage of those who want to hire a surrogate and somehow lots of surrogate-payers had their money taken with no surrogate given, and lots of surrogates are not getting paid. It's very tempting to say that when you rent a womb, or try to, perhaps trouble should easily ensue.
I wish no ill to anyone and I hope that the fraud part of this case is resolved. Still, there is something very sad to me about a woman who would rent out her womb and there is something very sad about a woman who would ask her to.

Are Obama-ites Still Worshipping?

2009-03-19T19:48:00.000-04:00

Of course! In fact, even though the emperor with no clothes, Emperor Obama, has said that he would like to require community service, i.e., indentured servitude, for everyone, most Obama-ites are too busy panting to understand that their children and grandchildren may be as much of an indentured servant as those folks the so-called progressives have sought to abolish. The reality seems to be that servitude is soon coming to everyone, except, of course, the power elite who pull the strings for government puppets, such as Emperor O. Nonetheless, I am, according to that pacemaker of morality, Gary Hart, one of those weird-ass types who don't worship Emperor O. Thus, I am a terrorist and you may be as well. Well, not really, but according to the nouveau definition of terrorist, brought to you by your tax dollars (and some fiat money) to the Department of Homeland Security.

I received this lovely semi-missive in e-mail today:

House Passes Mandatory National Service Bill

The House passed a bill yesterday which includes disturbing language indicating young people will be forced to undertake mandatory national service programs as fears about President Barack Obama’s promised “civilian national security force” intensify.

The Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education Act, known as the GIVE Act, was passed yesterday by a 321-105 margin and now goes to the Senate.

Under section 6104 of the bill, entitled “Duties,” in subsection B6, the legislation states that a commission will be set up to investigate, “Whether a workable, fair, and reasonable mandatory service requirement for all able young people could be developed, and how such a requirement could be implemented in a manner that would strengthen the social fabric of the Nation and overcome civic challenges by bringing together people from diverse economic, ethnic, and educational backgrounds.”

Section 120 of the bill also discusses the “Youth Engagement Zone Program” and states that “service learning” will be “a mandatory part of the curriculum in all of the secondary schools served by the local educational agency.”

“The legislation, slated to cost $6 billion over five years, would create 175,000 “new service opportunities” under AmeriCorps, bringing the number of participants in the national volunteer program to 250,000. It would also create additional “corps” to expand the reach of volunteerism into new sectors, including a Clean Energy Corps, Education Corps, Healthy Futures Corps and Veterans Service Corps, and it expands the National Civilian Community Corps to focus on additional areas like disaster relief and energy conservation,” reports Fox News.

The Senate is also considering a similar piece of legislation known as the “Serve America Act,” which also includes language about “Youth Engagement Zones”.

Fears about Obama’s plans to create involuntary servitude were first stoked in July 2008, when Obama told a rally in Colorado Springs, “We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that is just as powerful, just as strong, just as well funded.”

Despite denials that Obama plans to institute a mandatory program of national service, his original change.gov website stated that Americans would be “required” to complete “50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year”. The text was only later changed to state that Americans would be “encouraged” to undertake such programs.

In addition, Obama’s Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, publicly stated his intention to help create “universal civil defense training” in 2006.

“The bill’s opponents — and there are only a few in Congress — say it could cram ideology down the throats of young “volunteers,” many of whom could be forced into service since the bill creates a “Congressional Commission on Civic Service,” reports Fox.

“We contribute our time and money under no government coercion on a scale the rest of the world doesn’t emulate and probably can’t imagine,” said Luke Sheahan, contributing editor for the Family Security Foundation. “The idea that government should order its people to perform acts of charity is contrary to the idea of charity and it removes the responsibility for charity from the people to the government, destroying private initiative.”

Lee Cary of the conservative American Thinker warns that Obama’s agenda is to, “tap into the already active volunteerism of millions of Americans and recruit them to become cogs in a gigantic government machine grinding out his social re-engineering agenda.”

CFR luminary Gary Hart hit back at critics, claiming in a Huffington Post piece that, “Resistance to expanded public service programs can be expected from the ideologically sclerotic, those who occupy the negative ground between government as the problem and government as our enemy.”

And so, we pesky Constitutional-oriented folks are now way, way, way out of line with a starving Leviathan. And remember, when the proverbial s--- hits the fan, I didn't vote Congress back in. And I voted for Ron Paul, whom the media conveniently left out of the presidential race. As our dwindling republic continues its path to pure socialism, with nary a cry from most people, I vote for freedom. Do you?

A Very Obama Country

2009-03-16T13:53:00.000-04:00

As many people are losing their jobs in the private sector, or rather, what's left of the private sector, the government is surely finding ways to absorb these folks into the public fold. In earlier times, by a better educated populace, we'd call this kind of thing socialism or more appropriately, communism. But it's all done by what Vox Day calls The Magic Negro and as a result, people are more than happy to accept it and simply call it Obamaism. Whatever the emperor speaks is okay and people are, of course, suffering enough that they don't particularly care that Obama is prolonging these economic bad times by commanding the government to print more money. It's pretty clear from this piece of propaganda in Forbes that fascism is not only accepted and embraced by people, but that no one dare speak its name. When the government makes public-private partnerships, you've got fascism. As this entry from Wikipedia shows, fascists favor collaboration and oppose excessive state intervention. In other words, let's all be nice and play together. Because the government says so.

The fascists made a moderate stance on the economy, effectively declaring that they favoured class collaboration while opposing excessive state intervention into the economy, and calling for pressure on industrialists and workers to be cooperative and constructive, saying:

As for economic democracy, we favor national syndicalism and reject State intervention whenever it aims at throttling the creation of wealth.[36]

We shall fight against technological and moral backwardness. There are industrialists who shun both technological and moral innovations. If they don't find the strength to transform themselves they will be swept aside. We must impress upon the workers, however, that it is one thing to destroy, and quite another to build. Destruction can be the work of an hour, but construction may require years or centuries.[37]

No one much cares any more that we are much less free than we were even ten years ago. As long as Emperor Obama is at the helm, people believe they can relax and rake in the government benefits. Mr. Thinking Mama and I are currently on COBRA insurance, which means that we are paying $1400 per month to be insured. Do I like this? Not particularly. And who knows what the future holds? It will be nice if Mr. Thinking Mama finds a job where he has insurance benefits, but if not, then we'll figure out something else. Unfortunately, the government has interfered way too much in the insurance business and premiums are extremely high these days. The solution, according to the Obama-ites is that the government must rescue us even more. Even intelligent folks believe this crap these days. With media continuing pro-Socialist propaganda and smearing or ignoring people who actually believe in the Constitution, such as Ron Paul, what else can we really expect?

A Stimulating Stimulus

2009-03-10T12:51:00.000-04:00

There's not a lot of time to write these days. Or rather, I'm not taking a lot of time to write. There are bigger proverbial fish to fry. Anyway, I did take a glance at the News and Disturber today and I found out that North Carolina, which has turned into some kind of totalitarian madhouse since we left, is now about to have its capital city, in which I lived for many years, receive a bit of stimulation for an already hungry police force. Now, I'll say that I've never had anything but good happen to me when Raleigh's finest have brushed by me, although I have gotten a few speeding tickets (mainly from lesbian police officers--they never let anyone get away with anything). Nonetheless, all local police departments these days seem to be into receiving federal money, either not realizing that money comes with strings attached or not caring that it does. Either way, the result is that the feds can dictate even more closely what local police departments do. And that is not good at all. Take a look at the story's sidebar and you'll see that quite a few North Carolina cities are sucking from the Obama teat (sorry for the visual on that one). It's a shame and there's no telling what kind of guidelines the feds will come up with for all this money they're doling out. The real mystery here, however, is how the News and Disturber has not bothered to mention a bit about how this stimulus package fits in with anything in the Constitution. I wonder if Obama's covered this whole Constitutional thing at all in relation to all the money he's been encouraging Congress to print so that the masses will feel more secure in their indentured servitude. Well, I try not to listen to his doublespeak; so, maybe I missed his speech on it.

Michelle Obama Serves at a Soup Kitchen and I Don't Care!

2009-03-06T12:41:00.000-05:00

Sung to the tune of "Jimmy Cracked Corn." Really, the Obamas are excellent at p.r. I wish I could remember right now, and I'm in a hurry so I'm not looking it up, where it says in the Bible that good deeds should be done in secret. A celebrity--and make no mistake, the Obamas are indeed that--can't say hi to a homeless person without somebody writing a press release about it. The Obamas can hardly sneeze without somebody calling their excrement holy and writing an article about it. Ron Paul, meanwhile, defends the Constitution at every chance he can get and no one seems to notice. Gosh, I wonder why I think that mainstream media is bought and paid for. But it's working--the sheep are following.

When A Child Is Like A Car

2009-02-01T12:00:00.000-05:00

In the very strange and money-grubbing world of adoption, the "best interests of the child" are so very often considered, if you listen to adoption lawyers and others who make their living through the separation of families. In this extremely sad story, the adopters retained possession, eventually, of a beautiful little girl and the real parents are left with only pictures. Of course, there's a well-paid adoption attorney waiting in the proverbial wings with comments:

“There are no winners in a contested adoption case,” said Richard Lifshitz, who represented the adoptive parents. “These cases are never easy because there is a child involved. A child is not a car that’s being repossessed; it’s a thriving, living, breathing little person. The child is what’s most important, and I know that’s what’s most important to my clients.”

Au contraire, Mr. Lifshitz, whose last name contains four letters that are entirely appropriate for what he does for a living. There is at least one winner: the adoption lawyer. A child is like a car in adoption cases. Or, as I've always heard: Possession is nine-tenths of the law. In this case, the mother went to a family separation agency, euphemistically called "A Baby to Love" in Illinois. Although the article does not go into detail about what the social wreckers there told the young woman, while salivating for her unborn child, they probably advised her to say that she was raped and that she didn't know who the father was. Remember who is in charge when a vulnerable mom goes to a family separation agency: the people who make the money off her baby. In this case, the mom gave away her rights to keep the baby (she will always be the child's only mother, of course), less than the Illinois-required 72-hour waiting period. However, the adopters live in South Carolina, where the 72-hour waiting period is not required. The mom signed the documents at 70.5 hours after giving birth. For those of who who believe that even 72 hours is enough to make the monumental decision to give up the right to raise your child, try giving birth. I'd say that six months or a year would be the proper allotted time. Ah, but then there would be no harvest of newborns and the adoption industry, a $1.6 billion business, would lose a tremendous amount of money.

This particular mom gave her newborn daughter to adopters and the adopters took their potential adoptee to South Carolina four days after the child's birth. The dad then found out about the daughter, as did the newborn's maternal grandparents. At eight months, the daughter was given back to her rightful family, with the supposedly wonderful adopters showing up at the real family's door, demanding the child. I know that I'm glad I don't live beside the adopters in their tony South Carolina neighborhood. What people indeed! They can always find another child; the mother can never replace her daughter.

Ah, but the adopters, with the help of the South Carolina Supreme Court repossessed their car, um adoptee, and now, with a grieving mother, father, and extended family in the background, they happily took their new little possession back to South Carolina. Can you imagine the stories that the adopters will tell regarding their new possession? "You won't believe what we had to go through!" "The mother wanted to take her back!" and such will be the playground talk that the adopters will tell anyone who'll listen. Once again, I'm thankful not to be their neighbor.

Obama Mania: Can Anyone See What's Really Happening Here?

2009-01-26T10:44:00.000-05:00

Okay, so I wrote down all the Obamaspeak that I possibly could from Tuesday's speech by the new Emperor, all the collectivist talk about how we must do things for the common good and such. Really, I was hoping all this Obama Mania would die down by now and that maybe, just maybe, people would stop judging Obama by his skin color and start looking at what he's actually doing. As an artist who tries to surround myself with other comics, writers, and other culturally enlightened folk, however, it's really difficult to deal with the fact that even at the library where I take my children for storytime, there is the underlying subtext that I'm supposed to worship at the Obama altar, just like everybody else. I don't buy it, anymore than I'd be worshipping at the Hillary altar because she's a woman or at the John Edwards altar (what an altar that would be!) because he's from North Carolina. When are people going to wake up and see that Emperor Obama is no different than Bush? The media fawn all over the new Emperor so much so that even the rather wonderful Jim Ladd from 95.5 FM, KLOS has gotten into Obama worship. People believe the propaganda that there is going to be change and that for some reason, hope will somehow come through. All because there is a man whose father is black in the White House.

My wonderful friend, Lenard, even published a poem about how wonderful it is that a black man is president. Well, maybe, but what truly amazes me is how, when blacks have supposedly made so many strides so that we are supposed to look beyond skin color, everyone is hypnotized by Emperor Obama's skin color. The same thing has also happened, by the way, at the Canoga Park Bowl comedy show, where I perform three times each week. Sandy Brown, last night's emcee, was joking about how that now all whites are going to be assigned to a plantation, now that a "brother" is in the White House. I welcome all political jokes, but the not-so-subtle text of all the heaping praise that Sandy was placing on the new Emperor is that everything is okay because a man of half-African ancestory occupies 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Nobody seems to care much about the Constitution, or the new Emperor's lack of respect for it. And few blacks seem to notice anything but Obama's skin color. Is this the social progress and justice that so-called liberals have been clamoring for these past few decades? Meanwhile, it's business as usual at the place where George Bush approved of the murders of so many innocent people, albeit on the other side of the world. It's okay, I suppose, if the children killed are not your own. One of the few refreshing people that I know who is questioning Emperor Obama's ascendancy on the throne previously occupied by King Jorge is the incredible Wilt Alston, a fellow North Carolinian in exile. On Facebook, he passed around this blog entry, which shows not only the level to which the media fawn over Obama--the link to "Executive Order" shows how the press is worshipping the very pen that the Emperor is using, but that Obama has indeed approved the first murder of his term, which included three children killed. Explaining this tragic event to my children was only too easy--they understood that three children, just like them but in another part of the world, had been murdered. Their understanding of this horrid event was so simple, so much clearer than the adults who are spending time in Obama worship. They saw three children who are dead because the new Emperor commanded it so. My children do not much care about the new Emperor's skin color, nor do they care about whether or not Obama's African ancestors may have been enslaved at some point in time; they merely care about those three children, who will never grow up because of a murder that was okay with Emperor Obama. Of course, the Emperor's children, as with King Jorge's children, will probably never see the horror of battle and they will probably never have to worry much about their security, being that they will have Secret Service protection. In the White House, then, things haven't much changed, really. Except for the color of skin of the occupant. State-ordered murder is still occurring. But everyone is so worshipful of our new Emperor that no one seems to notice the little things like murder. No one, that is, except the families of those three children who were murdered. The media are too busy taking pictures of pens to notice those three children. But my own three children, who will not have the Secret Service protection, the servants, and the ever-flowing money that comes to a family that occupies 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, my own three very alive children think about those three dead children, those three children who will never grow to adulthood. And they don't care at all about the skin color of the new Emperor.

Homeschooling: It Shows

2009-01-20T13:19:00.000-05:00

We were in line at Trader Joe's (TJ's) the other night and the cashier was talking to the boys. By the time we left, she'd talked quite a bit to the boys and she'd allowed them to scan some things, as the nice cashiers often do at TJ's, and she said, "Are they homeschooled?" At first, of course, I thought she was referring to the two bottles of wine that I'd bought, as in, "Most people who homeschool drink lots of wine; I've noticed that." And yes, homeschooling does have its moments where a bottle of wine or two looks really good to the parents. However, in this particular case, she seemed amazed that my boys seemed so intelligent, mature, and at ease in talking with adults. Turns out she was homeschooled herself and she claimed to be able to tell homeschooled children by the way that they act. I can relate to what she's saying. Although there are some real terrors amongst the children in the homeschooling community, there are many children who are quite fabulous indeed. I don't think much about it as I take the boys with me on my daily errands and as they freely interact with the adults and children that we see. However, I am sometimes reminded, as I was with this TJ's employee, that homeschooled children often do have a maturity level far beyond that of their government-schooled peers. I think it's probably because homeschooled children are not sequestered in a room and to a certain plot of land, deemed sacred by the school czars, all day. My children, as well as those of many other homeschoolers, receive lots of real-life experience; they don't sit around in the unrealistic atmosphere of a classroom all day, with 20 or so other students their age and one or two adults who are trying to fulfill federal government standards.

I'm not the only one who sees this difference. The lovely and intelligent writer Karen DeCoster sent this story my way:

Trish --

You may want to spread this great story to the homeschooling community.

God I love homeschooled kids!

I certainly agree with Karen's last sentence. And yes, most homeschoolers, not being bogged down by the ridiculous things that keep government schoolers behind gates all day, are free to explore, mature, and learn the way that nature intended.

Obama Mania--I'm sick of it!

2009-01-19T14:04:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow is the day that King Obama is officially annointed Messiah, Savior, Buddha, and whatever other religious entity that he will replace. As I've woken up to the increasing socialism that the New-World-Order-promoting elites are placing around us, at almost every turn, I continue to be amazed at the number of people, often with multiple degrees, who are sheep following Master Obama and his every move. Otherwise sensible and well-educated folks are acting as if he's somehow going to save us from whatever we need saving from. Not many seem to realize that he's plunging us into the very same socialism that George Bush, a.k.a. King Jorge, started. The Executive Orders overruling Congressional decisions were made by Bush; they'll be carried out by Messiah Obama. Speaking of Congress, did anyone happen to note that both Messiah Soul Man and Messiah Old Man (i.e., John McCain) voted to plunge our country and our descendants further into debt by bailing out private industries. Does anybody even care anymore?!? I'm tired of shouting. I'm tired of listening to National Propaganda Radio and the rest of mainstream media fawning all over Obama and finding reasons to write about him, even if it's something as lame as an article about what a good father he is (supposedly).

I want to hear Messiah Obama no more than I wanted (or want) to hear King Jorge. I am extremely disappointed that so many people have fallen for Messiah Obama's bull, just as they fell for King Jorge's (well, many of them fell for it). I am also extremely disappointed that no one seems to care much about the Constitution anymore. If anyone really cared, they'd be asking Messiah Obama about leaving our economy to work itself out through the free market and they'd be asking him to leave health care the hell alone. It's really sad how much people, even the supposedly intelligent ones, have been conditioned to gladly accept socialism and the New World Order that is quickly coming upon us. No one cares much about freedom anymore. Not many people remember Ron Paul or Peter Schiff, even though they are the only people I've heard in mainstream media speak the truth.

Welcome to Totalitarian 2009!

2009-01-02T15:46:00.001-05:00

Going to Palm Springs in the HO for New Year's Eve, the boys and I were treated to all the Amber Alert boards with the message of Texting is Illegal on January 1st, 2009. My freedom-oriented brain has tried hard to erase the exact quote, but that was the gist of it. Make no mistake: As much as those Amber Alerts often try to capture parents who've lost custody of their children or some such, which makes me dislike the whole Amber Alert system very much, when there is no supposed child to save from his or her parents, there is definitely socialism to promote. Funny how we passed an art gallery in Palm Springs that had a huge picture of King Obama, whom Vox Day calls The Magic Negro, with the word "Hope" under it. While people are focusing on how fabulous it is to have the first president who calls himself black (it is possible that some other presidents have had African ancestry), not many people are realizing that King Obama is just as socialist as his European antecedents. Some well-meaning homeschooling mom (most of whom are King Obama worshippers, at least around these parts) passed around some article saying that it seems as though King O. is a really good father, because he listens to his children, you see, instead of telling them what to do. If you're having trouble following that line of thought, by the way, I'll explain by saying that it's rumored that King O. espouses the right childrearing theory, as righteously deemed excellent by La Leche League members and many liberal, secular homeschooling moms. Although I've met some nice women who fit the preceding description, I've also met some real doozies. Although I support what the La Leche League does, I have found, by personal experience, that their organization is as biased and excluding as a private country club. If you doubt what I'm saying, think of how, if any, the La Leche League has courted Sarah Palin, even though she did the supposedly right things of carrying her newborn in a sling and of breastfeeding her youngest (and supposedly the others). You'd think they'd have her on the front cover. And I'm so disconnected from that organization that for all I know, they may have. But I'm not betting on it.

So, so, so, texting and talking on the cell phone while driving are now two ways that the state of California can now stop you. A very informal poll a few weeks ago by my Cardio Barre instructor, Richard, found that only one person out of about 60 mostly-San-Fernando-Valley-ites has been ticketed. I'm betting that these laws won't affect most of the people most of the time. But the horrifying thing is that they can affect all of us sometime. Most Oprah-watchers are so used to giving up freedoms that I don't even think they know that they're responsible for these laws, via their state representatives and senators.

More Prop. 8 Crap

2008-11-29T13:47:00.000-05:00

Mainly, I've written about Prop. 8 on my lesbian blog, but it's certainly time to bring it here. The economy's in shambles, the Constitution is all but gone, but by golly, none of that seems to matter if gay people have the supposed right to marry a person of the same sex. The more I hear from the Gay Agenda Persons (GAPs), the more I'm sick of them. Or as David Manos, editorial letter writer in the L.A. Times, so succinctly put it: The left believes in freedom of speech and tolerance, as long as you march in lock step with their beliefs. I say: Amen!

According to the editorial letters, and I did not read the original story, a man named Richard Raddon, Director of the Los Angeles Film Festival, lost his job after he contributed $1,500 to the Yes on Proposition 8 people. Yes on Proposition 8 means that state-approved marriage should remain between a man and a woman. For this contribution and his support of keeping state-approved marriage as the definition that has existed for centuries, Raddon was somehow forced to resign. Imagine if the situation had been reversed and a GAP had been fired or forced to resign. Everyone from the Gay and Lesbian Anti-Defamation League to the Southern Poverty Law Center would have been suing the Los Angeles Film Festival. Ah, but Raddon had a belief that, despite centuries of support, was not politically correct. Many GAPs wrote in to let the Times know their displeasure. Two of the letters, of course referred the the "civil rights" of gays and lesbians in marrying a person of the same sex, redefining marriage and family. As my readers know, I am very much against state approval for any marriage; marriage is a sacrament between a man and a woman and God or whomever or whatever. However, opponents of Prop. 8 wish to redefine not only marriage but also the very idea of family. And here's where I beg to differ. God and nature, or nature if you're an atheist, have created the family as being between a man and a woman. Pro-adoptionists started messing with this natural relationship a hundred years or so ago when they began the idea of stranger adoption of infants and children. With such a background, it is no wonder that gay people demand the supposed right to take other people's children and call them their own, or the supposed right to allow an anonymous father to help create a child and then shut the dad out of the child's life forever. This is the kind of social entropy that most gay people fight tooth and proverbial nail to keep, assuring us the whole time that taking a child from its natural parents or giving it a step-mom instead of its real father is highly beneficial for the child and for society in general.

The thing about GAPs is that they portray themselves as victims. My desire to have a family was extremely strong and I realized that if I continued only having sex with women, the family thing would not happen for me. I didn't particularly get angry about this law of nature; I accepted it. It certainly helped, of course, that I was brought up in a community where marriage was highly valued. And it helped that I also dated guys. Sure, I'm a lesbian, but I have choices. Although what I'm about to write certainly is contradictory to the crap that women have been sold with the so-called feminist movement: You can't have your cake and eat it too. Those of us who realize this, and who are against the state's expansion of approval for marriage, for whatever reason, are often called bigots and homophobes and other not very nice names by those who claim to be so very very tolerant. Perhaps Jeff Iorillo, another Times editoral letter writer, expresses the GAP philosophy best with his writing:

Prop. 8 supporters like Richard Raddon financed a lynch mob that strung me up, declared me less human than themselves and robbed me of something I previously had. It is certainly my right to identify such people and to close my wallet to the businesses that provide the income they have used against me.

While my ancestors, to my knowledge, have never been on the receiving end of any lynch mobs, were I of an ancestory besides mainly European, I'd probably be laughing this guy all the way to Africa, laughing at his ignorance of the situation that many people faced one hundred or more years ago. To associate the supposed struggle of people who are attracted to the same sex to those who have been beaten, lynched, and otherwise chastised for the color of their skin and their ancestory is quite an affront to those whose ancestors truly have suffered lynch mobs. Not having state approval of your marriage seems quite pale in comparison to actually being lynched and killed because of your color. Right now, the boys and I are reading Mark Twain's Puddin'head Wilson, a book I highly suggest to show how those of even the smallest inkling of African ancestory have been treated. Are gay people afraid of being sold "down the river," as Roxy in Twain's story was? Does Mr. Iorillo actually fear that someone is going to come to his house and drag him out and hang him? Is Mr. Iorillo truly less than human simply because the state won't approve his marriage? GAPs are people who love being victims. Fortunately, there are gay people who are not victims, but we are much too scarcely represented.

To equate the supposed struggle of gay people to that of any race of people who have suffered is bizarre indeed. Nonetheless, the GAPs will continue to do this until they have completely undone the natural family relationships that have been okay for society since it began. If I want to share my life with a person of the same sex, I can certainly do so. In the state of California, there is nothing to my knowledge that can be done by those who have state approval for marriage, that can't be done by those who do not have it. The trouble really began when the state started licensing marriage.

I'm really tired of the GAPs and their intolerance for the beliefs of others. Just the other day, I talked to a lesbian on the phone and she was telling me how the relationship that she'd just gotten out of, with a woman, was one that she'd hoped "to have a family" with. That's how stupid we've become as a society. Two women can do lots of wonderful things together, but having their own family is not one of them. The thing about GAPs, of whom not all gay people are, is that GAPs want to change society and the rules of nature. As my Jewish friends would say: Oy-vay!

A Birthday Blessing

2008-11-24T03:49:00.000-05:00

November is a month of birthdays here at the Gingerbread House. What a pleasant surprise that I received while celebrating one of them today. One of the guests, with whom I used to be in a homeschool group, said that I've "ruined" her zest for adoption. She can no longer be happy when a friend of hers decides to take someone else's child and call it her own. In other words, I'm succeeding in speaking the truth. This one person, a mom of three, can never quite accept the brainwashing of the adoption industry, a $1.6 billion business.

She also mentioned that a friend of hers, who lost a child to adoption about 12 years ago, still mourns for her lost child. "It seems worse than death," said my friend. Perhaps it is, according to the moms who've lost a child to adoption. I'm thankful that I cannot state an understanding of either loss and I hope that I never will experience either. Having said that, I can see how the loss of a child who's out there, somewhere, might be much more difficult than knowing that a child is dead, horrible as that last scenario would be. With death of a child, there is closure; people mourn and are sensitive to a mother's mourning. With adoption, people congratulate the mother for "doing the right thing" by giving her child to someone else. The stress of having a personal mourning that no one else shares, and, in fact, having people tell you that you should be grateful for your loss, seems like an especially cruel thing indeed. I mean no offense to anyone who's lost a child, either by death or by adoption. Having said all of this, I know certainly that I'd rather my child be alive than dead, even if adopted out. I'm not even saying that I agree that adoption is worse than death; again, I don't want to experience either event. I am merely saying here that I understand how adoption, in today's climate of selling children, can be its own special hell that is very close to death of a child. In fact, a child does somewhat die to its natural family in adoption; years later, if a child is resurrected through reunion, things will never be the same as if the child had been left with the family.

I am thankful for my friend's new understanding of the adoption industry. That's how we change the world regarding adoption; one friend at a time.

And Here's What I Think About Arkansas

2008-11-12T11:30:00.000-05:00

There was some bill, and I didn't read it but just heard about it, or proposition or whatever they call it, in Arkansas on Election Day that forbade single people from adopting. It passed. I'm all for it. Why? Not because I don't think that single people could adequately raise a child; some can. My friend Tish, for instance, had a baby nine months after Caleb and although it's difficult for her and the dad is now out of the scene for the most part, she's doing great. From what I understand, the proposition on the ballot was aimed at preventing gay people from adopting. Why is this good? Certainly not because I don't think that gay people are capable of raising children; we are in some cases. The reality is that many, many gay people don't want to raise children, which works out nicely in many cases. For those who do, however, it should be their own child, not someone else's. I used to think, before I found my parents and did research into the adoption industry, that it would be great if gay people who want to be with the same sex adopted all the children who need homes. This idea won't work, of course, partly because of a previously stated reason, i.e., that many gay people don't want children. However, a more important thing to note is that there are 40 potential adopters waiting for each adoptable infant. Make no mistake: this demand for babies is why the states are trying to increase the supply through so-called safe haven laws, which are backfiring in states such as Nebraska, where people are bringing teenage children to the fire station to abandon because those teenagers cause problems. The demand for children far exceeds the supply. Therefore, we should not add to the demand by allowing more people to adopt. Do I think that the state should have any say whatsoever in the adoption business? Nope. But not increasing the demand for children is a good thing indeed.

How The Election Affects Me

2008-11-05T10:33:00.000-05:00

I celebrated my birthday Monday and I was born on Election Day. We had a wonderful time at the Gingerbread House.

On my birthday, however, we had to take our new dog to have him neutered. Why? Our next-door neighbor, who threatened to call Child Protective Services the other day when our five-year-old would not come to her when she called him . He's been told not to talk with her and instead of going to her, he came into the house and told me about the incident. She has been threatening to call the Animal Control people and of course, being in the police state that we live in, it's easy to turn in a neighbor falsely. True, our dog has barked but no more than other neighborhood dogs. It's clear that this neighbor has something against us and she seems to be trying to get us to sell our house and move. She was a government school teacher for many years and my guess is that she's so brainwashed that she can't stand it that my children are homeschooling. So, she threatens us. And she calls Animal Control. Turns out, in Los Angeles County, if you don't have your dog neutered and licensed, you could end up in jail. That's right:

Failure to spay/neuter an unaltered dog is a citable violation that can result in a $100 penalty for the first offence and $500 for subsequent violations. In addition (sic) failure to license can result in the assessment of a $500 civil penalty, and dog owners could be found guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of up to $1000 and/or one year in county jail.
Yep. Or as Mr. Thinking Mama put it:
"Whatcha in here for?" said the murderer to another inmate.
"Didn't neuter my dog."

In a police state, everybody is a lawbreaker and the law has a huge advantage because of that. We live in a police state. A neighbor can hold a grudge against you and your dog or your children can be taken away. For the record, almost everyone in the neighborhood seems to despise this woman and she has made a lot of people mad. If she continues to mess with us, we are planning to get a restraining order against her and/or sue her for damages.

So, that's much more important to me than who won the presidency. No matter who won, life in socialist Amerika will pretty much continue toward more socialism. On a homeschool list the other day, it was almost forbidden to say anything against King Obama, whom Vox Day calls The Magic Negro. And forget it when I tried to say anything about voting "Yes" on Proposition 8, which I did. I also voted against some proposition that required minors to obtain parental permission before having an abortion. I think that if a person is old enough to get pregnant, she is old enough to make a decision about having an abortion. And I think that if parents want their children to come to them about such an important decision, those parents should have earned trust when the children were toddlers, or earlier. You can't legislate trust between parent and child. You just can't do it.

There was Proposition 2, which seemed to be against animal cruelty, or so it was marketed. It allows the government more control over private property, which people, such as my strange neighbor, seem to welcome.

So, so, so, how does it shake down that King Obama will now reign in the place of King Jorge? King Obama, via Executive Orders, will be able to institute martial law just as well and he'll be able to screw up health care by nationalizing it. He's already voted to do that with the banks.

Oh, but government needs to help out in social issues, such as slavery, said one brainwashed homeschooling mom. Really, I sort of hate learning how these women really look at things sometimes.

As for me, I wrote in Ron Paul. The boys and I and Mr. Thinking Mama were in the polls as they closed. I asked for a write-in ballot and the poll workers had to ask their leader about how to do it. I guess that I may be the only one in my neighborhood who voted for Ron Paul. But I wrote him right in that ballot, proudly, even though he's not officially running. I didn't vote for either of the two-major-party socialists and my children will always remember that I voted for freedom.

As for King Obama, well, he's leading us to socialism, just like McCain, but the difference is that no one really cares. After all, he'll be the first black president! Therefore, no white people can really say anything against him or they'll be branded racist. And I'd love to meet a black person who didn't support him. I hope that those black people exist, just as you can find some women who didn't vote for Hillary.

As King Obama leads us down the primrose path toward Communism, people will throw palm leaves down for him to walk on. Personally, I couldn't care less about his skin color; I care a LOT about the socialism and huge national debt that he will leave for my children, for the health care that he is trying to destroy, and for the nationalized banks, which he has already wholly supported. Sigh. But he's black, so everything's wonderful in Amerika.

A Letter from an Adoptress (Finally Updated!)

2008-10-18T14:52:00.000-04:00

Now, before I start this entry, I'd like to say that I've heard from lots of adopters since I've been writing about adoption. I've heard from adopters who wished ill on my children and on me; I've heard from adopters who urged me to adopt a child; I've even heard from adopters who somewhat agreed with me. So, so, so, maybe all that kind of thing is why this letter has me so perplexed. The writer wishes not to be identified, which I completely respect. I'll call her M:

I enjoy reading your blog and was hoping you wouldn't mind my asking you a question.
>
According to the laws of our and another country, I am an adoptress of two
little girls. Now, I do NOT call myself a parent. I am NOT their mother and
they are not allowed to call me "Mama" or "Mom" or "Mommy" or anything like
that; I am Miss XXX and I am an adoptress. Likewise, my husband is NOT their
father. Our parents are NOT allowed to call themselves grandparents and the
girls are not allowed to call them as such. Our siblings are not allowed to
call themselves Aunt or Uncle. We are NOT their "forever family".
>
Their mother is dead; she died giving birth to them. We have continued
contact with their father and family, including siblings and uncles, in the
country in which they were born; THEY are their forever family. We visit 4
times a year for 2 weeks at a time and are making preparations to move to
that country so that they can grow up surrounded by their own culture and so
that they can know their family. I am not naive enough to believe that this
will, in any way, make up for having been removed from their country
originally and it will in no way be the same as if they were growing up as
natives, with their parents. I realized too late my mistake in wanting to
raise a child (the adoption had been finalized, but we hadn't yet traveled)
and will spend the rest of my life attempting to make up for it for these
little girls. I wish I could undo the past, but I can't. Before we left the
country with the babies, we met secretly with their father with our own
interpreter and asked him to please take the babies back, that we would pay
for all of the medical care that they needed and support his entire family
for the rest of their lives if he would only take them back and raise them
(it would have taken so little from us to make this possible, and we are not
wealthy by any means). Sadly, he considered them expendable; five children
were enough. If they had been boys, I'm sure it would have been a different
story. And if their mother had survived, I'm sure she would have gladly
brought them back to her bosom.
>
The problem we are having now is that these little girls, who are now 3 and
have been with us since they were 5 months old (they are twins), are
starting to ask why they can't call us "Mommy" and "Daddy". They don't
understand why nephews and nieces can call their grandparents "Grandma" and
"Grandma", but we won't let them do so. They know they have a Daddy, they
know they have brothers and sisters and uncles. We send letters and pictures
and drawings and there are photographs up all over the house. They know that
they were "adopted". They know other "adopted" children via cultural events
and ask why they call their adopters "Mommy" and "Daddy" but we won't allow
them to do the same. They even know a foster child who calls his guardian
"Mama".
>
Needless to say, we are not very popular in the "adoption" community, which
is okay with me, but the girls are starting to wonder why they can never go
to so-and-so's for a play date. Why some of the children are starting to
tell them that their "Mommy and Daddy" don't want them playing with them
because their adopters are "crazy". Even though we are only the adopters, we
do love them and it hurts us to see them struggle with this. Sometimes, I
want to cave and just say "it's just a name", but then I read yours, and
others', blogs, and realize that it is NOT just a name and I want to honor
that. I want to honor their mother. I want to honor their father. I bought
the privilege of raising them (when I was doing it, I didn't think about it
this way, as I had bought the story the agency gave us about why fees had to
be charged, but I know now that I DID buy them). I bought the privilege of
reading bedtime stories, kissing boo-boos, making cookies, doing their hair,
teaching them to read. I don't need to be called by a name that I will never
know (I've been in menopause since I was 13; I have premature ovarian
failure and, instead of going through puberty, I got to have hot flashes).
Don't get me wrong, if I COULD be a parent, I would love to be a parent. It
just will never happen, and I was okay with that before I even graduated
from high school. I did, however, want to raise children and thought that
this would be an okay way to do it. I do know that I was wrong, dreadfully,
horribly wrong, but I can't fix it. All I can do is try to do better for
these girls and work to make sure that other children do not suffer from the
naivete of adopters like myself, or even from the adopters who do realize
what they are doing and try to pretty it up.
>
We are also not very popular in our family, who don't seem to understand why
they are not allowed to take on names that don't belong to them. But, they
are adults and they can deal with it. My only concern is for these girls.
How can I help them around this issue? Do you have any ideas for "names" to
call adopters that would respect the girls' family while at the same time be
palatable to those, like yourself, who were taken/bought/stolen from their
parents? They are starting to just want to be like everyone else, and I'm
sure this will only become more difficult as they get older. What would have
helped you understand this at their age? Am I contributing to the problem
without seeing it? (I am only human and while I am trying, I make mistakes
and will make plenty more before my time on this earth is through.) These
girls didn't ask for this. In fact, they deserve so much better than this. I
know I made the mistake, but is there anything I can be doing to help them?
>
I would be very thankful for any thoughts you may have and I support your
work wholeheartedly. I believe that this system IS broken. It doesn't serve
the children, and it doesn't serve the mothers. It only serves the adoption
industry and adopters like myself. And I tell my girls that it was wrong,
that my husband and I were wrong (in an age-appropriate way, of course; the
older they get, the more blunt I will become about what it was that I and my
husband did). I was just so naive. I remember learning from the social
worker that their birth certificates would have OUR names on them, and I
actually thought I could just ask them not to change the names of their
parents, to leave them on there. It made no sense to me! I made color copies
of their birth certificates and then changed the copies to put their
parents' names back on there. I know that they aren't "legal" birth
certificates, but they are the truth.
>
I am so sorry that anyone has to go through that which you and so many
others have been.
>
> Sincerely yours,
M.

Thinking Mama responds:
Gosh, if you're reeling from that letter, you're not alone. If M. could spread 1/100th of her understanding about the adoption industry to the rest of the adopters in her community, well, that would certainly be a start in stopping stranger adoption, wouldn't it?

M. seems to understand and believe what those of us who have been separated from our natural families by adoption have slowly and steadily been realizing. I admire the strength that M. seems to show; surviving menopause as a teenager and being able to rise from that extremely difficult situation shows great fortitude. Like many women, however, M. believed the lies of the adoption industry. It is hard not to believe those lies, just as it is hard to believe that the government might not have our best interest in mind when bailing us out and turning our banks into Fascist institutions. Anyone who reads through mainstream media's propaganda, whether it be about adoption or about the Federal Reserve, shows a certain amount of true open-mindedness that most people in our brainwashed society, unfortunately, never achieve.

It is important to remember, however, that neither M. nor I nor any of those of us who've woken up about adoption can force change on those who are still asleep. I can partially understand M.'s plight of having to be around adopters when her beliefs are so different; I can understand it from an adoptee's point of view but not from an adopter's. Her courage in this situation seems especially admirable.

Regarding nomenclature, which, after all, is the question that she asked, I can totally relate to the confusion that adoption causes. I experience this very confusion each time that I go to North Carolina, when I visit the very dear and wonderful friends that I grew up with and they are calling Beauford and Ann, the wonderful people who, like my natural mother and father, were fooled by the adoption agency into believing that I could be "as if" born to them. Needless to say, avoiding the very issues of which M. speaks, I grew up calling Beauford and Ann "dad" and "mom," even though we all knew that they are not my real parents. Having grown up with this particular nomenclature, and having not grown up with my natural mother and father, it often seems strange to call my real father "dad," even though that's exactly what he is. Perhaps there is something about language that is formed before the conscious mind is very developed that makes us cling to the people whom we call mom and dad, whether that nomenclature is indeed correct or not. M., very admirably, is trying to keep things honest with the children that she is obviously very much helping. Remember that she tried to give those children back to their real dad but that he, swooned either consciously or unconsciously, by the adoption industry, refused to take them. Raising those children seems indeed the right thing for M. to do at this point. They are very lucky to have someone so honest in their lives.

Having said that, I can understand that M.'s parents and parents-in-law fully desire to believe the lies of adoption, as most people do. If there is one thing I've learned since I found my real parents it is that the truth is often more difficult to live with than lies. One reason that I think I lost many of my adopted friends when I found my natural parents is that those friends find it much easier to live with lies: They are right. It is often unsettling to speak the truth, as Ron Paul has discovered throughout his campaign for President and his tenure as a Representative. People want the lies; perhaps this is the way that things have always been: Those who crucified Jesus wanted to believe lies over the truth. Perhaps we have a natural tendency to want to believe lies, a tendency that is difficult to overcome. But what about when those lies about your family, the people that you grow up with, the people whom you trust with your very life?

This is the conundrum with which the current adoption industry, a $1.5 billion business, has saddled us. My attempts to tell people the truth have been met with all sorts of dismay, as I have partly described previously. People would rather believe all kinds of things than see the truth. I think it's a part of human nature to want to take the easy way out. It is much easier to believe the pablum of mainstream media than to think for ourselves and do our own research. Perhaps those who do think for themselves have always been ostracized.

Nonetheless, let's get back to the question and to my answer. I have had to come up with my own solution to this problem and it is one that works for me. It is interesting that after I found my parents, I moved across the country, to a place where I'd only visited a couple of times. Here, I can be anyone I want to be. Where I grew up, I'm often known as "Beauford's daughter" by well-meaning and wonderful people. If I lived there all the time, I would have to come to terms with this all the time, as I did as a child. I am convinced that many adoptees accept the lies of adoption simply because they do not want to face the pain of the truth.

New Part:
Here's the tactic that I am taking. I am mentioning this not to suggest that it be M.'s path, but only to suggest that this is one option. Granted, I moved 3,000 miles away, to a place where I could totally reinvent myself with the truth this time. In other words, I don't have relatives out here and when I talk about my mom and dad, it's my real mom and dad. I don't have to pretend and I don't have to worry about people who might still believe the lies. This option of moving 3,000 miles away is not for everyone. :) When people talk about the adoption industry's version of my life, I will say that it's bothersome. Some people whom I really like do this and I'm not going to stop hanging around them just because they're used to calling Beauford my "dad." On the other hand, it really bothers me and I may hang out with these people less because of it. What will happen if I correct them? If they're older, and many of them are, I figure that it's hard for them and I don't press the issue. But I may, with my children, say something like, "X calls Beauford my dad; a lot of people do, and even though he did a wonderful job of raising me, he's not my real father," or something similar. Sometimes I let it go, but my children and husband know what the truth is. I feel comfortable with this and it may be something that M. may want to try: Letting it go and letting the people who are around those children call the children what they want. As long as the children know the truth, that's all that really matters.

That said, I proudly call people who aren't really my aunts "Aunt." There is one person who grew up with me and is like a sister to me; so my children call her Aunt, even though she is not. Aunt and Uncle are indeed used to indicate relationships with people who aren't blood relatives and as long as we know that's the case, everything is fine. I feel the same way about Grandma and Grandpa. My children know that there are two grandpas and two grandmas for every child; they know who there grandparents are. However, they call a few lucky women "Grandma," even though we all know that's not their real grandma. As terms of endearment, these things work fine. I call my husband, "Daddy," for instance, even though he is not my real dad, of course. :) For sanity's sake, M. might want to take this attitude with people, giving them what they understand but also knowing in her heart and knowing in the hearts of those children that she seems to be doing such a fine job of raising, what the truth really is. As long as she and the children follow this truth, I think that all will be well. What hurt me the most as a child was the pretending. M. is not pretending, although other people around her are, and the children will know and appreciate the truth because of M.'s devotion to it. M. might want to say something like, "X and Y know that you're not their real grandmother, but you are and will always be a special person to them and they want to call you something special." Perhaps you can both decide on a name that works, such as "nana." Another option is, of course, is for M. to distance herself from her family, which may or may not be an easy thing for her.

I hope that I've answered the questions sufficiently; if not, please let me know. I feel slightly awkward answering such questions being that I haven't fully worked out all the name stuff myself. I am still pondering changing my last name to my birth name, but part of me fears changing my identity, whom I've become. This adoption stuff is never easy and the birth certificate thing is horrendous (I try never to use my falsified birth certificate.) and families are often hurt for generations by it. M. seems like a wonderful woman and those children are lucky to have her in their life. I wish M. the best of luck with this dilemma and much good fortune in working out the details. As far as I'm concerned, M. is doing a wonderful thing for those of us separated by adoption, merely by listening to us. If anybody deserves a restful and happy sleep tonight, it's M.

Where are the Christians?

2008-10-12T10:30:00.000-04:00

As we've been traveling around Los Angeles and its surrounding areas this week, I can't help but wonder how many people even understand that we no longer live in a free country. America has become a dictatorship and yet, life goes on. We did see, on the way back from the Santa Ana Zoo last week, protestors peacefully chanting, with a drum playing in the background, at South Coast Plaza in Orange County. They were for Ron Paul! We blew the horn. My children noticed them first, as I was driving. But for the rest of Southern California? I haven't seen much change. In Trader Joe's last night, I noticed people buying regular stuff; we were buying a little extra, for an emergency stockpile. Some people are predicting food riots in a couple of weeks or so. I want us to be prepared. No one seems too concerned that CONgress no longer exists as representatives of the people (I know that the proper senatorial role was deleted long ago, when the people started electing senators, not the state legislators, the latter of which the Founding Fathers set up.)

I heard a lot about World Government and the Mark of the Beast when I was growing up in the Southern Baptist Church. Although we don't attend church as much as I did growing up, mainly because our church is in North Carolina and we are not, I do wonder what preachers are preaching these days. Our pastor, Preacher Kenny, preaches the Bible. Still, so very many people in the place where I grew up believe in the Middle Eastern Bogeyman and Bush's efforts to control said bogeyman. So, so, so, I wonder if anyone is dissin' Bush in North Carolina these days, although he has ushered us into a police state and is this very weekend giving us over to a World Government, as he meets in an Emergency Summit. This economic crisis is just as contrived as the 9/11 crisis, although no one has, technically, lost a life in this particular crisis. Nonetheless, the results will be the same: Less freedom, more people-approved socialism, and more dependence on other nations.

Where are the Christians and why is no one speaking up from the Southern Baptist Conference? Could it be that Bush has bought and sold all the big players? After all, the Southern Baptists couldn't even agree to pull all their children out of the government schools. What a shame. What a real shame.

Take a look at this video and perhaps you will see that the New World Order is upon us. It's too bad that many of the people from my church and community don't have Internet access and rely on mainstream media propaganda to form their opinions. And for those who are behind Messiah Obama and think that his change is good, well, you will get what you deserve.

While Rome Burns . . .

2008-10-07T04:54:00.000-04:00

Oh, sure, it's easy to see how we can be distracted from all this bailout bill stuff, which is so very hard to understand, especially the part where King Jorge has encouraged CONgress folks, regular people all, to make Henry Paulson the Economic Dictator of the United States. Regular folks seem fine with it.

So we go on this week: two of my sons have Cub Scout popcorn to sell, we are still reeling and thankful to be doing so, after an accident on the 101 last week, en route to the Canoga Park Bowl Comedy show, left us with a punctured gas tank and a torn muffler and three healthy children and their happy-to-be-alive mama. Nothing much happened after I ran over the object on the freeway. Sparks flew from the car in front of me, which I saw run over the object. I had about two seconds to react. I could have, of course, swerved to miss it. But what cars would I hit? And my friend Lenard's daughter died after swerving and trying to get back on the highway, her car losing control and hitting a tree, killing her instantly. Would the boys and I have survived a swerve? Likewise, the thought later occurred to me that I could have instantly put on my brakes, to try and avoid the object. That option, however, may have caused the car(s) behind me to slam right into me, possibly injuring all of us. In those two or so seconds, I am thankful that I did not have time to think: I ran over the object. I could tell that something was wrong with the HO's (Honda Odyssey) muffler and as I was calling Mr. Comic Mom/Thinking Mama, I started smelling gas. The smell seemed to increase in intensity. As I took the nearest exit, Woodman Avenue, I had no idea whether or not the car was going to blow up. I tried hard not to think about it. I stopped and got the boys out. Lots of things could have happened but nothing terrible did. Gas leaked at a rapid rate out of my tank. The fire department (thanks, station 102!) was happy to come and contain the gas so that it would not burn. And AAA came and towed the car away. $1200 later, I am more thankful than ever to be writing these words so easily. When I picked up the HO from Paul's, a wonderful automobile shop near the Gingerbread House, he said he'd seen evidence of lots of cars that ran over something on the 101, with devastating results.

So we have a fascist government?

I like to think that fascism can easily be resolved, but death, not so much. On the other hand, fascism is certainly a problem. And whether we're dead or alive, conscious of the fact or not, willing to do something about the situation or not, we now live under a fascist government. I'm thankful to be alive and living under it, of course, as opposed to being dead and living under it.

The real problem is, however, that not many people care about the fascist government or even know about it. People who were ready to burn Wall Street two weeks ago have settled back into their cushy computer chairs. They may even forget about this nasty bailout stuff in a couple of weeks, when the election comes and goes. Not many traitors will be voted out and none will be executed, no doubt. Washington takes care of its own. I greatly admire Brad Sherman, my own Representative, for telling Congress that he and others were threatened, some with Martial Law, if this bill was not passed. Whoever thought that C-Span would be so very ignored?

Things are much better now, of course, now that the government has agreed to take care of everybody and solve all the problems of the economy. That's happening, right? And not many regular folks know that there is no possible government oversight of Paulson, according to this new law. We have all the information in the world at our fingertips, but it seems not to have made us one iota smarter.

More Adoption Lies

2008-10-03T08:49:00.001-04:00

It shouldn't surprise me that the News and Disturber has run a story that's so very pro-adoption and pro-adopters, calling the adopters, of course, "parents" and not mentioning the inherent damage that adoption itself and separation from his natural family may have caused this young man who died such a tragic death. Instead of reporting truth, the story itself was filled with instances of how his "parents" were trying to provide "nurturing." Only a few paragraphs into the story did I learn that the "parents" to which the author was referring were not parents of Josh, the young man who was killed; rather, they were adopters. Would it have been too honest to report "Adopters tried to provide nurturing"? What about mentioning Josh's natural parents? Was any attempt made to contact them concerning his death? As usual, in adoption-related stories, the lies and harms of adoption were merely swept under the proverbial rug, as if everything was hunky dory and Josh was lucky to have been severed from his natural family and placed with people who pretended to be his parents. Now, for those who are wondering, I do not say that Josh would have been better off with his natural family; perhaps his adopters were much better for him. It is indeed impossible in such adoption scenes to figure out what would have happened and although I have met and corresponded with many mothers who lost a child to adoption and later found that the child was abused in his or her adoptive home, each case is different. But why lie? Did it do me any good to grow up calling my own adopters "parents" and pretending that they were indeed related to me? If adoption is such a wonderful thing, why lie about it? There's nothing wrong with taking in a child who is truly needy, especially if all attempts to keep that child in his or her natural or extended family have been exhausted. But why lie and pretend that the people who adopt can be made parents by legal documents?

The truth is that adoption separates and tears apart thousands of families each year. The harm inherent in the process itself is rarely discussed in mainstream media these days. In addition, the natural parents are usually forgotten or described as abusive and neglectful. We rarely, if ever, hear from a child's natural family when adoption has occurred. One wonders in this case if Josh's natural family even knew about his death.

What a shame that this young and troubled man died, but what else can we expect from a system that rips children from parents and pretends those parents never existed?

Is Congress This Dumb?

2008-10-02T17:49:00.000-04:00

I hate to say it, but it seems as though Congress indeed is this dumb. I'm proud to say that Brad Sherman, our California Rep., with whom I often disagree, seems to be committed to a "no" vote on the now-increased bailout. However, as this story shows, adding even more money to this bailout seemed to entice some Congress Critters to a "yes" vote:

GOP Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, said she was switching her "no" vote to a "yes" after the Senate added some $110 million in tax breaks and other sweeteners before approving the measure Wednesday night.

"Monday what we had was a bailout for Wall Street firms and not much relief for taxpayers and hard-hit families. Now we have an economic rescue package," Ros-Lehtinen told The Associated Press.

This lawmaker's stupidity is absolutely amazing! Make the plan more socialist, make the burden more on our descendants, and suddenly, it's an "economic rescue package."

Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri was switching, too, said spokesman Danny Rotert, declaring, "America feels differently today than it did on Friday about this bill."

At least this guy, spokesman Danny Rotert, shows his ignorance in grammar (psssst, buddy, it's "feels different" unless people are actually feeling of the bill itself or literally touching something in a different way), as well as in economics.

But Danny, despite his half-witted attempt at grammar, is right about one thing: I'm not receiving nearly as many e-mails as I did earlier in the week. Why aren't people just as incensed? Has the mainstream media's campaign to make an economic dictator out of Henry Paulson, as Will Gregg so eloquently pointed out that this bill will do, succeeded? I've yet to read Ron Paul's name in an L.A. Times or other mainstream article; so, I'm assuming that people are believing the idiotic pablum that mainstream media are feeding us regarding this measure. Or maybe it was the Senate's vote of approval, which included both presidential frontrunners, Traitor Obama and Traitor McCain.

Am I the only one worried about this country? Does anyone else realize that giving our economic reigns, no matter how much security we're promised, to the government places us under the government's control? Does anyone even understand this concept anymore?

More Bailout Stuff

2008-09-30T15:28:00.001-04:00

I am truly thankful that the House narrowly defeated the $700 billion forced socialism legislation yesterday. However, I'm wondering why I'm having to write "narrowly" here. Why wasn't it a huge defeat? My guess is that the CFR and other buddies, who prop up the evil and completely unnecessary Federal Reserve Bank, are paying off some representatives. Or the reps themselves may be such idiots that they're not even getting paid. Listen to Gary Miller guy, from California, of course. I received this e-mail courtesy of Steven Vincent, who sincerely seems to want to end the Federal Reserve.

The Most Arrogant Lawmaker in America?The Most Arrogant Lawmaker in America?
September 30th, 2008 by Don Rasmussen
“If you just solely rely on the phone calls we’re getting from home, listening to people who don’t understand the complexities of our marketplace and what we’re dealing with here, the easiest vote for you to make would be a no vote today. You have to go beyond that.” - Rep Gary Miller R-CA Dist. 42

Obviously any legislator who would listen to the cries of the serfs over Lord Miller’s superior knowledge and commitment to our nation is a fool. Please let his Lordship know about your knowledge of “the complexities of the marketplace” by giving him a call at (202) 225-3201 in DC and (714) 257-1142 in CA.

If you're reading this blog and you care anything about freedom, call Lord Miller's vassals. I just did and it took two minutes. The vassal was polite and said that he would pass along my message. Please call--it's the only way that these Congress Critters are going to know what's going to happen to them in November if they continue to support forced socialism.

Also, take a look at this essay. Ron Paul predicted this financial problem and in fact, introduced legislation to stop it. But, as always, nobody listened.

Another wonderful essay, brought to my attention courtesy of Dan Black, is by the wonderful Lew Rockwell, someone who does understand the "complexities of our marketplace."

Mainstream media, of course, is telling a different story, lamenting that the bill didn't pass. Don't worry, the elite, as Rockwell said in his article, certainly have an alternate plan for forcing socialism on us and controlling our money supply.

Now, Here's the Way to Have a Bailout!

2008-09-30T11:31:00.000-04:00

Now this is the way to fix the economy.

Against AIG bailout - read this

I'm against the $85 BILLION bailout of AIG. Instead, I'm in favor of
giving $85,000,000,000 to America in a 'We Deserve It' dividend. To
make the math simple, let's assume there are 200,000,000 bona fide U.S.
citizens, aged 18+.

Our population is about 301 million counting every man, woman and
child. So, 200,000,000 might be a fair stab at adults 18 and up. Now,
divide 200 million, 18+ adults into $85 billion - that equals
$425,000.00 each! Yes, my plan is to give that $425,000 to every
adult as a 'We Deserve It' dividend. ***(Note: I would only include every
citizen, ( not illegals) currently paying or filing an Income Tax Return)

Of course, it would NOT be tax free. So, let's assume a tax rate of
30%. Everyone would pay $127,500.00 in taxes. That sends $25.5
billion right back to Uncle Sam! It also means that every adult 18+
has $297,500.00 in their pocket. A husband and wife would have
$595,000.00!

What would you do with $297,500.00 to $595,000.00?

Pay off your mortgage – housing crisis solved.
Repay college loans – what a great boost to new grads.
Put away money for college – it'll really be there.
Save in a bank – create money to loan to entrepreneurs.
Buy a new car – create jobs .
Invest in the market – capital drives growth.
Pay for your parent's medical insurance – health care improves.
Enable deadbeat parents to come clean – or else.

Remember this is for every adult U.S. citizen, 18 and older (including
the folks who lost their jobs at Lehmann Brothers and every other
company that is cutting back) and of course, for those serving in our
Armed Forces.

If we're going to re-distribute wealth let's really do it! Instead of
trickling out a puny $1,000.00 'economic incentive'.

If we're going to do an $85 billion bailout, let's bail out every adult
U.S. citizen!

As for AIG – liquidate it.

Sell off its parts.
Let American General go back to being American General.
Sell off the real estate.
Let the private sector bargain hunters cut it up and clean it up.

We deserve the money and AIG doesn't. Sure it's a crazy idea, but can
you imagine the coast-to-coast block party?!

How do you spell Economic Boom? W-e D-e-s-e-r-v-e I-t
d-i-v-i-d-e-n-d! I trust my fellow adult Americans to know how to use
the $85 Billion 'We Deserve It' dividend more than do the 'geniuses' at
AIG or in Washington , D.C. .

And remember, my plan only really costs $59.5 billion because $25.5
billion is returned instantly in taxes to Uncle Sam. Good idea? I
think so.

Thank you.

Judy Whiteley

I received this post from a homeschooling group. I absolutely love it! The socialists almost won yesterday with the vote to nationalize the monetary system. The solution, of course, is to end the Federal Reserve Bank, a private entity that has no business regulating our money. However, it is rumored that President Kennedy suggested ending it, only a few weeks before he was killed. The elite bankers have an extremely strong hold on the U.S. economy and threatening that hold could make their lives much more difficult. That's why Bush, who should be against any bailout, is touting this socialist plan as if it were some kind of free market panacea. And the masses, who are often informed only via the propaganda that major newspapers publish these days, believe that it's the "greedy capitalists" that have gotten us in trouble. It's easy to hate the "greedy capitalists," but much more difficult to place the blame on the government, which needs to stop printing money willy nilly and needs to wean itself from the quite toxic tit of the Federal Reserve. Most people have such a poor understanding of economics that they really believe that government schools provide "free" education. Perhaps this whole bailout thing will make people more willing to accept the truth. Perhaps.

Increasing the Supply of Children for Adoption

2008-09-25T11:42:00.000-04:00

The adoption industry, a $1.5 billion U.S. business that's growing each year, has been so successful with its propaganda that most people actually believe that the supply of children who are available for adoption grossly exceeds the demand. If people really understood that, for instance, there are over 40 potential adopters waiting for each adoptable infant, perhaps they wouldn't look so favorably on adopters when they take an infant from its mother. The demand is much higher than the supply of children. Nonetheless, it never hurts to have more white infants, which are more valuable on the adoption market than children of other ethnicities. Many people will, of course, call me racist for simply stating the truth. I'm not stating my opinion here; my opinion is that children should not be bought and sold at all, whether it be through adoption or slavery or just plain old selling a child. The facts are, however, that more adoptable infants bring more money for lawyers, social wreckers, and others connected with this hideous industry. So-called "Save Haven Laws," passed under the guise of protecting infants, swept the country with some federal government help, and now, voila!, people are dropping off all their children when they get tired of said children. I'm sure that the adoption industry social wreckers are wringing their hands over placing a 17-year-old, not an easy task, but there's also an infant and some smaller children involved and those will bring more money, no doubt. People hate to think of adoption as a business. We've all been brainwashed to think of it as this wonderful entity that helps children. Wake up, folks. It's all about money and breaking up families. The people who really run our government have created lots of things that break up natural families, such as government schools, day care, and adoption. The weaker families are, the more powerful government can be. Weak families and propaganda are why King Jorge can go on television, as he did last night, and tell people that the government needs to bail out huge corporations, setting the stage for national debt that can't be paid. One hundred years ago, people took care of their children and one hundred years ago, such a government bailout would have been met with shotguns at Congress. My, how weak we've become.

Come On People, Don't Apologize to the Government!

2008-09-25T03:21:00.000-04:00

I can't think of an apology to the state that I've ever liked. I read about them all the time though, with the star as people whose ancestors fought in the not-so-civil war between the states, which was basically when the South wanted to secede from the Union, a perfectly Constitutional thing from what I understand, and the North didn't want to lose all that productivity. Of course, it's been revised to have as the main point the whole slavery thing, making white people feel much more guilty than we should and making black people feel far more inferior than they should. But this little p.r. campaign sure has done a lot to make people hate the South.

Nonetheless, it's not at all refreshing to hear that over a century later, the South is producing such wusses as the mother of this man. Actually, I have a bit of admiration for Joseph Pascal Aprea, the 18-year-old man from Malmedy Drive in Holly Springs who had a gun in his car when he picked up his girlfriend. After all, it's his car, isn't it? His private property? Ah, but the state has done such a good job with its government school propaganda that the schools are no longer ours; we belong to the government schools. All of which explains some of the many reasons that my children don't go to government schools. Our local one has a gate around it, like a prison. But even sans gates, this incident, in which a guy was charged and spent the night in jail, merely for having a gun in his car, shows why I don't care to step foot in the place.

Evidently, they're doing a great job these days of confiscating private property, however, making sure that everyone who touches the hallowed ground of a school follows the rules, even when a taxpayer is inside has his or her own car. Oh, that kind of behavior from the government schools doesn't bother me so much anymore. When a tragedy like the one that happened a few months ago at Virginia Tech occurs and people still can't see the value of carrying a gun, well, I don't know what to say. Aprea's mom's comment, however, bothers me more than the government school's decree.

Aprea's mother, Jacqueline Tapp, said this afternoon it was just "a stupid mistake" for her son to leave in his truck the rifle and shotgun he uses for target practice and hunting.

"He just wasn't thinking. He didn't even put two and two together about how protective the schools are now," Tapp said.

Please allow me to translate: In a world in which two out of five of the Most Popular stories in the Raleigh News and Disturber this week concerned Clay Aiken proclaiming that he is gay, Tapp just doesn't understand how her son, whom I'll bet watches Oprah a lot less than she, might even think about disobeying the fine educational system that has evidently brainwashed her into believing that she has no rights on the hallowed ground that she, more than likely, pays some tax money to support. No, instead, she believes that in return for all this "free" education that her son, his girlfriend, and everyone else in Holly Springs seems to salivate to find, she should have to bow to the silly Zero Tolerance of the government schools, a world in which her own son tried to escape unscathed, a world in which a gun on a rack can send you to jail, a world in which a Fuquay-Varina police officer must follow his orders, even though he probably thinks they're pretty stupid and even though he admitted that Aprea had done no harm.

It's pretty obvious that Tapp and her allies at the police department have no understanding of private property, economics, or just plain common sense. Perhaps we can see now how easily King Jorge can persuade us to think that the bailout package is going to help the economy. All this government school education and people can't understand simple economics.

A little Red State Update's "Dumbass Party" seems appropriate here, for all parties involved.

Talk About Grass and Sheep Will Follow

2008-09-14T12:24:00.001-04:00

Sometimes, it really amazes me how much people have become sheeple in the past few years. Imagine what would have happened 100 years ago if your average small town had tried to pass an ordinance stating how high grass should be on private property. Now, these kinds of communistic ordinances are being passed all over the nation, even in the South. What is somewhat amazing to me is that no one bothers to say: This is my private property! You can't tell me how to cut my grass! Instead, socialists dicker over how high the ordinance should allow the grass to be. Of course, placing this whole high-grass-can-attract-rodents thing makes it a public health issue. Of course, public health translates into socialism quite easily.

I was extremely disappointed to see that Elkin, North Carolina, once a pretty free small town, has spiraled into this socialism, totally disregarding public property:

"I believe if we go ahead and approve this ordinance to get it going and set the standard, we can go back and look at the height again," said board member J. L. Lowe. The ordinance was passed with the suggestion that the planning board revisit the height requirements and that another amendment be added at a later date.

The council also dealt with the issue of response time.

"We are also changing the length of time for residents and business owners to respond from 45 to 55 days, to 20 days," said Crater. "This would allow for 10 days mailing and 10 days to respond to the letter informing of the violation."

In other words, you can get a ticket for something that you do on your own private property. Using true socialist media bias, there is no opposing opinion. There is not even the hint of both sides, i.e., that private property rights supercede such ordinances.

Last September, we were in this little town and I went to the cool, new coffee shop there. I learned that business owners are forbidden to flash lighted signs, on their own private property! And folks there think that California is socialist? Okay, it is in a lot of ways, but I'll tell you this: Our neighbor two doors down often goes for a while without mowing his grass. We live with no homeowners association and there is nothing that I know of in the city ordinances that say he can't do that. Each time I see his grass getting too high for my own personal taste, I celebrate the fact that he's able to grow it as high as he wants. As for the supposed potential rodent problem? We have cats to take care of that.

Why is Sarah Palin Running with the Devil?

2008-09-07T09:35:00.000-04:00

Okay, I know: I'm so very much against the current war industry and yet, I'm hoping to edit as many proposals as possible for the upcoming DoD deadline. Am I a big old hypocrite? Perhaps. But I also enjoy editing these proposals and I make money doing so. It's nice, also, to see what kind of scientific products the government is interested in. I can live with myself and I sleep well at night (except, of course, when I write these journal entries in the wee hours of the morning :).

But what about Sarah Palin? If it is true that she has a flag of Israel in her Alaska governor's office, as I've read is true, why? Wouldn't she be better off sporting a copy of the U.S. Constitution? Those little details about her, however, don't bother me nearly as much as whom she's aligned herself with: Warmonger McCain. Personally, I don't like what I've heard about McCain's taking a child from another family and culture and pretending that child belongs to him and Cindy. On a larger scale, however, I don't like that McCain seems okay with the whole unConstitutionally declared war thing. From what I've read, Sarah Palin is okay with this war thing, even going so far as to be proud of her older son for fighting for whatever it is we're supposedly fighting for (can somebody remind me again?). One of my favorite writers, Will Grigg, addresses the disparity of Sarah's refusal to have an abortion with her youngest child, who has Down's Syndrome, and yet her eagerness and zeal for her oldest son in going to serve, well, for what cause? I can't see that this Iraqi war has done much to give me or my children more freedoms. In fact, I feel much less free now, and by the increase in laws, I am much less free, than I was in, say, 2000. There is no longer habeus corpus, for instance, which means that I have no right as a person to defend myself, or to know what the authorities are accusing me of. Many Executive Orders and such have been passed that allow the government to snoop into my phone calls, computer records, and such, without my knowledge. Go ask your local librarian, for instance, how comfortable he or she is knowing that a G-man (or G-woman) may come knocking Monday morning and asking questions about the books that a patron has checked out. The librarian must tell the G-person, and cannot tell the patron that the government has been snooping. With results such as these from our supposed war on terrorism, I can't help but wonder whom the government is most afraid of: A supposed bogeyman in the Middle East or people who bother to think and read in the United States. I think that I know the answer. Perhaps Sarah Palin knows the answer as well. But she's not telling. Instead, she's touting the Republican party line, which claims to protect the unborn, but has little regard for the already born in countries that we occupy. Nonetheless, Republicans all over the country are hailing her, feeling akin to her because she's not yet joined the Council on Foreign Relations (although I'm sure that her invitation is in the mail).

Nonetheless, Sarah Palin, now on the payroll of the Republican Party, will continue "Defending Our Nation, Supporting Our Heroes, [and] Securing the Peace," earning the supposed trust of countless numbers of supposedly conservative women around the country.

If you lie down with dogs, you'll more than likely get up with fleas. Whatever Sarah Palin may have said or done previously, whatever tiny bit of respect that she may have once had for freedom, she is now lying with some of the most vicious and uncaring dogs in the country. She's barking what she's told to bark. And she's being what she's told to be.

Many thanks to Jim for alerting me, through his wonderful blog, to this specific Will Grigg column.

I'll leave you with a question: Sarah Palin may or may not have much to do as Alaska's governor, but she makes a good living doing it. I can only imagine how much she's traveling these days as Republican lapdog. Can't conservative women see that a woman who is running for Vice President doesn't have much time to be there as a mom? I don't know what it's like yet to have older children, but I know that an infant and a small child (as her younger two are) take a tremendous amount of time. I do three comedy shows close to my home each week and edit proposals at home and still, I feel as though I don't devote enough time to my children. How can Sarah Palin raise five children and run for Vice President?

Okay, I haven't left yet. I have more questions for so-called conservative women: My friend Tish was telling me recently about a "really conservative" woman that she knows who has cancer. It's especially sad because this woman has two small children. And she works full-time, said Tish. Wait a minute, I said, if she's so conservative, why is she working full-time? This Sarah Palin thing has brought up a similar issue: So, why is it that conservative women these days think it's okay to ship their children to a government school all day and go to the workplace? That's the question I'm leaving you with.