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I am sick and tired of the New Jersey Senate race between Tom Kean Jr. and Robert Menendez. Both of their campaigns are simply mudslinging; there has not been much discussion of the actual issues. They are both like broken records- whenever they debate or put out ads, it’s the same lines. Menendez claims Kean is tightly tied to Bush and is all pro-Bush, and Kean accuses Menendez of being “under federal criminal investigation,” which may or may not true. They just repeat these two accusations over and over, simply blaming stuff on their opponents- no actual discussion of the issues. It is entirely unclear what these two candidates stances on the issues are; a lot of people have lost faith in both candidates and are entirely dissatisfied.

How did we come to this? How did a senate race devolve into name-calling? WTF? This is politics, not pre-school. As citizens in a democracy, we’re supposed to be able to stop this- but how realistic is that? Third party candidates rarely get elected, and not voting just gives the votes for these two idiots more power. So, basically, unless we can get a massive move towards a third party candidate, we’re screwed, simply put. Who to vote for? I don’t know, you tell me. The fact that we’re forced to choose between two babies that can’t be mature enough to discuss actual issues aggravates me to no end. No one has any clue how these two candidates would vote on laws; the only reason I would vote for Kean is because Menendez is the incumbent, but all I know about him is that “he supports Bush”. Of course, all I know about Menendez is that he’s “under federal criminal investigation.”

This is our representation in the Senate, and no matter what we do, we’re f*&%ed. Its that simple. New Jersey is f%&@!ed. There’s no way around it.

Just as I was about to celebrate the news that legislation prohibiting video games had been struck down for the ninth time, I read about another attempt by lawyer Jack Thompson to violate the first amendment and get a game banned. The game Bully, by Take-Two Interactive, features is being brought into question due to its content, namely that of being a bully at the fictional school of Bullworth Academy. Since Jack Thompson hates video games, he has asked a judge to put an injunction against the game in his home state of Florida- but what’s worse is that the judge has consented to an investigation, even though such bans have been struck down NINE times! Apparently the nation needs protection from itself- The average video game player is 33 years old, and the average video game purchaser is 37 years old, which flies in the face of Jack Thompson’s “protection of the youth” argument- plus, there is a great rating system in place for video games already, the ESRB. It is entirely voluntary, like the movie rating system, and most major retailers will not sell games rated ‘M’ (Mature) or higher to those under the age of 17. Not only that, but as always, it is a violation of the first amendment to ban video games, found to be so, as stated before, NINE times. HOLD IT- change of gears. As I wrote this, I found another article reporting Judge Freeman has, in fact, decided against prohibiting the game- he is quoted as saying, “There’s nothing in the game that you wouldn’t see on TV every night.” He had to admonish Jack Thompson because he protested too vehemently- apparently on not being able to play for long enough. Hopefully this 10^th strike against banning video games will send the message that it is ineffective and not worth the money and time to attempt ban video games. Video games ARE protected free speech, and if you share my opinion, we need to fight against legislation like this- if you’re interested, join The Video Game Voters Network.

About a week ago tragedy struck in Amish country: a crazed man entered a school and shot several young girls execution style, and then he killed himself. His motivation is still not completely clear, ranging from anger at God for his daughter that died twenty minutes after birth nine years ago to having something to do with molesting young relatives twenty years ago. While this is a horrible story, there are many stories of goodness coming out of it. Reportedly, a 13 year old girl asked to be shot first, in an attempt to buy the younger girls more time, and then her sister asked to be shot next. This is an amazing display of courage and bravery, considered by some locals to be the influence of God. The Amish have also been extremely forgiving; one man is quoted as saying, “I was shocked and saddened, but why be angry, you know?” It is truly amazing how these people can be so forgiving. In a world of lawsuits and getting even, these people should be held up as role models and should be viewed as truly great people that should be praised for their humility.

First off, to all you out there who read Rosen’s Rants and are highly offended, you are idiots. The writing style is so clearly over the top a dead baby could understand that Jake is simply attempting to rile you all up and be sardonic. He’s kind of like Steven Colbert, except the sarcasm is less obvious because it’s typed. I see Rosen’s Rants as an amazing social experiment- he has garnered the most comments any post has received simply by playing on society’s hatred of bigotry and inability to take a joke. You guys need to learn to step back and laugh a little. I agree with him about the rampage thing, though.

Also, he has one point that is completely based on fact: when someone makes a statement that can be in any way construed as negative towards Muslims, they deny it and then bomb/shoot/attack the offender.

If you guys cannot recognize that his writing style is purely to garner reaction, you’re dumb.

On September 12^th, Pope Benedict XVI quoted the opinion of Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Palaiologos “Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached”, while so apperently condemning the statement as incredibly harsh in German; apparently the translation made it sound like he didn’t. As a result, many Islamic nations, such as Turkey and Iran, have been up in arms, and there has been violence against Christians in the Middle East. Recently the Pope apologized for the unintended interpretation of his comments, saying that he did not intend to make the opinion his own and was simply tying religion to violence, and that it is wrong on either end. When I first read the article, I too was deeply enraged by the Pope’s apparent insensitivity, but as I dug deeper and did more research, I saw that it was all a matter of misunderstanding, and I also noticed how the media criminalized the Pope. Many reports simply said the Pope called Islam “evil and inhuman”, failing even to mention he was quoting a medieval scholar. This is an outrage. We depend on the news for reliable and accurate information, but all the time they promote their private agendas and criminalize innocent people by simple omission of important facts. I personally hold the media responsible for every act of violence that this statement has generated in the Middle East. Way to go media. -Mike Tango

Look at this.

http://www.fccc.edu/

Somebody stole our name already.

Abu Hamza al-Muhajer recently went on Al-Jazeera news to announce that, as the new head of Al-Qaida, he was confident of victory and that all mujahedeen should unite on the battlefield. The point of all this, at least to me, is that cutting of the head of Al-Qaida did nothing to stop the flow. The group is too well organized to let a significant death have a critical impact. This indicates that we cannot defeat them militarily, as we cannot possibly kill all members of Al-Qaida in a short enough time span to keep them from regrouping and growing. The only way to defeat this insidious force is to pull out offensive military action and make this war a war of public opinion. We need to show that this group is cruel, unusual, and violates the tenets of the religion that they are fighting for through the media. By reducing military action to minimal, defensive action we can say this without appearing hypocritical; all collateral damage and deaths will be due to their actions, not ours, and which point the people of the area will be fed up and stop fueling this militant force with man-power. The plan may not be perfect, but it’s a start, and it’ll do a hell of a lot more than what we’ve been doing.

Another two for one special today!

First, yet again, a district judge has rule in favor of the video games industry in Illinois, deeming video games protected speech, and forcing the state to pay over half a million dollars in attorney’s fees. This should send a crystal clear message to the states that video games are free speech. United States District Judge Matthew S. Kennelly forcefully wrote, “If controlling access to allegedly ‘dangerous’ speech is important in promoting the positive psychological development of children, in our society that role is properly accorded to parents and families, not the State.”The basic stance that I take on this is that parents should be educated about the ESRB rating system, and it is the parents responsibility to make sure the kids aren’t playing inappropriate games, as the average video game purchaser is ~40 years old. I also support the position of major retailers, that they will not sell M or AO games to underage gamers. This system is entirely voluntary, like the movie rating system is.

My second issue is on the idea of black history month. Every year during elementary school, for a month, learning was concentrated on the African American’s contributions to America. Not to belittle the African Americans, but I learned too much about people who didn’t really matter and not enough about people that did. I learned that George Washington Carver taught former slaves self-sufficiency, came up with crop rotation, and did some stuff with peanuts too. I didn’t learn the story of Bill Gates with Microsoft and Steve Jobs with Apple, arguably having produced more significant achievements than Carver did- I don’t use Carver’s info today, but I use Bill Gates’ every day. I learned that Crispus Attucks was one of the victims of the pre-revolution Boston Massacre, but I didn’t learn that that a third of the American people opposed the Revolutionary War. I learned that Abe Lincoln freed the slaves (not a black person but significant to their history), but I didn’t learn that he did that only after being unable to end the conflict without it. I learned that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a great speech writer, but not that he had a history of plagiarizing much of his work, including fully a third of his doctoral thesis. The problem is that we either learn about the African American contributions to society, but not their white counterparts, who equal or outnumber them, or we don’t get the full story of their pros and cons. I don’t believe that we shouldn’t recognize the achievements of African Americans; we should simply place them on the same level as their white counterparts, and have that work intertwined with the rest of historical study, not set aside in a separate month. 

-The One True Mango

Today we’ve got a two for one special: Feminism AND Video Game censorship.

Feminism: I just finished watching the Colbert report and he interviewed a woman named Linda Hirsch, or Hirschney, or something like that. The point is, she’s telling women to join the workforce, get out of the home, and “get into power”. I have two issues with this.

First, the “get into power” part of it; women have just as much power as men, and getting into the work force won’t alter the power at all. To suggest that women need to wrest some power from men is frankly ridiculous, unless she wants to create a super-female man-enslaving empire, but she seemed pretty reasonable.

Second, she’s calling for those who want to stay home and raise their kids to go out into the workforce anyway, “to want to be independent”. Being independent by following her orders; ironic, isn’t it? Plus, I bet women have more freedom around the house than at work.

Frankly, I have no problem with women in the work force, but calling for every mother to go in for some sort of ill-conceived power grab is just ridonkulous. Yes, that’s right, ridonkulous. That’s what I think of you, Linda.

 Video Games: VICTORY IS OURS! The “Minnesota Video Games Act” has been deemed unconstitutional. This law would have fined any minor purchasing an M or AO game. It was dismissed on first amendment grounds. Wrote Chief District Judge Rosenbaum, “The [Minnesota Video Games] Act imposes a regime which attempts to regulate video games based on content. It does so by restricting minors from renting or buying video games with an M or AO rating. As these games enjoy First Amendment protection, any such restriction is presumptively invalid and subject to strict scrutiny.” 

He even reminded the Minnesota lawmakers that all the other laws had failed on first amendment grounds. He wrote, “Several other states have tried to regulate minors’ access to video games. Every effort has been stricken for violating the First Amendment…. The Court will not speculate as the motives of those who launched Minnesota’ nearly doomed effort to “protect” our children. Who, after all, opposes protecting children. But, the legislators drafting this law cannot have been blind to its constitutional flaws.” 

Finally, the court found that the study the lawmakers used to link violent video games to violent behavior was “completely insufficient” to prove such a link.

This is the seventh time since 2001 that a court has ruled that video games are protected free speech.

Eat that, Herdman.

Martin Luther King Jr. once wrote a speech commonly called, “I Have a Dream”. In the text of this speech, there is a segment that reads,

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

This dream, my friends, has NOT yet been met, due to a peculiar institution called affirmative action. Affirmative action is morally wrong. It screws over some white people who deserve to go to college, while making a highly racist statement about minorities. In Britain, the policy is called “positive discrimination”. This oxymoron is exemplar of the general immorality of Affirmative Action.

The basic assumption that is being made is that discrimination is wrong, which I strongly believe in, and sadly, so do many of the proponents of Affirmative Action claim to be.

It screws over white people because it artificially creates racial diversity and does not select the people that most deserve to go to college, rather the top of those that deserve to go to college in each race. This means that if I have a 4.0 GPA, but for various and sundry other reasons am not at the top of the acceptance list, and a black student with a 3.0, otherwise identical to me, but is the top black student, the black student gets to go to college because of racial quotas that must be met. I clearly deserve to go to the school, but because of my race, I don’t get in. This is clearly wrong.

Affirmative action is also racist against minorities; simply put, giving the advantage to the minorities implies that whites are inherently superior and thus minorities need a helping hand in order to be equal to a white person. This also, is morally wrong.

The same principles that guide the idea that minorities are no worse than whites guide the philosophy that whites are no worse than minorities, yet they are ignored by the champions of the former cause. There are dozens of examples of the ineffectiveness of Affirmative Action; for instance, a ladder fire company hired a black applicant who was AFRAID OF HEIGHTS over more qualified white applicants simply because he was black.

In cases such as these, public safety is endangered; the fire company has an unqualified employee and the employee goes to a job everyday for which he is unsuited. How can he be prepared to climb a ladder to save a person from a burning building when he is afraid of heights?

Clearly, Affirmative Action needs to stop now. It is unfair, unjust, and just plain wrong.

~The One True Mango