Jon’s Corner of the Whirled

I recently read the Kucinich press release claiming that the Democrats were “rigging” things against him in a couple of forums in Iowa.

I thought this was unfair, and shot off an email to both Iowa Public Broadcasting and the AARP expressing my dismay that he was excluded. I got this response from the AARP, which indicates that Kucinich was invited.

Dear Jonathan,

Thank you for your inquiry regarding the participation of Dennis Kucinich in the AARP/IPTV Forum that will be held on September 20 at the Adler Theater in Davenport, Iowa.

On July 2, 2007, Rep. Kucinich’s campaign was sent a registered letter inviting him to participate in the event. The letter was accompanied by criteria that were set by AARP for participation in the forum. Criteria include:

• Have filed an FEC Form F-2, “Statement of Candidacy,” with the Federal Election Commission;

• Have publicly announced an intention to run for the nomination of the Republican or the Democratic Party for President of the United States;

• Have a Campaign Office inside the State of Iowa; and,

• Have employed at least one paid campaign staff representative to perform

full-time campaign duties in the State of Iowa on behalf of the candidate since at least August 1, 2007.

During the weeks following his campaign’s receipt of the letter of invitation, Rep. Kucinich’s office had no communication with AARP or IPTV. The campaign did not acknowledge receipt of our invitation, nor did he or any of his campaign staff indicate any interest in participating in this forum. We did not hear from anyone about the forum until a story appeared in the Quad-City Times stating incorrectly, that Rep. Kucinich had not been invited to participate.

Rep. Kucinich did not meet all four of the stated criteria that would enable him participate in the upcoming forum by the designated date.

Ann Black

AARP Iowa Communications

It seems Representative Kucinich isn’t quite being honest in his press release!

Lisa and I had a nice trip to Lincoln City for her birthday last weekend. We stayed at the Starfish Manor, which I would highly recommend. We had a marvelous view of the ocean from our room, as you can see in these images.

The room was just what we were looking for: A quiet place for just the two of us. It had all the things we wanted, and a bit more. The room we were in had a king sized bed, a sofa, dvd/vcr player (which we also used to play audio cds), a couple of nice chairs and a marble topped table, a jetted jacuzzi tub with a view of the ocean, a small “kitchen” area with a refrigerator, sink and microwave, a gas fireplace, a small deck with a bbq and wicker chairs. The bathroom had a two shower heads as well.

As you can see in the image with the two chairs, there is a book sitting on the table. It has “Journal” written on the front. It contained entries from various people that had stayed in our room over the years. Lisa added her own entry, so if you ever stay in room “14″, be sure to look for it.

The weather was pretty good for July, so we didn’t spend a lot of daytime in the room. We ate dinner the first night at the marvelous Andaman Thai Restaurant that had been recommended by my parents. They were quite busy, but the food was excellent, and not terribly expensive. Initially, we had ordered a “Papaya Seafood Salad”, but they were out of Papaya. It was suggested that they could make a variation of Larb with the seafood instead, and we agreed. Unfortunately, it was too hot to eat. I’m normally not shy about spicy food. I like Habaneros, but the Larb with seafood was downright unpleasant. I made the mistake of wiping my nose with the napkin after wiping my mouth, and my septum was burning for a while. The other food was appropriately spiced and quite delicious.

The next day we went to Depoe Bay to walk through the shops and get Morgan some salt water taffy. On the way there, it was low tide, and Lisa was amazed to see Siletz Bay as low as it was.

We ate a passable lunch at Gracie’s Sea Hag, and headed back to Lincoln City.

I had purchased some nice steaks at Zupan’s before we left town. We used the BBQ on the deck and had a nice dinner looking out over the ocean.

We spent a little time at the casino in Lincoln City, and more time at the outlet mall there. Lisa enjoyed herself for her birthday. It was great to get out of town, and have some time together.

This video on YouTube highlights an alleged issue in American labor. The problem seems to focus on engineers, primarily software engineers.

This is disturbing on many fronts, and I agree with Lou Dobb’s comments at the end of this second video.

At work, the men’s bathrooms are divided into the urinals and the stalls. The stalls have full toilets in them. The urinals are closely packed together in a row with no dividers in between. Some men come into the bathroom and are uncomfortable doing their business in a line of urinals where someone might see something. To each his own. My beef has been with the guys that use the toilets, but don’t bother to lift the seats beforehand. It is just plain disgusting to walk into a stall and see that a small acid rainstorm has happened in the stall and left remnants all over the seat. This is a WORK environment with a lot of people. It is pretty amazing to me that people that work in this enviroment could be so oblivious to the mess they are making. I was happy to see that someone posted a signs on the wall behind the toilets. They say: “Bad Aim? Have a seat.” My thoughts exactly.

In our Little League board meeting last night, the president of the league refused to consider a person eligible for managing a Little League “Honors” team because of what he considered “unsportsmanlike conduct”. During the regular season, the manager in question “intentionally walked” a particular player from the other team. The manager claimed that this was a strategy: In a game with two outs, and players on 2nd and 3rd, he intentionally walked this particular player to make it easier to get the next out (because all bases are a force out with bases loaded). When this happened, he noticed that the player in question was “rattled”, and didn’t pitch well when their team was on the field. He then chose to intentionally walk this player in a subsequent game. Do you think this is “unsportsmanlike conduct” as the president claims?