Better read

It's been my experience that the best way to get to know a community is to read the letters to the editor.

Given that, there are a lot of concerned folks in Southwest Florida. And that concerns me. Because there's not a lot really to be concerned about in Southwest Florida.

Fr'instance,

If your biggest concern is you don't like the look of men (and women?) who shave their head, you have nothing to be concerned about.

If your biggest concern is the peeling paint on a few stoplight poles, you have nothing to be concerned about.

If your biggest concern is loud bar music in downtown after 10:30 p.m. (and before midnight) on a weekend, you have nothing to be concerned about.

If your biggest concern is a few cigarette butts in the sand on the beach, you have nothing to be concerned about.

If your biggest concern is that the new white paint on the street outside your $12 million home is too garish and is hurting the serene nature of your neighborhood, you have nothing to be concerned about.

If your biggest concern is landscaping in the medians around Southwest Florida, you have nothing to be concerned about.

If your biggest concern is how low teenagers are wearing their jeans and how much underwear they're showing, you have nothing to be concerned about.

If you're concerned about an increase in traffic around your $2 million condo during season, you have nothing to be concerned about.

If any thing like the above concerns you, I really think you should be concerned --- concerned that you no longer have a life.

That concerns me.

And so it goes.

The best policy

The fix is in. Always has been. Need an expert? There's one who for a price who will say just about anything you want him to say.

Our Deceiver in Chief is an expert at that. Don't believe me? The next time you see one of those military analysts talking about strategy and munitions and war and how great things are going, think about this.

Turns out there are no lengths this corrupt administration won't go to lie to the American public. Want a dose of 'truth'? Just buy it.

Early one Friday morning, they put a group of retired military officers on one of the jets normally used by Vice President Dick Cheney and flew them to Cuba for a carefully orchestrated tour of Guantánamo.

To the public, these men are members of a familiar fraternity, presented tens of thousands of times on television and radio as “military analysts” whose long service has equipped them to give authoritative and unfettered judgments about the most pressing issues of the post-Sept. 11 world.

Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance, an examination by The New York Times has found.

Ah, truth bought and paid for by our corrupt administration. (And, of course, paid for with YOUR tax dollars). There's more, of course.

Most of the analysts have ties to military contractors vested in the very war policies they are asked to assess on air.

Those business relationships are hardly ever disclosed to the viewers, and sometimes not even to the networks themselves. But collectively, the men on the plane and several dozen other military analysts represent more than 150 military contractors either as lobbyists, senior executives, board members or consultants. The companies include defense heavyweights, but also scores of smaller companies, all part of a vast assemblage of contractors scrambling for hundreds of billions in military business generated by the administration’s war on terror. It is a furious competition, one in which inside information and easy access to senior officials are highly prized.

Raise your hand of any of this really surprises you. Didn't think so.

Truth for sale to the highest bidder.

This administration (which John McCain would be happy to continue) has no reference point for truth. And no interest in finding it.

It's an embarrassment to the American people.

And so it goes.

Oh, the pain ...

You know, it's kinda hard to be curmudgeonly when this is the view out your front door ...



And this is less than a half mile away...



Oh, I suffer so ...

And so it goes.

Dumb and dumber

This just shows how ignorant 19 percent of Americans can be.

And so it goes.