Bydio

Devout Catholic, mother of six children — Betty, Joseph Jr., Peter, Helen, Gerard (d. 1982) and John — wife of Joseph Kuchinski (d. 2000), Marguerite Kuchinski has passed away this evening, July 30th, 2008, at around 8:30 PM EDT, of congestive heart failure.

Born May 28th, 1923, she was 85 years old.

I love you, grandma. Thanks for being there.

Here’s the eulogy for Marguerite Kuchinski written by Helen Solomon:

Thank you all for being here and I’d especially like to thank John, Chris, Matthew and Joshua for driving from their Florida vacation including a 20 hour drive in one day arriving just this morning.

Many eulogizers take a broad brush to paint a picture that can be seen from afar. A big picture hopefully capturing the essence of the loved one’s life. I wanted to say something brief and true - something to capture the effect of my mother’s life on this world. . .but considering the complexity of her life it seemed not possible.

There’s so much I know about Marguerite but my thoughts kept settling on moments, scenes composed over the years that like poetry describe her with both brevity and truth.

-I remember our school clothes (six children!) were starched and ironed - and in those days there was no spray starch, just a time consuming and messy process using powdered starch and water.

-I remember six birthday parties a year with delicious cake and frosting made from scratch and delightful lily pad flower-shaped cups made from colorful napkins that were filled with Hershey’s kisses and M&Ms for each party guest.

-I remember praise over good grades that encouraged each of us to excel in school

-I remember my friend Miriam confiding in me that my mother talked to the turtles that Gerard brought home from the pond that we kept in the kitchen for a week or so. I thought that was okay – people talk to their pets – but then Miriam continued. . . and. . she said the turtles talked back to her by blowing bubbles. My mother was the first Turtle Whisperer.

-I remember her picking bunches of concord grapes from our yard and turning the kitchen into a grape jelly factory – what a gorgeous smell!

-I remember when Byron was little my mother kept a little plastic shoe-shaped piggy bank on the mantle in the kitchen of her house in Whitman that she and my father would fill with coins. Each time Byron came over he would go to the kitchen, climb on a chair, empty the bank then put it back. Every time he came over the bank was full, waiting for Byron and my mother’s delight at Byron happily collecting the coins.

-I remember her taking care of my children so Robbie and I could spend time together – I turned a blind eye to the sugary cereals she fed Sam when I wasn’t around after I found out - when Sam learned to talk – he was saying Apple Jacks, not apples.

-I remember when she was babysitting and the washing machine hose broke and water spilled all over the first floor. She told me that Sam, age 4, told her “My mother’s not going to like this.” She loved that.

These are just a few of my memories and I know that you have your own that convey what you love about her.

- I know that Frannie Brodie used to get cards with bingo numbers written inside (B41, I 50) as part of the message – I don’t know what that meant, but Frannie always laughs to tell that story.

-I know Frank Hayes can tell you about the spooky picture of Babe Ruth she had in her window when the Red Sox broke the curse

-I know that she was very active in the church and led rosary in the last several years with a group of people who self organized and kept things running smoothly

I hope you will share your memories of Marguerite with me and each other. I know she would love to see us all here, gathered to acknowledge that she was loved and I know that she loved us.

While a good point, I think that most people in this country would vote for a proponent of individual rights over group rights if presented properly. The problem with that is specific questions — the “gotcha” questions — that makes individual rights seem callous while making group rights more friendly. We’re taught not to be selfish and to be more kind to other people, so we vote for people who want to give more stuff away to “help others”. So one might call this the lowest common denominator, but it seems to me that it’s the most generous who gets the most votes.

This certainly could be debated, but I don’t know of a study where what the candidates offered to the people was measured, but we know that every politician has campaign promises and we know that they often break those promises once elected. So the promise of betterment, often for a group, gains votes.

And I don’t think you need big money to win a campaign, but big notice. If the media picks up on you and portrays you positively, and does this often, then your message is ingrained on the people in a positive way. This can be done through guerrilla marketing and can be relatively inexpensive (compared to hundreds of millions of dollars). You could probably spend a million dollars on some big-ticket marketing that’s picked up by the media and gets very positive showings, and turn that into more awareness for a campaign. The advertising would be free.

This is from an email I wrote:

Let’s add Victor Davis Hanson to the melee. I probably agree with him 95% of the time:

Victor Davis Hanson - It’s America, Obama - National Review Online

And the only reason those two candidates are the ones going to win is because people are lazy and want their candidates picked for them. There are other people on the ticket, and you can write in someone. By voting for someone, you give your full approval of what they stand for, and I refuse to dumb-down and act like part of a herd because people are mooing for Obama or McCain. We have choices, we just refuse to exercise those choices, and our defense of such lunacy is “because I don’t want that other guy to win.” The only other time this thinking comes into play is during sports events, when you route for one team so another team doesn’t get into the finals. It signifies nothing but makes us “feel better” about the outcome. Here, too, we act as if elections have a predetermined outcome when in fact they don’t. No candidate is infallible, but which candidate is good? McCain isn’t good; his record proves he doesn’t vote on principles but on what will get him more power. Obama isn’t good; personally he’s an awful person and publicly he’s a lying lackey of the Democratic party. You wouldn’t trust either of these people at your workplace, let alone to represent you on a global scale. Libertarians at least run on principles, and I consider those principles good, so while the Libertarian candidate may be a relative unknown, I know what principles he/she will uphold, and all I have to worry about is if their personal beliefs will interfere with those principles. What are the principles of the Democrats or the Republicans? Even if there’s a list of which I’m unaware, when was the last time we saw one acting with any real principles?

So who you vote for is the person of whom you approve, and I don’t approve of the two major party candidates and therefore won’t vote for either one. I approve of the principles of the Libertarian party and therefore am more likely to vote for a Libertarian, but it’s not guaranteed because I will judge if I think that candidate is worthy to lead or not. Just remember that when you vote for Obama, you approve of him and what he stands for, and he stands for racism and outright lies. His charisma hides a rotten soul.

Lower Court uses Heller Decision to uphold BATFE ban on imported weapons
In one of the first lower court rulings since the Supreme Court handed down the weakly-worded Heller Decision, a government restriction on firearms has been upheld.

Steven Mullenix, a federal firearms licensee (FFL), was denied permission to import German WWII replica rifles by the notoriously anti-gun Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE). The BATFE used arguments from the 1968 Gun Control Act to argue that the replica BD-44 held no “sporting purpose” and therefore Mr. Mullenix could not legally import them.

In return Mullenix sued the BATFE for infringing upon his right to keep and bear arms, calling their ruling “arbitrary and capricious.”

Just a few short days after the Supreme Court ruled on the Heller Case — the supposed victory for the Second Amendment — the North Carolina Circuit Court used Justice Scalia’s own words to uphold the BATFE’s restriction on firearms importation.

The lower court agreed with the BATFE’s findings that the firearms Mr. Mullenix wanted to import were not “generally recognized as particularly suitable for or readily adaptable to sporting purposes.”

They went on to restate the Heller Decision language that the Second Amendment wasn’t unlimited, and that the government has the right to restrict or ban any type of firearm, stating that the right only applies to certain types of firearms.

Clearly, the ripples of the Heller Decision will be felt for years to come. Unfortunately we can only speculate on the future unintended consequences of this weak decision.

This much we do know: the Heller Decision is far from a victory for gun owners. It is already being used successfully to infringe upon the rights of gun owners across the county.

For all the latest Heller Decision related news, click here:
http://www.nationalgunrights.org/truthaboutheller.shtml

Gleaned from The Big Picture:

From Canada, who may end up being more Capitalist then us Socialists in the USA:

Two major related threats loom over the world economy: credit crises and rising inflation. What do these two menaces have in common? Bankers, hedge-fund managers, speculators and capitalism in general have been taking the hit for the economic turmoil, both for credit risk and inflation. But the looming collapse of Fannie Mae and Freddie Macin the United States should help change the focus a little. We are now getting down to the heart of the matter, which turns out not to be rampant capitalism but out of control back-door socialism.

- Terence Corcoran, The culprits behind credit, inflation risks

Source:
The culprits behind credit, inflation risks
Terence Corcoran
National Post, July 16, 2008
http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=cf306bf6-4d57-4f21-8fca-442268368aff

Yeah, you guessed it, another comment spam-filtered:

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Brian pays me $10,000 per Photoshop of Ahmadinejad, and I have to pay for my crack addiction, so I won’t give it up. lol

Mandating clothes means punishment for not wearing clothes, hence jail time for being naked. So by doing something that doesn’t cause physical harm, people without clothes are punished with physical harm (jail, assault, rape) under the legal guise of preventing them from being physically harmed by those who would assault and/or rape them. Uncool.

Also, if plain nudity can be redefined as pornography, then any kind of skin-baring can be redefined as something more sexualized. For example, breast feeding, which involves baring the female breast and allowing a minor child to put its mouth on it can be child molestation. Yes, it’s the wrong definition, but that’s my point: you can’t redefine nudity to mean pornography.

Again, my comment won’t pass the Snapped Shot spam filters, so I post my comments to the Child Pornography Called Art post here. Hell, if I write this much I might as well post it on my blog, too. Carpel tunnel, here I come!

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First off, the Cisco router is dead. Long live the Cisco router! :>

Rooster… well, you know.

Now back to the fun. Cap’n, our points of view are pretty close to polar opposites, but I’ll keep writing just to clarify my view. This kind of controversial talk is my kind of fun.

If I recall correctly, the girl was 8 when the pictures were taken, and as this furor erupts, she’s now 11 years old.

Phrases like “They don’t know no better” and “She has seen the seedier side of life” are ones that I have trouble with because it conflates nudity with shame and perversity. Nudity is probably the most natural we can be, as we are brought into this world bare. Clothing has evolved in style and meaning, but it’s mostly to keep us protected from the elements, not to keep us protected from each other. If clothing is mostly to keep us protected from each other, then we should welcome Shari’a law.

Lack of nudity — meaning keeping certain bits covered — is what causes titillation. When your biology says you want something but it’s hidden away from you in plain sight, this creates frustration. This is something being noticed in the Muslim world where sexual frustration is being channeled into the Jihad. When seeing the object of your desire in plain sight, that object becomes less frustratingly desirable over time to the point of it becoming commonplace. This is what happens with nudists. New nudists are shameful and gawky, but as they get used to seeing nude women and men around them all the time, the shame and frustration is sapped from them. Seeing this phenomena, one can conclude that nudity itself isn’t wrong or perverse, and can in fact be good.

I, personally, would never want to allow full nudity in public, but not because it’s dirty or prurient, but because it’s unsanitary. I wouldn’t be keen on sitting where bare-assed people have been hanging out because they would probably leave behind smegma and e. coli. Can’t have that.

As to Brian’s comment, he did say the image of a naked child was child pornography, and essentially agreed with your interpretation, so if nudity is child pornography, then by that definition one could say breast feeding is child molestation, etc. Now Brian won’t post my Photoshops anymore! See what you made me do, Cap’n?! lol

Standards. We all know media makes money by fascinating and titillating us, otherwise we don’t watch, so media standards are a poor measuring stick. Media is a reactionary force only. The law, too, is a reactionary force. Laws are enacted only after something occurs that creates fear. Unfortunately, the law punishes the victim in many cases, whether it’s drug use or nudity. To put someone in jail and force them to face the dregs of society because they didn’t have something covering their nipples is outrageous and wholly unacceptable in my not-so-humble opinion. These laws are called “protection”, but they don’t punish perpetrators of crimes, they punish those who might be attacked by criminal elements, all on the assumption that to put yourself into a potentially compromising situation is equivalent to assault and rape. Cat meat imam from Australia, no?

Again, as you said, it comes down to standards. Shall we punish nudity, or those who would take advantage of the nude? Should we jail the parents of a naked child, or those who would gleefully subject them to shame and humiliation — and rape in jail — because they painted or photographed something eminently natural? We can prove that the image of a naked person, at any age, is not harmful to anyone, so why should they be punished because such an image might make someone else think it’s okay to assault and rape that naked person? Our standard should be to punish those who would cause physical harm to a nude person, not to harm the nude person in the hope of preventing an assault and/or rape.

So sayeth the Donkeyrock. :>

Blind Faith - Can’t Find My Way Home

I couldn’t get my comment to go through on this post, so I’m posting it here:

See, here’s where my liberal upbringing shows through. Cap’n, I know you were being sarcastic, but I was pointing out that your sarcasm is actually prophetic.

The assumption that a naked child will instill lust in men is right in line with Shari’a law, which is why Shari’a pushes for full covering of women. However this is not the case.

As a normal adult, you don’t look at a naked child and think sex, you probably think of innocence (a common subject in art). But with such a virulent reaction to nudity, you push forward an ideal that that child’s body will create lust.

If you believe clothes are protection from “perverts”, then talk to people who have been sexually assaulted on the street. Lust isn’t visual it’s mental, chemical, hormonal. Just like a picture of a naked man doesn’t inspire lust in a heterosexual man, this child won’t inspire lust in most people. For those that are inspired to lust for the child, clothes don’t matter, just as clothes don’t matter when one sees a hot woman. She’s desirable, no matter the state of undress.

Now, the over-the-top reaction of making the mother and daughter walk around naked because the daughter is naked for a picture is outlandish. Conversely, should they force you to sit around and do nothing while they parade in your house and do whatever they wish? Of course not, and neither should they be subjected to such fantastical ridicule.

My point is that such nudity is only controversial in the minds of zealots. A rational look at the situation shows no reason to fear that image or fear for the child. The only shame she’ll encounter is from people who hate her body simply because it exists, and she’s not more likely to be assaulted because of the image unless it’s from people who want to hide her away and make her feel shame at being human.

And Brian, seriously, nudity is pornography? Such a definition would mean breastfeeding is sexual assault, that the great masters of renaissance art were just peddling sexual titillation, and that the human body is nothing but a shameful object that must be covered under thick robes and hidden away from uncontrollably lustful eyes. Are we not better, more controlled, than our cousins from hundreds and thousands of years past? Biology may dominate us, but our ability to think rationally helps us to transcend base instincts.

Dare you call Clapton a pervert? lol Blind Faith album cover:

Generation Kill on HBO seemed interesting but typical… bad American troops acting poorly toward the downtrodden

Design Star and Food Network Star are off the map now, both my people lost last night, Mikey V and Kelsey