On a normal news day, it can be cool to work in a television newsroom. After all, I see feeds of news stories all day long from the network and its stations around the country. I see more footage than most typical viewers, because most local stations don’t have enough news programming to use everything that is available. Unless you keep your eyes glued to CNN or MSNBC…or even Fox News…you probably wouldn’t see everything that I see passing by.

On days like the past few, working in a newsroom is nothing short of a curse. Like 9/11, those terrible images, each one worse than the one before, keep coming. There’s no end in sight. Those are the days that people who don’t work in a newsroom should be glad that they don’t.

Tonight, I saw a story about boats pulling people from flooded neighborhoods in the New Orleans area. In particular, there was footage of three adults and a dog — a labradore retriever mix, as far as I could tell — all stranded on the small section of a roof that wasn’t submerged. The people were pulled onto the boat one by one.

The dog was not.

The boat began to pull away, and a cameraman, who had been allowed to come along on the boat to document the rescue efforts, zoomed in on the helpless animal, who kept looking at the water and then back at the boat and (possibly) his owner who was leaving him there. His face showed a clear expression of fear. If he could have spoken, I suspect he would have been asking, “Where do I go? What do I do to get out of here?”

I wish I hadn’t seen it. I wish even more than I could forget that I had.

The people who were in the boat, didn’t seem to even look back at the dog. Maybe the dog was a stray and just happened to end up on the same roof as these newly-homeless residents. Maybe the dog’s real owner is hoping that another boat will come along and pick up his pet.

I sure hope someone will.

On a related note, an organization called Noah’s Wish is on its way to the area. It is their mission to do just that: to rescue abandoned or stranded animals in disasters like this one. A lot of people are directing their readers to the websites of the American Red Cross and other organizations to help the human victims. Not nearly as many are asking that you remember the animals; I’m one of them.

If you feel compelled to donate to the Red Cross or other organizations, for every dollar you send to them, I wish you’d consider sending at least 50¢ to Noah’s Wish. Every penny helps, no matter who the victims are.

On a normal news day, it can be cool to work in a television newsroom. After all, I see feeds of news stories all day long from the network and its stations around the country. I see more footage than most typical viewers, because most local stations don’t have enough news programming to use everything that is available. Unless you keep your eyes glued to CNN or MSNBC…or even Fox News…you probably wouldn’t see everything that I see passing by.

On days like the past few, working in a newsroom is nothing short of a curse. Like 9/11, those terrible images, each one worse than the one before, keep coming. There’s no end in sight. Those are the days that people who don’t work in a newsroom should be glad that they don’t.

Tonight, I saw a story about boats pulling people from flooded neighborhoods in the New Orleans area. In particular, there was footage of three adults and a dog — a labradore retriever mix, as far as I could tell — all stranded on the small section of a roof that wasn’t submerged. The people were pulled onto the boat one by one.

The dog was not.

The boat began to pull away, and a cameraman, who had been allowed to come along on the boat to document the rescue efforts, zoomed in on the helpless animal, who kept looking at the water and then back at the boat and (possibly) his owner who was leaving him there. His face showed a clear expression of fear. If he could have spoken, I suspect he would have been asking, “Where do I go? What do I do to get out of here?”

I wish I hadn’t seen it. I wish even more than I could forget that I had.

The people who were in the boat, didn’t seem to even look back at the dog. Maybe the dog was a stray and just happened to end up on the same roof as these newly-homeless residents. Maybe the dog’s real owner is hoping that another boat will come along and pick up his pet.

I sure hope someone will.

On a related note, an organization called Noah’s Wish is on its way to the area. It is their mission to do just that: to rescue abandoned or stranded animals in disasters like this one. A lot of people are directing their readers to the websites of the American Red Cross and other organizations to help the human victims. Not nearly as many are asking that you remember the animals; I’m one of them.

If you feel compelled to donate to the Red Cross or other organizations, for every dollar you send to them, I wish you’d consider sending at least 50¢ to Noah’s Wish. Every penny helps, no matter who the victims are.

Cindy Sheehan now says she’s glad President Bush refused to meet with her as she camped outside his Crawford, Texas ranch.

“If he’d met with me, then I would have gone home, and it would have ended there,” she told the Associated Press on Tuesday.

She also stated, “I look back on it, and I am very, very, very grateful he did not meet with me, because we have sparked and galvanized the peace movement.”

Almost sounds like she had a vested interest in Bush not meeting with her, doesn’t it? Now where have I heard that line of reasoning before?

In a striking bit of irony, Venezuelan President Pat Robertson said the United States should assassinate, has offered food and assistance to the Gulf Coast area ravaged by Katrina and subsequent flooding, according to a report by Yahoo! News.

“We place at the disposition of the people of the United States in the event of shortages — we have drinking water, food, we can provide fuel,” Chavez told reporters.

A frequent critic of the United States and a target himself of US disapproval, Chavez last week offered discount gasoline to poor Americans suffering from high oil prices and on Sunday offered free eye surgery for Americans without access to health care.

There is apparently no word as yet on whether the United States will accept the offer.

A recent article at “RantingProfs” accuses a CBS news crew of throwing a “cheap shot” at the pro-war side:

“But CBS’s Mark Knoller, while using the clip of a parent speaking, takes careful pains to point out that she is ‘the mother of a Marine safely home.’

You see the trick here.

Quote a parent, but be sure to quote one whose son is back home with his family, and only that parent, subtly making the argument that her support for the war (presumably the support of that entire group, since Knoller shows us no parent of a fallen troop) is a cheap and easy sentiment, since they have not walked the path Sheehan walks.”

I left a response to this piece:

“With all respect, that comment wasn’t part of a ‘trick’ and wasn’t made as a ‘cheap shot.’ It is an important distinction that needs to be made when one is referring to a parent of a soldier.

If he HAD used the mother of a fallen soldier who is in support of the war, would you not expect the reporter to have mentioned that she had lost a son, too? Or, in this case, should the reporter NOT have mentioned the fact that this mother who supports the war HADN’T lost a son, so that Cindy Sheehan supporters could have made the complaint that the media is using a pro-war spokesperson who hasn’t suffered the loss that Cindy has, and therefore, doesn’t have the same ‘right’ to speak out? This ‘trick’ that you accuse the media of having employed is the same complaint that war opponents accuse them of using the other way around.

It’s better that the media be upfront about who the soundbites come from rather than try to hide it.

(And lest it need to be pointed out, Cindy Sheehan didn’t ‘earn’ the right to be heard; she always had the right to free speech. The war supporters don’t ‘earn’ a BIGGER right to be heard just because they lose a son or daughter in Iraq, either. As Americans, we all have the same rights to speak out, no matter whether we are Gold Star families or not, right?)

Why did the reporter not use a soundbite from the mother of a FALLEN soldier? Perhaps one wasn’t available to him when he got there, or perhaps they were fed up with Cindy getting so much attention that they weren’t willing to talk to someone in the media. Maybe the grieving mothers in attendance didn’t feel like being interviewed. These things happen on a daily basis in every conceivable story a reporter covers. It’s even possible that without the personal loss, the speaker he did use was the most compelling of the group.

What’s the reason? I have no idea…you’d have to ask that reporter. I do know that everything ISN’T a conspiracy.”

It’s not the media that is trying to argue that those who speak out in favor of the war but who haven’t lost a son or daughter there are using “cheap and easy sentiments.” It’s some of the war opponents who are making that case. It’s those who say the war is unquestionably wrong who walk around as if they have a badge of “Courage” pinned on their chests just because they speak out against the war. No other position, according to them, can possibly be courageous or even sincerely felt.

Pointing out the distinction in that news report isn’t a conspiracy to downplay the argument. It is merely pointing out the distinction. No matter what, when that distinction exists, somone is going to jump on it as a sign of bias. If the media does mention it, those who support the war accuse them of being biased against it. If the media doesn’t mention it, those who oppose the war accuse them of being biased for it because they’re ignoring Sheehan’s loss.

Do I deny the fact that in a perfect world, the report would have had two “dueling mothers” who had both lost sons in Iraq? No.

On the other hand, in a perfect world, it wouldn’t matter because we’d all realize that everyone has a right to their position and a right to speak out whether they’d lost a son overseas or not: Cindy Sheehan didn’t “earn” the right to speak out because Casey Sheehan died; she had that right before he ever signed up. And those who speak in favor of the war are not required to have become Gold Star family members before they can be allowed to do so.

But when you consider that the shows that get the ratings today aren’t the nightly news broadcasts but rather shows like “Extra,” “Entertainment Tonight,” “Oprah” and the reality show of the week, you quickly realize that when it comes to the “average” news consumer, this is far from a perfect world.

I will try to redeem myself for last week’s blunder of question #6. Sorry to the early players last week for giving you a question that didn’t make as much sense as it should have. (I did correct the question later, so if you go back now, you’ll see what it should have read from the start.)

Amanda of “The Private Drama of My Life” (a private journal) was first to play last week. Congratulations, Amanda!

Last week’s questions marked the first time that Jennifer and Redsneakz played the ‘Six.’ Be sure to stop by their journals and say hello.

Here are this week’s “Saturday Six” questions. Either answer the questions in a comment here, or put the answers in an entry on your journal…but either way, leave a link to your journal so that everyone else can visit! If you don’t have an AOL journal, you can still play, but of course you’ll at least need an AOL screen name, which you can get for free with AOL Instant Messenger, to be able to leave a comment here. To be counted as “first to play,” you must be the first player to either answer the questions in a comment or to provide a complete link to the specific entry in your journal in which you answer the questions. A link to your journal in general cannot count. (Again, if you’re playing for the first time, please be sure to say so in the comment!) Enjoy!

1. What is your current desktop picture? What made you select it?

6. READER’S CHOICE QUESTION #60 from Stacy: Is there a specific person that you credit with your successes? and HOW did they help you?

If you have a Reader’s Choice question you’d like to see asked (and answered), click the e-mail link on the About Me bar and send it to me.

MY ANSWERS:
1. A closeup section of Van Gogh’s “Starry Night over the Rhone,” the same one that appears as a background element in my alternate journal, “Patrick’s Place 2.” I’ve liked Van Gogh’s various “Starry Night” portrayals, and I like the deep colors of that one.

6. I would have to say that more than anyone else, it would be my mother. She never tried to lead me to one career or the other, but encouraged me to do what I wanted. When it became clear that what I wanted was to work in TV, she never tried to talk me out of it. When it came time for college, I learned that she had been buying US Savings Bonds since I was six months old, so I didn’t have to borrow a penny in student loans. (That’s not to say I didn’t rack up debt, but the debt I built was my own, and through stupidity, not necessity.)

Do we need laws to define what publishing versus self publishing really mean? Jim Winter over at “Northcoast Exile” says we do, all because of Print On Demand (POD) technology and the havoc it is wreaking in the industry.

While POD was supposed to revolutionize publishing by allowing for more smaller presses to compete with the larger ones and allow for a smaller financial risk, POD also created two unfortunate side effects, Winter says.

One of them is that the vanity presses and scam artists have run amok.

Any time I read in a writing group that someone’s first book is coming out, the first question I ask is which publisher they inked their deal with. I ask for two reasons: first, if it is a “big name” publisher, and occasionally it is a big name or one of the big name’s smaller imprints, then I want to know more about their experience in getting an agent and how their work was edited. The second reason, though, is to weed out those who have gone the self-publishing route.

There are plenty of good writers who self-publish. Vanity presses are quick to point out that fact, too. But when you are your own boss, chances are your work experience is going to be pretty rosy. You have no one telling you that your manuscript is replete with grammatical and spelling errors that end up getting foisted on the reader. You have no one telling you that your dialog doesn’t make a damn bit of sense. You have no one telling you that your plot has as many holes as a block of Swiss. But your book is out, your name is on the cover, so you must be a good writer.

Since vanity presses have easy access to POD, a writer doesn’t have to be a good writer to get published. And because vanity presses really only want your money, no one in a position of authority in the publishing process seems willing to tell a writer that their work isn’t worth the ink. Meanwhile, they’re careful to include in their blind praise of the work little digs about the “big publishing houses” which would “never see the value of a book like this” because they can’t get past their own greed. I’ve heard more than one self-published author, in promoting the release of their upcoming “fiction novel,” say something along the lines of this:

“I learned quickly when I was shopping my book around that the ‘traditional’ publishers are only out for one thing.”

If you take the bait and ask what the one thing is, it’s always “money.” One recently-self-published author posted to a message board that she came to this conclusion after her first rejection letter. One? How many rejection letters did J.K. Rowling rack up before her first Harry Potter novel was sold?

Of course traditional publishers are out to make a buck! Do these people think vanity presses are non-profit organizations?? To hear them grovel, to read their remarks about trying to celebrate real talent that goes ignored by the ruthless, cutthroat “big guys,” it might be easy to think of them as charity.

Not all self-published novels are bad, just as not all Christians advocate assassinating foreign leaders. The point is, some (probably many) are, and POD has helped them get their bad writing on the shelves.

I define an author as someone who has been published, but I don’t mean one who has published himself. I’m a writer because I write. I’m a novelist because I have completed a novel (albeit a bad one) and am working to complete a second one which I hope to sell one day. I don’t call myself an author, because I don’t have a published work on the shelf. I see it the same way I see my work in the kitchen: I am a cook because I can cook. I am not a chef, because while I do manage my own kitchen (the one in my apartment!) and have cooking skills (which satisfies the dictionary definition), I’m not some great authority on cooking nor do I have unique creations that sets me apart from anyone else who follows a recipe.

Those are my definitions, not anyone else’s. I may be the only one who thinks of it that way, but it’s one way I keep myself from getting too caught up in any accomplishments that I haven’t yet achieved.

Like blogging, print on demand has allowed anyone with something to write to be published. It’s good that more people have the opportunity, but not necessarily good that more people are taking full advantage of it.

Do we need laws that make the distinction between being published and being self-published? It depends on what they’d accomplish. Maybe it would be worth it just to make aware of the differences, especially young writers who are quick to get caught up in the unrestrained praise and end up overrating their own abilities.

Shelly recently posted her take on speaking out in blogs, after reading a Chicago Tribune article about employees who have been fired for blogging about their jobs.

(Out of respect to her wishes, I did not post a response in her blog and I am not posting a link to her entry.)

In any case, she makes excellent points and I agree wholeheartedly with her take on Freedom of Speech, and the notion that freedoms and rights come with responsibilities.

She states:

When I see people get into nasty arguments online, aka the horrid flamewars, I think about this. X says something Y doesn’t like, so Y insults X. X gets enraged and insults Y back. Y cries foul, say he or she has the right to say what they did, that X is trying to censor them, etc. Well, if Y gets to insult X, then X gets to insult Y. If X disagrees with Y, X is allowed to say so. What neither X or Y can do legally is incite violence or criminal activity.

She’s right about that. But too often, I think, people seem to think that they can’t disagree without making it personal. In some ways, it’s at least a good thing that people feel passionate enough about their positions that they would consider anyone who disagrees as mounting some kind of personal attack. But people can disagree without turning it personal if they really try. Even best friends can have differing opinions. That’s not an insult, that’s life.

In her example, X says something that Y doesn’t like, so Y insults X. Why can’t Y just make a counter-argument without insult? Sometimes, the insults come later…sometimes Y does just make their own position known, and then X insults Y for disagreeing. Sooner or later, it seems, the temptation to be the first to take the “low road” is just too high.

I believe that debate is good; even if it doesn’t change the minds of the debaters, it at least clarifies positions and gives readers the opportunity to think about where their positions fall. Sometimes a nice jibe can be entertaining, but it does little to make an effective argument. It can even turn people away from your point if the insults get out of hand.

When “The Dixie Chicks” spoke out against the war in Iraq a few years ago, many listeners, angered by the “lack of patriotism,” called radio stations demanding that their music be pulled. Many stations temporarily complied. Questioning what an administration tells you doesn’t show a lack of patriotism in my book; that, to me, doing so is more of a duty of the patriotic. But just as “The Dixie Chicks” had every right to speak their minds, their fans had every right to stop listening to their music as a result of their remarks. Those who speak out don’t get to do so without the possibility of response. That’s one of the nice things about Freedom of Speech: it goes both ways.

But a funny thing happened when some started turning off their radios: everyone started arguing about whether the group had the right to make their feelings known — they did! — and whether or not consumers had a right to respond by boycotting the group — they did!

The group’s real message, expressing dissent about the war, got lost in the windstorm. Even when the group made a public apology, all that accomplished was settling down some of the people who had been so outraged that they’d speak out. The dialog about the war didn’t come back to the forefront when their music started getting regular play again. By then, people had pretty much lost sight of it.

Writing about the workplace may seem like a great way to relieve stress, but people are finding out the hard way that if the wrong person reads the digs at the boss, someone might get a pink slip. Is it fair? Maybe, maybe not. But it is the reality of the situation. You can be convinced that you have the worst boss in the world. But when you start naming names and being honest, you never know whether your boss might be one of those “lurkers” who hangs around your journal to see who’s saying what.

When “flamewars” begin, some people are attracted to the exchance only because they enjoy reading those quick-witted, snide comments. But when the reader starts looking only for the mean-spirited comebacks, aren’t they ignoring the meat of the argument? Don’t the arguments then begin to get bogged down, even forgotten, in favor of the insults? It’s not a question of who has the most valid points anymore, it’s a question of who “one-upped” the other the best.

Shelly suggests that personal responsibility may be dying in our society, that it could be the result of things being taken for granted. I wouldn’t begin to argue with that!

There are a lot of calls for truth these days. This standard doesn’t seem to apply, apparently, in the doctor’s office. According to a report from ABC News, Dr. Terry Bennett, a man who believes in “telling it like it is” learned how dangerous that can be after a woman he allegedly said was overweight left his office and went straight to the medical board!

What’s even more outrageous here is that the New Hampshire Board of Medicine reprimanded Bennett and the state’s attorney general asked him to take a medical education course, apprently to teach him sensitivity.

“Part of my job is to tell you the truth,” Bennett said. “You come in here, you pay $75 to sit on the couch. I’m not going to sit here and talk about the weather with you. If you’re noticeably obese, I know that you are going to have future health problems.”

The article does not mention the specific wording Bennett used to tell the patient that she needed to lose weight.

New studies reveal that 62-65% of the US adult population are battling with weight problems. Obesity is linked to myraid medical problems from obesity to heart disease.

Another of Bennett’s patients, who also left his office feeling offended after being told she should lose weight, vowed never to come back. She later changed her mind, and since then, Bennett has helped her lose 150 pounds. Now she has organized a petition to support him.

Bennett told ABC News that he wrote a letter of apology to the patient after she filed the complaint, but insists it’s his duty to educate patients about the dangers of being overweight.

Maybe if more doctors would take the “blunt” approach, we wouldn’t have all these expanding waistlines to deal with.

“It’s either fantasy or smut — and that’s sad,” says one concerned parent, on the options available to young teen readers these days.

According to a report by MSNBC, the “racy reads” are the publishing industry’s fastest-growing segment and that young girls are the biggest consumers.

The concern for parents is that books like Rainbow Party, Teach Me and the Gossip Girl series depict teens and sex in ways that might make sex seem attractive to their kids. In Rainbow Party, a book that received a lot of attention before it was even available, teens plan an oral sex party in which the colors of their lipstick will be used to “mark” the boys they have serviced. In Teach Me, which is due to be released soon, a teacher and student carry on an affair. The Gossip Girl series centers on rich kids with access to money, drugs and sex.

In defending his novel, Teach Me, author Russell Nelson says, “I feel like it fills an important niche in moving the readers to a higher level of maturity.”

Do 13-year-olds need a higher level of maturity? I’m not so sure that what they find in these books is such a shock to their system these days. There are things kids say in middle school today that most people my age wouldn’t have considered saying when we were that age, so I doubt how much of the “racy” content might seem racy to today’s kids. (Not that this isn’t a problem, I just think it’s a little unreasonable to think that today’s kids aren’t a lot more aware of things at a lot younger age: that’s the world we’ve built for them.)

Certainly parents have every right — and the responsibility — to protect their children from questionable content. But that involves getting involved, not just assuming that kids are selecting only “family fare” for their personal reading time. I think most of us would like to pretend that such heavy subjects never make their way to impressionable minds too quickly. Unfortunately, it’s happening whether parents like it or not.

NBC News claims to have received a lot of comments on this story:

“Many parents told us they had no idea what their teens were reading. They were surprised by the content of some of the current best sellers. One dad said he thought a book in his kitchen belonged to his wife, after reading the back cover. It turned out to be his daughter’s book.”

What strikes me about this statement is this: when the father assumed the book must belong to his wife, did he question her about why she’d bring such content into the house to begin with? Maybe it was confronting the wife about the book that led him to the realization that the book belonged to his daughter; or maybe, he assumed it was his wife’s and didn’t question it any further.

But their daughter could have just as easily picked up a “racy” title from her mother’s bookshelf rather than from a book store’s. Wouldn’t parents who fear that children might follow the example of characters in a novel consider the possibility that their kids might follow their own example? It’s not like kids who are capable of going to a book store and buying something their parents might object to without them even knowing wouldn’t also be capable of snooping around in their parents’ bedroom.

Colleen Curran, whose debut novel, Whores on the Hill, was released earlier this year, told Richmond.com that she’s concerned about the way young girls are left to deal with sexuality:

“I wanted to write a book about sex and what girls are really going through…I did go to an all-girls school, and they did call us the Whores on the Hill. The more I’ve talked about it, the more I’ve heard that other all-girls schools are called Whores on the Hill. And I think that shows a real fear of teenage sexuality – a real, present cultural fear of girls and sex and the power of that…What I wanted to [show] was that girls are going through it, too; girls are experimenting with sex and confused by sex and excited by sex and scared, so scared by sex. And it’s really hard for girls today because…there is still a huge double standard with women and sex. We’re stuck. We’re stuck between the virgin and the whore, and we don’t want to be either one.”

Maybe it’s possible that some elements of these “racy” reads aren’t finding their audience because of the content readers find racy at all. Maybe what attracts them is the parts the readers find to be so honest.

How can I defend books that would cause some to raise eyebrows? Simple. I’m a writer. I have to believe in the First Amendment; if I didn’t, why would I be writing to begin with?

Those who oppose the war in Iraq insist that Cindy Sheehan, regardless of possible political agenda, is important because she has created a dialog about the war that didn’t exist before. Those who fight racism applaud those who speak out frankly about the subject. Those who fight for medical advances or awareness encourage those who have been through illnesses to speak out to make more people understand all aspects of the situation.

Yet sex may be one of the last subjects about which so many people want to bury their head in the sand and pretend that it’ll just go away. Maybe these “racy reads” can create the same type of dialog…if given a sincere chance.

Think you hate getting all of those credit card offers in the mail? Your frustration probably doesn’t hold a candle to that of Sami Habbas, a grocery store manager from Corona, California.

Habbas received a credit card offer from JP Morgan Chase. The problem? It was addressed to “Palestinian Bomber.” When he opened the letter, it began, “Dear Palestinian Bomber.”

According to a report from ABC News, Habbas, a naturalized US citizen who has lived in America for 51 years and served in the US Army, called the bank to inquire about the odd piece of mail. When he was asked for the identification number on the offer, the operator called up the account and reportedly responded, “Yes, Mr. Palestinian Bomber, how can we help you?” And he says the same thing happened with more than one operator.

(Do they have the same phone support people AOL has?)

A Chase representative blamed the error on faulty information from a mailing list the corporation purchased.

“Although no Chase employee was involved in creating this information, we are embarrassed by this incident and regret that our automatic screening procedures did not catch this erroneous information,” said Kelly Presta, executive vice president of Chase Card Services.

Automatic screening procedures? How about all of those operators?? They should be even more embarrassed with them!

Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson acknowledged late today what the rest of us already knew: that he did, in fact, call for the assassination of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Monday’s broadcast of “The 700 Club.”

At first, on today’s broadcast, according to CBS News, he denied having made that statement and claimed that his remarks had been misunderstood. Here’s what CBS is reporting he said:

“August is a slow news day but it seems like the whole world is talking about my comments about Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez.

“I didn’t say assassination. I said our special forces should take him out. Take him out can be a number of things including kidnapping. There are a number of ways to take out a dictator from power besides killing him. I was misinterpreted.”

Apparently, by the end of the day, someone reminded the veteran broadcaster that back in the 1950s, someone inconveniently came up with this thing called videotape. Someone may also have pointed out that tapes of his actual comments from Monday’s show had been played all over the country for the past few days, leaving no doubt about what Robertson really had said:

“If he thinks we’re trying to assassinate him, I think we really ought to go ahead and do it. It’s a whole lot cheaper than starting a war. … We have the ability to take him out and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability.”

Over the 700 Club website, Robertson issued the following statement:

“Is it right to call for assassination? No, and I apologize for that statement. I spoke in frustration that we should accommodate the man who thinks the U.S. is out to kill him.”

I’m glad he apologized, even if he did try to come up with some kind of justification for what he had said. Maybe he’ll think twice before he condemns other religions for advocating violence in the name of their beliefs in the future.

Author Tod Goldberg has a regular feature in his blog: he criticizes the generally-stupid and inane questions received by Walter Scott’s Personality Parade. The column runs weekly in the Parade magazine insert in most Sunday newspapers.

Most of the questions, which are supposed to be sent online, can be answered online by going to resources like the Internet Movie Database or by doing a simple Google search. But that doesn’t stop people from asking Personality Parade, anyway.

But one question, Tod says, takes the cake. And his post about it was one of the funniest posts of last week. Give it a read here.

Barbara weighs in on the Cindy Sheehan protest over at her new Blogger home, “Independent Single Professional Female in the Buckle of the Bible Belt. YEEHAAA!!“

In that entry, titled “Sheehan,” she lists me as being against Sheehan. I made the following reply:

An excellent, well-argued entry!

I would like to clarify something about my position on this: I’m not sure it’s completely fair to say that I’m just against her. I support her right to free speech and her right to her own opinions. She does indeed have the right to protest in the way she’s protesting, and so long as she doesn’t break any laws, no one should complain that she is taking advantage of the same First Amendment rights the rest of us have.

But I am against her tactics: She claims that the war was started based completely on lies, an assertion many people do agree on. But does she really want answers from Bush, someone who she has indicated she doesn’t trust to begin with? What answers can he possibly give her to make it easier to deal with having buried her son??? Even if he pulls her inside his ranch, and in a private, one-on-one meeting, through tears streaming down his face, tells her that she’s right, he lied. If she doesn’t trust what he says as being factual; if, as she has said, Bush is a liar, how would she know that this little drama isn’t another lie just to give her what she wants so she’ll go away?

Protest the war because you think it’s wrong. Protest the war because you’re angry that you lost a loved one. But don’t protest the war under the auspices of wanting “answers” from someone you obviously don’t believe ever tells the truth to start with: to me, that isn’t completely on the level, either.

If we’re going to use the customer/manager example, let’s take a little closer look: okay, the President is our employee. What’s a good boss going to do when there is a problem with an employee? Is a good boss going to go marching into to the office with lapel pins that read “Firing Tour” and make a big public show of the employee’s questionable performance? Or does a good boss maintain restraint and keep things respectful while explaining to the employee why the actions he has taken are unacceptable?

And when I have a problem with a store, I am very careful when I complain: I have learned to NEVER make harsh statements like, “I’m never coming back in this store again,” because all that does is tell the manager that he has already lost me as a customer and that he therefore would be wasting his effort to try to get me back inside. I take a different approach: I explain, rationally, why I’m upset about the situation, and give the manager time to explain or address the situation. I do not show up outside his store with picket signs that show the world how lousy the service is. I worked in retail long enough to know that such action isn’t going to get you anywhere.

The main difference between the real-life situation and this scenario is that we can’t just go shop in another store.

I especially agree with your Fact One, though: I do believe she has the right to be there, and has every right to take the tactics she has taken. That is her choice. It isn’t the way I would have done things, but she is within her right. I don’t question the situation just because she is against the war, or because she is speaking out against Bush, or Republicans. I think we’d have many more problems if there weren’t people who had strong convictions on both sides of the issue: if we lived in a world where everyone blindly believed everything we were told, that would scare the hell out of me.

Barbara raises important points, though, about those who are protesting Cindy’s protest. I think the people who say she’s being unpatriotic because she doesn’t support the war or the president are the ones who are wrong here. We have free speech in this country for a reason. I would not deny Cindy Sheehan her opinions or her protest, even if it is unfolding in a way other than what I might have done in her situation.

In a new post, Barbara explains that she used the leadership/management example to suggest the expectations of a good leader. In fairness, I was pretty sure I knew that was why she used the example.

She adds:

“There is a difference, however, between the ‘manager’ and the ‘employer,’ particularly when Ms. Sheehan is one of millions of voters whose lives are affected by the leadership of the one supposedly elected into the position. Again, her choice in how to handle the matter is not of my concern: she was within her rights, has done nothing illegal, and does not pose a ‘threat to our national security.’ So whether or not she is correct in the way she went about it is not something I’m willing to argue.

But “her choice in how to handle the matter” was my whole point, why I questioned elements of her protest, but never her right to protest. If we’re going to compare Bush to an employee, I think our own behavior should be able to stand above reproach as his employers.

Do I mean to say she should have come in a bus decorated with elephants and the words, “Four More Years” and Bush’s portrait painted on it? Of course not. But a little diplomacy and a little restraint — the same things the war protestors say Bush failed to use before going into Iraq — might have avoided polarizing so many people on this issue.

According to Truthout.com, just before she left for Crawford, Sheehan said this about people who were “on the fence” about the war:

“If you fall on the side that is pro-George and pro-war, you get your ass over to Iraq, and take the place of somebody who wants to come home. And if you fall on the side that is against this war and against George Bush, stand up and speak out.”

So she’s saying, “you’re either with us or against us,” the same either/or nonsense so many war protestors have complained about Bush using? She doesn’t seem to account for the fact that not everyone is 100% one way or the other: she’s saying either stand up with me and denounce this war, or leave the country and go fight it yourself?

It sounds a lot like Dave, who asked when I would demonstrate the courage to speak out against the war, as though there was no other position possible that might make someone be deemed couragous.

Sorry, folks, it doesn’t work that way.

We do not have to conform to one way of thinking to be considered courageous in this country. We do not even have to publicly state our beliefs on issues. We vote in secret ballot in America: it’s not a matter of whether you vote Democrat, Republican or third party; what’s important is that you vote.

Those of us who are not in the military are not obligated to sign up just to go stand up for our beliefs. Cindy certainly didn’t enlist to express hers, did she? In fact, with regard to her son’s first enlistment, before the War in Iraq began, and even before 9/11 happened, it was almost the opposite: Cindy says she told him she’d take him to Canada so he wouldn’t have to report. If it’s fair to say that those who support the war should go enlist and fight it themselves, what are we to think about someone who didn’t want her son to be part of the military when there wasn’t even a war happening?

And her son voluntarily re-enlisted after the war had begun. Using Cindy’s logic, which seems to state that only those who support the war should sign up and go, what are we to conclude that her son’s position on the war was?

I don’t ask these questions to attack Cindy, who has obviously been through an extreme ordeal in losing her son, her marriage and now her mother’s stroke. I’m not saying the war is right, or even that we got there for all the right reasons.

I simply point out that there are people — and I don’t mean Barbara here — who are so quick to side with Cindy because she “dares” to question what Washington tells us, which we all should be doing regularly anyway, but who at the same time balk at anyone who questions their side of things.

Isn’t that a double standard?

Doesn’t it make you ask why?

Yeah, I’m still trying to figure out how “spaghetti” can be considered a snack food from last week’s quiz. It’s not something I’d snack on, but maybe somewhere in the world, it’s the equivalent of potato chips or popcorn. Stranger things have happened.

An odd thing happened with last week’s “first to play.” The rules specify that to be counted first, you must post the complete link to the specific entry. The first comment actually from esalansky but didn’t have the link to the whole entry; the second comment came from firestormkids04 but the link goes to an entry but it wasn’t the ‘Six’ at all, so in fairness, the third comment becomes the “first to play” of last week. Congrats to Jennifer of “Ramblings from off the top of my head.”

Last week’s questions marked the first time that Kris played the ‘Six.’ Be sure to stop by her journal and say hello.

If I missed any first time players, please let me know by saying so in your comments. If this is your first time playing this week’s edition, please say so as well. It’s easy to miss a first-time player because there are lots of folks who kindly stop by each week!

Here are this week’s “Saturday Six” questions. Either answer the questions in a comment here, or put the answers in an entry on your journal…but either way, leave a link to your journal so that everyone else can visit! If you don’t have an AOL journal, you can still play, but of course you’ll at least need an AOL screen name, which you can get for free with AOL Instant Messenger, to be able to leave a comment here. To be counted as “first to play,” you must be the first player to either answer the questions in a comment or to provide a complete link to the specific entry in your journal in which you answer the questions. A link to your journal in general cannot count. (Again, if you’re playing for the first time, please be sure to say so in the comment!) Enjoy!

1. Other than the “Saturday Six,” what weekly or daily memes do you play most often? (Please give a link to that journal.)

6. Are you named after anyone? Has anyone ever been named after you?

If you have a Reader’s Choice question you’d like to see asked (and answered), click the e-mail link on the About Me bar and send it to me.

MY ANSWERS:
1. The only other one I’ve played recently is Charley’s “The Friday Five.”

4. How You Life Your Life

You seem to be straight forward, but you keep a lot inside. You’re laid back and chill, but sometimes you care too much about what others think. You tend to have one best friend you hang with, as opposed to many aquaintences. You tend to dream big, but you worry that your dreams aren’t attainable.

5. “Roses Are Red” by James Patterson. I think I set it aside because the newest Dean Koontz novel had come out, and since I wasn’t that far into ‘Roses,’ I just figured I’d come back to it later. I haven’t yet, but I will.

6. I share the same middle name as my dad, but no one in the family is named Patrick. Mom just liked that name. My best friends just had their third child and named him Hayden Patrick, so yes, someone has been named after me. I still can’t believe it.