Speed bumps - and the morons who try to avoid them.

I work out at a gym that has below-ground parking. People go in and out of this garage at break-neck speed. Consequently, the gym installled speed bumps before and after the entrance.

 

Yet a day doesn't go by where I see virutally the same people swerving to avoid such speed bumps, or partially going over them. 99% of the time, they do this by going into the oncoming lane.

 

Why are people so stupid? These are accidents waiting to happen.

 

Is it so necessary to be going so fast as to endanger not only oneself, but every pedestrian and other driver in the process with such stupidity? It's not my fault such idiots are late to their spinning classes that they must act like maniacs in their gas-guzzling SUVs or Road Rangers to find that parking stall closer to the walkthrough door!

 

Would it hurt to just leave a bit earlier, go over the speed bumps slowly, park a bit further away? Heck one might even find the walk a good exercise in of itself!

 

 

 

 

Bill Maher

While I wasn't a fan of his show, I don't think I could've said the following better:

 

" Mr. President, this job can't be fun for you any more.  There's no more money to spend--you used up all of that.  You can't start another war because you used up the army.  And now, darn the luck, the rest of your term has become the Bush family nightmare: helping poor people.  Listen to your Mom.  The cupboard's bare, the credit cards maxed out.  No one's speaking to you.  Mission accomplished.

Now it's time to do what you've always done best: lose interest and walk away.  Like you did with your military service and the oil company and the baseball team.  It's time.  Time to move on and try the next fantasy job.  How about cowboy or space man?  Now I know what you're saying:  there's so many other things that you as President could involve yourself in.  Please don't.  I know, I know.  There's a lot left to do.  There's a war with Venezuela.  Eliminating the sales tax on yachts.  Turning the space program over to the church.  And Social Security to Fannie Mae.  Giving embryos the vote.

But, Sir, none of that is going to happen now.  Why?  Because you govern like Billy Joel drives.  You've performed so poorly I'm surprised that you haven't given yourself a medal.  You're a catastrophe that walks like a man.  Herbert Hoover was a shitty president, but even he never conceded an entire city to rising water and snakes.

On your watch, we've lost almost all of our allies, the surplus, four airliners, two trade centers, a piece of the Pentagon and the City of New Orleans.  Maybe you're just not lucky.  I'm not saying you don't love this country.  I'm just wondering how much worse it could be if you were on the other side.

So, yes, God does speak to you.  What he is saying is: 'Take a hint.'"

Katrina, Bush and race

"I was somewhat amazed (slap me stupid) when Bush replied to assertions by some that the Katrina response would have been faster if so many of the victims were not poor and black with this gem: "The storm didn't discriminate and neither will the recovery effort."  Technically the storm didn't discriminate, true.  Storms are neither conscious nor evil.  They simply blow in and destroy whatever, whoever, lies in their path.  But using this
technicality exposes once again the President's bewildered lack of understanding of the effects of the storm.

  As a causal force the storm did not discriminate, however, its effects were most certainly discriminatory. 
And the fault for that discriminatory effect lies not with the storm, but with a government that has allowed a
three-tiered society to become entrenched, and made it very difficult to cross over from the lower tiers to the
higher tiers; poor to middle class, middle class to the very rich.  Yes, it can be done--in fact, it happens
all the time--to a small percentage of very motivated individuals.  Meanwhile, the vast majority of the poor
stay poor, and raise poor children that stay poor.  So, to return to my point, Bush used a technicality to
ignore a huge societal problem exposed in the raw by the after affects of Katrina.  The poor were most certainly
discriminated against because they were left behind to face the wrath of the storm.  Furthermore, we saw the
faces of the poor in New Orleans and they did not represent the rainbow of color racial equality brings."

 

Ken Gunn