You should have to take a test before you vote.

It should test your knowledge of the candidates. Basic stuff: where they stand on the issues, their running mates, etc. Why?

THIS is why:

Did he really just say that?

I'll be honest: I didn't watch the whole debate. I was busy bathing children, cleaning the kitchen, putting the baby to sleep, etc. I listened to as much as I could and I even sat down and watched some. Two snippets I heard, well, you could have knocked me over with a feather. I was STUNNED at Obama's ignorance regarding insurance costs for children. Take the fingers out of your ears when it hits about 58seconds.



A few years ago, when Rob thought about switching jobs (and as it turns out, he's looking into that again), we researched the cost of insuring Beth until his coverage kicked in again. I fell off the chair when the first quote came back at about $300/month. The subsequent quotes were similar. Cheap?! Is he freaking kidding me? Evidently, he wouldn't know "cheap" if it slapped him upside the head.

Then there was this. Start listening at about 35 seconds in.



Now call me crazy, but didn't we intervene with the holocaust? I would swear up and down we entered World War II in 1941 and, according to all the history books, kicked a large amount of ass. But I'm just a mommy blogger, I could be wrong.

Your Daily Dose of P.O.S.

That's "Piece Of Shit" for those who aren't familiar with that time-saving acronym.

"Every action of our lives touches on some chord that will vibrate in eternity." ~Edwin Hubbel Chapin

I was watching the RNC with my husband last night and when the topic about Sarah Palin's family - and consequently, her daughters pregnancy - came up, we started talking about how ironic it is that when a Democrat makes controversial decisions, "everybody" thinks that their personal life should be completely separate from their political life. Yet, when a Republican (or their kid) makes a controversial decision, suddenly everyone in that family should pay publicly for that decision. Clinton's trysts in the White House were supposed to be ignored because he was just so wonderful, but we're supposed to have this tainted view of Sarah Palin because their making her daughter own her decision and they're going to support her?

But that's not what I really want to talk about today. In talking about all this, we turned to the topic of abortion and Barack Obama's stance on it. Rob mentioned, in a not-so-offhand way, that Obama is in support of after-birth abortions. Naturally, that stopped me in my tracks. I knew he supported a woman's right to choose (as do most libs) but I had never heard of a politician who was in favor of this horrendous practice.

So I zipped over to the computer to research this claim. His website renounces the rumors, of course. That didn't satisfy me. I don't buy half of what any politicians website says - not even McCain's - and so I searched on. The next site on the list was an article by Jill Stanek. I'd never heard of her before but I figured if it was that far up on the list it had to be pertinent. I read it and was SHOCKED. Stunned. Horrified. Repulsed. Devastated. Broken. Then I found her blog. She's keeping tabs on him, as well as anything abortion-related.

This morning, I found this video:



If that video doesn't move you to tears (or if you're like me, heaving sobs and an unbearable sadness in your soul), then I'm suspect of the presence of your soul. How could he let things like this happen? How could anyone? I mean, if Sens. Kennedy, Clinton, all those way-left Democrats voted against it...and I thought Ted Kennedy was as far left as one could go. Guess I was wrong.

Please don't let this man become president. If he's willing to ignore this practice and not vote against it, you must surely realize that it's just the tip of the iceberg where his character is concerned. You all know abortion will never go away, too many people support a woman's right to choose. In cases of rape, incest, and danger to the mother's health, even I support it. But what's going on in those Illinois hospitals is unfathomable to me and as a mom of two wonderful kids...having watched them come into this world and seeing their eyes look up at me, trusting me to make everything okay, to hold them and to feel their spirit in my arms...I don't know how anyone could stand there and blindly support someone who would allow the inhumane, barbaric killings of babies to go on another day.

Coffee Talk

I have a hodgepodge of things to talk about, partially because I just do and partially because I never got around to blogging yesterday. Double-time, people!

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I cleaned the fish tank yesterday. Mundane in and of itself, there's an underlying tone of resentment on my part. I didn't want the fish. Rob decided, back in March, that the one thing Beth was lacking in her life was a fish tank full of pretty little goldfish. So he brought home a little (and by little, I mean about two quarts) tank with 10 Comets in them.



That...x5. Within three hours of being home, the fish count had dwindled to about four. So Rob and Beth traipsed off to Petco at 6:00 p.m. to do it up right. When all was said and done, 24 hours later we had this:



Now I realize that a three-year-old can't clean a fish tank. But a 29-year-old sure can and he's only helped maybe twice. Every other time, I do it myself. This was his idea! I told him the last thing we needed was another cost in our lives. Fish are expensive creatures to properly care for! You're putting in a new filter every month, you have to feed the shiny bastards, you need brushes and nets, water conditioner, gravel vacuum, algae tablets. How did animals I didn't want in the first place become my responsibility?

What's worse? I worry about the damn things! I actually care that they swim in a clean tank and have enough to eat. I care if algae starts growing.

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Finally, someone says it! Well, someone who's voice extends beyond the four walls of their two-bedroom loft apartment. I'm not disputing his gift as a motivational speaker. If you aren't listening too closely to the content of his speeches you might find yourself truly excited at the end of his monologue. But if, like me, you're listening for specifics, then you're going to be sorely disappointed. He calls for change, for looking past party divide to reach common ground, blah blah blah...but he has yet to relate any actual plans for all this change.

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We have two containers of peanut butter in our cupboard. One is Great Value (yes, Walmart brand) Creamy Peanut Butter. The other is Safeway's Reduced Fat Creamy Peanut Spread. Two differences: One is reduced fat and is called Peanut Spread. But I lie, there aren't just two differences. Check out their lists of ingredients:

Great Value Peanut Butter: roasted peanuts, sugar, contains less than 2% of molasses, hydrogenated vegetable oils (rapeseed, cottonseed, soybean), salt.

Safeway Reduced Fat Peanut Spread: peanuts, corn syrup solids, soy protein, sugar, contains 2% or less of the following: salt, molasses, fully hydrogenated vegetable oils (rapeseed, cottonseed, soybean), magnesium oxide, ferric phosphate, zinc oxide, niacinamide, copper sulfate, pyridoxine hydrochloride, folic acid.

Q#@$#%!#$^@#$%!#$%!@#$!???????????

Now I could sit here and research the function of each and every one of those chem class bonus question answers but I won't and this is why: I don't think I want to know what they're there for. Seriously, I'm of the mind that the longer the list of ingredients on a package, the worse it is for you. That's not that I don't buy processed foods like Nutri-Grains, cereal, soda, etc. But for something as simple as peanut butter, the list of ingredients shouldn't take up four rows of text. When I can afford to buy Adam's (which, by the way, I love but it's too expensive for as fast as we go through it), I love seeing ONE ingredient on the label: PEANUTS.

K.I.S.S. Keep It Simple Stupid. Er, Safeway and all other reduced-fat-peanut-butter-makin' companies.

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Finally, in this weeks edition of "Signs You're Online Far Too Much," I have to set the scene. I've brought in the Op-Ed section of the San Jose Mercury News to take a picture of the abovementioned political cartoon. I've opened it and then folded it in half like so...



As I'm taking a moment to read the rest of the Readers' Letters, I reach the bottom of the first column and instead of turning the newspaper over to read the rest, I reach for my mouse and start scrolling down. *sigh*