River: How do you stop being dumb?

Yesterday morning I left to take the Y.D. to school without putting on my glasses. Not the first time, either. My current prescription is mild enough that I can occasionally get away with this, but still... Dumb.

By permission, (from pocketnaomi someone who can claim attribution in a comment if she wants; I forgot to ask), we have this intriguing question:

What do you do when you're being dumb and you know it and that doesn't seem to have any effect on whether you keep doing it or not?

To which I will sheepishly add:

What if the dumb thing is not doing, or putting off, something that you really need to do?

( I'll go first.. )

What do the Republicans stand for these days?

[With permission, from a locked post by my nephew, because I felt it needed wider distribution.]

So, can someone explain to me what the Republicans stand for these days?

See, I was listening to a party guy on the radio [the show was On Point, on NPR] on the way home talking about what they need to do to regain power. That got me wondering if the Republican party stands for anything other than hate?

- small government? I think not.
- individual freedoms? Yeah right.
- fiscal responsibility? Have you looked at our deficit?
- pro-business? I can't really see how.

So...
- hate against pregnant women who want an abortion? Check.
- hate against gays who want to marry/adopt/have eights/etc... Yup.
- hate against people with drug problems (ie - throw them in jail) rather than rehab for them? Yup.
- hate against individual rights by limiting civil liberties? Yes.
- hate against the environment? I think so.


There was a caller who said that when he watched the democratic convention he saw a group of people full of hope and positive energy. When he watched the republicans he saw anger and fear. Is it any surprise Obama won?

So, I'm serious here. I know some of my friends at one point or another considered themselves to be republican. Step up and explain why please. I really want to know.

[I also have a link to this Salon article that essentially asks the same question.]

Public service announcement: links

When a post of mine contains a link whose text looks like a hostname or URL (with the "http://" omitted, usually) you can be pretty damned certain that it's the web site or web page itself that I'm trying to draw your attention to.