March 4, 2012

SandBoxBlogs: Newsmax "Palin: Rep. Allen West Should Be Considered for VP"

Write a letter to a soldier.  Or a thank you note to a cop.  Set up pen-pal arrangements with an orphanage.


Any of those ideas are better ways to occupy your time than writing rant email to 'SandBox Nanny' over the view she is about to express over Sarah Palin.


Truly, 'kids'.


Again:

The view 'SandBox Nanny' has on any woman holding the Office of the Presidency of United States is that a woman has no business holding such a position.  Can a woman do the job?  Of course we can and likely a lot better than a number of the men who have held the spot.  The problem is that it's a whole other world out there once female POTUS steps off American soil.  Can you imagine the Taliban or Iran taking her seriously if she imposed sanctions??!  Get real.  'Wait until your father gets home' is a concept that works well.

Now, VP or Sec State?  You betcha.  Those two spots should never be held by a man again.  Would Palin make a terrific VP?  You betcha.  With the added bonus that putting her on a ticket with someone like Newt would guarantee a win.  Putting her on a ticket with someone like Romney would at least get us one conservative in the White House.

Sarah Palin, love her or can't stand her; has been the singlemost driving force for positive change in conservative politics since Ronald Reagan.  Love the Tea Party or can't stand the Tea Party, makes no difference.

The entire left has nothing but Tea Party Envy.

This idea of hers to promote Florida Rep. Allen West (R) is a good one.  Ideas like this and her total lack of outward reserve in expressing herself while pushing the establishment are unifying the disenfranchised voter.

Here's to the little guy.

Let freedom ring.  (Read and watch?  Click title)

"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."

SandBoxBlogs: Union Leader "For what, all these wars?"

An outstanding piece from Pat Buchanan.  A must read.  (Click title for full column)

"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."

SandBoxBlogs: Aspen Daily News " The professor and the basketball star"

(Comment ability blocked on this post)

Dave Danforth:
"...For his class, Tatge pulled together a 17-page file on the Stephens episode. It included her Twitter and Facebook profiles, the police report and court documents. It also included her permission to travel out of state for the team.

Four sorority members at Stephens’ Pi Beta Pi told her that her record was the subject of a journalism class.

“I felt embarrassed,” Stephens told The DePauw. “I felt really uncomfortable walking around. I don’t think it reflects on the person I am.” Stephens told her parents, who complained to DePauw’s vice president for student life, ramping up the case to a level where it drew the attention of national websites.

The school was caught in a dilemma. It wanted to make sure its students were comfortable, while also protecting the sanctity of the classroom. The case involved academic freedom, privacy issues, and freedom of academic expression, for starters. There were no right answers.

Stephens’ mother let loose in a letter to the paper. She accused Tatge of wanting to “create news,” and of making himself the center of a story. By targeting her daughter, Tatge was also guilty of a form of social bullying, she said. This in turn drew rebukes from other students, who questioned whether Stephens was taking responsibility. Stephens, they suggested, had put herself in harm’s way.

DePauw officials are still mulling what to do, if anything. The values at issue conflict.

Add to these values the question of police discretion. Police officers are hired by the public to protect them. But often, the public complains that they are disproportionately getting busted instead of protected by officers who are out “trolling for trouble,” in search of cases they can “clear by arrest.”

Community standards and public safety often don’t square up. Local police standards are often imported from other towns from which officers are recruited. Locals note how the community values taught to Pitkin County sheriff’s deputies clash with the more “them’s-the-breaks,” “knock-’dem-heads” practices on display in Aspen police reports.

Ultimately, citizens decide what kind of law enforcement they want, although many don’t know it. The chief local prosecutor is often elected, though local citizens differ over respect for police while scrutinizing their tactics and the integrity of their reports.

It matters when it hits home, as it did to Alison Stephens, her family, and to a distinguished visiting professor at DePauw. Its 2,400 students all know the news before it hits..."  (Read more?  Click title)

"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."

SandBoxBlogs: Aspen Times "U.S. attorney: No pot shop safe from federal enforcement"

Will 2012 bring the final outcome?

Is this the year that the medical marijuana industry finally gets a straight answer on the question of whether to stay open or close the doors?  Finally get a break from lawyer fees and being hassled in the business community on all kinds of levels?  Be able to go to work without being afraid the cops are on their way?

Colorado US Attorney John Walsh says that it is.

Rema Rahman:
"DENVER — The U.S. attorney in Colorado says there is no such thing as "safe harbor" for pot shops.

U.S. Attorney John Walsh sent a letter Friday to a lawyer representing medical marijuana dispensaries, saying safe harbor doesn't exist for such shops because marijuana remains illegal under federal law. It was the latest in an exchange of letters between Walsh and lawyer Robert Corry regarding the location of dispensaries and how far they need to be from schools.

Walsh said in the new letter that it is at his office's discretion to take enforcement action against any and all medicinal marijuana dispensaries...."  (Read more? Click title)

"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."

SandBoxBlogs: Aspen Daily News "A skier’s best friend"

Aspen Daily News:
"Dogs in Aspen are a ubiquitous site, seen everywhere from the post office to City Hall to the numerous parks around town. And while many owners may even bring their dogs to work to lie silently in the corner of the office, there is an elite group that wake up everyone morning and really go to work. Instead of getting the morning paper, these canines strap on their harnesses, hop on the chairlift and spend the day on the mountain ready to spring into action if there is an avalanche.

There are 11 mountain rescue dogs spread across the four local mountains: three on Aspen Mountain; three on Highlands; four on Snowmass including a part-time Mountain Rescue Aspen dog and a new puppy named Piper; and this season brings the first dog to Buttermilk, Two, aptly named since she was the second born in her litter.

Lori Spence, a member of the Highlands Ski Patrol and leader of the rescue program on that mountain, said all of the dogs within the Aspen Skiing Co.’s program are owned by their handlers. The low staff turnover of patrollers helps to facilitate that approach, and is unique when compared to other resorts where the dogs belong to the companies that own them.

Although local avalanche rescue dogs were formally introduced seven years ago, Brad Benson, the leader of the program on Aspen Mountain, traces the first working canine back to 1983. Chopper worked on Highlands with his owner Chris Kessler, who was killed in a slide on Highland Bowl in 1984..."
(Read more?  Click title)

"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."

SandBoxBlogs: Steamboat Today "Oak Creek musher Tom Thurston on his way in Iditarod"



— Oak Creek musher Tom Thurston said he was gunning for a top 20 finish in this year’s Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in Alaska, and Saturday, he was well ahead of his goal.

Through the first leg of the 40th annual Iditarod, Thurston was fourth. Of course, it helped that he started fourth and that the leg, which cut 11 miles through downtown Anchorage, Alaska, was only ceremonial.

Thurston, his 16 dogs and the 66 other teams in this year’s race will get down to the real race starting Sunday in Willow. It will be the first real step toward the finish line in Nome, nearly 1,000 miles away.

Racing the event for the fourth time, Thurston enters with much greater expectations. He’s finished twice, including last year when he hoped only to make it to Nome and to build his team’s experience...."
(Read more?  Click title)

"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."

SandBoxBlogs: Summit Daily News "Biff America: Love doesn't melt the snow"

Jeffrey Bergeron:
"(Read more?  Click title)...There is a story about a southern senator in the 1930 s — an avowed segregationist. After his retirement, he was a on the board of a state-run high school for the blind. The post was mostly honorary, but after many years he finally attended a function — a segregated schools dance.

The room and dance floor was divided by a rope, with black students dancing on one side, white on the other. The senator saw the ludicrousness of the situation, as neither could tell the difference. Rather, they were told by those sighted whose skin was what color. The students could feel the rope separating them, but could not see the color dividing them.

The story goes that from that moment on, the once-bigoted senator disavowed segregation.

There is a rope dividing same-sex couples from the rest of us. That rope was put up by those too unimaginative or steeped in bias and zealotry to focus on real problems or issues. That in itself is a slope as slippery as any snowy sidewalk absent the heat of love."

Jeffrey Bergeron, under the alias of Biff America, can be seen on TV-8-Summit and read in several newspapers and magazines. He can be reached at biffbreck@yahoo.com.

Biff's book “Steep, Deep and Dyslexic” is available from local book stores or at BiffAmerica.net


"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."

SandBoxBlogs: Summit County Citizens Voice "Morning Photo: Sky Fire "

Bob Berwyn:
"SUMMIT COUNTY — Every now and then I can’t help but pick out a few sunset shots from here and there. And for as often as I’ve photographed sunsets from the meadows and wetlands near our house, I never get tired of it, and no two sunsets are alike."  (See more?  Click title)




SandBoxBlogs: Glenwood Springs Post Independent "Rush the uniter"

Kathleen Parker:
"WASHINGTON — Who'd have thought that Rush Limbaugh would become the great uniter in this divisive political season?

Indeed, he has united decent people of all stripes and persuasions with his vile remarks about a Georgetown Law student.

Perhaps by now you you've heard of Sandra Fluke, who created a smallish tempest when she tried to testify before a congressional committee considering the federal Health and Human Services contraception mandate and was denied a place at the (all-male) table. There really was no reason for her to testify. The subject was religious freedom versus government overreach, not contraception per se, but this detail no longer seems to matter.

Fluke stalked out of the hearing room and has enjoyed the media spotlight ever since. She did finally get to testify at an unofficial hearing convened by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, during which she focused on Republican “censorship,” which, fascinating as it sounds, was a sidebar to a non sequitur...."
(Read more? Click title)

"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."