The don't ask don't tell policy

I believe that everyone that is physically capable of serving in the military should be allowed to do so without regards to their sexual orientation.

Not everyone is comfortable with openly talking about sexual issues whether they are straight, gay, bi or a transsexual, which means that you will always find people that are willing to talk openly about their preferences, which in of itself will cause problems in some situations whether it be for the individual or for the group.

How can you tell an individual that yes we need all the people that we can get to go fight for us, then turn around and tell that same individual that we do not need you due to who you like, regardless of what you can do to help the war effort? This only serves to belittle the individual that has signed on to do what he or she can for our country.

The individuals that are gay or bi who make the decision to join our military already know that there has to be discretion as to who to confide in when it comes to their sexuality given their own experiences and how comfortable they are in telling people about themselves, which means that they should be trusted enough to make the decision for themselves as to whether they come out while in the military.

Most people have come across individuals that have struggled with their decision due to what people may think of them.

Most people who don't want anything thing to do with the whole situation will site their religious beliefs. Here is one very specific question for those who site religious text as their reasoning:

Where the bible does use the term "lay with" with the meaning of having consensual sex and uses the term "get to know" with a meaning of rape, where specifically in the bible does it state that preferring to "lay with" the same gender constitutes an abomination?

The Gulf Coast Oil situation

When it comes to the mess that has evolved in the gulf coast due to the oil rig sinking, I think that what is needed is better direction in what to do to stem the flow of the leaking oil and more resources in dealing with the ever expanding oil slick that is heading to the coastline, with the resources directed at limiting what ends up of the areas that are at most risk of distruction due to even a small amount of the oil entering into that specific environment along with clean up of the areas that can be cleaned.

Yes we do need to know what went wrong and part of that is knowing who made what decisions that helped create the problem on the rig which caused the fire in the first place and then the subsequent sinking and ever expanding oil slick. However at this point we need the people who are capable of stepping up and getting people to stop bickering about who's fault it is and to separate the clean up effort and the attempts at stopping the flow so that people who are dealing with one aspect are not bothered by the other aspect.

The New Health Care Law

I applaude the fact that the democrats pushed through a bill on health care. Unfortunately they had to include pork barrel politics in it due to the fact that the republucans didn't want to be apart of the process.

Instead of trying to come up with one of their own or to tinker with the presidents bill to see something that included things both sides wanted they just judged the bill on what they didn't like.

By no means am I trying to say that it is a great bill or law, it does have its flaws for which the republicans helped point out at the same time we need something that protects those who are sick and those who have to pay the premiums into the system the livelyhood of each sector in medicine with out forcing people into hawk to be healthy.

The U.S. Census

The United States is gearing up for the Decennial Census which is the major census and happens every ten years.

The Census is a massive undertaking that at times gets a bad reputation due to the fact that they have to do a nationwide survey of the population with many people being afraid to give the needed information due to the big brother mentality that is perpetuated by some media outlets and by people fearing that the information is going to be misused by the government in general.

the census workers only show up at any given address for specific reasons which are address canvassing which makes sure that the address data base is up to date, and in instances where the survey has not been returned or completely filled out.

A U.S. Census worker has to identify him or herself as a U.S. Census Employee, why they are there and make sure that they have their credentials on on them for identification purposes. If for any reason you feel that an individual isn't who they say they are then you have every right to call the U.S. Census offices in your area to see if they have an individual employed at one of their offices, or you can call your local authorities as well.

Any information you do give to the U.S. Census is legally protected by the U.S. Constitution and can not be shared with anyone.

The Census date is April 1, 2010 any one showing up before then saying that you didn't fill out your survey or it was incomplete isn't a Census worker and the Census has to wait for the surveys to come in to be able to process the information and it will be a while before you hear from the Census if you didn't fill out your survey or if it wasn't compete before returning it.

congratulations to the president

Even though the Nobel Piece Prize is a surprise to many people, he deserves to be congratulated on winning it. Now that he has won it, it will make it harder for him to do his job due to the expectations that will inevitably be placed on him but it will also make it a little easier for him to bring people to the table to work things out once people stop wondering what he has done to deserve the honor.

Senator Ted Kennedy

Senator Kennedy a man that may have come from a privileged family, will surely be missed for his tirelessly fighting for those who had nothing while serving his beloved constituents even as he himself faced some of the toughest adversities one could ever face, with having to bury 2 brothers who died while trying to serve our country in the manner they thought best.

He has shown that no matter the adversity you must stand up and fight, fight for what you believe in no matter the cost. For that whom ever the torch passes to, will be judged based on what Senator Kennedy tried regardless of whether or not his efforts were fruitful.

Obama's health care plan

I believe that President Obama has the right idea in general in the fact that we need to reform the health care system and also to get the government involved. I feel that its not a matter of whether or not the government should get more involved but rather how they should be involved and to what degree.

the one major problem is that not everyone wants health insurance for one reason or another and you also have people who can't afford the health insurance or would rather use the emergency room as their doctors office. any and all reform has to take these into account and we have figure out how to remedy them as well.

what's with people in power in other countries

with what is going on in both North Korea and in Iran it makes me wonder how the people that lead their countries got their power. One seems overly eccentric and the other seems to want to do anything to stay in power including not letting a full recount of his countries election.

jobs, unemployment, skin cancer, friends

its been a year since I had been diagnosed with skin cancer. In that time I had lost a job due to the place I was working at closing, while recovering from surgery to removed I was forced to be on unemployment and looking for a new job. even though I had that going on I could not have asked for better time of year to be off where I ended up having most of the summer off from having to go to work every day so I could recover more easily from the surgery, not because of the type of surgery but from where I had the surgery.

a month or two after I was fully recovered from the surgery I ended up with a better job than I had left last spring. Even though some of the social interactions are weirder than I am accustomed too I feel as if I have found some better friends than I had in my last job aside from a couple people in my last job I still have contact with.

stem cell research reversal

I am happy that President Obama reversed President Bush's decision to ban stem cell research. I believe that every life is important but I also feel that there is no gaurantee that the embryos would mature enough to be a viable life.

I feel that regardless of religious beliefs, the good of the many in most cases out weighs the good of the one but in the case of medicine the needs of the one help push forward the research that helps us deal with the needs of the many and we need to explore options that we may not always agree with. we have shown in the past that under certain conditions we will forego ethics so we can save a live during war time which means we cannot pick and choose our battles with medicine as long as we don't intend to hurt anyone.