I was surprised to hear that yesterday the US Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty for child rape cases is unconstitutional, calling it “cruel and unusual punishment.” This was a case brought to the US Supreme court from Louisiana, where a man was convicted of raping his eight year old step-daughter and sentenced to the death penalty.
The most recent medical evidence shows that pedophilia is incurable. People who sexually abuse children, go to jail and serve their time and are released back into society do it again and again. They can’t help themselves.
To make a sweeping declaration about this means that the child rapist, no matter how badly they tortured the victim, no matter how many times they raped the child, they will not be sentenced to death. I think that could be a mistake. I think that victims of child rape suffer the rest of their lives, and the one that raped them stole their lives from them. I think that if the death penalty is taken off the table, then life imprisonment without chance of parole should be the mandatory sentence for child rapists.
Some gas stations have decided to stop accepting credit cards completely, and have switched over to “cash only” at their pumps. They say that the credit card fees are costing them too much money and they can’t afford to pay them. I find that hard to believe, my understanding of credit card fees is that they charge a fixed percentage of the sale. So the more gas costs, the more profits the gas station is making, and that profit should more than cover the credit card fees.
I hate the thought of paying cash at the pump when you have to pump your own gas. I hate the thought that I’d have to have $100 of cash in my pocket at all times.
I can see the scenario now: When pumping gas you have to wait in line for ten minutes for the guy in front of you at the pump to pull away. Then you have to pull into the spot. Then you have to guess how much you are going to be pumping, go into the station and stand in line for ten minutes waiting your turn to pump the gas. Then you pay up front and go out to pump the gas. What should be a ten - fifteen minute process has turned into a thirty minute process. I get very annoyed already at the people who pay cash before pumping because I wait in line for them for fifteen minutes and when they come out their arms are loaded with soda and candy, so you know that they blocked the pump while they were inside shopping. Then they stand beside the car for five minutes, drinking their soda and eating their candy and just staring at you before they start pumping gas. Then they decide to clean all of the trash out of their car before moving away from the pump. You KNOW that is a passive aggressive act, but you are trapped there so you just sit there, trying to be patient, even though you WANT to ask them to “get a move on!”
Oh, the thought just makes me cringe!
Well, I don’t know which news is getting the most press, Tim Russert dying from heart failure, or the big prison break in Afghanistan. No, I take that back, the death of Tim Russert is getting the most press. I understand that is big news, but the prison break in Afghanistan worries me much more. I suspect if Tim Russert hadn’t died on the same day as the prison break, that the prison break would have gotten much more coverage!
So, I am worried about the prison break. Suicide bombers initiated the attack on a major prison in Afghanistan. Other outside militants helped with the break, and almost a thousand prisoners escaped the prison. According to the news, the escapees are mostly Taliban terrorists who will be future suicide bombers. That worries me a lot. We certainly don’t need more fanatical suicide bombers running loose!
This afternoon we are expecting a lot of company. My wife’s side of the family is coming over for a “family day” reunion type of afternoon/evening meal. We are expecting about twelve people to come over, everyone is supposed to bring some kind of food to share with everyone else. They are supposed to start arriving around 3pm today and leave around 8pm.
So my wife is running around the house trying to get the house “company ready.” I’m going to go outside and mow the lawn and hide in the garage as much as possible so she doesn’t ask me to do anything inside the house to help.
The Golden Corral restaurant is one of my very favorite restaurants. It is an all you can eat buffet restaurant that actually has food you want to eat! I’ve been to restaurants that advertise that they have an all you can eat buffet but when you get up to the buffet table you find only five or six items, mostly cheap fillers like macaroni and cheese or spaghetti. The Golden Corral restaurant has no options except all you can eat, and their buffet tables include several types of chicken, several types of beef, several types of fish, a lot of different veggies and fruits, shrimp, and lots of different desserts too.
My wife really likes their yeast dinner rolls that they bring to your table. I know they keep bringing them endlessly, hoping to fill you up on them, but they really are good! We know that the rolls they bring to our table have to be thrown away if we don’t eat them, so my wife brings an extra large purse with her and a large gallon size zipper style plastic storage bag with her so when we are finished eating if there are any dinner rolls left over that we didn’t eat she can bring them home with us. We don’t think that is stealing because we didn’t ASK for the rolls, they just keep bringing them! She doesn’t keep slipping rolls in her purse continuously, she just puts the leftovers in after the meal. And we know they will just get tossed out when we leave if we don’t take them. So we take them and eat them the next day. They are almost as good reheated in the microwave the next day if you wrap them in a paper towel and nuke them for ten seconds.
