Odds and ends, 9/6/07

Oprah may be going all out for Obama. Rats. Now I'll have to take the Fred 08 and the Dennis Kucinich bumper stickers off my SUV.

The sad thing is, some people will probably follow her lead. I couldn't care less who Oprah endorses and works for except that there are people who do.

I like what one of my co-workers said about Oprah today. She gives advice on marriage and child-rearing, but she has never married and she is childless. But people listen to her anyway.

Tell me, P.T. How many suckers are born every minute here in 2007?

Aside: I told my coworker that the only people who know how to raise children are those who have never had any. I'll admit I'm flying blind much of the time dealing with a 15-year-old daughter, a 13-year-old son and a 7-year-old son who is his dad made over. I had all the answers before my daughter was born. I miss my arrogance.

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At least this guy doesn't do business in West Virginia as far as I know. It comes from a news release put out by the American Tort Reform Association:

The ad, appearing on some taxi cabs in and around Palm Beach, Florida, McKinney reported, are those of personal injury lawyer Craig Goldenfarb, whose Web site, among other things, informs visitors:

'If you or a loved one believes a life may have been saved if a public facility . . . would have had an AED [defibrillator], please contact the . . . Law Offices of Craig Goldenfarb, P.A. to discuss the merits of your possible case.'

“Of course, Mr. Goldenfarb’s Web site offers no information about the personal choices that can lead to heart attacks, such as eating or drinking or smoking too much and not getting enough exercise,” McKinney pointed out. “Apparently, he’d rather we blame someone else, and that mindset helps make Palm Beach and Miami-Dade counties the collective judicial hellhole they are,” he added, noting that ATRA’s Judicial Hellholes® 2006 report cited South Florida among the “nation’s worst, most unfair jurisdictions in which to be sued.”

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I have no problem with being asked to show my ID when I cash a check or use my credit card. Sometimes I thank the teller or the clerk who asks, especially if they're apologetic about it. I would rather they ensure that I am who I am rather than cash one of my checks without asking for ID.

That leads into this news item from Georgia today:

ATLANTA (AP) — A federal judge has ruled that Georgia’s voter identification law does not impose a significant burden on the right to vote, meaning the law will be enforced.

David Brackett, a lawyer opposing the voter ID law, said on Thursday they were disappointed with the judge’s decision and were considering whether to appeal.

“We think that it will result in a lot of Georgians not being able to vote in person the way that they would prefer to vote,” Brackett said.

There should be ways of obtaining a legal photo ID without having to get a driver's license. My eighth-grade son is taking a class trip to New York next spring, and all the kids who are going are required to have a state-issued photo ID.

If I had more energy, I would look more deeply into why some people think a photo ID is an unreasonable burden.

I just wish the poll workers at my voting place asked to see my ID when I went in to vote. But they don't.