Carmichael's Position

Knee… Meet Jerk

Sometimes I think Shelia Jackson Lee simply cannot help herself.  Matters of truly debatable substance on how to best get our fiscal house in order become a reason to challenge the loyal opposition by baselessly accusing them of being racist!

"I do not understand what I think is the maligning and maliciousness [toward] this president,” said Jackson Lee, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus. “Why is he different? And in my community, that is the question that we raise. In the minority community that is question that is being raised. Why is this president being treated so disrespectfully? …”

Yeah that will rally the party faithful to the cause!

"I am particularly sensitive to the fact that only this president — only this one, only this one — has received the kind of attacks and disagreement and inability to work, only this one," said Jackson Lee from the House floor.

Because Democrats were Oh So Willing to work with the previous administration in a non-confrontational fashion.  What Sheila?…  If you simply say it… it must be true?  SDASTFU!

"Read between the lines," she continued. "What is different about this president that should put him in a position that he should not receive the same kind of respectful treatment of when it is necessary to raise the debt limit in order to pay our bills, something required by both statute and the 14th amendment?"

Ummm, yeah… Its because he’s a minority.  That’s the sole reason intelligent, thoughtful people disagree with this President’s desire to increase our Debt Limit and our Tax burden even further.

Look, I’m tired of this kind of drivel… it serves no purpose to the national discourse!  This is a serious matter before the people, and yes it should be debated by serious adults in a mature manner.  Not that I expect our elected officials to meet any of these expectations, but to instantaneously reduce the structure of the debate to a function of RACE!  Plllleeeaaaassssse!

Sheila does nothing to advance the very real issue of racism in this argument, if anything she belittles it!  By constantly claiming racism any time someone of a color other than our president’s disagrees with him is ludicrous and insulting. 

I am curious, when then Senator Obama actually voted “Nay” and not his usual “Present” on a similar resolution to raise the debt ceiling during the Bush Administration, was it because the President at the time was… uh… I don’t know… maybe… White?

Now on to the real topic at hand… Why do we have a debt ceiling at all?  If all we are going to do is continue to raise it to accommodate our irresponsible spend to the limit (and beyond) , fiscal policies?  When is enough enough?  Sheila’s argument appears to be… Well hell, like all Americans, when we spend beyond our means, we simply go to our credit card agency and request a higher limit!  ~ and of course are always awarded with said higher limit!  “Because, ya know… if they don’t… they are obviously RACIST!”

Isn’t it that kind of thinking that got us here in the first place?  It is time to CUT!  Not tax more! Not spend more!  The teet of the American people has run dry, we’re sick and tired of paying for our Government’s entitlements (read re-election bribes) and some of us are drawing a line.  Others want to continue business as usual and keep milking that cow until she is dry!  Then what?  Seriously it is high time we cut off the spending, reign in federal government’s recklessness in the name of providing for…

The next vote!

Silver Lining?

This evening could have turned out to be a real pisser…

While playing racquetball this evening at the Green Mountain Rec Center, there… as they say in the south… “Came Up a Bad Cloud!”  My playing partner Rich and I could barely hear the crack of a 100mph + racquetball against the wall over the din of Rain, Hail and Thunder outside! 

I was dreading heading to the parking lot to see how much my Z4 was to look like a Titleist… heavy sigh…

That wasn’t all… while in the midst of an extremely aggressive rally, Rich’s racquet leash snapped… yeah, he lost his grip on the racquet… let me tell you it was a very strange sensation feeling the impact on my right elbow (yeah the boney part) and seeing the ball float harmlessly over my head.  Talk about not having a clue what the hell just happened.  OW!!! THAT FRIGG’N HURTS!

So after mopping up a little blood, and taping an aspirin to it we finished our match.  For the record I won 4 games to 1 (like you doubted it…).

After packing up my gear, I was filled with a feeling of despair and dread as I walked toward the parking lot.  I expected I was going to have to pull my camera out to take pictures of a heavily cratered Beemer for the Insurance record.  Those stones were quarter sized after all.

As luck would have it… BMW must make there cars outta Teflon or something because there was not one divot in that 4 foot hood line!  WOW!  Things are looking up!

Speaking of “looking up”  I was presented with other photography opportunities.  Rather than explain… I’ll let the images do the talking (or writing in this case).

 

And there you have it… Storms don’t always bring bad things.  There is plenty of beauty in their rage!

Bit of a Light Show here at Casa De Carmichael

Monsoon season doncha know…

The air was literally charged…

Indoor Polo and Photography Challenges

Last week when I was back in the rain and humidity of New York I had the opportunity to watch my boss play polo… indoors!  Nope, not water polo!  Real Horse-involved-and-all… polo!

Ya see, his polo club has options, either they play on one of two 300 yard by 160 yard pitches, or if it is raining… like it was on that particular Wednesday evening… they move it indoors, in a quite sizable barn.

I had joined up with Kevin in hopes of photographically capturing something different.  Man was I in for a challenge!

   

Initially I captured a couple of decent outdoor (in the mist) shots as best as I could lighting conditions permitting.  The horses were beautiful, strong peaceful animals and quite tolerant of this camera tote’n, Bostonian wearing interloper mingling amongst the riders, the keepers and the other steeds.

The challenge came in when the action started… again not on the field, but in the dimly lit barn.  Camera setting had to be greatly modified to even begin to capture the action.  ISO jacked to 1600 – Check!… Fastest Lens @ 3.5 – Check! shutter speed as slow as I dare go @ 60 – Check! 

Ha!  Who am I kidding these are going to be grainy as 1930’s ‘Talkie’! and blurrier than Rosie O’Donnell’s figure!

Doesn’t mean I didn’t try!  And yep sure enough upon my opening the images on a full resolution screen, about 90% of the images were indeed crap!  Discernable yes… but still crap when it comes to quality!  My kingdom for a Nikon D3s!  and a super fast lens!

I did however have an idea.  In a tip learned in one of my many Photoshop instructive publications it counseled to not get rid of grainy, out of focus images that have pretty good content.  Rather, alter them using any of the many image filters available in Photoshop!

And voila’ creativity in action!

More efforts can be seen here [Link]

Enjoy…