Mister D Says...

Daily screed on why the Left makes no sense

Yesterday, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon vetoed a bill that would have exempted motorcycle riders oder than 21 from the requirement to wear helmets on Missouri’s non-interstate roads. He said that “the cost of repealing… would have been too high.” Let’s be clear: there is no financial cost here; he’s talking about the “cost” in terms of injuries and deaths to motorcycle riders. So, in the mind of Gov. Nixon, people can’t be trusted to decide to wear a helmet so we need a law to protect them from themselves.

Now, I don’t think that riding a motorcycle without a helmet is smart. I think that cycle-riding in general is less safe than an automobile and, given the additional risk, if I rode a motorcycle, I would wear a helmet. However, I also think that:

1. I’m old enough to take care of myself
2. Police officers who are busy writing tickets for helmet-less riders are, by definition, NOT catching bad guys
3. A law that requires me to do something only to protect myself is an unnecessary limitation on personal liberty

Here’s the part that I don’t understand: folks on the Left generally approve of a law like this (or one requiring seat-belts, or car seats for children) because, as I understand it, they figure that the required behavior makes everyone safer and, since some part of the population is too irresponsible to decide for themselves, we should frighten them into line with the threat of punishment.

But, these same folks on the Left often accused President Bush and his administration’s Patriot Act for unnecessarily impinging on our liberty and privacy. The oft-quoted line from Benjamin Franklin is, “Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety” (by the way, it’s not clear whether or not he wrote that, but that’s another story). The Left uses Franklin’s thought to argue that an intrusion into civil liberties for the sake of national security is not correct.

So, let me see if I understand: it is not OK to limit liberty for national security, but it is OK to do so to protect a small number of stupid motorcycle riders from hurting themselves?

See? Doesn’t make sense, does it?

Let me try this again

Back here, I linked to this article about two loonies in Sweden who have decided not to let anyone know whether their child is a boy or a girl. I asked, “Is this really what the LGBT movement is fighting for?”

A lot of friends of mine didn’t get what I was trying to say (which is my fault), so I’m taking a second shot. My reaction is based on the fact that those folks in Sweden are merely acting on the logical conclusion of the argument that there are no important differences between men and women.

Many unfortunately misguided people believe the wrong-headed idea that the only difference between men and women is plumbing. We have language, law and social mores being re-written every day because of this misconception.

The LGBT movement, who are fighting tooth and nail to redefine marriage to include homosexual unions, is acting upon this belief. So, I ask them, take a look at the logical extension of the cause… is that really what you’re fighting for? A world in which people don’t reveal their gender?

The actions of this Swedish couple is so contradictory to common sense that, if it weren’t so sad, it would be funny.

Does that make my position clearer?

My story about why #ebay sucks

I have a first-generation that I want to sell so that I can buy a new iPhone 3GS. I have seen lots of evidence that people are willing to pay upwards of $300 for the model phone I have, so I figure that it can’t be too tough to get me some of that.

First, an aside: why would anyone pay that much for a first-gen phone when they can get a brand new iPhone 3G for only $99? For two reasons:

1. It seems that, although the 3G is unlockable and jailbreakable, neither process is as simply as it is on a first-gen phone.
2. It seems that T-Mobile (and maybe other carriers, too) don’t have a 3G network so ulocking an iPhone 3G to use with those carriers is hard/doesn’t work.

Whatever. Either way, my iPhone is worth some coin. Enough, it seems to let me upgrade to a 3GS. Back to the story…

It seems that my options are:

1. Sell it on eBay.
2. Sell it on Craigslist
3. Sell it via a service like Nextworth.

I tried Craigslist first, since I’ve never sold anything successfully on eBay, but there were no bites. I figured that I might have been asking too high a price so I decided to go to eBay to see what the market would bear. My buddy recently sold her phone there successfully so, I figured, how hard could it be?

Now, I’m not an idiot (reportedly). I have read stories of scams on eBay but those stories all seem to deal with items far more expensive than my phone. So, I decided to list.

It was exciting! The phone sat for a week with no activity then, in the final hour of the auction, stuff happened. In all, seven bidders placed 17 bids on the phone in that hour, with the price rising 25% in the final 45 seconds! When the dust settled, I sent an invoice to the winner and cleared a spot off on my desk to hold all of my loot.

Then the crap started. There was no response from the seller. Then I got the following message:

Hello seller, i won your item on ebay i want you to send your paypal email address so as to make a payment online

Mind you, this was after I sent an invoice. When I went onto eBay to use their tool to send him another message, I saw that he was “no longer registered.” Uh oh.

I sent three more messages over the next three hours, to no avail. My final message said, “I haven’t heard from you since the auction ended and I would like to nail things down today. If I don’t hear from you soon, I will have to offer the iPhone to the next-highest bidder. PLEASE RESPOND!!”

I heard nothing. So, late that night, I offered a second-chance offer to the next-highest bidder.

The next morning, I saw a message from both buyers waiting for me. The auction winner, whom I will refer to as “LyingTool” wrote me the following:

Just to let you know that payment has been made via PayPal online i added $100 for shipping and handling via first class shipping USPS(EMS) make sure you mail out the item today this is the shipping address bellow:-

Name:Hamsa Abdulfatai Adisa
Adrees:12 Isafinrin Layout, New Town Road
City:Akure
State:Ondo
Zipcode:234034
Country:Nigeria

Holy crap. Really? Does anyone fall for this anymore?
To make matters worse, the second-place bidder’s message said that she had already won another auction so she didn’t want my iPhone anymore. The third-place bidder’s bid was over $60 less than the top two.
So, let’s recap. LyingTool cost me a bunch of money and my auction and there’s nothing I can do about it. To their credit, eBay refunded me my Final Value Fees immediately upon my complaint. But, I still have to pay for the listing, which I never should have made in the first place.
So, this morning, I re-listed on Craigslist for less money. LESS THAN TEN MINUTES LATER, I got an offer from a real, live, English-speaking person. I sent a PayPal request and - fingers crossed! - he should pay me later today.
That is, I swear, my last eBay auction.

Kirk and Spock and... ?

I’ve read two pieces today which both made reference to the relationship between Kirk and Spock as an example of a perfect symbiotic relationship. Both, in different contexts and for different purposes made the point that Kirk and Spock’s friendship formed the core of what makes Star Trek great.

What about the good Doctor McCoy?

In my opinion, the three-way relationship this trio formed was a perfect story-telling device: Kirk, the hero, wrestles with difficult decisions each week. His two halves, the logical, personified by Spock and the passionate, personified by Bones, argued each issue out until Kirk decided what to do.

I think this critical piece - the role of McCoy - was missing from the new movie. At least, I missed it. Did you?

Bull's eye analysis re: the Pre

Steven Frank gets it totally right:

It is absolutely mind-blowing that Palm pulled this off as well as they did. This is like the Mac OS 9 to Mac OS X transition for Palm — a massive rethink of the entire platform that must succeed for the company to survive.