Playoffs?

Do you remember Jim Mora's rant?

My CHIEFS play the Colts today in a wild card game. The Colts with Peyton Manning are of course the favorites, but they still play the games just to make sure.

So, at 3:30 CT I will be plastered in front of the TV with an adult beverage. It may be the end of the CHIEFS season, but maybe; just maybe they will earn one more week.

I love it and I hate it.

Update: Colts 23 Chiefs 8

Keeee-rappp! Well, maybe next year.

Until the next time
John Strain

Poor Saddam

Poor Saddam Hussein; his dignity and human rights were violated. All because someone taunted him prior to his death and videotaped his execution. Boo Hoo! How can we as a civilized people live with ourselves after such an atrocity?

While I am thinking about it, those poor prisoners at Abu Ghraib were similarly treated. Here’s a boo hoo for them too. Those embarrassing pictures taken of them were so humiliating; they would have been better off had they been shot on the battlefield.

It seems like the so-called good guys are violating rights left and right. If it isn’t George Bush trying to listen to the phone calls of terrorists, then it’s folks trying to keep non-US citizens from over running the country.

Have things become so ideological that common sense is dead? How in the world can someone ponder the life and death of Saddam Hussein and think the main point is someone telling him to “Go to hell,” just before he dances at the end of a well deserved rope?

He is damn lucky he wasn’t in the hands of someone like himself. Hussein killed, maimed, and tortured for fun. His acts of violence are in the same category of the world’s most notorious bad people. Yet there are morons who are willing to ignore all of that and give their voices to the defense of his “rights.”

Some say that Jesus tells us to turn the other cheek. Was Jesus turning the other cheek, when he ran the money changers out of the temple with a whip? Was he turning the other cheek when he railed against the Pharisees and the religious hypocrites?

It is God’s task to judge, but I doubt the fact that Saddam was taunted or videoed will have much impact on his final judgment when compared to his life’s actions.

Why do folks want to make excuses for the guilty and the bad? When the dirty bastards flew planes into the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, the dust hadn’t settled before idiots were asking questions like: “What can we do to make them like us?” and “How can we change to show them that we are nice?”

Even when we decide to go to war, we want to do it in a nice way. We can’t fight on the Holy Days of our enemy, we can’t shoot them if they are in a Holy Place, and if we catch them, we are supposed to grant them rights their peace time government would not grant even its own citizens.

It all comes down to our basic point of view. I am an American. I am proud of that fact. I love my country and I want to see it succeed. I want America to be the best it can be.

It is not unlike being a parent. I am a father. I love my son. I spent time with him as he grew. I pulled for him in everything. I was proud of his achievements and I helped him learn from his failures. My love for him has done nothing but grow.

Does America make mistakes? Yes. Does the government sometimes let its citizens down? Yes. Do you throw your kids out of the house if they do something wrong? Do you disown them if they fail? I hope not.

America is you and me; not them. The them are the folks who want to do us harm. The them are the folks at Abu Ghraib and Gitmo. I don’t care about their cause. They lost their right to talk about causes when they started killing innocent Americans.

So if I don’t get all teary eyed when a dictator gets razzed on his way to meet the devil, forgive my harshness. If I don’t go picket the White House because scum bags who want to be called soldiers in captivity, but dress like citizens and hide behind women and children on the battlefield aren’t getting the rights an American citizen is getting; forgive me of that too.

I am not neutral in this fight. I want America to win. I watched the video of Saddam hang and it made me feel good.

I do not advocate wrong treatment, but neither do I feel bad when certain folk’s rights are violated. You reap what you sew eventually. Even so, Saddam got off easy.

Do you think the Kurds are worried about Saddam’s rights? His life was the cause of so many deaths and so much suffering. He lived in luxury, but he died despised. Before that trap door opened and he fell to his death, he heard exactly what he deserved and that video is the only image of Saddam Hussein that will bring anyone joy.

Kurdish victims of Saddam's gas attack

Until the next time
John Strain

A New Year and I got me some writing to do

Ha, I'll bet this headline has English teachers cringing all over the world.

It is a New Year and I need to get busy. I have some post ideas floating around in my noggin.

I am really happy about my CHIEFS. I know there are some Bronco fans that read this blog so my heart goes out to them. They had a tough loss.

My son was at the CHIEFS game Sunday and I saw him on television. I heard Barbara yell from the other room, "That's John! That's John!" Leave it to a mother to find her baby in a crowd of 80,000 people all dressed the same. It is like that penguin photo, but what may look the same to everyone else, isn't for a mama.

Here is the video I snatched from the Tivo. John, his girlfriend Mandy, and her family are the ones on the top row toward the end of the video. John is on the far right in the CHIEFS jacket. They look cold.

Have a Happy NYD and maybe I will get busy writing.

Until the next time
John Strain

Dog ladder

When I was little, I heard my mother talking about my grandmother. She kept mentioning grandma’s "dog ladder." I had know idea what she was talking about, but I knew it had something to do with what my grandmother ate.

Mom would say, "Grandma can't eat so and so, because of her dog ladder." Finally, I couldn't take it anymore and I asked her, "Mama, what's a dog ladder?"

My mother seemed confused, "Dog ladder?" she said inquisitively. "Yes," I said, "You said grandma has a dog ladder."

I remember her laughing for a long time and explaining to me between her hysterical laughter that it wasn't a "dog ladder, but a gallbladder."

Then there was a similar incident that occurred when we were playing the home version of the "Match Game." I used to love that game show.

Anyway, the game was about associations. There would be a word like "dog." The contestants would respond. In this case they might say "catcher." If your partner said the same thing you did, then it was a match. The most matches would win.

So, we are playing the match game and the clue was "blank side." I said "cross side." I was really referencing a name I had been called many times. I didn't know though that it was spelled, cross eyed. Again with the hysterical laughter from the family.

I guess I had a gift of hearing things wrong in such a way that everyone around thought it was funny.

Oh, speaking of "dog ladders," Barbara had hers out today. The surgery was successful and she is doing just fine.

The nurse told me Barbara wouldn't be able to sweep or mop for the next 10 years. Chicks stick together.

Until the next time
John Strain

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from the Strain's

May you continue to unwrap the gift of Jesus and may this Christmas be filled with the love of your friends and family.

Until the next time
John Strain