The Death Penalty

In light of the entire death of Bin Laden I have seen people over joyed about his death and people proclaiming that that killing of another man no matter what, is wrong. I am a strong believer in justice and the death penalty. I believe it absolutely has it's place in all societies. I believe our country is more than capable of using it in a fair manner.


Before you start hollering "Cruel and Unusual" punishment at me, lets take a look at those terms and their definitions.


The word "Cruel" is defined by Merriam Webster as:


disposed to inflict pain or suffering : devoid of humane feelings, cruel tyrant




I would say in our country we execute a person in a swift and painless manner. Executions are now done by lethal injection. It's done quick and painlessly. They even sterilize a fresh needle for the inmate. I would say this is having feelings for the last moments of their life. They are not crying out in pain, they are not cut up and left to bleed out. I believe we give them more respect at death than they probably gave their victim. In my eyes, the death penalty cannot be defined as cruel. It is done humanely.


The word "Unusual" is defined by Merriam Webster as:


not usual : uncommon, rare


Ok that doesn't tell us much, so lets look at uncommon and rare, shall we.


Rare: seldom occurring or found
Uncommon: not ordinarily encountered

So what this says is "unusual" means it's something that is not common, not heard of. Something you don't hear about. We have been executing people since 1608. That means we have records of execution for 403 years. The death penalty is not a new thing. Since it's not new, it cannot be uncommon.

I personally feel the argument of "cruel and unusual punishment" a moot point by definition. Now what is cruel is the fact the average time a prisoner will spend on death row is over a decade in solitary confinement. It is cruel that we don't just get it done in a timely fashion, not only for the inmate but Americans that pay taxes. On average it costs 50 thousand dollars per year per inmate to maintain them. There are currently 1,246 inmates on death row. That's $62,300,000 a year to maintain people that have been sentenced by their peers to die. Now remember that 10 year average....you can do the math I am sure. 34 of 50 states in our country allow a death penalty ruling.


Each of these people have gone to trial, evidence presented and convicted by a jury of their peers. Average Americans picked for jury duty. While I understand mistakes have been made and people are let out of prison after DNA had proved them innocent, these people have spent enough time there to prove their case in our technological age. Not to mention they will continue to have time to repeal because of how long they are forced to spend there waiting.


I do not under any circumstances rejoice, party, or feel happy when an inmates sentence is carried out. However I do believe many of the victims families are given closure to their great losses. And that's the way it should be. It will never bring back lost loved ones, but the criminal doesn't get the satisfaction of living when they took someone else.


Bin Laden was not tried, we as Americans were never shown actual evidence of his crime, only that "intelligence" was able to prove he was the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks. He was killed in a fire fight during an operation to capture him. It was more than likely not an "execution" so much as it was our forces protecting themselves as they are trained to do. Police officers in our country practice the same actions when being shot at. Just as with the death penalty, no one should be celebrating, cheering or rejoicing in the death of another human. Instead they should stop and wonder if justice was actually carried out in this case. And if the accusations are in fact true, we can feel a small amount of closure and hope for the end of this war.



http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/

Week 3 Check In

Well we are just one week away from completing our 4 week challenge!  Skip has really done well in this. We have decided based on what we have experienced so far, that we are going to continue to eat grain free.  We are both feeling better and we have more energy.

Skip has lost another 2lbs this week, 1/4 of an inch and dropped his fasting glucose 14 points! It's been very helpful for him to see the numbers written down every week because he has solid proof he is getting somewhere.   He is not complaining much about not being able to eat brad or drink soda anymore.  We had the ultimate test when we went out to eat for the first time yesterday. He ordered a tea, soup and salad and left the crutons on the plate...willingly.

As for me, due to some personal matters, I will no longer be tracking how much weight I lost. I will however continue to track my fasting glucose. It was up 17 points this week.  YIKES.   The only thing I can think of is I ate a bit of white chocolate before bed last nite and was up early this morning testing so it may not have been a full 8 hours.  I will try again tomorrow.


Aiden is thriving.  We have seen an increased appetite as well as willingness to eat things he didn't like before. That alone makes me happy!

Kids Dating

I have to talk about this one tonite because it bothers me.  Children should not be dating.  They should be taught the importance of not moving from boy to boy or from girl to girl at a young age.  Dating is courtship, courtship should be leading to a serious commitment...marriage.  A child cannot get married.  They can't even comprehend the idea of a life long commitment when they are allowed to move from person to person, handing themselves off to whomever looks their way.  There is no way they can learn how to have a lasting relationship through the good times and bad times when they break up and date someone new every other week.

I didn't date simply because I was told NO.  There was never any reason other than, "because I said so."  Mom and Dad divorced when I was about 13 and I got stuck with my mom who didn't teach me anything but bitterness.  I have no doubt I would have never gotten mixed up with my ex-husband if I had been taught the importance of a relationship. That 2 people should compliment each other.  Be one together and be strong together.  A relationship should be about building a better life and achieving goals that mean something to you as a couple.  I am very lucky to have found someone who helped me understand this. We are one and we make each other stronger.

A girl or boy of 12, 13, 14 etc is just not going to be able to understand that. Not to mention at that age they are still being cared for by their parents and there is simply no need to have someone else to take care of you.  You can't even really take care of yourself without an adult at that age.  You are still learning your strengths and weaknesses.  You still don't know who you are.  How can you honestly know at that age if another child is going to strengthen you?  What do you really have to offer that the parents aren't already providing?  A women provides a clean home, soft shoulder for ones head, meals and tender hands to care for children.  A man provides income, a firm voice in important matters, he is a role model to his children, he keeps his family safe.   Children cannot offer any of these things, because they are still children running to their mother's shoulder, still children being protected by their fathers.

It should not be ok for a parent to watch and allow their child to date one kid this week and a new one next week.  It should NOT be ok to watch their daughter be treated like a pass around nor their sons being disrespectful by passing said girls around.  What are we teaching our girls?   That it is not important to have some self respect and dignity?  That it is ok to just move from boy to boy and not think a thing about it?  Our boys, what is being taught to them?   That it is ok to have a harem of girls? That anything lasting is not worth it? These actions are going to follow them into adulthood and seriously impair their ability to find someone and hold onto them.  They are going to give themselves away who knows how many times before getting married. Nothing will be special when that day comes.  Then if they do ever get married, what are the chances they will stay together?  What's to say they decide that it is easier to just pack bags and find someone else based on what they learned in their past?

I want my kids to know there is someone out there that needs them.  They don't need to play the field as a child to find that person.  I want them to be selective and careful about who they choose to promise the rest of their lives to, because I really want it to be a one time thing for them.  I want them to really have an understanding of the importance of love and what it means.  What it does to life, the wonders of it, the trials of it.  Love is not easy, but it's not hard.  It's full filling.  You aren't going to get that by voluntarily being a pass around.  You won't be able to appreciate one person for who they are without comparing them to all the people before them.  No one deserves that.

Get a handle on your kids now. Teach them that marriage and the relationship that leads to it is a sacred thing and should not be taken for granted, that it is not found after the 100th person you dated.  Teach them to be kids now and teach them the responsibility they will have to a spouse. Prepare them by example, give them something to look up to, something to desire because it is such a good thing. Leave no question in their eyes about the importance of a mature, healthy relationship.  Your kids will thank you for it.

Sheila's Wifey Wednesday

Sheila over at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum posts things about being a good wife every Wednesday.  I thought today's post was interesting, it's about wives fantasizing about other men.  Particularly famous men, sports players, actors, etc.  Also the subject of women preferring a friends husband to her own for whatever reason.

I have no crush on any famous person nor do I on anyone else's husband for that matter.  Ya I might get all excited about Gerard Butler in a kilt, but that's about as far as it goes. Even then I think that was a one time thing during a very boring night when Skip was deployed.  I don't march around the house declaring how much I am "in love" with someone I will never meet.  It seems pretty pointless to me. Also pretty childlike.  I love Skip and that's that.  Aiden certainly doesn't need to see or hear that.

My mom is like this about Johnny Depp.  ( I had to look that up to spell it right)  She has her WHOLE office covered with pictures of him, posters you name it.  She runs out and gets every DVD as soon as it is out and just moons over him.  IN FRONT OF HER HUSBAND.  And what's worse is he has even played into it by buying her some of those things.  I just don't get it.  Skip wouldn't tolerate that.  I also wouldn't tolerate that from him.

Maybe women should just turn off their TV's, quit comparing their husbands to other men and start wanting the thing's they already have.  When you fantasize about things you don't have in your relationship, it makes it easier to think your relationship is bad.  It makes you want more and more.  It strains things and makes your spouse think he (or she for that matter) has to live up to expectations that may not be deliverable for the life situation you are in.

So ladies make a point of always saying once nice thing to your husband everyday.  Make a point about saying nice things about him in public.  Lead your lady friends by example.  Stop listening when they complain about their relationship, guide them back to their husbands to deal with their situation in private.  This way maybe they can start the process of being as madly head over heals about their husbands as they are about their celebrity crushes.

Week 2 Check In

Well, we now have 2 weeks under our belts with only a couple set backs.  We had the ball on Thursday.  At the time we RSVP'd we were not yet going grain free and so I ordered pasta...yikes.   Skip had chicken, but he dared to have a dinner role. We also had cheesecake.  Neither of us drank and we had water with dinner.  Skip did wake up with a headache on Friday...interesting that he would eat grain and get a headache less than 24 hours later.  He hasn't had one since we started.

Our other weakness this week was ice cream.  We haven't completely cut out ice cream because frankly we don't want to torture ourselves.  But instead of only eating it once or twice, I think we had it 4-5 times.   Soooo that was bad. We talked about that this morning.

Well onto the results.  I did have a gain of 2lbs, but a loss of 1/2 inch on my waste and my fasting glucose level was down to 110mg from 133mg last week.

Skip had a loss of about 1/2lb, lost 1inch from his waist. His fasting glucose level was 128mg down from 133mg last week.

We still go to bed late, but find that we are sleeping better now.  Not near as much tossing and turning.  We haven't been waking up feeling cloudy and have the ability to get out day going without really wanting to get back into bed.

So while we still cheated with ice cream and once nite of indulgence on the town, we still had results from practicing being grain free the rest of time.

Trashy

First off let me say this post is probably going to sound very judgmental and I may sound stuck up or too good for my own shoes.  But I am going to call things as I see them.

I attended my first Army Ball last nite.  It was the welcome home ball for the 601st Combat Aviation Brigade.  They have been gone on a year long deployment and finished returning last month.  I have never been to a formal event, but it is my understanding that being formal means looking like a respectable lady.  After all our men are in their best uniforms for the evening, bow tie and all.  Skip and I picked my dress in February, yes I said SKIP AND I.  I very much appreciated  his input on the different dresses I picked and tried on.  We decided on a floor length, dark blue dress with some sparkle sewn on to the bodice.  It was strapless, but had a short coat.  The girls were WELL covered and not overflowing out the top. I had no intention of standing out, simply looking nice next to Skip.

All that being said, I fully expected to be under dressed.  I did get my hair done yesterday. I had a new set of earrings, a necklace and bracelet.  Oh and I had a nice head band worked into my hair.  When we got to the hotel the ball was being held at I was immediately floored.  The few girls in the parking lot were simply eye ball spectacles.  Very immodest and in dresses that simply did nothing for their body type.  One woman was in a hot pink, clingy, strapless dress and she probably weighed 300lbs.  I am not trying to say anything about size here, but there are just some things you don't where when you are super big or even super small for that matter.  It's about practicing good judgement.

When we got in I was amazed by the amount of skin I saw and the all the tattoos on these women.  I am not even talking girly tattoos.  There were girls who had their arms, backs, hands, necks, breasts and any other small piece of skin they could have possibly showed covered in ugliness.  I would say more than half didn't bother to have their hair done.  More than half had ill fitted dresses.  Some had on dresses that one would wear to a cocktail party, not a formal event. I almost felt out of place, but I soon realized I at least wasn't going to be a laughing stock and was more than likely one the best dressed there.  Even the wives of the heads of the unit appeared to have put in very little effort.

We did get seated with 4 other men and their dates for dinner.  I was the only one NOT texting through dinner.  My phone wasn't on the table vibrating.  It was sad really that no one could just take the time to disconnect from the world for just a few hours.  Skip and I were pretty quiet.  Most of the conversation was nothing we could relate to. Skip was the oldest at the table and I am aged beyond my actual years anyways.  There is no way I could hang out with any of those girls and feel like I got anything out of it.

My concluding thought on the whole thing was,  most of the women dressed and conducted themselves little better than trash.  This was a formal event to welcome back service members that just spent a year away from home and their families. I felt like most of these girls, through the way they dressed and acted, showed little to no respect, gratitude or pride in what the unit did.  It should not be ok to any man to let his wife, fiancée, girlfriend sister or whatever walk into such an event looking like last weeks garbage.  It's disrespectful and should be considered a slap in the face.

A Side Effect for Skip

Skip suffers from headaches.  Almost daily.  Always a dull ache in his head and he frequently can be seen sitting at the table holding his head in his hands.  Neither of us take things for headaches unless it's just unbearable, but that doesn't happen very often.  His vision has been checked, his teeth are fine. So we have been kind of at a loss about the headache thing.

BUT, this morning I had a sudden Ah-Ha moment.  I was reading a status on FB from a friend who is very into all natural healing.  Someone made a comment about their headaches going away after a serious diet change.  Skip hasn't had a headache since we quit eating grains.  It just dawned on me that he hasn't been complaining or holding his head.  I told him my observation and he said," Well can I have some pizza and see if it comes back?".

NO.  LOL.  So that is really the first BIG thing I think I have seen with this.  I will most definitely be monitoring it.