"Brown Shirts" imagery over-reaching? Think again. We are better than that America. Far better.

So the news is breaking, along with windows, right now that Democratic officials' offices in five separate locations over four days have been  vandalized. Mike Vanderboegh's blog is calling for people across the nation to vandalize property as an act of civil disobedience.


For those of you who thought it was over-reaching to invoke rhetoric of brown shirts and KristallNacht imagery, I have unfortunately been vindicated. The news is now breaking that we had our very own tiny attempt at a KristallNacht. From Alabama, Mike Vanderboegh, has called upon people to break the windows of Dem officials' offices. 5 offices in 4 days have had bricks thrown through the windows. Congressman John Lewis was spat upon and racially heckled this morning as he walked in Washington DC. Sarah Palin has called upon the public to "reload", labeling locations with gunsites where elections should be "targeted". "If Brown can't do it, a Browning can" is on a billboard in Massachusetts. Others have received death threats.

Congressman Bart Stupack (D) labeled baby-killer by Neugebauer (R) during congressional session, today used his misbehavior as a fund-raising tool, after he publically apologized for his inappropriate comment. Hypocrite. If he is so passionate about his comment, then he should "grow a sack" and stand by what he said, instead of offering apology then taking an about face with his speech to supporters! He needs to sit down, take a Ciallis, and shut up.

Apparently  MikeVanderboegh has not bothered to look the actual meaning of "Civil Disobedience":
" Refusal to obey civil laws in an effort to induce change in governmental policy or legislation, characterized by the use of passive resistance or other nonviolent means." Dictionary-answers.com


Breaking windows happens to be an act of violent vandalism, not Civil Disobedience. 


For those of you who did not manage to attend sixth grade, Kristallnacht was so named since it was "the night of broken glass" when Hitler incited German youth to break the windows of Jewish Shop Owners. 
Different target. Different group of haters. Fewer windows. A far more impotent leader. Similar feelings. Similar hate. Similar, albeit far more weak, danger. The good news is that vandalism is still enforced by the rule of law as a crime! The good news is Mr.Vanderboegh remains in the fringe. Here is a sampling of his ranting: 


"They do not, it is apparent after the past year of town halls and Tea Parties and nose-diving opinion polls, hear you SHOUT. They certainly do not hear the soft "snik-snik" of cleaning rods being used on millions of rifle barrels in this country by people who have decided that their backs are to the wall, politics and the courts no longer are sufficient to the task of defending their liberties, and they must make their own arrangements." 


..."So, if you wish to send a message that Pelosi and her party cannot fail to hear, break their windows.


Break them NOW.


Break them and run to break again. Break them under cover of night. Break them in broad daylight. Break them and await arrest in willful, principled civil disobedience. Break them with rocks. Break them with slingshots. Break them with baseball bats.


But BREAK THEM.


The time has come to take your life, your liberty and that of your children and grandchildren into your own two hands and ACT.


It is, after all, more humane than shooting them in self defense.


And if we do a proper job, if we break the windows of hundreds, thousands, of Democrat party headquarters across this country, we might just wake up enough of them to make defending ourselves at the muzzle of a rifle unnecessary." Vanderboeghs's Blog




So fine. The government no longer represents the people. This is news? This is different than when Bush or Clinton were in office? Remember Janet Reno's troops burning Waco, attacking Ruby Ridge, or pushing an MP5 machine gun into four year old Elian Gonzales' face? Name me a president you could trust.. how far back in time do you have to go? Yet, somehow our nation has endured without hateful, corporate funded fascists pointing fingers at their political opponents. We can handle commies and socialists without stooping to shameful behavior that is far less than we are as a nation.



Machiavelli's first rule of statecraft dictates that to rule a population the ruling class must manufacture differences within the population, and polarize the governed based upon these differences. Baby-killers v pro-life. Illegal immigrant v citizen. Rich v. Poor. Working voter v. welfare recipient. Pro-health care v. private health care. Global Warming v. denial of Global Warming. Fascist v. Free. Socialist v. Free. Communist v. Free. If you don;t like socialism, remove all the corporate incentives we give to businesses in the form of tax breaks! Remove all those farm subsidies! Freemarkets are wonderful, until it takes the pork off your own plate. 


If all these people are so hell bent on a revolution, what do you propose to replace our system with? If you do not have a better plan, simply attacking what we do have with nothing to relace it with will make matters far worse than they are now.

Are we so weak and disempowered that we will guide crackpot extremists and corporate special interest funding groups guide our agenda with hate? 

We are better than that America. Far better.

Droid Doesn't. Neither do other "Smartphones The Global Recession, business PIM data, and not-so-SmartPhones.

Droid Doesn't. Neither do the other "Smartphones"!

The Global Recession, business PIM data, and not-so-SmartPhones.

 March 3, 2010- Professor Bryan Grant RSCH1203 Georgia Perimeter College

Share this via social media- 
"Global Recession, Business PIM data, and not-so-SmartPhones. Droid Doesn't. Neither do the others by @bryangrant http://bit.ly/c9DhLO"


Consider that we are in a recession.  Recessions result from a cumulative effect of poor decisions, missteps, and inefficiencies spanning the global business communities, governments, and individuals.


The talk of economic stimulus has been hollow, the results insignificant, and the investment cost astronomical.


One way of gaining a lot of ground in turning around the current recession is to empower people everywhere with tools that actually work. Tools should use standards, empower effective collaboration, and minimize redundant tasks.


When your Windows system crashes, is slow, or does not sync reliably, the user waits. Waiting means you lose money, means less business, and depresses economic growth. When Microsoft Office Outlook on PC does not collaborate at all with Microsoft Office Entourage on a Mac, time and money is lost since those two participants have to redundantly find ways to collaborate.


Each time a user must manually re-enter information, such as contact information from a business card or an email, this is time and money lost. Each manual cut n paste to open a website or a map is money lost. VCards are now broken owing to lack of use and variant new implementations. Beaming does not exist any longer except between Nokia and Palm products. Blackberrys cant open vCards from other platforms. The standards for shared calendars amount to no standard at all. Calendars are not shareable unless you work in the same corporate environment. Office now uses .docx formats, breaking with standards used for nearly 20 years.


G20 nations should use their preeminence to development, establish, and adopt common business tools. Many of these standards have already been developed and been available for use by software vendors for the past 12 years. VCards, ical, ldap, are all jargon for standards that enable anyone anywhere to leverage the same data without having to retype it all in. These standards are sporadically used, and are endemic to inefficient economic development.


Adoption and enforcement of the use of common, open source based standards for business tools would truly stimulate economic growth since business operators would be able to quickly and easily collaborate using common tools such as categorized contacts, calendar items, notes, and tasks, all enabled with reminders and prioritization flags. Overlooking the use Categories is very much like having a huge pile of data and simply throwing it all in one box without any means of keeping it organized. Categories enable you to organize, and therefore actually use your data. It is a critical component of any PIM.


For all of Microsoft’s faults, bloated programs, and inherent risks to data loss, as well as proprietary licensing, Outlook is the ONLY game in town that provides a standard suite of personal information management (PIM) applets as well as email, and a way to categorize, thereby organize, all of it. It is the only platform that syncs to practically every handheld device in the market. It is the only tool that has dozens of conduits to services like Plaxo, LinkedIn, etc to make your data portable and shareable.


This is a straightforward issue, and the players consistently ignore any attempt at standards.


Why don’t more people complain? Most people aren’t aware of this issue until they run afoul of this.Most folks new to the environment are unaware that it used to actually work. Still others cannot express their complaint since they do not have the technical jargon/vocabulary to do so. The problem lingers and festers, hindering the workplace from leveraging their knowledge to create more opportunities for growth, innovation, and change.




The buzz of late has been about SmartPhones. The offerings in the market for the past several years are inherently broken.  This article will look at the so-called SmartPhones, and their shortcomings. Going forward, “PIM” implies all four databases complete with reminders, flags, and categories. “Social Media” implies any tools that enable access to services like Plaxo, LinkedIn, Blogs, Facebook, share this article links, Twitter, MySpace, BaseCamp, Groove, etc.


Every last one of the competitive offerings are broken in way or another.


Blackberry- The most common Blackberry to small business people is the 8330 Curve. It is also the lowest common denominator in their product lines, being the cheapest and most widely available product. Storms, Tours, etc are better in terms of performance, but most people either don’t have them on their carriers or simply can’t afford them unless their company buys them.


While boasting to have three slots in the top 10 highest radiation (SARS) ratings on the market for any phone anywhere, Blackberry 8330 does all of the PIM functions, reliably and fully. Yet, 8330 is slow, cant access the BB App store without frequent crashes. Social Media access is useless being slow, unreliable, and very limited in use. Yet it sure does a good job of keeping your data synced with Outlook on PC. On Mac, until Sept of last year, there was no sync software for Blackberry, unless you rolled the dice and $60 to use Missing Sync, which is apt to mangle your data. Using a virtualPC on Mac was not possible since the USB cable would not stay connected to the VirtualPC.


The Blackberry User Interface is very poor, without logical links between new phone numbers and existing contacts in the address book, addresses in the address book and maps, graphics and scripts on web pages are just plain broken, you can’t set the default browser to another more functional browser like miniOpera. You have to use the Blackberry one unless you manually run Opera and cut n paste the URL into the browser. Can you say broken?


Windows Mobile. While it does sync to Outlook very well, the rest of the system is slow, crashes frequently, and is problematic when actually making phone calls. It has many similar issues to Blackberry. Social Media is also a non-starter at this point. Apps are few and far between, and most cost a pretty penny.


iPhone, while the bling factor is very high, it does NOT sync fully to Outlook. It does NOT provide a complete bridge between Mac and PC systems if that is your goal.  Categories, Notes, Tasks do not travel well between platforms, and most these don’t sync to begin with. Mac does not have a Notes app that can sync anywhere, UNLESS you buy the data-mangling MissingSync. iPhone is good at linking all kinds of things together... An address can be viewed on a map without manually selecting the address text, and then pasting it into a map application. Websites look terrific and are fast to load. It is good as an entertainment device. There are very many useful apps; some are even good for business. Yet, it does not fully sync to Outlook, nor does MobileMe, the OTA sync solution.


Google's Android, arguably the only open source based cell phone OS platform on the market, does not handle PIM very well at all. Likely this stems from the dysfunctions of the Gmail development team. All these years Gmail has been up and running, do you think there is a tasks or notes feature in Gmail? No. Do you think there is bidirectional sync between any local PIM like Mac Address Book or Windows Outlook? No. One way via data export, not sync. Does Gmail handle Categories? Nope. They call them Groups. Which conflicts since Groups in outlooks are used to create Mail Lists? If you import from Outlook to Gmail, you will mangle your existing email list groups within Gmail unless you manually save them offline, then manually repopulate them after you bring in the latest contacts database. All of this is manual.


Therefore, the Android, being closely related to Gmail and Google apps, is also a non-starter. Oddly, Android is NOT closely integrated even with Google’s own applications! Google reader? Nope. You have to install a broken 3rd party app. Blogger.com? Good luck. Can you edit or cut n paste from an email in Gmail? Nope. You can only annotate an email to reply to or forward, and you can’t select the text from the original message. With Google docs it is only through the browser.  You have to manually retype in your address, though you told the android your Gmail sign on info to begin with. YouTube? Hah. You have to type it manually. (Better hope it doesn’t forget what you typed a week later!) How about Picasa? Nope. 3rd party substandard apps only, so Android provides practically no interface to Picasa for web albums... opting to point people to Flickr instead... which is NOT tightly integrated to Gmail.


And Outlook... ah yes. The fundamental reason why a Smartphone is a Smartphone, at least IMHO, is the ability to use and update your PIM data on the road. All the stuff that is broken between Outlook and Gmail? Most of that is also true between Android and Outlook.
Android ONLY syncs Contacts and Calendar items, and then only from one data store. If you are using say Gmail locally in outlook, and have an exchange account for work, you will only be able to sync with one or the other. Not both. (Blackberry allows full sync to all, so does windows mobile)


Specific gripes for Android:
- The Quick office app did not display a small (1.8mb) PowerPoint presentation. Useless.
- Typing with your thumbs is pretty useful since your other fingers are holding the device in the air, and preventing it from landing on the concrete. I can only get the touch screen keyboard to accurately respond by using a smaller finger such an index finger. Using thumbs, I am all thumbs. poking with one hand and one finger while the other holds the phone, I am a 10word a minute typist. Whee.
- Unless you want duplicates, you must blow away one of the databases, either your Gmail data, or the Outlook data. The "sync" tool does not merge. You pick from Outlook or To Outlook, overwriting one way or the other. How is that Syncing? It’s not.
- The ONLY tool to remove duplicates from your PIM data is Plaxo. If you are use Gmail imap on Outlook, Plaxo has a bug which conflicts with Gmail IMAP. To remove Dup's you have to remove Gmail IMAP from Outlook, restart Outlook, install Plaxo's conduit, run the De-dup routine, remove the Plaxo conduit, re-install Gmail IMAP. Fun!


My conclusion, barring some unattended surprise from a test drive of the Palm Pre, is that I will have to remain a Blackberry customer for the foreseeable future. I will have to manage my Social Media assets on a real computer. I will have to sync with a cable to my real computer. I will have manually cut n paste text to get the job done.


Time testing those two phones, Samsung Moment and HTC Hero, amounts to 6 hours. Time writing up the results so the rest of us will know to give it a pass and use those6 hours to something actually useful? 3 hours.


Imagine all the other users attempting to improve their position by adapting new tools to increase access and usability of their data? Imagine all those out there who simply accept it, and just bang away without a complaint? Add up all those hours. Then look again, with a fresh eye, at the global recession. Broken tools lead to broken bank accounts.


QED.

545 Politician vs 300 Million Americans

545 Politician vs 300 Million Americans


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545 Politicians vs 300million Americans #teaparty #reform #freedom http://bit.ly/buySUz


(I hashed #teaparty since I figured those folks would be on board with the theme of this. Heck.. all Americans should be on board with this. )
Charley  Reese has been a journalist for 49 years..



545  PEOPLE
By Charlie Reese 
Politicians are the only people in the world  who create problems and then campaign against them.

Have you ever  wondered, if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, WHY do we have deficits?

Have you ever wondered, if  all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, WHY do we have  inflation and high taxes?

You and I don't propose a federal budget.  The president does.

You and I don't have the  Constitutional authority to vote on appropriations. The House of  Representatives does.

You and I don't write the tax code, Congress  does.

You and I don't set fiscal policy, Congress does.

You  and I don't control monetary policy, the Federal Reserve  Bank does.

One hundred senators, 435 congressmen, one  president, and nine Supreme Court justices equates to 545 human  beings out of the 300 million are directly, legally, morally,  and individually responsible for the domestic problems that plague  this country.

I excluded the members of the Federal Reserve  Board because that problem was created by the  Congress.  In 1913, Congress delegated its Constitutional duty  to provide a sound currency to a federally chartered, but private, central  bank.

I excluded all the special interests and lobbyists for a  sound reason.. They have no legal authority.  They have no  ability to coerce a senator, a congressman, or a president to do one  cotton-picking thing.  I don't care if they offer a politician $1 million dollars in cash.  The politician has the power to accept or reject it. No matter what the lobbyist promises, it is the legislator's responsibility to determine how he votes.

Those 545 human beings spend much of their energy convincing you that what they did is not their fault.   They cooperate in this common con regardless of party.
What separates a politician from a normal human being is an  excessive amount of gall.  No normal  human being would have the gall of a  Speaker, who stood up and criticized the President for creating deficits..  The president can only propose a budget.   He cannot force the Congress to accept  it.

The Constitution, which is the supreme law of the  land, gives sole responsibility to the House of  Representatives for originating and approving appropriations and taxes.  Who is the speaker of the House?   Nancy Pelosi.  She is  the leader of the majority party.  She and  fellow House members, not the president, can approve any budget they want.  If thepresident vetoes it, they can pass it over his veto if  they agree  to.

It seems inconceivable to me that a nation of 300 million can  not replace 545 people who stand convicted -- by present facts -- of  incompetence and irresponsibility.  I can't think of a  single domestic problem  that is not traceable directly to those 545 people.  When you fully  grasp the plain truth that 545 people exercise the power of the federal  government, then it must follow that what exists is what they want to  exist....

If the tax code is unfair, it's because they want it  unfair.

If the budget is in the red, it's because they want it in  the red ..

If the Army & Marines are in  IRAQ ,  it's because they want them in IRAQ

If they do not  receive social security but are on an elite retirement plan not available  to the people, it's because they want it that way.

There are no insoluble government problems.

Do not let these 545 people shift  the blame to bureaucrats, whom they hire and whose jobs they can  abolish; to lobbyists, whose gifts and advice they can reject; to  regulators, to whom they give the power to regulate and from whom they can  take this power.  Above all, do not let them con you into  the belief that there exists disembodied mystical forces like "the  economy," "inflation," or "politics" that prevent them from doing  what they take an oath to do.

Those 545 people, and they  alone, are responsible.

They, and they alone, have the  power.

They, and they alone, should be held accountable by the  people who are their bosses.

Provided the voters have the  gumption to manage their own employees.

We should vote all of  them out of office and clean up their mess!

Charlie Reese is a former columnist of the Orlando Sentinel  Newspaper.

What you do with this article now that you have  read it.......... Is up to you. 

Floods, Bread, and Circuses. The wealthy remodel. The real victims are overlooked.

Anyone who suffers any form of perceived loss, such as what has resulted from the recent floods in Atlanta, deserves compassion. Especially so for those in counties like Douglas and in North Georgia where they were taken by surprise.

What I do not understand is why anyone living along Peachtree Creek or the Chattahoochee River is surprised they have been flooded? This is isn't global warming. This is not new. This is not even a 100 year flood, much less a 20 year flood.

Though reported as the "Worst in Recorded History", the flooding which made all the headlines around Buckhead & Vinings occurs every 6-8 years. The event is appropriately deemed the "worst" owing to the flooding in the outlying counties which was widespread and unanticipated. People actually died in the outlying areas. People in Buckhead got to remodel. 

For ITP ATL, the flooding is a result of inadequate infrastructure to offset for the impermeable ground cover generated by development. Point the fingers at developers and you would be wrong. They build detention ponds according to code. They are shaken down for exorbitant impact fees in City of Atlanta. Those impact fees get funnelled into a general fund. The funds do not usually end up building infrastructure to offset the increased run off. Point the fingers at the municipal authorities. They have the inadequate codes. They misallocated the money. It is their responsibility to manage "proper" growth in their jurisdiction.

As for my fellow ITP residents, they already know the drill. Researching a given property using FEMA's website or interflood.com will demonstrate the frequency and severity of flooding. The FEMA insurance rating should be a BOLD type hint. The main reason ITP houses were on national news is that it makes a much better photo opp to show a 1 million plus home 10 feet deep in chocolate soup. Meanwhile, the areas where people died lies 25 miles to the west of the homes on the news. 

Filming a flooded field where the livestock were swept away does not show well in a film. It is just a flooded field. They could not capture the action of the animals drowning, or the farmers attempting to save them. Showing the tail lights of a car that was swept away does not convey the action. They missed the chance to film the action of a person and their child dying.  What is left? An enormous mansion covered in muck for days. That is action. Someone lost their stuff in the first floor of their McMansion. 

These are the linkely choices news editors made when picking mansions for the news, instead of depicting the tragedy of real loss. That would be too much like work? The public wants action and drama. Given them "Bread and Circuses". "Let them eat cake". 

I have heard it said from joggers at Memorial Park, "People who live here must see it as a way to redecorate their houses at least once over 10 years, at the insurance company's expense." 

The insurance companies & FEMA Flood Insurance enable these people to rebuild, in the very same location, over and over again.

Intown residents chose their own hell. Call the contractor and decorators! Reserve a suite at the Four Seasons! We are remodeling the house with insurance money! Whee! Chaaarge It! 

Our ITP neighbors enjoyed all the headlines. The outlying county residents suffered huge losses, and some lost their lives.  Those are the ones who really are in hell. We don't see pictures of their "Gates of Hell", just the fancy mansions that are well-insured.

From my memory, these are the large recent floods for Buckhead over the last 20 years: 1990, 1994 (opel, 2004 (Ivan?), 2009

http://ga.water.usgs.gov/floodtracking/chattahoochee/pdf/floodtrack_chatt_back.pdf

City of Atlanta Parks and examining the role of Conservancies and City Responsbilities

Piedmont Park conservancy group pays off

While well-written and informative from a historical perspective, this article barely hints at the challenges that smaller conservancy and sports organizations face when dealing with the city itself; scratching the surface on the implications of universal use of the Conservancy model in a given municipal environment.

The model of a non-profit conservancy is ubiquitous. Thereby the model holds a large degree of credibility. Simply because a given model is prevalent, does not necessarily imply that it is without serious drawbacks.

City parks are an amenity to any city. The original management model of public parks was that city tax dollars and staffing support the maintenance, improvement, and operation of the parks within the municipality's domain. However, when budget cut backs are needed, the funding of the parks is usually the first in line to have their budget reduced. Over time, cutbacks degrade parks, thus creating an environment suitable for the creation of Conservancies by grassroots organizing citizens form together to raise funds to repair otherwise untended and deteriorating parks.

The Conservancy model has gained widespread popularity, with even small neighborhood parks taking over the city's management responsibilities. The benefits of the conservancy model are fairly obvious. The leading benefit is that an organization dedicated to the mission of a given park's restoration, expansion, and operation can better pursue execute it's projects since they will have the latitude and focus to direct their budgets with a large degree of autonomy, once a master plan is established.

Within the Conservancy model, there is a spectrum of specificity of the model's application. You have sports teams appropriating fields from a park such as Frankie Allan's baseball (BYO) facility on Pharr Road, improving the fields, and leaving the remainder of the park literally to rack and ruin. You have well run groups, such as Grant Park, that have generated enormous visible improvements to a park, with very little actual money raised to accomplish the goal. You have other groups that leverage revenue generating facilities within a park charging park users for various access and park activities, such as Piedmont Park. What is consistently true among these applications is that Conservancy activities relieve the City of cost and responsibility. The ongoing existential problem is that the City, as the erstwhile trustee of these public assets, generally does a poor job of interacting with 3rd parties who have been delegated the City's own responsibilities.

The parks administration regularly displays sudden changes of mood and attitude when interpreting MOU's with Conservancy's. I have personally witnessed the City's capricious disregard for fairness time and again. There are several examples. Grant Park must rent it's own Pavilions from the City, though they use these properties for a park raise funding event. Bitsy Grant must rent it's own bathrooms for the gala fundraiser, as well as pay the city staff, instead of allowing volunteer docents to staff the event. Bitsy Grant, after investing $2m for new courts which more than exceed the water usage regulation codes, could not use water on the brand new clay courts since they are lumped in with all the other courts that have not been improved. To prevent the $2m investment from literally drying up and blowing away in a dust cloud, Friends of Bitsy had to raise another $25,000 to install well equipment to water the courts, never mind what impacts widespread use of wells in an urban environment may have on ground water. This past January, rugby teams were kicked off fields en masse, while paying tens of thousands of dollars per year in field rentals, being labeled as field destroyers, when unscheduled field users actually destroyed the fields, leaving them as the only ones to be reached when blame must be assigned, since they were the only ones paying rent on the fields. The Parks Department was given ongoing photographic documentation of the usage by the rugby teams, but this information was not taken into account when the four teams were expelled.

Suffice it to say, unless you are the 800lb gorilla, your organization will face inconsistency and adversity in your interactions with the City. I can only conclude that until an organization achieves a financial stature that elicits respectful and consistent treatment, they will continue to have to struggle to assert the tenets of an MOU with the City.

Another important shortcoming implied by the Conservancy model is that the proliferation of the model has produced a negative pressure on the competing conservancies ability to raise funds to the particular detriment of non-tax funded charities.

- The first movers have enjoyed a majority of the capital donations and attract/retain the more qualified staff. For example, Piedmont Park is a first mover. Being well situated and visible to nearby corporate funding sources, they have generated a long standing relationship of trust. This creates a very difficult climate for other conservancy's in which to compete, since the donors are already committed to one park versus another. In the City managed model, all the revenue generated by the park would have benefited other parks within the Parks Dept. Now, this is funnelled only to the park generating the income. Whether this is appropriate or not is a subject to lengthy debate. The essence is that the other parks without similar revenue generating properties, will inevitably be at a disadvantage.

- Once the management and funding of a given park has been delegated to a conservancy, the City can then depend upon the efforts of the Conservancy's for finances instead of lobbying for adequate internal funding from the City's annual budget to perform the activities their department is otherwise charged with. The public, in effect, does not get what it is paying for, and now is called upon to donate even more funds to a Conservancy to enjoy services that should have otherwise been made available by virtue of taxpayer contributions.

- To subsidize parks with charitable funds when tax payers are otherwise supposed to provide those funds negatively impacts other charitable organizations that are not deemed "city services". Parks are "city services" and therefore entitle to share in the proceeds of tax revenue collections.

Therefore, the overall effect is that several conservancy's compete for limited resources, also pulling funding resources from other charitable organizations that may have no means to make claims upon municipal budget resources.

One solution requires reformatting how City Hall and it's Parks Dept serve the public properties for which they entrusted. Any Conservancy's political strategy should call for active lobbying for the prioritization of tax funding for parks. However, the funding will support an Parks organization that has very many operational shortcomings and only have marginal, durable impact. The city itself, as we well know, has very many operational shortcomings. In order for the parks to be effectively managed by the city, it implies that literally all the other broken facets of city operations also need to be repaired.

Therefore, the way forward is to maintain the Conservancy mission as status quo, all the while to present a unified front requiring the reform of city operations, hiring & contracting practices, the balance of power between the mayor and city council, and implementation of formal accounting controls in conjunction with ongoing 3rd party audits for oversight.

The focal point of this political front would logically be Park Pride, since they span the ecosystem of Conservancy's in our region and espouse missions statements in alignment with the conservancies they service.

If we can organize this message to the City under Parkpride's banner, voicing the need for reform of city financial controls, hiring practices, and balancing of power, then one day we may just be able to hand much of this responsibility back to the where it should have been maintained all along. Then, a Conservancy could provide active oversight and input into the future care of a given park, but utilize tax payer funds that have already been raised to achieve the goal, rather than absorbing charitable donations from missions that do not qualify for tax payer funding as a component of a qualified City service.

If these efforts do succeed, the reality is that Conservancy organizations will not likely abdicate their authority to the City, even if it would be more effective for the overarching park conservation mission.

As a rule of thumb, any organization will entrench itself, even to the peril of the mission, since this is the natural response and function of the organizational collective's ego; the identity of the organization will want to survive, no matter the cost.

When the citizens and groups such as conservancies do succeed in reforming City of Atlanta, we will have an interesting, perhaps painful, challenge to reorganize our organizations to ensure the most effective strategy in the new environment.

Therefore, Conservancies are here to stay! ;-)

Atlanta's Casino - Atlanta devolves into Pottersville?

We are one step away from having a casino in the middle of downtown Atlanta.

"The Atlanta City Council and Mayor Shirley Franklin have endorsed the project. The casino development could help to relieve the city of an estimated $56 million balance on roughly $85 million in bonds issued for redevelopment of the site in the 1980s. "
Read the full article here


All of this brings to mind Yeats -

"The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity...

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born? "-Yeats - The Second Coming

Will we allow Atlanta to devolve into Pottersville ? We should demand a referendum on this issue, and demand it straight away before we lose our ability to participate in the process.

Is this the best idea our city and state's business and political leadership can conceive of for this prime real estate? Real estate situated in the middle of our downtown area, across the street from the Capitol building (full of erstwhile "Conservatives"), and adjacent to the largest University student body (GSU) in the Atlanta metro region.. ALL THEY CAN COME UP WITH IS A CASINO?!

Georgia State University, "Founded in 1913 in Atlanta, Georgia State University is the second-largest and one of four research institutions in the University System of Georgia."

Atlanta is a premier national city! We have a strong business community. We have so many great things about our region and the city itself.

Atlanta is not a resort destination.

Atlanta is by no means a flagging metro area desperately stooping to anything in the name of economic development.

This initiative displays a lack of vision, a lack of transparent representative government processes, and exemplifies the power the "machine" has to override the general disposition of the public.

The casino increase law enforcement costs by the increase in organized crime and vice related activity. We can not afford our current law enforcement budget as it is!

There are demonstrable negative impacts that a casino will bring upon our community. These are well researched and documented. Our tax dollars will have to offset these impacts.

Please download this document from University of Chicago as an example. The University of Chicago is home to economic luminaries such as Milton Friedman. Perhaps they understand how to research economic impacts of a given initiative?

Refi the USA, in lieu of Stimulus

Monday, February 09, 2009
Last updated: Thursday, March 12, 2009

Refi the USA, in lieu of Stimulus

Friends,

Please review the following as an alternative to the Federal Stimulus bill. Please assert your commentary in the comment fields below this proposal.

This document proposes a clear alternative approach to the Stimulus bills.

The tenets of this proposal will quickly deliver the desired effect of market stabilization, restoring confidence in the markets, and thereby enabling access to credit. This proposal will have a swift impact, without the need for ongoing government spending.

The government incentives requiring banks to extend loans to "underqualified" borrowers, as well as the investment banks pushing the limits in vast numbers of loans of what is a reasonable risk, collude to form what amounts to a Ponzi scheme, with the distinction of involving so many various parties in government, mortgage lending, real estate services, and other investment banking, that prosecution in an efficiently and swift time frame is not possible for the near term to create any positive impact upon the confidence levels in the markets.


With relatively minor government expenditure, banks, and local administrative services, a strong and deep keel will set into the deep waters of our economy, stabilizing markets and restoring confidence.

Confidence in values will increase, credit resources will open, the inventory of homes will decrease, demand for new home starts will then increase, and jobs will spawn throughout the entire cycle owing to the 90 days hiatus from payments restoring ability to pay and decrease interest liabilities by individuals and businesses allowing for expansion of business.

Therefore, it is proposed:

Immediately Stabilize the Underlying Asset Values.
For any home sales in the next Two years, the minimum sales price allowable by law shall be determined as the lesser of the last mortgage property appraisal or the last Tax Assessor’s valuation prior to January 1, 2007. Arguably, the last time the market can be said to have been functioning was prior to January 1, 2007.

Since individual States will likely refuse to waive the associated Intangible Taxes for each loan refinance, it could be possible to use Stimulus funds to reimburse States for the associated Taxes.

After Two years expire, the minimum allowable sales price shall decrease by Ten Per Cent per year annually over Five years. After the Seventh year, the open market shall dictate pricing.


Refinance Every Home Loan in the USA.
Once home values are stabilized by law, every homeowner in the USA shall be refinanced to a Thirty year Fixed Conventional Mortgage Loan at the preferred borrower’s market-based interest rate, currently 5.1%. Each homeowner shall enjoy 90 days hiatus from payments.


Restore Consumers Confidence in the ongoing Cost of Credit.
For all inhabitants, including aliens resident legal or otherwise, of the United States holding credit cards and other unsecured consumer related credit card debts, all outstanding balances of credit card debt shall be assigned no more than an 8% interest rate, and debtors shall enjoy 90 days hiatus from payments. For a period of two years from the date of the bills enactment, credit card interest rates shall not exceed 8%.

Restore all Home Equity Lines that the homeowner had prior to January 1, 2007. Affix a maximum interest rate of 3.5%, which shall endure for as long as the current homeowner remains in the property.

Directly Fund Access to Education. For EVERYONE.
All outstanding college loans and any subsequent college loans for the following Five Years shall enjoy a maximum interest rate of 3.5% and no origination fees shall apply.

Students shall not be required to make payments during periods when they are earning less that 50% of the Average Household Income in their Metropolitan Statistical Area or County, which ever is smaller.

Enable Businesses to Invest and Expand.
For all businesses, any outstanding balances of debt shall be reassigned an interest rate not to exceed 8%. Any subsequent borrowings shall be assigned a rate of more than 8% for a period of Two years.

Acknowledge Lending Practices Have Been Basically Unfair, Possibly Illegal.
We must admit meaningfully that a wrong has occurred, and these people damaged deserve meaningful

The members of this category shall enjoy the aforementioned refinancing if they are able to retake their home.

Dispossessed homeowners shall be restored financially to their status before dispossession.

Where the home has already been resold, the disposed homeowner shall be reimbursed the lost equity in the property existing as of January 1, 2007. In either case, all dispossessed homeowners shall be reimbursed for any expenses related to the dispossession such as storage of personal effects, health care, loss of wages, or other provable expenses and damages. and swift redress.

The source of reimbursement funds shall be: TARP funds where the mortgage bank made no attempt to perform a workout with the homeowner OR Stimulus funds where a good faith workout was attempted by the lending bank.

Where the home was purchased by speculatively, by non-property occupying owners, the property shall revert to the original owners. The investors made whole during the transaction. Investors were behaving in a lawful manner, and therefore should not be damaged.

Reform the Banks and the Real Estate Transaction Cycle. (1st draft)
Where possible and provable, criminal proceedings should be brought forth against any parties clearly stepping outside the law at that time.

Penalties for fraud activities such as collusion to perpetrate mortgage fraud shall be increased significantly and shall have federal jurisdiction.

Require Multiple Listing Services to provide Open, Affordable, and Full to the General Public.
This will weed out the dead wood of incompetent agents, and allow real agents to provide better services.

Illegal Immigration, End It. Collect Tax Revenue from the Workers. (1st draft)
Those currently in the United States under illegal circumstances could be paying their full share of Tax Revenues if we simply assign Tax Payer ID Numbers to each migrant worker.

There is no law that necessarily connects Citizenship or immigration status with the ability or responsibility to pay Taxes. Therefore, taxes can be collected from anyone in our nation, if they simply had an Account Number and access to Identification.

Currently Illegal immigrants would be allowed to stay in the USA, provided they begin paying taxes and register themselves. They would not be eligible for Citizenship owing to the illegal nature of their entry to the country.

To reinstate eligibility to apply for citizenship, currently illegal immigrants shall have to perform community service duties of Five to Ten hours a month for a period of Five years.

This would integrate the immigrants into their new communities by given them opportunities for volunteer service, thereby improving the community in which they now live.


Rationale:
Whereas, previous attempts to direct funding to "bail out" the economy have been misused, subverted, or at the very least experienced far less success than what was generally expected.

Whereas, the current stimulus package will likely amount to an ineffectual misdirection of our nations resources. There are no discernible areas in the economy that can be improved by direct inject of capital. Even if there were areas where investment could make a significant impact, the government is not capable to execute the appropriate spending regime, and, furthermore, the long term financial impact upon our economy, could actually send our nation further into economic decline for an even longer period of time.

Whereas, the mortgage servicing industry faces financial penalties for performing loan "work outs" with mortgagee. The loan investor pools build these penalties into the loan servicing engagement contracts. Individuals with the loan investor pools can also sue the Servicing companies for performing "work-outs".

Whereas, if only failing homeowners are given benefits, the ones who are actually paying are in effect penalized for being financially responsible, since there are no provisions being discussed for those who are in good standing.

Whereas, the manner under which lenders have extended loans during the past decade has proven to have contributed significantly towards undermining our nation's, and in turn the world's, economy.

Whereas, these loans extended by the financial industry amounts collectively to an enormous Ponzi scheme, since the extension of loans to underqualified borrowers directly impacts the investment of the owners who were qualified and depends upon ongoing demand of buyers to maintain the valuations underlying the loans.

Whereas, any prosecution of the perpetrators of the Ponzi Scheme is impractible owing to the diminished responsbility of all the parties involved.

Whereas any relief of homeowners still residing their homes would be unfair to those who, owing to timing of the relief, were unable to enjoy any relief since they no longer have their home.



Sincerely,

Bryan “Beau” Grant, BSM, MSMoT
Convivia Group (http://conviviagroup.com)
Commercial Real Estate Brokers
http://www.linkedin.com/in/bryangrant

Grandpa McCarthy had a heartattack last night

Robert C. McCarthy Jr, my grandfather, suffered a heart attack this morning around 8am. He is currently being catheterized.. for what seems like all morning and part of the afternoon. So we don't know the extent or scope of the problem.. Healing a heart attack can always be helped by strong prayer. If anyone deserves a prayer after years of hard work and service, it is this man.

The Lord must have been pushing me to go visit him , since the trip was a last minute "grab-and-go affair", and I coincidentally arrived in Asheville last night to visit the Gran's. Last night, we watched the usual dose of Fox News, loud commercials, political speeches, and local news... and then the usual intrafamily panel analysis and discussion about national politics, complete with printed articles in hand from all parties.. grandma too. Calm thoughtful banter about issues that we can all have direct impact upon. ;-)

[Sample Fun Topics: Obamarama and the Care Bears Vs Blood n Guts McCain and Caribou Barbie. Discuss. Topic: Oil V Renewables, domestic or foreign still destabilizes our country. Foreign for obvious reasons. Domestic since Oil Companies manipulate the political process and easily corrupt our officials and legal systems. Discuss. Topic: Where is Osama and how did he get a dialysis machine into a high altitude cave? etc..]

A great but humble man, Grandpa was a Korean war hero who fought at the Frozen Chosin (2 purple hearts) in Marine Fox Company defending against an advance of 9 Chinese Divisions in the withdrawal from North Korea at the beginning of the war. He has 4 children, 9 Grandchildren, 1 great-grandchild, 2 dogs.. He is a first degree black belt green thumbed gardener. He surfs the Internet at 84 years old, still drives his mini-van with Drill Baby Drill, "W", and Marine Corps stickers on the back, helps promote longevity through holistic remedies. Obviously, he is a staunch Republican, but wondering from time to time about the last 7 years. Still, he keeps his signed photo of W and the 1st lady prominently displayed right next to the signed photo from the Gipper (Reagan for you kids out there). Grandpa is incisive, very intelligent, the best husband any gal could hope for, dog lover, patriot, healer, the best grandparent, and a heck of a Scottish Country dancer.

I guess last night was one "Fox News evening" too many. He went to bed an was awaken by a pain in his shoulder. Grandma quickly deduced this indication as symptomatic of heart attack, and high tailed it to the VA hospital.

Your prayers are welcome and needed. Thanks for your healing thoughts that many of you have already expressed. Y'all are the best!

Tibetan Olympic Team

For many years, I have admired the philosophies taught by Tibetan Bhuddist monks. I have admired the endurance of the refugees, and known for a long while the atrocities they suffered at the hand of the Chinese. They are not the only ones to suffer this ruthless intolerance of cultural and religious diversity, instead forcing cultural unification and homogeniety at the point of a gun.

To mark the games, I have procured a Tibetan Flag, and plan to hang it out in the front of my home during the games, along with an American flag to show my support fo our athletes and my support for all those ground under the boot by China and similar governments.  Those of you who know personally, have seen my Free Tibet sticker on my old car for many years. Yet, it is not as if a sticker really amounts to much more than than visual clutter, unless people ask questions about the sticker.

Also, I wanted to remind folks that we enjoy the presence of a real Tibetan Monastery here in Atlanta, the Drepung-Loseling Institute.  They have established, over the past few years a strong relationship with Emory University. I invite people to visit on Tuesday's for the public teachings, which are discussions of philosophy and relate to human development and "Right Action". You will not bump into radical protesters waving flags and hopping about. If you do want to hang a Tibetan flag, they have some in the book shop. Just remember to take your shoes off when you enter the sanctuary!

It greatly pleases me to see the exposure of their plight to the world. It is my hope that with this exposure, the Chinese government to find better ways to deal with it's citizens and the world at large, ways beyond using brutal force, torture, censorship, and misinformation. (The China-Dalai Lama Dialogue: Prospects for Progress)

It is a hard question, whether to boycott Chinese products, as if that were actually possible since we no longer produce anything for the retail consumer, or whether to pursue the Dalia Lama's approach of Active Engagement, striving to raise awareness within Chinese leadership that they are connected with everyone, and that both our ends and their ends share, and therefore there is no victor, but simply, we all progress and move forward humanity in an enlightened and peaceful manner.

I tend towards the boycott side, but I simply have not found the faith within me to go along with the better approach of Active Engagement. I agree with the idea, but simply must mature enough to support this approach by my own actions.

The US infrastructure is failing. I simply see that every dollar I spend on Chinese goods build their schools, their roads, and their high speed rail.  Our money supports their military and puts their citizens further under the boot of a ravenous central government that Orwell envisioned. Our funds prop up a government that really is one of the most powerful and oppressive the Earth has known since World War II. We are just lucky they halted their militarily aggressive foreign policy with Tibet. Now,China's strategy seems to be, "Rope up the commodities and supply routes, and then command the terms of engagement", as they are now doing.

China is rising to super power and economic status largely thanks to our purchasing habits and failure to enforce productions standards on their producers. Shirking these same  business legal standards would land you in jail here in the United States. Somehow, it is OK for our retailers to source products from a market where human rights, labor laws, the rule of law, environmental standards, and living standards are all ignored, at least as demonstrated by their actions, by the Chinese central government, as well as local and regional officials. You want proof? 320 million Chinese have cancers that are directly attributable to environmental hazards such as cadmium and lead in the water. The entire problem with pet food from last year stemmed from this cause, and killed thousands of pets. (Geopolitics, China, and poisoned pet food)

So raise your awareness towards the idea of the world economic agenda, and therefore geopolitical security (Engaging China: The Political Economy and Geopolitical Approaches of the United States, Japan and the European Union) , being largely influenced, if not dictated, by a China empowered with our own consumptive inability to establish a true free market economic environment here or abroad.

Instead, the world trading community has invited a player to our game of open markets and allowed this player several trump cards the others are not allowed to use. How could China fail to rise to prominence, taking the entire pot of winnings?  The trump cards - human rights, labor laws, the rule of law, environmental standards, living standards, and unilateral pricing of the Yuan - all give any business an strong incentive to ignore moral issues, and source production in China. Since "everyone is doing it", it would be suicide not to follow suit.

Please urge your politicians during this election cycle to take a good hard stand on trade imbalances. We are as a nation, unwittingly or not, supporting a communist regime that fundamentally contradicts our constitution and what America, under the Bill of Rights, is founded upon. Call upon the politicians to wake up to this fact and take significant action.

Thanks for your interest and enjoy supporting your nation's games in the upcoming Olympics!

Warm Regards,

Bryan Grant

State of the homes in Atlanta

Homeowners here are a little nervous about the downward turn. However, Atlanta has been weathering the storm rather well by comparison to the West Coast or Florida, all except for condos. Though well paying jobs do seem to be growing scarce here.

Congress has done little to turn all of this around. The economic stimulus tax rebate checks will translate into us paying that money back in more taxes or inflation. The money is going to come from somewhere. They just get good political mileage out of this gambit.

Meanwhile, the banks are getting away with murder by being able to turn down offers for homes going into foreclosure, then once the house is foreclosed, the bank allows the buyers to bid up the price. The homeowner loses all their equity, the bank gets restored for the loan by the new buyer, and gets a nice tidy profit for their "troubles". Though it is technically illegal for banks to "broker" property, they are effectively doing so by turning down bona fide offers and allowing the value to bid up.

Meanwhile, the lax regulations for lending practices that has led us down this old and familiar road have not been dealt with by anyone. This lax environment allowed banks to dangle tempting fruits to home buyers by allowing most folks to buy more than they probably should have. While closing the deal, the banks, Realtors, and mortgage brokers downplayed the realities of re-financing when things go badly for the homeowners credit. All them, for the short term returns, earn more buy selling a bigger home than not. Once they are paid, there is no further recourse against any of them. Now the banks want us to bail out their loans? Ha. One of the rare good things Bush has done is threaten to veto congress's attempts to bail out the banks.

The banks know which loans are in danger of foreclosure. Unless they want to hold bad debt, those loans should be allowed to refinance to a 30 year fixed at a reasonable rate for a 725 FICO score, as a standard, and then given 2 or 3 months of grace period to re-stabilize the buyer's payment budgets. All of this should be at no expense to the homeowner. The banks set up this mess, they promoted the products, and they allowed marginal loans to be underwritten. They should eat the losses, or work in good faith to transition these loans into more serviceable accounts. And since their actions have led to an artificial run up in values, they have endangered the financial well being of every home owner.

This would go a great distance towards stabilizing the credit markets, both here and abroad.

The alternatives to this course of action are few. If we stay on the road we are now on, in terms of the Fed and Congress's quick fixes, we will drag the markets further down, and delay recovery.

Hmm. Maybe they want this to happen so we will vote in the new Amero to replace the Dollar, and usher in the North American Union to extinguish the flame of liberty knows as the USA.

3 Beagles: Updates

Hey all,

I still have the 3 Beagles referenced in the other email and need to get them placed into "Forever homes". There are some new photos - webalbum.

They are all on Petfinder, which will be the most likely source of a lead, but .. it is always good to work the friends and family social network when placing dogs.

They are now being sponsored with fund from Atlanta Beagle Rescue, but I am fostering for the interim. Bobbie, one of my neighbors, has volunteered to foster Jake, but the other two are here with me.

The female, "Lucy", is pretty much ready to go and is vetted/spayed. The young male, " Bart", is up for neutering next week. The oldest one, "Jake" we are going to do two weeks from now, as he has a cold right now.

Thanks for your support, and definitely keep forwarding the leads to me if you have them.


Beau


PS: If you any of you know anyone in the press or legal professions, please have a look at this case, and lend a hand. Someone brought it to my attention tonight. How the rescuer is being is arrested for saving a dying dog, but the owner is not being arrested for gross negligence and cruelty to animals, I will never know or choose to accept. The incident is up in Pennsylvania, so pass it along to folks up there to help as well.

Tha 

 

 

This is from Bayard Snowden in TN and that is his son on the couch with the dog....

 

    An old tired-looking dog wandered into the yard.  I could tell from his collar and well fed belly that he had a home.  He followed me into the house, into the kitchen, and on a couch.



    An hour later he went to the door, and I let him out.  The next day he was back, resumed his position on the couch, and slept for an hour.  This continued for several weeks.  Curious, I pinned a note to his collar, "Every afternoon your dog comes to my house for a nap."
    The next day he arrived with a different note pinned to his collar, "He lives in a home with ten children.  He's trying to catch up on his sleep.  Can I come with him tomorrow?"

 

 

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--
Bill Penn
The Letitia House Gazette

--
Bryan "Beau" Grant
Convivia Group
Commercial Real Estate Broker

"The two most powerful warriors are patience and time." -Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy

Office: US - +1 (404) 351-0905
Office: UK - +44 (20) 8144 7750
Mobile: US +1 (404) 932-6399
Skype: malacandra
SecondLife: Jebediah Raymaker
Google Chat: bgrantenator


The information in this e-mail and any attached documents is strictly confidential and may be legally privileged. Any unauthorized use or disclosure of this communication is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, you must not read, use or disseminate the information.  If you believe that you have received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender immediately and delete it from your system. Further, this e-mail does not constitute an offer to sell securities or property or the solicitation of an offer to buy securities or property, and may not be used for such purposes.

3 Wise Beagles found on Christmas Eve..

(Please do CROSS POST to your own lists.)

View their photos here: http://picasaweb.google.com/bgrantenator/BeaglesXMAS2007

The short story:

On Christmas Eve, I found 3 pure bred Beagles on the side of the road.. 2 male and one female, all unfixed/unspayed. One of the males is quite old, but is gentle and bright. The other two are are 2-6 years old, behave like siblings, and are clever and gentle. The younger male likes to assert himself as the Alpha dog, but he is manageable and can be trained pretty easily with more time.

They curl up together to sleep. The two males sleep on top of one another, despite the apparent rivalry.

They appear to be seasoned hunting dogs, very friendly even affectionate dispositions, and really clever. They also get along with cats. My cat was not put off them, snoozing about a foot away from one of them.

They seem to be housebroken, having only one or two accidents. Given their emotional state, this is pretty normal to have an accident.

Anybody who knows anyone with a penchant or knowledge of Beagles, please call me to get these three into fostering or adoption. -404.932.6399 cell.

Thanks!!

Beau Grant

"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress
can be measured by the way its animals are treated"

                                                                              Mahatma Gandhi

PS: If you want to adopt them directly, please fill out on adoption form on the Ga Humane Society website. I will work with them to get them spayed/neutered BEFORE they are adopted, and the adopting family can reimburse for the expenses. Under no circumstances will these be released before being spayed/neutered.. for obvious reasons.


The Long Story - I just returned form visiting my family in Augusta. They live out on the Savannah River just over the border into South Carolina. It is the first nice neighborhood on that route. It appears that shrewd McCormick County, SC  red necks dump their pets on the road into the neighborhood.

This year on Christmas Eve, I drove past 3 beagles who were sniffing around a spot on the road. I passed them on my errands about 3 times. They never left the spot, so I when I was heading back up to Atlanta, and it was getting dark, I decided these must be abandoned. They appeared to be waiting for their owners return. They would inspect each car as it made the turn onto the road, making sure if it was the right one. Sooner or later, someone would carelessly run them over by talking on their cellphone, so there was no choice but to round them up.

I flagged down a car with a couple of guys who helped me put them into my car. The Beagles were very cooperative, the problem was that I already had my three labs in the car.  Popping the rear hatch window, we found that if inserted them backwards, then they would not snarl at each other. I suppose this worked because the new Beagles showed submission to the labs by presenting their backsides first.

Barely making my Christmas eve dinner plans back in Atlanta that evening, I managed to install the Beagles in the sunroom under the Christmas tree, where they drank all the water, ate all the food, and curled up on the dog beds. I decided to forgo the stand up-sit down-kneel Christmas church service routine, opting instead return home after dinner to give  them all a good cleansing, stem to stern. After a thorough scrubbing with gentle topical disinfectants, endless q-tips soiled with ear goo, and organic soaps and conditioners to remove the caked on dirt, sludge, brambles, fleas, and ticks, they emerged clean and vibrant. All the cuts and tears on the ears were dressed, and all in all, they emerged shiny and presentable for Santa Claus.