To Ask or Not to Ask

Labor Day Weekend is coming up in a few days. In most families, this is a time for gathering together for the last cook-out (unless you live in a year-round warm climate) before Autumn and falling leaves.  In my family, there seems to be no awareness of this activity unless I invite my kids to come.  Actually, this seems to be the case for all holidays.  Since the demise of the grandparents, it seems that family time is just not a priority with my kids, with the possible exception of Ryan.  Labor Day is no different.  As usual, I had to ask Kevin if he and Julia would be able to come down for any part of the weekend, but they said no, they had other plans.  Ryan and Katharine accepted the invitation and said they had Sunday available, so we will have the cook-out then. Ryan does better than the other two at keeping in touch: he lives in town and checks in several times a week.  I just realized that I didn't even ask Jenny, and realized further that if I had, she probably would have declined as well. It's an all-day drive from Virginia.  I might have thought to ask her if she had contacted us any time in the last few weeks, but I guess she's too busy to think of her parents. In my fantasy, it is my kids who are asking us if we want to get together with them for a holiday before they make other plans, not us always asking them. Maybe they don't think that family gatherings at any time other than Thanksgiving or Christmas are important. They are wrong. It hurts to be so ignored by them.

 

Gay or Transgender - That is the Question

OK, here's a question to ponder: what is the difference between a homosexual male and a transgender male? Suppose, for instance, that you're a male who is sexually attracted to males, rather than females.  How do you know whether you are a homosexual male, or a female trapped in a male body, given that gender identification is now determined solely by one's own feelings, rather than by one's anatomical make-up? Suppose you're a woman who is attracted to other women, rather than other men: How do you know that you are really a woman having feelings for another woman, or a man trapped in a woman's body having feelings for another woman? What if Psychology has been wrong all along, and there is really no such thing as actual "homosexuality": that what has been called sexual orientation is really gender orientation? It would explain why there are so many gays and lesbians who demonstrate personality characteristics or preferences associated with the opposite gender.  Even if this were true, combining homosexuals and transgenders would still only affect less than two percent of the population according to most measurements, but in a country of 300+ million that would be about six million people-certainly a sizable number. Geneticists seem to be finding genes for everything else, perhaps they will eventually find the gene that determines sexuality and sexual orientation.  That would really be a breakthrough, don't you think?

Media Bias

In yesterday's Hartford Courant, there were eleven editorials in the Commentary section, seven of which involved national politics.  Of those seven, four were attacking Trump. The others dealt with ObamaCare and its different potential futures, why Governor Molloy might not be the best person to stump for Hillary, and one lone piece laying out the many reasons why the writer would be voting for Trump.  Additionally, there were five political cartoons (six if you count the weekly Caption Contest), three of which (four if you count the Caption Contest winner) were anti-Trump. Even in the hard news section, there was only one overtly political story, and that one dealt with Trump's allegedly falling poll numbers.  All week there has been an endless reliving of Trump's verbal gaffs, while there has been no reporting about Hillary's email problems, or her continued attempts to deny that she did anything wrong, in spite of the FBI Director's assertion that she did. She cast aspersions on the families of the Benghazi massacre and indicated that they were either lying or delusional for saying that she blames a video for the deaths, yet there has been no mention of that, but Trump defending himself against the callous remarks by the Muslim Gold Star father has been all over the news for days. Personally, I'm not as concerned with what either of them say except as their remarks relate to their actions.  So far I have not seen or heard that Trump is anything but a successful business owner who has made a positive impact on cities across the country and the world, while Mrs. Clinton has accomplished nothing positive to show for all her experience. The Hartford Courant isn't even a major national newspaper, but it still reads like a Democratic mouthpiece. Of course, this is Connecticut, one of the bluest states in the nation, and also one of the most poorly run, with an economy and a tax base in shambles. I wonder if there is any connection?