These are on one of my daily calendars. They remind me of the important job I have to do...

"It has been said that paternity is a career imposed on you without any inquiry into your fitness for it. That is why there are so many fathers who have children, but so few children who have fathers." --Adlai Stevenson

"You will never 'find' time for anything. If you want time, you must make it." --Writer Charles Buxton

As a husband, father of three, company owner and triathlete, I know first hand about creating time. It is NOT easy, but it is doable. I have blogged before on the concept of filling idle space and spending idle cash, the same is true of time. We seem so busy even when we are doing nothing. I do not accept, however, when people tell me that they "have no time." It's simply not true. It is a matter of prioritization and motivation - both of which I have only part of the time.

I haven't commented on any current events lately, so I thought I'd take an opportunity to give my brief assessment of a few news items:

Ports: On the one hand, we need to be mindful of the security of our vulnerabilities and the ports definitely fit that bill. On the other hand, it seems we are being a bit "jumpy" at the notion that an Arab country may be involved - isn't that a bit presumptuous? Ultimately, I think it is very fair that this gets extra scrutiny regardless of which country it is buying the port operations - any country other than our own, even a friendly Western European company, should be scrutinized. Of course, politicians are making a bigger deal out of this than it probably is. There was a lot of huffing and puffing and not a whole lot of facts. The fact is, this came out in the news back in Nov. '05 and no one seemed to care. Then there's the whole "Bush didn't even know" bull honky. So what, Bush doesn't know everything, that's why his administration has thousands of employees to vet these kinds of deals. It was vetted and IF properly done, then I don't see any reason why the deal shouldn't go forward. I also firmly believe in the notion of "Trust, but Verify". Security of the ports still remains in our hands - Coast Guard and other agencies - and we need to make sure that they are not compromised.

NSA "Spying": First of all, I find it interesting that the press always refers to it as "domestic", but I always hear that only one end of the call is in this country. Someone better tell AT&T 'cuz I'm getting charged international rates for calls from my house to Europe. Bottom line, if we find phone numbers, email addresses, etc. in the raid of a known terrorist, we ought to use that information for our security - I think everyone agrees with that part. If the current laws don't support how we are trying to do that, then by all means work on updating the laws. We have laws that allow wiretapping of organized crime rings in our country, so why can't we come up with something for this? More huffing and puffing that makes this whole program sound way more nefarious than it is. Hey, if someone in the administration is spying on someone outside of the scope of what was found from the terrorists, then that is probably wrong. If it's happening, then we should know about it and people should be punished, but so far I don't believe that is known. Also, the purpose of this program is not for criminal prosecution - although I suppose it could lead to that and then a judge would get to decide whether or not the information gathered in the surveillance or a result of knowledge from the surveillance would be admissible - rather, this is an attempt to PREVENT terrorist attacks. Given that, I'm hard-pressed to get too upset about this. Stop the huffing and puffing and update the laws.

Muslim Cartoons: Even the press is bored of this one even as some of the protests continue. Clearly, at least a portion of the Muslim community is using this to try to use this to impose their culture and perhaps more importantly their RULES on the rest of us (don't start with me on the our foreign policy - we can talk about that another time). Do they have a right to be mad about the cartoons - sure. But it DOES NOT give them the right to break the law in protesting it and it is grossly DISGUSTING that they are toting signs suggesting the killing, beheading, etc. of not only the cartoonists, but any non-Muslims. Other than Muslims continuing to make a bad name for themselves, the other thing that I find hilarious is the MSM. Take CNN for example. They won't show the cartoons, but in the lead-in to a segment discussing it they show anti-Semitic and anti-Christian "art". What hypocrites! Everyone saying they are not showing them so as not to "inflame" Muslims is really saying we're too chicken sh!t and willing to succumb to their threats. PERIOD!

Cheney Hunting Accident. Yeah, so what. Next...

Patriotism has become the most bastardized word of the 21st century thus far. Thanks to our wonderful politicians, Republicans invoke it and Democrats redefine it. Either way, they've ruined it.

but, I AM PROUDLY PATRIOTIC!!

Now let me remind everyone what it does and does not mean. First, it doesn't mean:

• blindly agreeing with our president, or any politician for that matter
• dissent, especially politicized dissent (thanks Hillary)

What I think it does mean, in a nutshell is a belief that our country is GREAT. That it is -- we are -- better than other countries. That doesn't mean that I disparage other countries, it just means that I root for our country in the Olympics, that I love our way of life, our freedoms, our opportunities, our beautiful beaches and our majestic mountains. I love the sports and I love the music. I love the city and I love the country. I love the people that I meet at marathons, when I'm on a morning run or riding to work, the people I meet at work and at play and in my neighborhood. All of it is uniquely AMERICAN.

Some people may think that I have to dislike other countries to love ours so much. But the fact is that I love other countries and especially the people of those countries. We have a Korean and Indian that work in our company and I'm sure they tire of my curious questions about their countries. My parents were both born in Western Europe and I have traveled there extensively as well as visiting Turkey, Morocco and other countries. I even lived in England for a year. While I have seen some anti-American sentiment, I take it in stride. The overwhelming majority of people I have met abroad are wonderful and have no disdain for our country. If I was born and raised in Western Europe I would likely feel the same patriotism for that country.

Our country is not great because of our government, it is great almost in spite of it. We are great because we are free and we have not taken that responsibility lightly. We are a beacon of freedom for the rest of the world, and while we will always have our detractors and while we are by no means perfect, there is NO country better than ours. We lead the world not by choice or exerting power, but because we do more than just talk - we take action, not only our government, but more importantly as a people.

Some say that horrible things are done in the name of Patriotism and disparage those who consider themselves patriotic. Patriotism, like love, lends itself to abuse because we WANT to believe the best in our country. There are those that use the ones that love them, it does not make the one who loves a bad person. Patriotism is good. Those who abuse, or disparage, our love for our country are both wrong.

I LOVE THE U.S.A. and no one - not a president, not the most anti-American person - can change that. I will not let political correctness and anti-americanism get in the way of me saying it and displaying it. I LOVE THE U.S.A and I'm proud of it!

Feel free to use it any time

I'm quite tired of writing\blogging at the moment, so I'll just provide the link to a good article (I think) by Larry Elder about how blacks are doing quite well. Yes, there are still hurdles for many, but it improves every day. My point is not that we've attained equality, but that as a whole, blacks are doing better than some "race-pimps" would like you to believe.

Here's the link...

You can ignore the first part about the King Funeral. I really don't care too much about the whether the comments made by Carter, Lowery, et al, were appropriate or not. Get past the first 3 paragraphs.

Some key quotes from the article (I did not verify the facts\sources - I'll leave it up to you):

"Most blacks are middle class and do not live in the inner city. If black America were a separate country, its GDP would place it at No. 16 in the world. Corporations like Time Warner, American Express and Merrill Lynch all have black CEOs. "

"Polls show over 90 percent of whites would vote for a qualified black presidential candidate, versus one-third in 1958."

""You need only do three things to avoid poverty in this country: finish high school, marry before having a child, and produce the child after the age of 20. Only 8 percent of families who do this are poor; 79 percent of those who fail to do this are poor." James Q. Wilson as quoted by L. Elder

I would argue that if the Jesse Jacksons and Al Sharptons went away (no, not dead, just stopped race-pimping), blacks would continue to improve their lot much faster than with their "help."