Swine flu, Teachers, and drunk driving

Well from the title you can see that a few things in today's news have touched a nerve. You have stupid people who need to get some common sense, greedy over paid people who need to earn more and work less, and judges who need to get a clue.

First there were several stories regarding the swine flu. Several people were interviewed who are not eating pork because they are afraid of getting the flu. This would be the virus that has jumped from pigs to humans in Mexico(this time around). You can not get it from eating the meat. The virus only lives in live hosts and the human flu does not even come from the pig but is a pig virus that has mutated in a human. Do some reading and stop listening to the news hype.

The Ontario elementary school teaches ratified a four year contract yesterday. In the contact they received a 10% raise, and more prep time. This is 10% over 4 years or 2.5% a year, who is getting 2.5% now a days. We just handed out raises at work and the average was 1.3% or the cost of living. These people are like the auto works, they have the best benefits going yet still whine for more. (of course this is back firing on the auto works but the teachers are public sector) Teachers are already the highest paid public sector works and because of their wage increase in the last 10 years many programs have been cut and teaching tools like books, computers, and pencils need to be cut on a regular bases. Then they got more prep time, how much more time do they need to prepare for the same lesson they teach every year. The last time they got this they cut the kids break time by ten minutes. 4 years ago the kids had two 15 minute breaks and a hour lunch. Then they changed it to two 45 minutes nutrition breaks( same amount of time) but last year they took 5 minutes from each to meet prep time demand from the union. maybe if the teachers stayed at work for 8 hours a day like the rest of us that they could get their work done. I have sat out side several schools over the years waiting for or dropping off the kids. Most teachers show up just before the first bell and several leave before the last bell and most are gone with in 15 minutes of the last bell. I would love a 9 to 3 job. Maybe they need to privatise the schools and get the teachers to do some work.

Last a women was sentenced yesterday to three years in jail for driving a car into a utility pole, killing her passenger, while having 3 times the legal limit of alcohol. Why do we let these people get away with what is essential murder. In this case several people tried to take away her keys and she refused taxis. In another case several years ago the judge could not decide whether to give sentence the defendant to time served or two years house arrest and it was his second conviction for killing someone while driving under the influence. We need to get tuff on these offenders and start sentencing them for the crime they committed. 25 to life should be the sentence that is handed down for these crimes.

This has been my point of view.

Why we are in Afganistan

The uncle of the latest Canadian soldier kill in Afghanistan has asked the question. Why are we in Afghanistan? Reading of several articles have many people in her home town asking this question in grief. I must admit that or government and media outlets do not do a very good job to highlight why we are there. Afghanistan is a country that has been in turmoil for centuries and the last tyrants to control the country, used the blanked of religion to hide their sadistical abuses they practised.

Earlier this week a young couple tried to flee their village in Nimroz province (currently controlled by the Taliban) they were hunted down taken to a mosque, controled by ulta conservities, found guilty taken out into the street and exicuted. The crime Abdula Aziz and Gul Pecha commited, they wanted to get married. They were gunned down because of love. This happened regularly under the resigm of the Taliban along with there other humanitarian crimes like preventing girls from going to school. Under the Taliban it was common place for young children to starve to death because there father was killed and there mothers where then not able to go out in public to get food and water to substain their lives. People a killed regularly in the remote provinces for there religious and political views, opresion is a way of life.

We can't consously, in a have country, allow this to return to Afganistan. There are not enough troops in the country to properly police the country and bring it into modern times. We in the west have sent over token relief to make ourselves feel better but not be inconvienced. maybe it is time we were inconvienced. Maybe it is time that we do something for others and not just our selves.

This is my point of view

The Bus Comes to Town

The GRT has finally setup a pilot route out to Elmira passing through St. Jacob's. I have taken it to get to work these past two days and found it very nice. I need to get up 40minutes earlier to get to the office by my normal 8am but that is no big deal. Yesterday not knowing the full schedule, when leaving work I had to wait 12 minutes for the first bus then 25 for the one that goes to Elmira.

There has not been that many people on the bus so I hope they do not discontinue this pilot but make it permanent. My hope is that it will continue and that when the lease on our one vehicle is up we can go down to one. We have been thinking about it for some time now and this bus route makes it very viable. Currently I save about $10 a week on gas, which does not seem much since I increase my commute by 60minutes a day, but if we can reduce by one vehicle then we would save several hundred a month. I even think in the winter if I continue to coach that I could make the Monday practices with time to spare, and with my two girls going to the same school next year getting them to the arena will be easy.

The only complaints I have about this service is that it does not run late enough. During the week the last bus leaves Conestoga mall at 6pm and on Saturday it leaves at 4pm and there is no Sunday service. I was thinking that this service would open the Conestoga malls jobs to more teens from Elmira and St. Jacob's. Stopping so early prevents the easy travel for these jobs. It also prevents the easy access to the movie theatre at the mall.

Lets hope that the route is made permanent and that the schedule is lengthen a little.

This is my point of view