Parks Pages dot com

Okay. I didn't want to deal with hate mail, so I posted this anonymously over on Jeff's Gameblog as a comment to his "Political Meme."

Let me put this into gamer context:

REAL LIFE RPG (TM)

Character Creation:

In the Real Life RPG(TM), you roll your character's physical traits and choose the attitudinal ones.

PHYSICAL TRAITS
Attributes
There are six attributes in the RL-RPG: Strength, Dexterity, Health, Willpower, Intelligence, and Perception.

Roll 3d6 for each and assign as desired.

Race (1)
Roll percentage and consult table:
1-68 White
69-83 Hispanic
84-95 African American
96-100 Asian American

Gender (2)

Copy this sentence into your LiveJournal/blog/whatever if you're in a heterosexual marriage, and you don't want it "protected" by the bigots who think that gay marriage hurts it somehow.

From Jeff's Gameblog.

I almost commented on that blog, but I just started reading it -- I've never conversed with these folks before.

Here's the response I would have added:

If you think that marriage is purely a religious affair, then it should be removed from State recognition completely.

If the State recognizes it as a "legal" arrangement, then it should in no way discriminate against participating citizens.

Just who is this "Joe Six-Pack?"

I mean, who is he to you? When you hear the term, "Joe Six-Pack," what picture comes to your mind?

I would leave this open, hoping for a myriad of comments, but pretty much there are only three people who look at this web page, and one of them is me.

"Joe Six-Pack" to me is a white guy, in his early thirties, sitting around on a Sunday watching football on TV, in either sweats or blue jeans, but definitely white sneakers. Joe's abut overweight.

A friend's blog wrote about Sam Wurzelbacher, AKA Joe the Plumber, and pointed to this blog.

Here's a quote from that entry:

I hope you will join me in expressing a simple bit of solidarity with this guy, Spartacus style. I AM JOE. I am a Wal Mart schlub in flyover country who changes my own oil and unclogs drains without a license. I smoke and drink beer and toss the football in the front yard with my kid, and I figure I can fend my way without handouts from some Magic Messiah's candy bags. Most everyone in my family and most everyone I grew up with is another Joe, and if you screw with them, you screw with me.

Here are some areas where I disagree with this sentiment:

• Solidarity is nice, but joining one guy's group just to oppose another's is just one more way to create division, and a pretty dumb reason.
  

First off, I am thrilled that Wayne put up a blog post. I'll respond to it on his blog.

I just finished watching the first presidential debate. I'm not going to say who I thought did better, but I am going to talk about the state of our country thanks to GWB's leadership.

My wife tells the story of how the 5th through 8th graders at my daughter's school researched and discussed the issues that are facing our country at this time of election. And in this process, the issue of personal freedom came up. Not from the kids, for they were raised post-9/11 -- they don't know what freedoms they've lost -- but instead, from the adults.