Neff Zone Column

Print Edition: September 1, 2007

NEWS AND COMMENTARY

One thing I like about the news is that almost every story can be a launching point for an opinion. Here are some of the recent news items that have caught my eye and my take on them.

Let’s start with the Michael Vick dog murder story. For me, the most interesting aspect of this sordid mess is that an NAACP leader came to Vick’s defense with the logic that banning Vick would take away "his ability to bring hours of enjoyment to fans all over the country." Pure rubbish!

First of all, since when does the NAACP concern itself with dogfighting? If "civil rights" is somehow in this discussion, shouldn’t the NAACP be on the side of the dogs?

Second, if this is indeed the position of the NAACP, that no matter how horrendous an offense may be the offender should automatically get a second chance, I would ask why that same standard was not applied in the Don Imus case. After all, Imus has fans too and right now they are not getting many hours of enjoyment because the Imus program is no longer on the air. Seems like a double standard to me.

Perhaps the NAACP should look at the Chicago police study of dogfighting that found that 59% of dogfighting "owners" were affiliated with a gang and 86% had been arrested at least twice. The study also found that dogfighting is linked to criminal activities such as drug dealing, gun running and gambling.

Next, how is that Chinese outsourcing working for you these days? Ready for a couple of more doozies?

How about the factory in Beijing that has been collecting used chopsticks and then repackaging them without any form of cleaning or sanitization? They "recycled" as many as 100,000 pairs a day until they were caught. Sort of makes you want to carry your own fork in your pocket, doesn’t it?

Or how about the blankets that were shipped to Australia and New Zealand that were found to contain high levels of formaldehyde (900 times above the acceptable limit)? That’s the same chemical used to pickle those frogs you dissected in high school biology class. No wonder the Aussies are a bit goofy. It’s not the beer, mate, it’s me blankey!

Did you hear about Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s new health care proposal? On his website it says: "The health of our nation can be improved by extending health insurance to all Americans, not through a government program or new taxes, but through market reforms." In a speech to the Florida Medical Association he explained that everyone could be covered "by using money already being spent to treat the uninsured" (USA Today, August 24).

What makes this interesting to me is that when I proposed exactly the same thing in my July 29, 2006 Neff Zone column www.neffzone.com/cadillacnews/2006july29.htm. I received quite a few e-mails from my conservative critics outlining why my proposal was socialist bunk and suggesting that I might be a communist liberal. Now Romney has the "idea" and it’s free market conservative genius at its best. Ooooooo, I love the smell of flip-flops in the morning.

Speaking of flipping, our own Congressman Pete "I endorse term limits except when they apply to me" Hoekstra has done a 180 degree flop regarding the war in Iraq. Once a staunch supporter of the war, Hoekstra now thinks democracy in Iraq is "not going to happen anytime soon, if it happens at all." He also now thinks perhaps the tribes in Iraq should take the lead in delivering services: " They have a thousand years of experience of tribal culture…this is how we deliver services, keep security and stability in our neck of the woods." Translation: It doesn’t matter what we do we cannot turn Iraq into Texas and Baghdad into downtown Dallas.

Hoekstra’s change of course comes hard on the heels of an excellent essay published in the New York Times and other newspapers across the country. What makes this essay poignant is that it was written by seven soldiers (grunts on the ground) who actually served in Iraq, not some editor or politician who only visited the green zone. Some will discount the essay as more NY Times liberalism, but that’s a spurious argument because it runs parallel to Hoekstra’s (and other ranking Republicans’) new stance regarding the war. To read the essay go to http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/081907A.shtml.

Finally, in a study out this week in the Journal of Family Issues, it was found that married men worldwide do less housework than unmarried cohabitating men and far less than women. Why is this a surprise? The unmarried guys are trying to impress unmarried women. Married guys no longer have to do that, so it gives them more time to concentrate on how to get out of housework.

In the United States, the statistics show that men do 37.3% of the housework and women do 70.6%, which is odd because that adds up to about 108%. I would argue that the extra 8% should be attributed to the men’s side because two days a week we go above and beyond by staying in our La-Z-Boys watching football thereby not messing up the rest of the house.

Conversely, in the Czech Republic the men do 32.2% of the housework and the women only do 28.6%, which adds up to about 61%. That means 39% of the housework never gets done. What this obviously means is that if you marry a Czech woman your house will be a pig sty but your wife will probably have her own La-Z-Boy and will be sitting next to you watching football. Now that’s true love!

Jim Neff is a local columnist. Comments to neffzone@gmail.com. Read Neff Zone columns online at www.neffzone.com/cadillacnews.