So, we researched the laws of Fort Worth, and found out that putting up a “No Soliciting” sign means that anyone that puts anything on our door, or petitions us for any reason can incur a $500 dollar, per incident fine. The only people exempt are government officials. We looked around online for something tasteful (and affordable), couldn’t find one (this one came up on our search many times – yuck), so we just put up a paper sign in the window with the following:

No Soliciting
Violation of this notice may result in a $500 per incident fine.
City of Fort Worth (Ord. No. 15245, § 1, 9-17-02) & (Ord. No. 17829, § 1, 10-9-07)
This includes Handbills and Religious Petitioning

Hopefully that will get the point across. If not, I will just start turning everyone into to the City for code violations. We like our sleep around here, and our “guard dog” Mydrinn will not be deterred from his solemn duty, so do us all a favor, just go away, we aren’t buying anything from you anyways.

There were several good stories around on the net about this topic, but one of my favorites was this girl’s. Her blog name and motto are just so good, I had to link back.

So it just took me 35 minutes ‘to case clear security to get to my vegas flight. And I was the only one in line!

DFW A terminal

Tsa: id please
Me: that is my id ‘pointing to my PASSPORT
Tsa: sir where are going?
Me: las vegas
Tsa: last time I checked a map, las vegas is in the US!
Me: and?
Tsa: well then you don’t need a passport to go there
Me: and?
Tsa: so your passport is not valid id for this trip
Me: excuse me?
Tsa: yes I need a government issued id
Me: my passport is government issued, its issued by the government of the netherlands, would you like me to show you where that is on a map?
Tsa: that government is not recognized by the tsa. And I know that the netherlands is in norway. So I need to see a drivers license.
Me: the government of the netherlands is not recognized by the tsa? That’s dissappointing, im sure my queen will be absolutely distraught to hear that an id checker at the dfw airport is not recognizing her as a legitimate government. Its a good thing though that the tsa doesn’t set foreign policy, and that that’s left to the state department. Have you informed condileeza rice that the tsa is now deciding what governments will be recognized by the us government? Are you guys the jokers that decided to regonize kosovo as an independent state?
Tsa: condeleeza who?
Me: So my passport really isn’t going to work? And you need to see a drivers license?
Tsa: yes
Me: well here’s the problem ‘ I hand him my dutch drivers license ‘ see this is also issued by that government that you don’t recognize.
Tsa: hmmm…. Don’t you have anything that’s issued by the government in the us?
Me: I have my greencard but the problem is, like you said las vegas is in the us, according to the map you just checked, the same one that told you the netherlands is in norway. So since I don’t need a greencard to travel to las vegas, my greencard won’t work either even though it was issued by the dept of homeland security, the same part of the us government that the tsa is a part of.
Tsa: yes that’s true. Ok so you don’t have any valid id for travel in the US?
Me: apparently not, since my passport and drivers license is not recognized by the tsa and my greencard is not valid for travel within ths us.
Tsa: ok well you can travel without id, you’ll just need to go through additional screening.
Me: great
Tsa: I need a male assist.

Ten minutes later

tsa2: hi sir
Me: hi
tsa2: im going to go through your bags and then wand you, is that ok?
Me: sure
tsa2: sir what’s this? ‘pointing to my passport’
Me: that’s my passport
tsa2: but you told the id screener that you don’t have id
Me: that’s right
tsa2: so you lied to him
Me: no
tsa2: no?
Me: according to his requirements I did not have id that met his requirements for travel.
tsa2: huh?
Me: since im going to vegas, apparently my passport is not valid for traveling there, because accoridng to his map las vegas is in the us and since its in the us and I don’t need a passport to travel there, my passport is not valid for travel.
tsa2: huh?
Me: exactly
tsa2: ok?

There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home…… Toto I don’t think we’re in Holland anymore.

One less moron on our countdown to everyone in the US…..

[Original Thread]

Assuming there is only one moron involved, -1 more moron.

So, let’s assume only 75% of the country is Christian, and only half of them are stupid enough to go for this. ‘I realize it is a stretch.’ That means 112.5 Million Morons to add to the list. 162.5 million morons to go.

I am putting this in the 300 Million Morons category because someone out there wants to vote for her….like 20+ million of you. So, now we are down to 275 million and still counting.

Ok, just to be clear, I don’t want to pay a cover charge ‘$3.50′, which is a cheap cover, so I slip out of the bathroom and knock myself senseless because I am a clutz, but sue the club and win $12K. What exactly was the charge? The window sill was wet and not marked? I don’t understand what the actual charge was. What did the club do or not do that made it liable? It was charging cover and therefore caused mental duress, which in turn was a contributing factor to her falling? And what the heck did she get done that was $12K worth of work? I have had dental work by a great dentist, but I dont think I ‘and my insurance’ have paid that much in years.

So, in counting down our morons, here is the break down: Kara Walton’1′, Jury’12′, Judge’1′ for a total of 14 morons, leaving 299,999,986 to go!

My response:
I am writing today to express my complete disgust with both House Bill 2 and House Bill 3 currently before the legislation supposedly working for me.

Why is it, in this great state, that instead of fixing the problem, more are created? The problem is, of course, education financing, but in reality the problem isn’t the actual financing, but administration. Texas spends more per student than almost any state, yet our education system is comparatively pathetic. I graduated from a private high school, that spent about one third, per student, than the state does, and yet the lowest SAT score in the class was still 300 points above state average! Instead of continuing to throw more money at the issue, it is time to hold the superintendents responsible for their spending, and force reforms in the way schools earn and spend money.

Here in Keller, the school district is asking for more money via a bond because they didn’t plan to for basic maintenance, but instead built extremely elaborate schools, and spent hundreds of thousands on Astroturf! In a district like Keller, where the teachers have to purchase their own copy paper in order to have hand outs, why is Astroturf even a line item?

These two bills will not fix the problem; in fact they will hurt the Texas economy by hurting small businesses. The housing industry in Texas is very strong right now, a little slower than in recent years, but still extremely strong, leading this constituent to believe there is nothing wrong with property taxes. Leave the taxes alone; do not hurt our economy by imposing a tax that may force layoffs in the small business niche of the state.

Stop applying band-aids to the problem of our educational system, and fix the problem. Hold the superintendents accountable. More money is never the solution to a hemorrhaging of funds, and if the superintendents are not held accountable for this crisis, I personally will hold you, my elected representative, responsible for this situation, and lack of action undertaken to resolve the issue.