Regardless, I received an email from a long time reader, a mother who is ninety-one years old TODAY, asking me if I would repeat a piece that I wrote a few years ago concerning the things that children say.

I took a trudge back into my archives to find that particular item. I found it; but it was difficult to read due to formatting differences between the old system and the new one. WordPress likes to format things its OWN way.

Who knew? I didn’t; but I do NOW! I definitely have some work to do in cleaning up those archives, which I’ll get to whenever I have a chance.

Anyway, here is that piece. I cleaned up the formatting, shortened it a bit, and reworded the timing context so that it makes sense to people reading it TODAY.

The first incident—and definitely my all-time favorite—occurred at a local Burger King in the midst of approximately 40 other customers as they inhaled their lunches in order to get back to work on time.

A young mother (in her 30s) and her two children (a boy named Zack and a girl named Emily) sat at the table next to mine. Mommy was a bit pensive about something. But, Emily wasn’t.

She was busy explaining to an elderly woman seated one table over—in great detail, mind you—that she was in FIRST grade but had the day off because of teacher meetings.

Also, according to Emily, her little brother, Zack, was ONLY 4-years old and went to pre-school, but ONLY in the morning.

The children were well behaved. Emily, was as cute as it gets, the very definition of precocious, and had NOT a shy bone in her body. She was a veritable fountain of information. And, it didn’t take a lot of probing to get her to share it, either.

Whatever was on mom’s mind, she perked up a bit as soon as a man came in and joined them. He was daddy. No, I’m not a mind reader; Emily gave it away, not to mention the fact that Zack gave him a hug.

“How’d your mother’s doctor appoint go this morning?” he asked his wife. From the look on her face, he had to know that all was NOT well. But she didn’t get the chance to answer him, at least not immediately.

At this point, it’s critical for you to know two things. First, it seemed that Emily had overheard mommy talking to mom-mom about the preliminary results of her doctor’s appointment.

And second, MOMMY assumed, even though Emily was present during her talk with mom-mom, that Emily wouldn’t actually understand ANY of it. BIG mistake!

Mommy was correct, of course, Emily DIDN’T understand. But, like many young children—especially the precocious ones—she HEARD what she DOES understand.

And, if you are a grandparent and YOU do NOT want your sweet, intelligent, little granddaughter to tell perfect strangers what’s wrong with your health, DON’T tell MOMMY about it in front of your granddaughter.

Just say that you’ll explain everything LATER… you know, when Emily’s not sitting in the room.

But, Emily’s mom-mom didn’t follow this advice. And, as soon as daddy asked mommy the question, Emily’s head snapped to the left as her 7-year old beautiful blue eyes fixated on her daddy’s face.

The child’s words brought EVERY grown-up within a radius of about 10-feet of her voice to an abrupt, STUNNED, laugh-stifling silence as she told her daddy what the doctor had said.

With an air of seasoned professional empathy, in a perfectly resolute and calm demeanor, and with the complete diagnostic assuredness of a highly experienced physician, Emily said, “Daddy, mom-mom’s doctor told her that she has a cute vagina.”

Daddy QUICKLY looked down and slightly away from Emily—I swear that I saw a droplet of blood as he bit into his lower lip to keep from laughing. Mommy perked up IMMEDIATELY!

Quick thinking and no longer pensive, she smiled and calmly said; “Are you sure, sweetheart? I thought the doctor told mom-mom that she was having some acute angina.”

Anyway, mommy explained it all to Emily and, with the exception of a couple of rather overweight customers who had to be resuscitated: they couldn’t re-catch their breath, everything ended well.

Mommy and daddy (especially MOMMY) deserved a lot of credit. They kept their cool without making Emily feel like she had done anything wrong.

Emily’s precociousness struck me as refreshing! For such children, knowing ALL their body parts by their anatomically correct names is a cakewalk.

And, I’m betting that mommy probably had THAT talk with Emily back when she was around THREE! But, of course, I’m just assuming.

The incident also reinforced what I’ve written about several times: young children—even the really smart ones—HEAR what THEY understand, which is often DIFFERENT from what we well-meaning adults actually say.

It also explains why little 5-year-old Jeremy Rhodes thinks that the Blessed Mother is full of grapes. “Hail Mary, full of grapes…,” he prays. The child’s NO dummy! He knows what grapes are; he’s been full of them a few times, himself. But GRACE? A GIRL? No way!

As well, it explains why many years ago, TV and radio personality, Charles Osgood wrote about a 6-year-old’s recital of the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag.

“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for Richard Stands…”

Nor can I forget 8-year-old Carla who was having some pizza with her aunt at the Concord Mall here in New Castle County, Delaware. Carla was worried about her pop-pop; he was at the eye-doctor having his cadillacs removed.

And, several years ago, 6-year-old Jacob told people that his mother’s “lectric girdle” made the lights go out in their house and she couldn’t finish making his pancakes!

I even have my own treasure-trove of verbal misinterpretations. When I was six years old, for example, my father began taking me to 11:30 AM mass every Sunday.

At the end of the mass, the congregation always sang a hymn in honor of the Blessed Mother. And, by God, I ALWAYS sang along. Only MY words were different from the actual words.

The hymn’s refrain was “Oh Mary conceived without sin, pray for us.” But, I sang—LOUDLY and CLEARLY—“Oh Mary can SEE without SEEIN.”

Oh, I KNEW about “sin.” Catholics learn from early ages that we’re nothing buy unworthy sinning scum. But, at the age of six years? CONCEIVED! Who knew?

Have a wonderful Mother’s Day, Martha. You’re younger at heart than some people half your age!

Proponents claim moral righteousness, prevention, and cost savings as their justification. Opponents claim moral indignation and lack of prevention as their justification.

And, the opponents accuse the death penalty states of legalizing murder in the name of the state.

I’m not going there for this piece. The emotional issues of righteousness and moral indignation prove nothing. The cost factors involved with both policies are misleading.

And, even though homicide rates for non-death penalty states are lower (highlighted in yellow) than those in death penalty states—in many instances they’re significantly lower—multiple factors determine the ups and downs of this nation’s homicide rates.

Once again, for the record—I’ve posted it numerous times in this BLOG—I am indifferent to capital punishment. I have no problems with states that wish to impose it as long as they follow ALL Constitutional mandates.

On the other hand, I’m just as comfortable with states that have abolished capital punishment. And, I wouldn’t lose a nano-second of sleep if the U. S. Supreme Court abolished it.

My point for this week’s piece has nothing to do with the pros and cons of capital punishment. My goal is addressing the usual gang of unremitting in-state babblers and their baseless claims that Delaware is soft on imposing death sentences.

I’ll begin with a few statistics. I’m using 2010 numbers because the latest COMPLETE crime statistics is for that year. So, I’m using the same year for all comparisons.

This stuff is all over the Internet. The problem is that it’s in myriad unrelated data bases. So, I’ve extrapolated information from several unrelated data bases.

My sources for this piece are the United States Uniform Crime Report, Wikipedia for state landmass data/population data, and the Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC) for death penalty data.

I picked homicide rates per 100,000 population as a starting point. As well, I’ve compared Delaware’s rate to those of California, Texas, and Pennsylvania because these states are significantly larger than Delaware is BUT the homicide rates are amazingly similar.

Delaware’s homicide rate is 5.3/100,000. California’s is 4.9/100,000; Texas has a rate of 5.0/100,000; and Pennsylvania’s rate is 5.2/100,000. The range is 0.4 (less than one half a point.

The national average is 4.8/100,000 population. By itself, this isn’t all that significant. But, let’s do some real comparisons.

California’s population is 37,253,951. Texas has a population of 25,145,956; Pennsylvania’s population is 12,830,310 people; and little ole Delaware rings in at a mere 897,934 people.

In terms of landmass size, Texas ranks first at 261,797 square miles. In 2^nd place is California at 155,959 square miles, followed by Pennsylvania at 44,817 square miles.

And, we could drop Delaware (ALL 1,954 square miles) into Bronx County in New York—with a bit of room to spare, no less.

So, we could fit 134-Delawares inside of Texas, 80-Delawares inside of California, and 23-Delawares inside of Pennsylvania.

And, at the same time, please note that California has 41.5 times more people than Delaware has; Texas has 28 times more people than Delaware has; and Pennsylvania has 14.3 times more people than Delaware has.

Yet, Delaware’s homicide rate is 1.08 times higher than California’s, 1.06 times higher than Texas, and 1.02 times higher than Pennsylvania’s.

Delaware is my home state. And, while I’m quite proud of this fact, I’m not all that proud about EVERYTHING involving Delaware. We’re ranked 14^th in the country in homicides per 100,000 population. I’m NOT proud of THAT!

However, Delaware is NOT shy about sentencing convicted murderers to death. Nor, is this state hesitant over carrying out such sentences. In its history, it has commuted only ONE death sentence to life without chance of parole.

All other death sentences have been carried out as expeditiously as possible. And, those currently on death row have absolutely NO reason for optimism.

Incidentally, the average stay on Delaware’s death row has been about 7.5-years. But, this figure has been inflated by at least a year due to a couple of FEDERALLY-mandated moratoriums.

According to the Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC), based on a study of death penalty cases from 1977 through 2000, Delaware ranked 3^rd in the nation in death penalty sentences as a percentage of death penalty trials undertaken.

Nevada ranked 1^st at 6%, followed by Oklahoma and Delaware at 5.1% and 4.8% respectively. Pennsylvania ranked 11^th at 2.4%; Texas ranked 16^th at 2%; and California ranked 25^th at 1.3%.

The significance of these numbers is the fact that they were compiled during a period when the fervor for the death penalty in this country was at its peak: 1974 through 1999.

Click here for the entire list of states. And, please note that the national average was 2.2%.

While a lot of good things take place in Delaware, the fact is that a person is more likely to be a homicide victim in this state than in 36 other states.

On the other hand, if you murder someone here and a jury convicts you, you’re far more likely to be sentenced to death than in all but two of the death penalty states, not to mention the fact that it’s a virtually assured FACT that the sentence will be carried out.

He’s a retired CPA. But, I’m convinced that he missed his real calling: the Christian Ministry. And, it would not surprise me in the least if he decides to heed that calling now. He’s only 63-years old; and, he’s in excellent health.

What prompted me to write this piece? A uniquely human capacity for convincing ourselves that myth is fact, even when the numbers and logic unambiguously say otherwise, is this week’s culprit.

Tim and I have another long-time friend, Jeff. There was no stauncher Christian than Jeff. But, 15-years ago, his only son died from the ravages of pancreatic cancer. While it didn’t kill it all together, it shook Jeff’s faith in God to its foundation.

And, sadly, just 4-years ago, tragedy struck again; his adult grandson died after a year-long battle with a malignant brain tumor. On top of all of this, Jeff’s wife died unexpectedly in her sleep about two years ago.

It’s easy, at least for me, to understand that Jeff’s long relationship with God came to an abrupt and bitter end. Jeff is now an avowed born again atheist!

However, Tim decided to appoint himself as Jeff’s earthly shepherd and lead him back to the “safety” of the herd. But I don’t think it’s going to work out.

The three of us were having a cup of coffee at Jeff’s place this past Thursday afternoon. Jeff decided to have a beer instead of another cup of coffee. I joined him. Tim doesn’t drink alcoholic beverages.

One beer led to a second, a third, then to a fourth for Jeff. He wasn’t tipsy, slurring-his-words drunk, but he was feeling no pain, either. I don’t know why, but Tim decided it was time to exclaim God’s love and mercy for the human race in general and for Jeff specifically.

In a flash, Dr. Jekyll became Mr. Hyde. Jeff fumed; “If you want to believe all the religious crap, be my guest. But keep it to yourself. The Bible’s nothing but myth-filled fiction and God’s the biggest phony of all!”

Staring daggers directly at Ted, he ranted on; “There’s no God; there was no Noah, no ark, or any of the rest of that stupid crap. We’re all random accidents.”

He slammed his fourth empty beer can into the trash and began creating a fifth one. I had yet to finish my first one.

Tim is a smart man who’s really GOOD with numbers. He was not just a CPA—which is an intellectually demanding gig to begin with—he was a top-notch forensic CPA. He could detect bogus numbers from miles away.

Yet, at this point, he decided to set an increasingly inebriated Jeff straight relative to the Biblical flood, Noah’s Ark, and what “really” happened back then. It simply didn’t dawn on Ted that Jeff didn’t want to hear it.

The heated exchange between the two of them ended with an agreement to drop the subject. Jeff promised me that he wouldn’t leave his house until he sobered up. Ted and I left.

Thankfully, the exchange didn’t end a friendship. The three of us will meet again next week for COFFEE. And, I’m betting that “Reverend” Ted will not be mentioning God.

I’m still amazed, though, that a person as adept with numbers as Ted is, ignores those numbers when it comes to a Biblical account like Noah and his ark. Think about it.

According to the Bible AND the folks at Christian Tips, God ordered Noah to build an ark 300-cubits by 50-cubits by 30-cubits. At 1.5 feet per cubit, it would have been a ship that was 450-feet long by 50-feet wide by 30-feet high.

My question has always been how someone stuffs two each of millions of species and their food into a 675,000 cubic foot water-born vessel made of wood.

It seems like such an absurd attempt to turn myth into science. How can Biblical literalists believe this stuff and still claim ownership of 3-digit IQs?

How did they feed, and water, all those animals, not to mention clean up all the messes they would have left? Even more intriguing is how Noah and his family kept them from preying on one another. There must have been a predators-only deck!

And, what about the fish and WATER-based dinosaurs. Why take them aboard the ark? Are we to assume that they might have suddenly lost their natural ability to survive in water—even in a raging flood?

Of course, these questions are rhetorical to fundamentalist who believe that the Bible’s literally true. With straight faces, these folks can answer each of these questions “logically.”

According to folks at the Creation Museum, the ark carried ONLY 30,000 species; all the others came from THESE over the years since the flood subsided. And, the ark did, indeed, have separate decks for predators and prey.

As for the fish, silt from raging water would have clogged their gills and caused them to suffocate.

It’s all absurd to me. There’s no way to fit even 30,000 species, including some mighty big ones—LAND-based dinosaurs, elephants, saber-toothed tigers to name just a few—along with Noah, his wife, and their entire immediate clan in such a small vessel.

And don’t forget about all the associated feeding and cleaning supplies. Yes, we’re supposed to believe that all of it fit into an ark with only 675,000 cubic feet.

And remember, that ark was constantly bobbing and pitching with all the violence that comes with raging flood waters!

But, for those with FAITH, this is not only possible; it’s factual. Because, as religion teaches, with faith, God can do anything and He NEVER makes mistakes.

Myths, religious or otherwise, have nothing to do with truth. The religious ones, though, are all about the human struggle in dealing with life and the passage of time, beginning with birth, going through childhood, adulthood, and ending with the ravages of old age and the prospect that death may be final.

And, you know what? There’s nothing wrong or sinful about us believing in myths, whether they originate from the Bible or from Superman comic books.

It’s only when our belief in myths leads us to commit unspeakable acts against others that they become wrong—an omniscient, divinely merciful, flawlessly-just, omnipotent, faultless, and loving heavenly Father notwithstanding.

And Ted, leave our good friend, Jeff, alone. If he doesn’t want to go to heaven, there’s NOTHING you can do about it; you’ll just have to go without him. Besides, even if he goes to hell, he won’t be friendless; I’ll be there!

Personal perspective is often NOT the only reality. Facts are absolute; truth, however, may be relative. In other words, applying absolute facts may well lead to equally valid but different truths.

Humans take a lot for granted. We take things out of context. Sometimes we do it intentionally as in the way we conduct our politics. But mostly, we do it unintentionally simply by paraphrasing what we THINK we understand to be the absolute FACTS.

For example, at times of humanitarian crisis, it’s not uncommon to hear folks laud Americans as wonderful people. I won’t dispute this. Main Street America consists mostly of good and caring people. But, it’s not because we’re Americans.

Being Americans does not automatically make us wonderful people. It makes us lucky people, but not AUTOMATICALLY wonderful people. Like every other country on this globe, America has its share of wonderful people; but, it also has its share of sheer, unabridged bungholes!

Seemingly with each successive election cycle in this country, ever weaker candidates, with even weaker platforms, come out of the woodwork, wrap themselves in the American Flag and then babble on endlessly about their love OF and concern FOR our Constitutional “guarantees.”

For even casually astute listeners, it takes less than 30-seconds of listening to such dweebs to realize that they know absolutely NOTHING about the Constitution.

Our Constitution guarantees NOTHING! It’s a sheet of parchment paper on which our Founding Fathers wrote the soundest fundamental truths known to humanity: HUMANITY’S right to pursue LIFE, LIBERTY, and HAPPINESS.

Whether that right comes from our Creator (God) is a matter of faith. I won’t go there because I simply don’t know. On the other hand, as a scientist, I can spot a strong statistical correlation a mile away.

There’s a story about a well-intentioned preacher who had approached a farmer about donating some of his abundant harvest to the poor. “It seems that God has been quite generous in treating your fields and harvest well,” said the preacher.

Continuing, he said, “Don’t you think a nice donation would be a wonderful way to thank God for His generosity?” The farmer responded as follows:

“Sir, I give money and food to the poor because I know what it’s like to be hungry. But, as for God’s generous treatment of my fields and harvest, you should have seen how he treated them when I wasn’t around.”

Relative to RIGHTS, the only ones we HAVE are the ones we’re able to defend. And, in addition to our ABILITY to defend them, we must also be WILLING to defend them. And, herein is the basis for our guaranteed rights.

King George didn’t GIVE our Founders ANY of the rights we enjoy today. They motivated the citizenry of the day, formed an army, and TOOK them from him. And, we’ve been both WILLING and ABLE to defend those rights ever since.

God notwithstanding, the correlation between nations willing and able to defend their rights—to the death if necessary—and their remaining FREE, is not only a direct one, it’s in the vicinity of 0.9999 (a 1 is an absolute correlation).

If we, as a nation, ever lose the ability OR the willingness to defend our rights, our magnificent Constitution will become a worthless sheet of paper. And, while I concede that I may be wrong, I doubt that God will ride in and save us.

And, there’s one other matter I’m going to address. It concerns all the political hissy fitting relative to climate change.

This isn’t about whether or not it’s happening or whether or not humans are causing it. Fox News and MSNBC can mentally masturbate over these things until Sarah Palin turns Liberal.

Oh, and of course, CNN will continue its practice of providing its listeners with an endless parade of alleged non-partisan panels of “experts” to discuss both sides’ positions, along with a legal analysis from Jeffrey Toobin.

The fact is that all of it amounts to nothing more than a horde of intrepid windbags trying to increase their viewer ratings by enticing the clueless among us to choose sides.

Again, God notwithstanding, planet Earth has survived the past four and a half BILLION years in spite of a number of cosmos-sponsored, species-ending events.

Yes, Earth may well survive another 4-BILLION years as long as the Sun continues to function. But, the cosmos will continue sponsoring species-ending events.

So, there’s no guarantee that the human species will not go the way of the dinosaurs, a species that survived about 165-million years. Humans, from their first arrival, have been around ONLY about 2-million years.

And, keep in mind; the dinosaurs were incapable of self-extinction. Humans, on the other hand are quite capable of self-extinction.

We’re the ONLY species capable of fooling ourselves into thinking we can unrestrictedly evade Mother Nature’s rules without suffering eventual dire consequences.

Like it or not, Earth is a FINITE planet. But, seemingly, most humans can think ONLY in linear terms.

Every system we’ve created has been based on linear logic. It’s yet to occur to most of us that linear systems cannot run indefinitely on a finite planet. Something has to change; either the planet or the people living on it.

Our survival on this planet depends on our ability to adapt to the natural balance of nature. Mother Nature runs the show. She simply responds to imbalance.

She does not get mad; she just gets even. We attempt to fool her at our own peril.

This planet ran as nature dictated for billions of years before we arrived. It’s likely to run a few more billion years after we’re long gone.

It would be wise for us to remember that the cosmos is neither hostile nor benign; it’s merely indifferent. It has NEVER felt the slightest compulsion to adjust itself to OUR silly-ass whims.

Oh, and those questions came with a warning that we should be just as worried about atheists as “we” are about Muslims.

Then that poster emphatically stated, as fact, that atheists have reached 25% of the U. S. population in JUST the last TWO years!

Well, I’m glad I read that post because I didn’t know I’m supposed to be scared of Muslims OR atheists.

But, after reading that post, the only thing that scares me is THAT poster; he’s an IDIOT. And, even worse, he’s not the ONLY one out there!

Pew.org is a solid, unbiased source of all statistics involving religion. They publish an annual report.

You can click here for the Pew website. But, if you want to go directly to their latest report on religion in the United States, click here instead. Notice the effective date of the report (April 14, 2012). Cowabunga, that’s YESTERDAY!

I’m not qualified to condemn OR defend religious beliefs. They’re based PURELY on faith alone. As such, they’re beyond the scope of rationalism. In other words, there’s NO empirical proof either way; so believe as you wish.

Since the human species’ arrival on this planet, we’ve prematurely and habitually relegated EVERYTHING we don’t understand to GOD. If you’re comfortable with this, fine.

But, it’s also OK if you’re NOT comfortable with it. I’m NOT; and, I’m not even an atheist.

It takes blind, absolute iron-willed decisiveness to declare oneself an atheist. I’m not THAT decisive; so, I’m an agnostic. I simply don’t know! But, this isn’t the point here.

I’ve never been big on believing in things without some evidence to support them, especially when what I’m told to believe is without parallel and spread by those with no more empirical knowledge than I have.

But, again, this is a topic for a future post. My point here is to ease the fear of an atheist/Muslim threat to self-righteous Christians.

And, to this end, I’ll simply lay out the NUMBERS compiled by Pew Research and the CIA World Fact Book for 2012 (estimated).

I’m not making this stuff up. Click here for the Fact Book. Once there, click on “People and Society;” then, scroll down to “Population;” and, right below that is “Age Structure.”

Then click back—here it is again—to the Pew report on religions and contrary beliefs in the United States.

You’ll note that our current population is an estimated 313,847,465 people. But, since Pew only counts adults, I’ll do the same by counting ONLY those in the 15-years and over age brackets.

Within that age bracket there’s an estimated 250,342,231 people, of which—according to Pew—78.4% claim some derivation of Christianity: around 196,268,309 people.

Also, according to Pew, Muslims represent 0.6% (SIX-TENTHS of ONE percent) of the believing population in this country. This establishes our Muslim population at an estimated 1,502,053 people.

Pew also estimates the atheist population at 1.6% of the belief crowd: about 4,005,475 atheists.

But, since the real scare concerns Muslims and the “growing” number of atheists, we can stop counting here.

So apparently, 1,502,053 Muslims are threatening 196,268,309 Christians. REALLY? Christians outnumber the Muslims in the United States by a ratio of 131 to 1.

Is someone expecting me to believe that, if it comes to a battle, 131 Christians can’t kick 1 Muslim’s butt?

On the atheist front, about 4,005,475 atheists are threatening those same 196,268,309 Christians. The Christians outnumber atheists by a ratio of 50 to 1 and the CHRISTIANS are worried!

Religion has the potential for accomplishing a great deal of good in this world; but, not this way. All of this hatred, fear-mongering, and killing in the name of religion has to stop. It’s childishness with the most deadly of results.

Since the advent of the human race, good people have done good things while evil people have done evil things. This will continue with or without religion. But, EVIL is at its worst when it’s committed in the name of religion.

Truly dangerous religious leaders are those who are able to convert untested dogma into their OWN enduring truths. Of course, they also need the allies of institutional power and the passage of time.

While the Federal Government endorses no “OFFICIAL” religion, by virtue of its generosity in granting myriad tax exemptions and deductions, it DIRECTLY endorse multitudes of “UNOFFICIAL” religions.

And, this would not be a problem at all were it not for the fact that, although it does so unintentionally, it INDIRECTLY subsidizes the inevitable religious hatreds and bigotries that go along with them.

Living in a country where groups of PHONY Christians trot out the Bible and Ten Commandments as a reliable trump-card to circumvent the Constitution whenever it’s convenient to do so, one gets a realistic sense of the hidden problems created whenever religion gets too chummy with politics.

If we continue to politicize religion—Christianity or otherwise—by forcing elective wannabes to pander to the religious phonies among us, all we’ll do is destroy this great nation.

We’ll eventually eliminate our status as a Secular Republic that grants a freedom to practice all religions and reestablish ourselves as a Theocratic Republic that recognizes, and ENFORCES only ONE!

If Sharia Law upsets you—it terrifies most Americans—you’d better not just SUPPORT separation of church and state; you’d better DEMAND it in no uncertain terms.

Because, at the rate some of the current crop of Republican AND Democrat wannabes is pandering to the religious PHONIES among us, we’ll soon have our own version of the “moral” police, along with religious synods devoted to the righteous execution of infidels.

Believe it or not, I’m STILL receiving some negative emails over last week’s posting. They’re about evenly split between my Trayvon Martin comments and the ones concerning gambling.

While I have no intentions of rehashing all of it here again, I have to wonder if everyone was reading the SAME words.

Some of you need to reread the piece. You’ll easily discover that I did NOT call George Zimmerman a racist. I have no idea if he’s a racist. He might be, but; based on additional evidence since I wrote the piece, he’s probably not. However, it’s beside the point.

Trayvon Martin was within 80-feet of his father’s front door and walking quickly to get there. The police had already told George Zimmerman to break off the pursuit. But, he didn’t do it.

He got out of his car and confronted Martin, ANYWAY! Had he followed the 911-dispatcher’s command, there would NOT have been a confrontation in the first place.

In MY opinion, Zimmerman wasn’t engaging in racism; he was simply being a Wyatt Earp bad-ass seeking O.K. Corral glory. I accused Mr. Zimmerman of letting his feelings of inadequacy relative to the size of his “manhood”—if you get my drift—control his emotions.

And, given his past aggressive confrontations with others, including a police officer, I’m not backing down from my assessment of his personality. So, the chest-thumping Rambo types will just have to get over it.

As to my comments regarding gambling, PLEASE… someone point out where I said that this country needs to outlaw gambling. The notion reeks of our long ago attempt at alcohol prohibition. And, we all know how well that one worked!

A majority of people who gamble, like a majority of those who drink alcohol, do it recreationally without any severe social or criminal penalties. The ones who must modify their behavior are the problem gamblers and drinkers!

In fact, one of the funniest state lottery commercials I’ve ever heard, hit the radio airways right here in New Castle County, Delaware about 12-years ago. I have no idea who wrote it; but it went like this: “Remember, the less you bet, the more you lose when you win!”

It ranks right up there with one of the best rationalizations for gambling that I’ve ever heard. “Some people may be lucky; but, if they don’t gamble, they’ll never find out.”

Humans are a credulous lot. We need to believe stuff. We’re always looking for factoids to confirm our preconceived notions because actual facts are often disappointing.

For example, we’re in the midst of a national election year series of Republican primaries. Much of the rhetoric is borderline insane with generous helpings of outright lies.

If we take the pretentiousness seriously, we glean a sense of urgency that a gigantic monster’s mouth yawns before us and that Barack Obama is about to push us into it.

Yet, if we actually analyze what the Republican candidates are telling us—Democrat candidates are every bit as bad—it’s easy to realize that the lot of them are halfway between being too frightened to act and too dumb to know what to do.

In fact, multiple presidency-seekers define the essence of primaries. They’re NOT a means of clarifying candidates’ qualifications, but rather an ideal opportunity to let us potential voters know at WHAT and to WHOM we should redirect our outrage.

And, for God’s sake, let us NOT forget that it could be a lot worse. Do you have any idea what it would be like right now if Obama had to contend with a primary challenger? OH! THE! HORROR!

Too many primary voters are extremists, reflexively choosing whoever’s furthest to the RIGHT or LEFT, while vociferously declaring everyone else an anti-Christ.

This seems to be the one area of commonality between the Democrats and Republicans. Both of these groups do their utmost to convince the rest of us that they’d rather lose an election than move towards the CENTER.

At its beginning, the Tea Party movement consisted of a small group of intellectually solid organizers who had become furious—and justifiably so—over unharnessed government spending. But now it’s down to the voter level.

At THIS level, people still claim to be furious over government spending. But, the fact is that they’re a selective amnesia-suffering horde of former Bush supporters, a majority of which yawned through both of his record deficit terms without as much as a whimper.

I have no idea how the next presidential election will turn out. And, even though I disagree with much of Obama’s politics, I’m a Conservative who voted for him the last time.

Actually, make that a Conservative who voted AGAINST Sarah Palin the last time. And, for the record, I’m not at ALL impressed with the current crop of Conservative candidates, either. I’ll probably vote for him again!

But, some things never change. Weak candidates with even weaker platforms still wrap themselves in the American Flag and talk incessantly about their love for the Constitution, even though most of their words relative to the Constitution prove their cluelessness about its mandates.

However, I’m still using training wheels; so, please bear with me for a while. And, to this end, I’m going to clarify a couple of things I wrote in last week’s piece—BOY, did I get email over some it!

First, Rackshare, the company that offered the Blogharbor blogging platform did NOT go out of business; neither did Tucows, the vendor that offered the blogging platform as a vendor service.

Tucows is a company that provides all kinds of other vendor services. They’re still VERY much in business and thriving quite well. And, Rackshare developed PressHarbor to replace Blogharbor. As well, Rackshare remains a competent, thriving business.

As a blogger, I never had to deal with Tucows directly. However, I did so with Blogharbor Support. The service was always OUTSTANDING. And, it has remained so as PressHarbor Support.

That support group handled everything. All I had to do was provide my domain name. They, in turn, imported everything into my new WordPress blog.

And, due to a few personal unique circumstances that made it virtually impossible for me to follow all the instructions, John Keegan went light years above the call of duty to get me through the transition.

For the record, self-hosting a blog is not something for the technically timid to try doing because you’re responsible for EVERYTHING: virus control, spam control, template development… the list seems endless.

However, Rackshare developed PressHarbor to eliminate such hassles while providing bloggers with a self-hosting platform that is under their OWN technical control in virtually every other respect.

So, finally, even the technically DENSE can gain access to a very powerful self-hosting blogging platform that is a breeze to use. If you’re interested, check them out at www.pressharbor.com.

Next, I received a ton of email concerning my opinion of Mr. George Zimmerman, the Floridian who fatally shot Trayvon Martin a few weeks back—read last week’s piece.

The responses ran about 35% in disagreement with me. However, my opinion remains steadfast. But, since I don’t want to lengthen this post. I’ll write a follow-up later if the facts eventually prove me wrong.

Finally, I must clarify something I wrote several posts back concerning people playing lotteries. The emails filled my inbox a couple of times.

I used a quote—I’m not sure who said it originally—but, I paraphrased it as, “Lotteries are state taxes on the mathematically-challenged.” I have not changed my mind.

However, I NEVER said that “people who play lotteries are stupid.” For example, all sorts of folks play Powerball. I play it myself whenever it reaches an annuity value of $200-MILLION or more.

I buy ONE ticket; and, even then, I buy it ONLY as long as I don’t have to wait on line to buy it! Hundreds of thousands of other people do so as well. Neither I, nor any of them are stupid for doing so.

I did NOT buy a ticket for the latest Mega-Million drawing ($600 PLUS-million). The lines were insanely long! For me, by the way, I consider more than 3-people waiting on it to be an insanely long line when it comes to buying a lottery ticket.

Conversely, if playing the lottery has become an integral part of your retirement funds, you’re STUPID! Likewise, if you have to forgo buying necessities—food, clothing, etc.—so you can afford to buy a ticket, you’re STUPID!

The list of rationalizations is longer, but you get my point. If you take money you can’t afford to throw away, in order to buy lottery tickets, you have a gambling addiction, which makes you sick, not stupid.

However, refusing to recognize it and seek professional help DOES make you STUPID!

Also, I’ve NEVER said that the “odds of winning a lottery depend on the number of people playing.” This is simply false.

Using the Mega-Million lottery as an example, the odds of winning on a single ticket depend on the way the lottery is set up. To win this one, a player picks 5-digits from a pool of 56 digits (1 through 56) plus 1-digit from a pool of 46-digits (1 through 46).

A player must pick the winning combination of 5-digits from the first pool PLUS the winning digit from the second pool in order to win. It’s a simple COMBINATION problem.

How many 5-digit combinations from a pool of 56-digits are possible? Any $12 scientific calculator with a built-in cNr function key can calculate this number. Tap in 56; tap the cNr function key; tap in 5; and then tap the “=” key.

The answer is 3,819,816. In other words, there are 3,819,816 different ways to draw 5-digits from a pool of 56-digits. The probability of doing this is too small to worry about: 0.000000261.

Then, the probability of drawing the ONE winning digit from the pool of 46-digits is 0.02173913. The probability of drawing BOTH, the winning 5-digit combination PLUS the winning single digit is 0.00000000561146!

This combined probability sets the odds of winning the Mega-Million jackpot with a single ticket at 175,711,535 to ONE! I believe the media set the winning odds at around 175-MILLION to 1.

It does NOT matter how many people play Mega-Million, the odds of winning it do NOT change. However, the more people who play it during a given drawing, the greater the possibility of having more than one jackpot winner.

Have a great holiday! For those who so commemorate it, have a safe and happy Easter. Personally, I’m QUITE partial to the “Cadbury Bunny.”