Get outraged at THIS, Rep. Schakowsky

On National Bankruptcy Day (February 10), our beloved Kathleen Fasanella put up a tombstone picture memorializing the murder of our children's industry. (You can make your own tombstone here-- do it in the name of free speech!) Some misinformed twit that managed to get herself elected wrote her a letter in outrage at this, ordering her to take it down (as if!) and citing the deaths of kids who were killed years ago by strangulation in cribs as reasons that we needed a law against lead and phthalates. I was really angry, but Kathleen urged us to be mature and not post back. She wrote Rep. Schakowsky a very well-reasoned letter, which Rep. Schakowsky will probably not read intelligently and realize the error of her ways, even if she were capable of such a thing.

Well, I'm just not as old as Kathleen, am I? So I'm going to tell you what I really think.

Representative Schakowsky can take her letter and shove it in whichever bodily orifice will give her the most pleasure.

Yeah, kids sometimes die by accident, and sometimes by poor design. It's a tragedy. But CPSIA is killing the country I love, the country my great-grandparents saved up all their pennies and got on boats to come to so that ALL their children could have the chance to make it in the world. When you have to consult a lawyer before you hold a church benefit sale, YOU ARE NOT IN AMERICA. When you live in fear that some rogue group of logically-impaired self-appointed safety nannies who have the ear of the powerful are going to take you down for selling pewter crosses, YOU ARE NOT IN AMERICA. When your customer wants you to add non-slip fabric to the soles of their custom toddler booties and you have to advise her to do it herself because you haven't had such fabric tested, YOU ARE NOT IN AMERICA. The Founding Fathers would be turning over in their graves if they saw how their carefully crafted republic had been perverted into a country where the people don't have a say, unless they're the right kind of people, in which case their word literally becomes law.

The America I knew and loved died the day I discovered that nobody in Congress was ever going to listen to us because we aren't with a prominent organization.

The America I knew and loved died the day I realized that our representatives don't give a flying fig newton what the American public thinks, as long as they keep getting invited to all the best Washington parties.

Benjamin Franklin famously said "They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." The America I knew and loved just gave up a hell of a lot of liberty for no marginal increase in safety. What does that tell you about Rep. Schakowsky and all her Washington buddies? If she doesn't deserve either liberty or safety, why the hell would anyone think she deserves my respect?

Stuff THAT in your pipe and smoke it, Rep. Schakowsky.



OK, OK. My mom reads my blog and I'm sure I'm soon going to get an email telling me to be nice.

PLEASE stuff THAT in your pipe and smoke it, Rep. Schakowsky.

There, Mom, I was nicer!