Imagine what it would feel like to reach into your pocket and find a lottery ticket you didn't remember buying. You check the numbers and discover that you've won the jackpot. That's sort of what it felt like to buy a house in Peachtree Corners a few months ago, only to discover that our back yard borders with Simpsonwood Park. Of course the real estate agent mentioned something about the woods behind our new house had been purchased from the Methodist Church by Gwinnett County, but we had no idea what Simpsonwood really is -- a chance to experience what heaven must be like, a pristine natural experience hidden in the suburbs north of Atlanta. Simpsonwood Park is "223 acres of unspoiled natural beauty on the Chattahoochee River" according to a postcard sent by the people associated with the website www.savesimpsonwood.com. Though I have no official affiliation with that organization, I have decided that I firmly support their cause and plan to attend the meeting to be held this Thursday, June 30th, at the Simpsonwood United Methodist Church located at 4500 Jones Bridge Circle in Peachtree Corners. According to the organized opposition to the plans to develop Simpsonwood Park, hundreds of trees will be cut down to allow for paving roads, sidewalks, and parking lots. These changes will be in spite of the fact that Jones Bridge Park, located only about a mile from Simpsonwood and has much easier, more direct access to the general public. Conversely, the main entrance to Simpsonwood can only be accessed by making several turns and using roads that navigate through … [Read more...]
David Cohen’s appeal to authority
David Cohen is (allegedly) a Constitutional law professor at Drexel University in Philadelphia, the very city where the Declaration of Independence was penned in the days leading to July 4th, 1776, Why someone would pay this man to teach law students about the Constitution is beyond me, because the drastic solution he proposes won't solve the problem he thinks is epidemic -- gun violence. In a recent op-ed published in Rolling Stone magazine, Mr. Cohen argued for the repeal of the 2nd Amendment on the grounds that the Founding Fathers "got it wrong" when they granted ordinary citizens the right to bear arms (radical liberals: 'bear arms' means the right to own a gun.) Mr. Cohen began his embarrassing article with the somewhat pompous declaration, "I teach the Constitution for a living." This statement is intended to imply to Mr. Cohen's audience that he possesses superior knowledge about the Constitution, even to the Founding Fathers (implied by his "correcting" them and identifying things he claims were mistakes in the original document, and only in his own mind, of course) -- an appeal to establish his opinion as authority - which by doing with his very first words, commits a logical fallacy. Mr. Cohen continues: "I revere the document when it is used to further social justice and make our country a more inclusive one. I admire the Founders for establishing a representative democracy that has survived for over two centuries. But sometimes we just have to acknowledge that the Founders and the Constitution are wrong. What is this nonsense about social justice? … [Read more...]
Radical liberals and the rights of others
Before I say the first word about politics, I need to be clear that I'm neither a registered Democrat or Republican; I am a independent voter who holds both political parties in pretty much equal disdain. They don't even bother trying to represent me in Washington. I'd love to be able to think of myself as a liberal -- it sounds wonderful, at least in principle. Some of the synonyms for the word 'liberal' are generous, abundant, copious, and plentiful. And of course, the antonyms for liberal include intolerant, stingy, narrow-minded, mean, and greedy. Really...who wants to be thought of as mean, or intolerant? I certainly don't. But the problem with self-identifying as a liberal is that the political ideology and the dictionary definition of the word appear to have very little in common with each other. Now people who know me personally know that I'm not really a confrontational sort of person, but neither am I the "go along to get along" sort of person, either. I'm about ten times more likely to initiate a conversation about the upcoming football season for the Georgia Bulldogs than politics or religion, but I'm also not shy about expressing my opinions or correcting the record whenever it seems necessary. I have this very annoying tendency of stubbornly refusing to concede that I could be wrong about something in lieu of better evidence. I'm also very unlikely to simply take your word for anything if the argument from authority has been invoked. Naturally, being radically liberal is a political orientation, not a religious one. It has been my experience … [Read more...]
Home Improvement(s)
When we bought our new house earlier this year, we realized several significant projects would need to be completed before we could relax and truly call this "home." Of course we needed a fence so our dogs wouldn't roam all over the neighborhood, and the Chamblee Fence Company recently completed an outstanding installation -- this is the first fence I have ever owned that the gates can only be left open if they are held or blocked, perfectly positioned so that they will automatically swing shut and close, a feat previously only managed post-installation, with a special hinge from Home Depot. There is nothing that will put fear into the heart of a pet owner quite like discovering an open gate when their dogs have been outside, enjoying the yard. Chamblee Fence has been in business longer than I've been alive for a very good reason. The fence came after the rotted old timber retaining wall was ripped out and replaced the incredible crew at Bentley's Nursery and Stone Yard. When professional engineers have highly recommended their professional work, it was an added bonus that Bentley's quote was considerably less than other estimates, and the quality was obviously exceptional. Check out the before... and after pictures! My final project was one that we decided to tackle ourselves, even though I need my fingers for typing, and hammers tend to place them at risk. Therefore my solution for the construction … [Read more...]
