"Contract employee"

How many people out there are working as contract employees? What it means is

- no paid vacation

- no sick days

- no paid holidays ( a holiday means a short paycheck the next week)

- no security

- no decent feedback (you'll get laid off for no reason with no warning)

- no 401K - pension? what's a pension?

Software workers have been dealing with this a long time. Now, so are a lot of factory workers. Now, this:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/09/27/351993359/more-flights-canceled-in-chicago-suspect-had-been-told-of-hawaii-transfer

I am sick to death of getting chain e-mails and Facebook notices all about

how we owe all our freedoms to the military. Not to take away from those who died in uniform for this country, but what about all the union men, the suffragettes, the men at the Stonewall riots, the kids who sat in at lunch counters and got on the buses, the people who ran the Underground Railroad, religious leaders who said religion was a private matter, not a state matter, etc, etc.

People hear that 3/4 of poor Americans own a car and think this:

I know I'll be corrected if I'm wrong, but wasn't Hillary inevitable once before,

like about 8 years ago?

Dumb question about ISIS - I noticed on the BBC footage this morning that a lot of these guys are

wearing what I would call a ninja costumes - swathed in a black outfit complete with a headpiece that covers the lower face. Are these guys trying to ensure no one can recognize them so if things go sour, they can go back home and take up their old lives?

Question about the ACA: Has anyone seen any info on whether the rate of

bankruptcies caused by medical bills has fallen? It may be too soon to see any changes there.

Which disease will kill more Americans this winter?

Let's stop focusing on NFL players who beat their wives, girlfriends and kids:

it's time to focus on at cops who beat their wives, girl friends and kids. Too many get a pass from their fellow officers - it's the normal historic "protect the institution" reaction common to the police, military, colleges, churches, hospitals, etc. But the time for "protect the institution" by protecting the perpetrators is past. It's time to protect the institution by sending the perpetrators to prison.

It's the best way I know to filter the bad cops out of the force.

Is "Lest we forget" a good policy?

I don't expect anyone who lost a friend or family member on 9/11 to ever forget. I don't expect anyone who actually witnessed the events to ever forget.

But - that doesn't include someone who knew someone whose cousin went to school with someone who died on 9/11

But - that really doesn't include anyone whose involvement consisted of watching the entire thing on TV.

I'm tired of anyone who has only a tenuous connection to the events demanding that I honor their loss. I think that's an insult to the people who did lose someone that day. And don't tell me all about your PTSD brought on by watching the television.

With those exceptions, should the rest of us be engaging in a policy of never forgetting the events of 9/11? I don't mean recording them in history books, I'm talking about keeping them front and center as a basis for foreign policy. Where would we be today if we had never "forgotten" Pearl Harbor? The USS Arizona is perhaps one of the most poignant memorials I know of, but that doesn't keep us from having Japan as a major ally today. The Vietnam Memorial is in a class all its own, yet American corporations are pouring money into Vietnam. I happen to work with two Vietnam vets who served in combat units and have gone back on company business.

For some of us, what happened is personal and will always leave an open wound. Those people deserve our respect and more importantly, our financial help for injuries connected to that day (I'm thinking especially of those rescue workers now dealing with respiratory issues, etc.) For the rest of us though, sooner or later, it's time to let it go.

Advice for scammers: If you're going to call me and tell me that you're from Microsoft

and you've spotted a dangerous virus on my computer, it might help if

- you didn't start the conversation by giving me an obvious fake first name

- I could understand your English

- the connection wasn't so poor and background noise so loud i had trouble hearing you anyways.

C'mon people, you've got to step up your game!