The Land of Ozz

“I hope my friends will follow my lead and vote for Senator Fred Thompson when the polls open in 2008.”

Those were my words, but I am not sure I will be sticking to them. I wrote that at the end of a blog post on November 24th. Then I saw the debate and really liked what I saw from Huckabee and not so much what I saw from Thompson. Just call it a flip-flop if I pull in behind Huckabee. That’s fine with me because I am not running for office. Right now I am firmly on the fence. One of the questions that I had considered for asking Thompson if I had a chance was, “who would you vote for if you were not running and why?” I would like to ask Huckabee the same one and a few others.

I am confident that either Fred Thompson or Mike Huckabee will win the South Carolina Republican primary this coming January regardless of what the polls say. Out of all the front runners, these two most closely represent the southern conservative point of view in my opinion. I am pleased to see Huckabee gaining ground on the more liberal Republican contenders. Fred Thompson, definitely not a liberal contender, has been my favorite until recently mainly due to my belief that Thompson is more electable candidate. However, I value my Christian friends’ opinions and have looked closely at Huckabee as a result of some of them leaning in Huckabee’s direction. I am now much more on the fence during this primary election than I have ever been for any election. I am also more knowledgeable about the candidates at an earlier point than I have ever been.

One thing is for certain. I am not going to agree with any single candidate on all of the issues. None of them is a clone of me. I do believe that strong family values and a solid commitment to maintaining the security of this country are the most important issues at stake.

See detailed pictures that show how we made this train

One of our family’s favorite things to do during the holidays is to bake. This year we plan to carry on the Christmas season baking tradition by creating the Gingerbread Train once again. Last year was our first attempt and it was a huge success.

There are plenty recipes on the Internet to for building gingerbread houses and gingerbread trains. We got our recipe and templates from FamilyFun Magazine. Their online version gives detailed pictures of the entire process in addition to the train part templates and a gingerbread recipe that will make enough dough for two train cars.

Here are a few recommendations that we think will make the project even more fun:

1. Make extra train cars.
2. Use different candy to decorate.
3. Assemble the train on a movable surface.

In the event you prefer building a gingerbread house, check out Simply Recipes for instructions on How to Make a Gingerbread House.

It was really more like Sticky Fingers had Fred Thompson. Presidential candidate Fred Thompson made his rounds in the low country of South Carolina today with stops at a gun show and then a brief visit with supporters at Sticky Fingers in Summerville. I attended the rally at Sticky Fingers and got to hear Senator Thompson speak in person for the first time.

There were no ground breaking surprises in what Senator Thompson had to say today in Summerville, SC, but that is exactly the way he plans to keep things. Senator Thompson is grounded in strong conservative values unlike many of his republican opponents who could have easily switched parties and run on a democratic ticket due to their liberal views. Senator Thompson spoke of his strong support for the idea of appointing federal judges that will uphold the Constitution of the United States above their personal beliefs and prejudices. He ranked the presidential duties of appointing judges right up next to national security in terms of importance.

While appointing judges and national security rank high on Senator Thompson’s list of important presidential duties, it was the immigration issue that seemed to get the most attention today. This grates on my nerves a little since the immigration issues in this country have only been a big concern since September 11, 2001. A large portion of the general population of this country seems to have been put under some sort of hypnosis that makes them think that unsecured borders and illegal immigrants are closely tied to the events of 9/11. I will concede that immigration and border security are valid issues that a president should be concerned about, but in my opinion, these should not be the main issues that determine how people vote in 2008.  The root of the immigration issues did not crop up since 9/11 and will not be solved by the president alone. Unfortunately these issues seemed to be much more of a crowd pleaser than any other issues on the stump today.

I would like to have asked the Senator a few questions, but time and opportunity was not available for more than a few questions. I would like to have heard some specifics on the following:

• Given his experience in Hollywood and in Washington, elaborate on his publicly stated views on how he as president could help strengthen family values.
• What is the first thing he would do as president to help put money back into the hands of the American people the way SC did with the recent sales tax changes that netted my family of five almost enough tax savings to buy a month’s worth of groceries per year.

I have yet to see the heat get turned up on Senator Thompson’s lack of specifics regarding his Christian faith. Many of the front runners claim to be Christians and that may factor into the results here in the deep south when the primary day rolls around. Some big name players in the Christian community have questioned Thompson’s Christianity. I would certainly prefer that our president be a committed Christian. At the same time, I know plenty of self proclaiming Christians who are not qualified to be president of the United States of America. It is entirely possible that many of the presidential candidates are not true believers when they get out from in front of the camera. Regardless of how outspoken Senator Thompson is or not regard his faith, the fruits of his public service support his claims to uphold values that all of my Christian friends hold dear.

Senator Thompson has as good chance of winning SC in the up coming South Carolina Republican primary according to the most recent Rassmussen Poll. I hope my friends will follow my lead and vote for Senator Fred Thompson when the polls open in 2008.

A tip for you die hard shopping fans as we approach Black Friday.

Planned Cost - Sale Price = Savings

No plan to buy - Sale Price = Impulse Buy

A sale price on any item is only a sale price if you were planning to buy the item anyway.

It seems that there is a new tax law in South Carolina. The picture on the right shows a portion of the receipt my wife brought home from Wal-Mart this weekend. I was so shocked by the tax amount, or rather lack of tax, that I called the Wal-Mart store to ask if their registers were malfunctioning. The lady from the customer service center at the Goose Creek Wal-Mart enlightened me on a new tax law that removes the sales tax from our grocery bill.

This new tax code supposedly went into effect on November 1, 2007. Did it get buried on page 23 of section Q of the local paper? While I do not watch much TV, I would have expected to hear about this on the radio or maybe at work among the idle chatter. Is it possible that this tax cut came in so low under the local radar that no one even knows about it?

For a family that spends about $600 per month on groceries, this will help us to the tune of approximately $40 per month*. That is sweet. That is another date with my sweetie each month. If we share a “Tour of Italy” at Olive Garden and only drink water, we might even be able to squeeze out the sitter’s wages for a couple of hours. This tax savings will be put right back into the economy as far I our house is concerned. Thank you SC State Government!

*Note: Not all of our grocery budget is spent on unprepared food so the tax cut will only affect approximately 95% of our grocery budget. This sale tax change only applies to unprepared grocery items “that are eligible for purchase with US Department of Agriculture food coupons.” Source

How the IRS helps me save 50 cent per gallon on gas.

The time of year has arrived when many US employers kick off what we call in the civil service “Open Season”. This is a time of the year when employees are allowed to make benefit changes that may not be allowed at any other time during the year, with a few exceptions called qualifying life events. (i.e., death, birth, marriage, adoption, etc.) One of the most useful, but often overlooked optional benefits that many employers offer is the Health Care Flexible Spending Account. Through these accounts the IRS allows for tax payers to have money withdrawn from their paychecks pre-taxed to later be used to reimburse medical expenses. In 2003 the IRS extended the coverage of these accounts to include over the counter medications and medical supplies. Many employees avoid this program because they do not fully understand it and are scared of the possibility of loosing unused money. This is a valid concern, but in y opinion, those who avoid flexible spending accounts are leaving money on the table.

So what does a flexible spending account have to do with gas prices?

I am glad you asked. One of the allowed categories of medical expenses in the flexible spending account is called transportation. The general guidelines for the transportation category are as follows:

“You can include in medical expenses amounts paid for transportation primarily for, and essential to, medical care.

You can include:

• Bus, taxi, train, or plane fares or ambulance service,
• Transportation expenses of a parent who must go with a child who needs medical care,
• Transportation expenses of a nurse or other person who can give injections, medications, or other treatment required by a patient who is traveling to get medical care and is unable to travel alone, and
• Transportation expenses for regular visits to see a mentally ill dependent, if these visits are recommended as a part of treatment.

Car expenses. You can include out-of-pocket expenses, such as the cost of gas and oil, when you use a car for medical reasons. You cannot include depreciation, insurance, general repair, or maintenance expenses.” Source: IRS Publication 502

With this one benefit our family is able to offset our gas costs by an average of 50 cents per gallon based on $3 per gallon prices. I will add a disclaimer for our situation, but that does not take away from the fact that an average family can cut gas prices by 25 cents per gallon or more with a flexible spending account. My disclaimer is that our son Caden sees an above average number of doctors on a regular basis so our transportation expenses are more than double that of a normal family of the same size as ours. That said, I have broken out a separate line in my calculations to show how a “normal” family would be saving 25 cents per gallon on gas even if Caden had not seen so many doctors this year. The “extreme” column represents our situation with Caden’s appointments.

The IRS allows for 20 cents per mile to be reimbursed through the flexible spending accounts. I have included a little chart to show how much gas costs per mile based on a vehicle’s MPG rating and the price per gallon at the pump.

Below is how I calculate the 50 cents per gallon savings on the year. The numbers used here are based on six months worth of transportation expenses with an average of 16.5 miles one-way to our medical service providers. I used Google maps to determine the distances. We completed 55 trips for medical purposes at 33 miles round trip on average for a total of 1814 miles in approximately six months. (Shown below in the “Extreme” column) There were 29 trips averaging 28.6 miles not including Caden’s appointments. (Shown below in the “Normal” column)

You will notice that our adjusted price per gallon of gas price is now at $2.51 based on the original $3 per gallon purchase price.

There are a few notable items.

1. The better mileage your vehicle gets the more you will save per mile. I actually used conservative numbers for our car so the actual savings for us is well above 50 cents per gallon on the year.
2. The vehicle that my wife drives averages less than 10K miles per year of driving. The higher the percentage of miles driven for medical purposes will increase your savings. If your vehicle is used only for medical purposes, then you would likely end up making money.
3. Higher gas prices will mean less savings unless the IRS adjusts the mileage rate for 2008. The rate went up from 18 to 20 cents last year.
4. If you drive a vehicle that gets terrible mileage or if the price of gas goes up faster than the mileage rate, then you would be better off taking the actual expenses in reimbursement instead of the 20 cents per mile allowance.

Participation in a Health Care Flexible Spending Accounts should be approached with some caution. Any money put into the accounts pre-taxed must be used for expenses within the plan year or the money will be forfeited at the end of each year. I had planned to get an implant this year that was going to cost about $1800. The implant could not be scheduled this year so I ended up with $1800 more in my flex account than planned. This led me to start combing through the list of reimbursable items allowed by the IRS to see what I could use to retrieve some of my cash. The transportation expenses were a great discovery that I was not aware of even though I have been a faithful flex plan participant for more than 10 years. The transportation expense reimbursement along with regular co-pays, over the counter medications, deductibles, and other medical expenses is allowing for me to utilize the entire $2100 that I diverted into my flexible spending account pre-tax this year. My total tax savings will be as much as $588 based on a 28% tax.

I encourage you to investigate your benefits package to see if it includes a Health Care Flexible Spending Account. If you are already a member, then I hope you are making use of the transportation category to save you some cash on gas.

Today marks three years of blogging for me.  I began blogging on Caden’s Page on the day of Caden’s birth.  I did not know I was blogging at the time, but figured it out in rapid fashion.

“Any user can change any entry and if enough other users agree with them then it becomes true.”

This is a quote that was pulled from a Comedy Central snippet that appeared in a Fox News story that ran this past Thursday evening. While the quote above did come from a comedy act, it is unfortunately a part of reality on the Internet.

“Anyone can post information as if it were fact…without any editorial review before the information is posted.”

This was a comment offered by a legal expert who was interviewed during the Fox News story. The story talks about how lives and reputations can get ruined by the activities of people who go to Wikipedia with an ax to grind.

I recently found an entry posted to Wikipedia about a very popular book written by a friend of mine. The sales numbers on this one book run in the millions. The book has nearly 1000 customer reviews on Amazon with 50% of the reviews giving the book a 5 out of 5 rating. Yet, there are a select few Internet users vandals (as described in the Fox News story) who have taken it upon themselves to try to sabotage the success of this book and ruin the reputation of the authors. These people have built web sites dedicated to discrediting the authors going as far as to use the author’s name in their site’s domain name. Some bloggers that I have questioned have openly admitted to never having read the book even though they proudly repeat the lies written by these vandals as if it were fact.

So you are wondering what the title of the book is, who are the authors, and who are these Internet vandals? Man I like the term vandal, especially as the term is defined in the Unabridged Dictonary.com entry.

“Vandal - (2) a person who willfully or ignorantly destroys or mars something beautiful or valuable.”

Vandal was the term used in the Fox News story to describe the folks who participate in activities of spreading lies that can damage the lives and reputations of others. As for who I am talking about, well I am not going to give any more details right now. Some of you will be smart enough to figure it out. Some of you reading this may have even participated in creating and editing the Wikipedia entry in question. I have not touched the entry nor have I ever posted a review on Amazon for the book. I felt that my inexperience with Wikipedia in particular was reason enough to leave the editing to the experts for now. As for the Amazon reviews, I have not wanted there to be any potential for anyone to say that the deck is stacked in terms of customer reviews.

Fortunately some seasoned Wikipedia editors have warned these vandals that they must comply with Neutral Point of View (NPOV) rules. The wiki editors have removed much of the opinionated content, but there’s still way too many links to the lies for me to point you to the article. The entry is simply not reliable and contains way more opinion than fact. The current ratio of negative (criticism) links is 3-to-1 over the number of links to official web sites representing the author and the book that the wiki entry was written about. The vandals have not paid very much attention to the wiki editors. The contributions of the vandals have been far from neutral from the start. In fact, according to the editing history, it took nearly five months before a single positive (supporting) link was added to this Wikipedia entry. There were plenty of external links to the critic’s sites, but not a single link to an official web site representing the author or the book.

Why am I being so mysterious? My goal is not to embarrass these vandals like they so enjoy trying to do with my friend. I certainly have the ammunition to embarrass at least one of them if that were my motive. At least one of the (uhm?) anonymous contributors appearing in the edit history of the wiki entry about my friend’s book has made visits to this site and even left comments. On at least one occasion the IP address shown in a comment on one of my blogs matched exactly what appeared in the Wikipedia editing history for this book’s entry on the same night. I do not find this IP address match up to be a coincidence since several of the comments on my blog from this visitor show them coming from the same IP address consistently for over two months. The IP addresses this visitor has been sourcing from for over two years has changed slightly from time to time. This tells me that their ISP is issuing addresses from a DHCP pool the same way many ISPs do business. However, a majority of the edits in the history of the Wikipedia entry I have been referring to came from the same ISP’s address pool that this visitor has been sourcing from for over two years when visiting this blog. This leads me to believe that this visitor of my site has been one of the primary contributors to this one Wikipedia topic. The majority of contributions to this particular Wikipedia entry were made by people who have no interest in publishing facts. Their message is full of slander and lies.  Why am I making a big deal out of this? Because it can happen to anyone. It can happen to you or someone you love.

In closing I want to make it clear that this is not a critique of Wikipedia but a critique of the people who vandalize Wikipedia and the Internet in general. I find Wikipedia to be a great resource on many subjects. Unfortunately there are a few “Internet Vandals” who try to misuse Wikipedia as a place to vent their frustrations over the success of others.