ONE STOP SHOPPING

I grew up on Warner Bros. cartoons, and always wondered about the ACME company. They served a small, but important, niche market, mostly comprised of predatory cartoon animals looking to inflict damage on smaller, weaker (and usually craftier) cartoon animals. Not unlike the LTD catalog, which serves female office workers looking to inflict low-grade wood & ceramic "gifts" on their friends.

Now that the complete ACME catalog is on line, Michele offers some suggestions on what to order, as well as what to do with your treasures after the big green truck drops them at your doorstep.

SMOKE 'EM IF YA GOT 'EM (OFFER VOID IN NEW YORK)

Steve over at Little Tiny Lies does a good job of ripping the Nanny State a new one in regards to New York's smoking prohibition. My favorite line:

"Banning smoking at restaurants and bars is like banning yelling at football stadiums or orgasms at cheap motels."

The rest of it is pretty good, too, so go read.

ON PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY

Michele did a nice job of mocking Kraft's decision to change their packaging & advertising to encourage people not to snarf Oreos like a starving sow. Her point being that portion control is an individual responsibility (or perhaps the parents' in cases involving small children).

On the other hand, The Inscrutable American (via the Emperor) posted a very up-close and personal look at one particular drug-addled teen prositute, and conclued that the problem here is a lack of 28-day programs to help crackies kick the rock. Or, perhaps, not enough eviscerated drug dealers.

Personally, I lay the blame elsewhere. On her need to turn to prostitution for the fast money needed to cover her habit, I blame the illegality of the drug itself. Take away the black market aspect, and the drugs become affordable on a legitimate salary. No need to turn to another high-profit criminal endeavor to support the first one.

But mostly I blame the teen herself. Her situation, while tragic and heart-rending, is the direct result of numerous bad decisions she's made every day for years. Primarily the one she made to try the stuff in the first place, but also subsequent decisions to keep using it. The fact that she chose friends who encouraged her self-destructive habits didn't help, either.

She's now bound in chains that she herself forged one decision at a time, and it will take much larger and tougher decisions to break those chains, if they are to be broken at all. I sincerely hope she finds the courage to do that.

But in the end, I just can't look at this situation & say "poor baby, what have they done to you?" I can only say, "what have you done to yourself?"