But I beg to differ. There is no dilemma. This has never been true. Back when I used to write about Apple, twenty years ago, and today, it is quite clear: Everything Apple does is about selling hardware. You can set your watch, your rumor mill, and your stock options by this.

If they don’t think it will further hardware sales, they won’t do it.

I would like Apple to build a wall wart¹ that connects to my iTunes Match account (nee, my iCloud account) to stream music.

It should be very much like an Airport Express, being wall-wartish, and having an audio out option, but it should be purpose built to connect to my music in my Apple ecosystem. I would set it up via my Apple i(OS)X device, connect to my WiFi, log in to iCloud, save my credentials, and it would be ready to go.

This magic wart would then let me listen to my music, via iTunes Match, without a computer or a copy of iTunes running. I wouldn’t have to plug my iPhone in anywhere, or use minutes/battery to stream music. I wouldn’t have to “Start iTunes, Honey, so we can listen to music.” I could still use Remote (or iTunes on OSX?) to skip, pick a playlist, etc.

How sweet would that be?

Really sweet.

Bonus, it would be ready for iRadio, or whatever Apple calls their eventual streaming music service.

Yes, I know this is very specific to the Apple ecosystem. And it would be fab if Apple would let you connect it to Pandora/Rdio/Spotify/whatnot, but Apple would never do that. On the other side, Apple would never allow a third party wall wart to connect to iTunes Match, so. I am, in my circumstances, stuck with Apple. I can live with that.

But I can’t live without this thing. Build it, Apple!

Ironically, their answer is to present the fix to society’s ills as a video game:

“The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.“ Wayne LaPierre, NRA Lobbyist

Bad guys. And good guys. Shoot the bad guys to save the children.

Well, I have some black and white rhetoric for you, too, Mr. LaPierre.

What is safer than a good guy in a school with a loaded firearm? No firearms. Not for good guys. Not for bad guys. Leave the firearms to the professionals who need them.

But I’m good now.

I don’t have a moral problem with killing animals for meat. Never have, really. I have lots of problems with the way we raise and kill food animals, and try to buy my meat from local producers with small scale slaughtering operations. I don’t eat a lot of meat, for health reasons. But I’m fine with animals as meat, killed by humans.

In that sense, I don’t have a problem with individual hunters going out and killing animals for meat. And while I may have a personal distaste for hunters going out and killing animals for fun, that isn’t what my argument is about.

I have a problem with people owning guns.

As I have said before, professional gun owners need their guns to do their jobs. Fine. But recreational gun owners do not need their guns. Recreational hunters do not need their guns. Recreational hunters do not need to kill animals, and they certainly don’t need to do it with guns.

They may want to. But that isn’t a good enough reason to own a gun.

• You want to be one with nature? Go camping.
• You want to feel the “thrill of the hunt?” Grab a camera on your way out to the blind.
• You want to feel like a man? Volunteer at a soup kitchen. Build a house. Read at the library.
• You really need to kill? Do it with a bow, if you must. I’ll concede that piece of ground.

Your hunting rifle does not make you safer. It puts everyone around you in danger. What is safer than a responsible, trained hunter with a properly secured gun? Not having a gun.

And then there’s this:

“…the urge to kill lies within us all, especially as children. Without proper channelling of these instincts, children often grow into physically abusive and/or murderous adults. Can any of us honestly say that, as kids, we didn’t shoot birds with our slingshots and bb guns, or set homemade traps for other critters? I say that if you can say that, then you either never had an opportunity as a child, or you’re an exception to the rule of human nature.”

From Why do Hunters Hunt? by Russ Chastain

I’m sorry, you have an instinctual “urge to kill” that you need to channel properly? And you had it as a child? I don’t have an alternative for you, except to hope to God that you are the exception, not the rule.

Some of the reading I did for this:

• Why do Hunters Hunt? by Russ Chastain at About.com
• Why I hunt at the IHEA site
• Why do people hunt? at Yahoo! Answers

It has been several days, and I think I’ve come to some… conclusions about what I think. Buckle up.

First off, mental illness is a terrible problem. Unlike with guns, it is an almost unfathomably complicated topic, of enormous importance, that I am completely unqualified to speak to. I do think that, as a country, we should be able to tackle both guns and mental illness. Both clearly need the attention.

But, on guns, I think this:

• I believe that people should only have access to guns if their profession requires it. Yeah, I’m a little left of Liberal on this. But there is no reason, in a civilized society, for individuals to own guns for any sort of recreational purpose. None. Try your best to give me a reason. I like them doesn’t count. I grew up with guns doesn’t count. I need to defend myself (from other people with guns) doesn’t count. I’m part of a well-regulated militia and I need them to defend myself from a future totalitarian/socialist government. Really? Guns kill, and you can’t tell me that killing is an acceptable end goal. Punto final.

• If you own a gun for recreational purposes, I will be civil to you (lest you, you know, shoot me), but I will not be your friend. My children will not play at your house. You had better tell me now, and get it over with. You can unfriend me and we can go our separate ways. My children and I will be safer.

Sure, a full-on firearms ban will never fly in this country. I understand the practical problems with my stance. A ban on assault weapons, or on high-capacity magazines, or on bullets, is likely to be much more successful. But I remain convinced that you do not need a gun. You should not have a gun. You are not safer with a gun. I am not safer if you have a gun.

Gun-related deaths in 2010 in the United States, from the CDC:

• unintentional firearm deaths: 606
• homicide firearm deaths: 11,078
• suicide firearm deaths: 19,392
• total firearm deaths: 31,672

Gun related non-suicide deaths per 100,000 people:

• United States, 2008–2010: 3.97
• France, 2009: 0.68 (17.1% of US total)
• Italy, 2009: 0.47 (11.8%)
• Australia, 2008: 0.26 (6.5%)
• Germany, 2010: 0.16 (4%)
• United Kingdom, 2011: 0.07 (1.7%)
• Norway, 2010: 0.06 (1.5%)

Yes, in the US, you are 56 times more likely to die from a gun than in the UK. That does not include suicides.

Once they come out of hiding, the NRA will trot out all their usual tropes: guns don’t kill people, gun safety training is very important, everyone should have gun locks, or gun safes, or unloaded guns, or something that makes your gun safer.

You know what is more effective than gun safety training? Not having a gun. You know what is more effective than gun locks? Not having a gun. You know what is more effective than gun safes? Not having a gun.

You know what is safer than having a gun? Not having a gun.

Arr. Probability, I hate you.

But I am finding it more and more difficult to reconcile the two.

There are few established alterna-Scouting opportunities available in our area. (No CampFire group, no YMCA Adventure Guides, no BPSA group.)

So, I can:

1. Keep my kids in the BSA and shut my mouth (or work from within for change). In the meantime I keep sending money to the BSA, implicitly supporting their positions.

2. Pull my kids from Scouting and enjoy not having annoying activities three times a month.

3. Put my time and treasure where my ethics are and start something myself, either personally ((DIY looks cool) or with the structure (if not support) of some organization like BPSA.

The first choice, sticking it out, is where we have defaulted. But when we joined the current Pack, (remember, we just moved) at the introductory meeting some honcho from the local Council came to sell it, and the first thing he said was how wonderful it is to have a place “where we can talk about God. We can’t do it in our schools!” He went on a bit about how glorious this was, and how important, and then he might have caught my eye and he never came back to it. It left a really unpleasant taste in my mouth.

The second choice, ditching, would be easy, but it feels so wrong. Worse than choice number one, in fact.

The last one is clearly the right choice. But I am old, lazy, and tired (or at least I feel that way) and this would be a huge commitment on my part. I think there might be some support in the community (at the very least in my church, where it has already been brought up once), so I probably wouldn’t be flying alone. But this is really quite a daunting task. I am, shall we say, daunted by the thought of it.

Thoughts? Encouragement? Volunteers?

• The Time Karl Rove Took on the Fox News Decision Desk
• The vindication of Nate Silver
• Obama’s victory speech or, “Where’s that guy been during the 2012 campaign?”
• Rasmussen is 24th out of 28 polls in accuracy list. Tied with Gallup.
• The deafening silence at UnskewedPolls.com
• Dick Morris predicts a Romney landsli… hold on, I can’t stop laughing.
• Akin shot the whole party in the foot — this one’s close to home.

There may be profanity below. There will definitely be Liberal bias, so you have been warned.

• During his concession speech, I realized that I have no animosity towards Mitt Romney. I think he is an ambitious man used to success, and he really, really, really wanted to be President. I think he really is a moderate, and I don’t think he believes half of what he “stood for” in this campaign. And while it disturbs me that he would be so glib with his values, I don’t hate him for it.
• But Mitch McConnell can take a flying leap onto the nearest freeway. Here is what he said this morning, “Now it’s time for the president to propose solutions that actually have a chance of passing the Republican-controlled House of Representatives and a closely divided Senate, step up to the plate on the challenges of the moment, and deliver in a way that he did not in his first four years in office. To the extent he wants to move to the political center, which is where the work gets done in a divided government, we’ll be there to meet him half way.” (Source). That is such bullshit, coming from a Republican Party that deliberately, explicitly, and ultimately unsuccessfully stonewalled the President on everything he tried to do, even when he moved to the right of the political center. I call bullshit, Senator.
• I confess that listening to Obama last night, I felt a little of the hopey, changey thing from four years ago. And it felt good.
• I may have gloated a bit on Twitter last night. But seriously, the GOP spent the last four years actively denying Obama, trying to cast him as a failed President, and last night they got their ass handed back to them by the People. Fuck yeah.
• Where has Boehner been? Isn’t he from Ohio? Rob Portman was popping up everywhere like an eager gopher, but not John Boehner. Curious.
• Last night, only one person I voted for was actually elected, even all the way down to the local school board. Not the worst ballot experience I have had (that was 2004 in Omaha, Nebraska, when nobody I voted for was elected). I may be living in the wrong place.
• The next generation has arrived. Gay marriage passed in two states (after losing 33 times in previous elections). Pot is (or will be) legal in Colorado. (Source). And the youth vote carried Obama again, just like it did four years ago (Source). So fasten your seat belts, Boomers, your young tattooed Latina barista is about to take the wheel.
• Fox News, et al., was not only wrong, but dishonest with their viewers, all season long. This article in the Atlantic is (liberal and) very interesting. And they call us sheeple. (The Atlantic)
• And finally, this. “I believe we can keep the promise of our founders, the idea that if you’re willing to work hard, it doesn’t matter who you are or where you come from or what you look like or where you love. It doesn’t matter whether you’re black or white or Hispanic or Asian or Native American or young or old or rich or poor, able, disabled, gay or straight, you can make it here in America if you’re willing to try.” (Transcript source)
  See the video

It has been a good day so far.

Please, exercise your right to vote.

Take your kids to show them how important it is.

And then get donuts.