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It's been said opinions are like...
well, you know, everybody has one, and this page contains mine (opinions, that is). A reminder, these are only my opinions, in America, we are allowed to have our opinions, regardless as to whether or not they are popular. I welcome your opinions too, and have provided a form at the bottom of the page where you are welcome to leave your comments.
Dial 10-10-297 and pay only 10 cents a minute for all your long distance calls, so promise the TV ads, as well as their web page. No monthly fee, no hidden charges, no hidden fees, blah blah blah,..... Yea, right. Here's what happened to me. I placed 2 out of state long distance calls, for about a minute each the other month. Now it doesn't take a wizard, genius, or brain surgeon to figure out that 2 one-minute calls at 10 cents a minute would be 20 cents. Duh. I bet even Jethro Bodine could cipher that one out to Granny and Jed. Knot knot, knot, knot knot. Whatever. Anyway, when I got the bill, sure enough there were my 2 calls, billed for 10 cents each, 1 minute per call. For all I know, my calls may have been less than a minute, but I'm not really even concerened if they round up to the next minute, I'm not that nit-picky. Anyway, below that, hmmmm, what's this??? A Universal Service Fee ....but, but, hey wait a minute, I thought there were no other fees or hidden charges! What happened? Well, I gave them a call, and was told by a customer representative that the Universal Service Fee was mandatory, and there was nothing they could do about it. I was told that this was recent legislation and it's purpose was to help provide internet access to schools and libraries, which sounds like an okay idea to me. However, I have 2 problems with what I was told, after searching around I found that the actual wording in the legislation is something like 'telecommunication companies should charge the fee, as opposed to must charge, and apparently there is no fixed, or standard rate for the amount. I believe on my phone bill I was charged 20 cents, for the 2 one minute calls, and about 41 cents for the Universal Service Fee, the net result was that I paid about 26 cents a minute, not 10 cents / minute! It seems to me that if they really would have valued me as a customer, and a future customer, they could have made an adjustment of some type. In fact, the representative told me that they have had the fee for quite some time, but they just recently raised the amount percentage, and indeed, I believe I have used their service before, but the charge was negligible, certainly not more than the actual amount of the phone service used. I have previously used another service, 10-10-998, and on my phone bills there were no surprises, I was only billed 10 cents a minute for the calls. I am not affiliated with, nor do I endorse 10-10-998, but I bet even Jethro can figure out which long distance service I'll use next time. I have not found anywhere, on either their mail - out brochures or the 10-10-297 website any mention of a Universal Service Fee, and it strikes me as a possible misrepresentation when a company advertises a service at one price, and you end up paying another. Also, it's kind of interesting that I was not charged a universal service fee by 10-10-998, but that a 10-10-297 rep told me it was a required charge. Sure.
Or now it's Arturo Resendez Ramiriz, or something like that, the guy not only seems to change his name everyday, he never seems quite sure of the spelling. What a piece of work this guy is. For those of you who have been living in a cave and / or purposely don't follow the news, this is the illegal alien Mexican national who has been riding around on the good ol' U.S. of A. freight trains, stopping now and then for a break to jump off the train and rob, rape, and kill people. Oops, I meant to say alledgedly robbing, raping, and killing people. We wouldn't want to falsely accuse or prejudge this guy, now would we. He says he doesn't like Americans. Funny, I don't remember inviting him over. The body count is about 10 so far. His specialty seems to be breaking into homes of people who live close to railroad tracks, and beating or hacking to death the elderly, infirm, or people just plain trying to get a decent nights sleep. What a guy. He, alledgedly even killed one guy and raped his girlfriend as they were walking down the rail road tracks. As Jay Leno pointed out, too bad the guy wasn't suicidal, he might have at least jumped on an Amtrak now and then. Don't write me, I didn't say that, Jay Leno did, write him. I wish he would have simply jumped in front of a train, if you disagree with that, don't write me, you're a moron. Anyway, Resendiz Ramiriz, or whatever he calls himself these days has surrendered to Texas Rangers on the U.S. side of the border. It didn't take long to hear a bunch of whining about the possibility that he will most likely face the death penalty. Awwwwl, poor guy. He said he was told he would be treated humanely. Well, no one's taken him out in a field and bludgeoned him to death with a baseball bat, so already he's been treated better than most of his victims, I mean, alleged victims. He sits in the Harris County Jail and is out of the heat, humidity, rain, cold, and gets 3 square meals a day at taxpayers expense. Sounds pretty humane to me, more humane than what I've heard about the Mexican jails that serve up the beans with human excretement floating on top. At least this piece of human garbage is off the streets. After the trial, and an automatic appeal that Texas requires, add a few million tax dollars, and after about another decade or so he'll probably get to take the long distinguished walk down to the Huntsville State Prison death chamber for his all too painless lethal injection. May God have mercy on his soul.
What can I say, congrats Nolan for your induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame, to say you certainly deserve it would be the understatement of the century. I can only hope that there might be more athletes that will come along to provide such a positive role model influence for our future children in the generations to come. In recent times we've seen a lot of athletes get into all kinds of trouble, bar brawls, drug abuse, picking up prostitutes, or whatever, (I'm not being judgemental here, I've had a bar brawl or two) and we've certainly seen more than enough of bad behaviour during sporting events, spitting on umpires and coaches, and biting off ears are a couple of things that come to mind. It's refreshing to see an athlete such as Nolan Ryan who has not only had a great career, but has been such an exemplorary role model for our children. Kudos to you, Nolan.
Derrick Iozzio is the Houston Police Officer who was recently convicted of the MURDER of his next door neighbor. He is white, his neighbor was black, and the all white jury gave him 10 years probabtion and 600 hours community service. His Lawyer was Dick DeGuerrin, a high profile attorney who has handled a lot of high publicity cases. Now, obviously I wasn't on the jury, and in no way do I purport to know all the facts in this case, I am basing my opinions on no more, no less than what I've heard on the local Houston TV and radio stations. First, I want to say that I think that overall the Houston Police Department does a very fine job, and a tough job, I have the utmost respect for our 'men in blue'. The first thing that I noticed that happended was that right after the decision, blacks were protesting the outcome of this case. From what I have ascertained, there was a long standing situation of ill will between the two parties, and the officer shot and killed his neighbor during one of their confrontations. Again, I wasn't there, and didn't attend the trial, but it seems to me that this is not a simple case of 'white cop kills black neighbor and all white jury gives out only probabtion'. I don't think this is a race issue, and I don't think a white jury would be less fair to a black victim than any other victim. I don't recall any white protestors after the O.J. Simpson trial claiming that the black jurors in that case didn't care if black men were killing our white women. I think the outcome of this neighbor vs neighbor case is probably more a result of our imperfect legal system, than any racial factors, and if there is any finger pointing to be done we should take a look at our justice system. It seems that time after time those who get the most lenient results are the ones with the high dollar lawyers. And I don't think that just because the person who commits the crime is in law enforcement, they should be given special treatment or consideration. (I'm not saying this is the case, in Texas, if you have never been convicted of a crime, or been on probation, your are entitled to probation) Since the police are entrusted to keep the peace and uphold the laws, it seems that they should be held to a higher standard of conduct than the average citizen, especially when it comes to firearms and their actions, which they should not only be responsible for, but also accountable when a crime such as this one happens. It just doesn't strike me as being fair that someone who is convicted of murder should recieve a probated sentence instead of some serious jail time, but the law says you can get probation in the circumsances of this case. I think the outcome of this case just sends the wrong message. Of course, this is only my opinion, feel free to leave your thoughts below.
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I'd like to hear your opinion too!...
If I get enough responses, I may start a forum
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Read a book! sharpen your mind! Click on the Barnes and Noble Bookstore link below, I have it set to take you to bargain books in the $5 to $15 range. They got CD's, software, and magazine stuff to ya know :)
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last updated by Matt Gilbert on April 22, 2000
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