Most recent, on the topic of Plaxico Burress (the wide receiver from the Giants who shot himself in the leg in a club with his own gun) Stephen A said:

Plaxico Burress is a man that was tardy. He was a guy who took his gifts and his professional career  for granted. He was a guy who was late excessively, pretty much over 50 times last season or the season before that actually, according to sources that I spoke to within the New York Giants association. But, that was his biggest crime – he was just a tardy individual that was unprofessional when it came to showing up to work on time.

Really? That was his only crime? He didn’t carry an unlicensed firearm into a club in New York and shoot himself with it?

Now we all know that he should not have been carrying an unlicensed weapon – we get that. We know that the laws in NYC stipulate that theres a mandatory three and a half year minimum sentence in state prison – we know that. Unless of course you got big time laywers and are able to wrangle a plea bargin.

So, if you KNOW that the law is a three and a half year minimum mandatory sentence and Plaxico is only getting 20 months – why are you complaining again? And are you saying Plaxico didn’t have a big time lawyer? There wasn’t a plea bargin, because Burress plead guilty!

The reality is, the man made a mistake. He had a gun, purportedly licensed in the state of Florida. He’s working for the New York Giants. He goes to a club in New York City. Let’s not even get into the fact its something his agent should have taken care of, or his representative. Somebody should have known that the man had a gun.

Here, Stephen A seems to make it sound like carrying a gun licensed in Florida, into a club in NYC is okay. Obviously, the law in NYC would suggest otherwise. It also appears that he thinks it is the agent’s fault. Sadly, I am sure Plaxico didn’t call his agent to tell him he was going to be carrying a weapon into the bar that night. Doesn’t really matter, its Plaxico’s responsibility, not someone elses.

Stephen A – drop the ignorance, please. You can’t honestly defend this one. I know you like to look our for all african-american athletes, no matter what they’ve done. You similarly have made ridiculous statements about Barry Bonds and Michael Vick. You seriously can’t see how this was Plaxico’s fault? Mistake? How is it a mistake when he slipped a gun into his pants and went to a club? The mistake is that he shot himself. He wasn’t sentenced to prison for his mistake, he was sentenced for his own admission that he exercised bad judgement.

I actually have some sympathy for the guy, given that his wife is pregnant and he won’t be around to see his daughter’s birth. However, that’s what the man has to live with.

Dwelling on mistakes isn’t any way to make progress.

And because of my upbringing, I tend to carry a lot of guilt around. Recently a friend of mine wondered if I was catholic, which was actually pretty funny. I guess catholics carry guilt? I grew up non-denominational so I wouldn’t know.

In any event, that’s really all I meant — I know, super vague, right?

I have had a lot of really disparate thoughts recently – anything from the moon and space, politics and health care, agency vs freelancers, the fear of dying and why I shouldn’t really be scared of it, True Blood and whether or not a world with vampires would be exciting, among other things.

I’d really love to write on all of them. Sometimes, I then think about how my blog is totally a dumping ground for random crap. Should I try to make this site a little more focused? Don’t know. Is this site the Seinfeld of blogs? Thats an interesting thought.

I’ll just say from the outset that Bernie Madoff is a douche bag.

My take on this situation, that of his sentencing to 150 years in jail, isn’t going to offer up some other assessment of this guy. Total. Douche. Bag. However, I want to explore a bit deeper and look at his sentence.

On the surface, sure, 150 years when a guy is like 71 seems excessive. And there will be others that will say that a sentence of that length is entirely justified – that he ruined their lives and he deserves to be thrown into a cell and locked away. Hell, some think he should be put to death! The courts are clearly sending a message, and fine, that’s good. The thing that has me scratching my head is that we’d send a guy away for LIFE for this kind of a crime.

Maybe I am just ignorant (and if so, please let me know I have a thick skin) but, no one died (actually, someone may have killed themselves but I don’t believe Madoff actually pulled the trigger on anyone is what I mean).

Some rich people lost money. Some probably less than stinking, filthy rich people probably lost some money. This guy, again, was a douche bag. Many of the people who lost money are going to get a portion of it back. Does a life sentence fit with this crime?

I’ll put myself in the victim’s shoes. Okay, i invested some money and the person I trusted more or less stole it. And, this happened over a long period of time. Well damn, who doesn’t steal from you? I feel like car and home instance is a total scam. Same with home owners association fees, automated speed cameras, investment companies and in some cases, even the Federal government. Everyone is out there trying to screw you out of your dollar.

I’m not saying this guy doesn’t deserve punishment – but locking an old man up for 150 years (he’ll be dead in 10) isn’t going to really get anyone their money back. He was obviously intelligent. Put him to work for the people he stole from. Give him no comfort, thats fine, but make the punishment be productive for some type of good.

To me it becomes a bigger issue – money for life. If this guy killed someone, then yes, lock his ass away. But, he stole money.  Yes, a lot of money.  Should his entire life be taken away for that? Is money that valuable? Is there no other way of making it up to the people who lost the money? Do they not have ANY accountability in the fact they gave him the money in the first place? Does the government have any accountability (I assume they do if they are refunding people up to 500k).

Does Madoff deserve to sit in a cell for the rest of his life (aka 10 years or so)? What type of justice would you dispense if it was up to you? Probably sounds crazy but i’d put the guy to work (under supervision) for minimum wage doing CPA work or something for non profits – put his intelligence to GOOD use and turn him into something other than a crook.

This entire event has conjured many thoughts and observations, about life and society.

Here are just a few:

• The first news outlet to report that Michael had died was TMZ. This is kind of sad, for many reasons, as TMZ is a glorified gossip site. Why were they first? Because they don’t care about privacy of the family.
• Many people were happy at the news. Obviously, Michael did many questionable things in his life but, is that really a reason to be happy that he’s dead?
• He was only 50 years old. I am 35 (15 years younger). Lately, I have been reading about people dying of heart attacks at young ages. Little scary.

Other thoughts, perhaps a tad morbid but – is it better to die young or old? Everyone talks about wanting to live to an old age, and that is appealing on certain levels, mostly because as humans I believe we are programmed to be afraid of death. However, would you rather waste away or die suddenly and get it over with? I am thinking selfishly here. Many people have written that this was perhaps the best thing that could happen to Michael, and I kind of wonder about that. The same has been said about Ed McMahon’s passing.

The freaky thing about Michael Jackson’s death was just how sudden it was. I don’t recall reading anywhere that he was in poor health. Just out of nowhere – dead.

Its silly, but when I hear about a celebrity dying my mind immediately questions how that could happen. Here are people with money and means, with the best health care money can buy. Of course, death doesn’t discriminate and I know that – still it just feels so shocking to me.

In any case – rest in peace Michael. I am neither happy nor sad at your passing, just freaked out at how sudden and unexpected it was.

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I’m not entirely sure when it happened, but sometime in the past year I realized that playing the blame game really doesn’t get you anywhere. Sure, sometimes things are your fault, and you should own up and take responsibility, especially if an action you caused hurt someone else. However, dwelling on a mistake, or accident or hell, even placing blame on someone even when the issue wasn’t their fault is just really counter productive.

This is especially true when said person is doing their best to remedy the problem in the first place.

What does the blame game get you in the end? A momentary feeling of relief or a venting of anger? It doesn’t really get your problem solved I can tell you that.

Sometimes people need a push — to get their lives in order, to step things up at their job or take a step towards commitment. I have witnessed this a lot over the past few weeks. I guess the thing which surprises me is the ability that some people have to be creative, or to find solutions to complex problem but don’t.

I’m not sure why that is. I mean, if you know you can contribute more than why not do it? If you have something to say, why not say it?

I use this cliche at least twice a week — life it short. Why waste yours and everyone else’s time by only giving 50%?

The reinvention process is a funny one. See, it happens really, really fast. Overnight, even. This again leads me to the question posed above.. If you CAN change why DON’T you change.