Thursday Political Questions (TPQ) from now on.

Watching the third and final debate, I have to wish that we could have a screen running below with a truth o'meter. I'd wish that we could get the correct take on everything but even factcheck takes time to address these issues and it's still filtered through the prism of whomever wrote the piece for factcheck.

Who checks on the factcheckers?

So here are some thoughts that I have about this political process.

Who do you want to hear talking at you for the next four years or for that matter, even the next twenty minutes?

If a single community organizer signs up 150,000 new voters from a list of 400,000 in one year in 1992 using dial up and the rudimentary equivalent of America Online, how many people would he have to meet/phone/fill out forms for per day?

Answer: 410 successful contacts. Please note, this does not take into account any weekends or holidays, just a straight 150,000 divided by 365. It does not also account for wrong numbers, hang ups, refusals, incorrect or double identifications, deceased, moved, or unfindable individuals.

If we factor in the entire list, assuming 1 of every four individuals was reachable, but the other three had to be attempted in the process, the number rises to 1095 per day. But hey. Maybe it wasn't this hard.

Maybe 1992 was a leap year.

Do you think your taxes are too low?

Do you think your neighbor's taxes are too low?

Name a person you KNOW, who you think should pay more. Tell them. IF they agree, ask how much more.

Name three things the government does so well, no one else can do it.
Aside from spend at a staggering rate, writing papers on every subject imaginabl.e and talking about anything and everything for as long as possible.

If you love how insurance micromanages health care, you'll love the government creating an administrative overlay. Right?

Do you think that having one party control the house, senate and White House is a good thing?

Would you think it was okay if your son who was eight when we experienced 9/11, when he's 47 hangs around with Osama Bin Laden if the later is then a professor at a University in a major city?

Does anyone know if Hillary wants to make a Rocky like comeback now? She's starting to look good to me...or at least moderate.

And Finally, and this is the big one...
Can we make a law so that the political process can only last a single year, from the primary start to the election of the president...so as to shorten the entire season?

I'm scared I'll see bumperstickers for 2012 November 7th.

Debug System Failure

My son, being nine, has honed driving his older sister absolutely crazy into an art form. Button pushing isn’t a choice for him, it’s a way of life.

“Ignore him.” I explained when her brother was playing Safari and kept shooting her with his fake gun and saying, “I bagged a hippo, I got bonus points…I got an elephant…extra bonus points…you know why you get bonus points don’t you?”
She sighed, “Mom? Don't I get credit for not punching him?”

"Yes." But this was insufficient praise for not having the satisfying smack of hitting her brother, so I tried diversion. “Help me make breakfast.” I was making muffins. She considered the prospect and agreed. There was a momentary cease fire in the fight.

Teasing only works if the victim is being actively tormented. His other older sister simply put on her MP3 player. His younger sister wasn't outside and his younger brother wasn't a big enough target, so the safari king came in to hunt his favorite quarry.

I tried a preemptive disarmament strategy. Handing him breakfast with the added point, “Your sister made it.” Didn’t garner a positive response, simply an affirmative grunt, but the teasing had been momentarily suspended by the presence of food.

Now it was lecture time. Mom spoke in her Mom lecture tone…and I saw the brains tune out. I felt like the UN. I needed a more effective model for obedience than my home persona so I pulled out the teacher voice and became Mrs. Antonetti.

“What do they teach you at school about teasing?” I asked my son.
“The Debug system. We need to ignore the teasing. Then we need to walk away. Then if it continues, we say in a nice firm voice, “Please stop.” If that doesn’t work, we get a teacher.”

“Okay. I want you two to Debug each other from now on, instead of running straight to me. Pretend I'm a teacher. I used to be. I have the degree.”

“Can’t.”
“Won’t work.” My daughter added. Both of them were agreeing.

“Why not? You both know it. You both understand it. I could give detentions if that would help.”

“Mom! You can't give detentions. If they're done at home, they're just time outs."
"Fine, I'll drive to school. You can stand in a corner there."

"Mom, you're not going to load up the car to drive us to school to stand in time out. Besides, if it happens after 7pm..."
"Then you'll just go to bed."
"Teachers don't do that."

"Look, just don't listen to him when he's being rude...and you....Stop Being Rude!"

"I can’t ignore him.”
“Yeah, and she bugs me.”

“Look,” I said, giving them both my undivided attention, “Just pretend it’s me talking. Pretend it’s me saying, “Clean your room. Hang up your coat. Put away your shoes, clear the table. Read. Do your homework.”

“But those are boring things to do.”
“Exactly. Whenever your brother teases you, pretend it’s me. Whenever your sister annoys you, pretend it’s me.”

They blinked, as if they hadn’t heard. One was digging his elbow into the other’s as they stood at the kitchen island not hearing my lecture. “Just like that.” I explained.

At this point, my husband walked by, “I’m not sure that’s the lesson we want taught.”

“Don’t worry love,” I answered, “they weren’t listening.”

The Sherry Spin Doctor's Phx

What a difference a week makes.

When my parents flew back home and my husband went back to work and I was left to manage all nine people by myself, originally I thought the reason my two toddlers washed their beanie babies in the toilet while I was nursing was pure payback.

The two stacks of unchacteristically less than awesome marks for two of my other children, I also chalked up to post I just got a new sibling regression. When four of my oldest five staged a rebellion over what they would wear for school pictures, neither my husband nor I thought these antics were anything but the reaction of baby bear to Goldilocks.

"She comes into my home, eats my food, breaks my things and took over my bed. When do we get to scare her into running away?"

However, the scope of assaults on my adult sensibilities made me pause to consider whether larger forces were at play. When the three year old pushes a chair to the freezer to acquire the stash of M&m's from the top shelf, one has to wonder if she was working alone. When the younger sister of said three year old mimics those actions to spill coffee grounds and rice on the freshly mopped floor, perhaps a review of the catechism on venial and mortal sin is in order.

But today, my daughter decided to paint her hair with orange juice while the four year old sang a soft lullaby to the new baby, "Baby Paul, I love you. You're so cute. You...can pick your nose." Meanwhile, my other toddler put her potty training seat on her head as a hat. It got stuck. My son forgot about a major project which we could have been working on over the four day weekend. There is a little grey "pet" that scampered through my kitchen. We also have play practice, softball playoffs and two orthodontist appointments scheduled for this weekend. Meanwhile, both cars decided this week to require intensive love. They were feeling unappreciated.

Our 401K tanked.

Yet, despite this post partum regression/recession, I remain in a state of Yoga like bliss.

Why?

The Island Park News has asked me to be a regular contributor for a column called "Fractured Motherhood Tales."

I washed my daughter's sticky orange hair.
It's all potential material. Natural Prozac just courses through my veins. And I’ve already come up with the perfect cure should I ever suffer writers block.

“Look kids, Mommy bought a whole pack of rainbow colored sharpies.”

For more Endorphine Soothing Experiences try .Humor-Blogs.com!