Go ahead, go on strike

The Huffington Post blogger brouhaha has descended from farce into...whatever the heck is one step stupider than "farce."

Here's the most recent bit: "Arianna Huffington: 'Go Ahead, Go on Strike -- No One Will Notice.'" (Practical question: Can you really go on strike from a job that you weren't even paid for?)

Sorry, bloggers-for-nothing: You've been pwnd. You voluntarily chose to work for free, in the naive hope of getting famous. Nobody forced you to do it. Your boss-owner may not be the most gracious person in the world, but she made a zillion dollars, and you'll see none of it, regardless of the lamentations of The Newspaper Guild, California Media Workers Guild, and National Writers Union of how unfair it all is.

You cut your own deal, and it was an epically crappy one from a business perspective. And quite frankly, you pretty much piss me off, since your lack of business acumen devalued what freelancers do.

Welcome to 1984, but lamer

My 8th grade daughter came home from school the other day and informed us that they're not allowed to use the word "dice" in school anymore. In a political-correctness-run-amok moment, they're now known as "number cubes."

I wish I were joking. I am not.

Heck, by the time I was in 7th grade, my dad and I had a weekly nickel-dime-quarter poker game with my best friend and his dad, and I have taught my kids everything I know about poker, blackjack and craps strategy. Indeed, I consider it one of my core parental responsibilities, based on the old gambling saying that "If you're at the table for 5 minutes and can't spot the sucker, it's you." As in cards, so in life.

And if the schools believe that they're somehow going to deter kids from gambling with a P.C. word construction as lame as "number cubes," they are simply delusional. Ignorance is not strength, no matter what the Ministry of Truth might want you to believe.