Nancy A. Nord was nominated by President George W. Bush to be a commissioner of the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) for a term that expires in October of 2012. The CPSC is supposed to protect the public against unreasonable risks of injury and death associated with consumer products. You know, lead. Things like that.

Nord is also the president of Executive Women in Government, a nonprofit professional women’s organization. Sorry, women.

In two different letters, Nancy Nord has asked lawmakers not to approve legislation that would increase the agency’s authority, double its budget and increase its ever more pathetic staff. She opposes increasing the maximum penalties for safety violations. She opposes making it easier for the government to make public reports of faulty products. She opposed protecting industry whistle-blowers. And of course she opposes prosecuting executives of companies that willfully violate laws.

Hello? Anyone home in America?

The agency has suffered from a steady decline in its budget and staffing in recent years. Its staff numbers about 420, about half its size in the 1980s. It has only one full-time employee to test toys. And 15 inspectors are assigned to police all imports of consumer products under the agency’s supervision, a marketplace that last year was valued at $614 billion.

I am ashamed to share a syllable of my name with Nancy Nord. My mother’s name is Nancy, too. I haven’t felt this bad since people started asking me if I was related to OJ Simpson because of a character he played. Sorry, children.

The very direction of North – what Nord means – is blasting its winds in her general direction.

Anyone who doesn’t think the agency needs more resources “does not understand the gravity of the situation and does not understand the concerns that America’s parents have for the safety of their children,” Pelosi said.

Government Bad. Corporations Good. Yar yar.

Family values? Children’s safety?

Lead, good. Whistleblowers bad.

Good government? Promote the general welfare?

Bah. We don’t need your stinkin’ children.

I posted a little while ago about the little boy who couldn’t see a future for himself outside of the JWs. All Jehovah’s Witness children grow up this way.

Watch this short new video to get a sense of the kind of message that all JWs – even children – hear ad nauseum. Notice the way non-JWs are presented, and the image of God that they create.

There is no room for love, compassion, or grace in this message.

I’ve heard Jehovah’s Witnesses trying to claim that the Watchtower Society never gave the 1975 date for Armageddon. They did – I remember it – and this video proves it. “Stay alive ’til 75″ was something I heard a lot as a kid. People made all sorts of decisions based on this false prophecy, and when 1975 came and went, a lot of people left. There has been a fair bit of historical revisionism since that time, as there has been for other dates that had been given.

This is the kind of discourse I grew up hearing all the time. I thought that I would never graduate from High School before the end of this wicked system of things happened and all the other people were destroyed and the New Order on a paradise earth (full of unified Jehovah’s Witnesses) would begin.

JWs believe that you have to be in the organization to survive the Great Tribulation. They make noises these days about God being the only one to judge, but no JW really believes that. They hear differently all their lives, and they know about the “theocratic war strategy” of lying to the satanic public.

JWs imagine the Last Days vividly – and often – and most would never have the courage to leave the organization, just in case it really is “the Truth.”

Ex-JWs might enjoy the background music on this, including the “From House to House” Sambo remix.

(Thanks to JB, JME, and Amanda)

More videos about Jehovah’s Witnesses (or resonant with exJWs):

Here’s a turnaround. I’m asking readers for your viewpoint and advice.

Something very upsetting happened last night and I’m trying to understand where things broke down, how I should evaluate the whole thing, and what – if anything – I should do about it.

Background: We’ve been friendly with a family in the neighborhood for a couple of years now. They have a son who is a bit younger than Ben, and the boys play together – either here or at their house. We’ve all been rather flexible and informal about having the boys here or there. It’s a help all around.

Their house is a (self-described) matriarchy. They are both intelligent. She enjoys persuading others to her point of view and will use charisma and/or forcefulness as needed. She speaks with speed and volume, and is very quick-paced. Her decisions are self-directed. He is easy-going and conciliatory, speaks softly, has a slower pace. He prefers a more task- than people-oriented experience – and seems to have some attention problems from time to time. I mention their preferred behaviors because it is relevant to the way the whole situation evolved. Both have a tendency to drop details/procedures/rules, whether because (in her case) she is involved in a conversation or (in his case) he’s not really focused on the task at hand.

We have had a couple of misunderstandings before. Once, they were out of communication despite a pre-arranged plan and it meant that John couldn’t go with me to an important event. Another time, she picked the boys up, but then didn’t go back to the house, or didn’t answer her cell phone, or return my call. By the time I got home from work, I was in a near-panic. She had taken them to McDonald’s and was using the playground to keep them occupied while she worked on reports. Once, she said she was going to take care of dinner for the boys; Ben told me that dinner was pretzels and rice-cakes. I fed him dinner when he got home, just before he went to bed. More recently, I got nose to nose with her in order to try to convince her not to go into attack mode at the school (that doesn’t fly here in Georgia – people here would feel battered and abused by that – and we finally talked about strategy on some issues she had with the school policies). I can be aggressive and persuasive too – but it is a challenge even for me to get a word in edgewise if she’s on a rant. These little things have gotten smoothed out, but there is a bit of a pattern.

There has been a lot of pleasant time too. It’s nice to have a girlfriend nearby, and we met when we were both trying to finish Ph.D.s while caring for small children. She can be very charming and interesting company, and she gave me some professional advice just the other day that was very helpful. He has helped me with a couple of things around the house – installing a dimmer switch, fixing my speakers, etc., and I enjoy talking with him, too. So – all in all – it’s not exactly an easy friendship between the families, but it’s been a fairly good one.

Yesterday, they offered to take Ben in the afternoon and keep him for a sleepover. John and I had planned to catch a movie. My understanding was that they were going swimming at their friend’s house – I (mistakenly) thought that this was at a house on their street, a place we had already seen and that we knew. Then, the boys would play, have dinner, have the sleepover, and I’d come to pick him up in the morning.

John and I didn’t end up going out. We couldn’t agree on a movie. There weren’t any films playing that we both wanted to see. So we rented “Paycheck” (which was fine except for the completely gratuitous car chases and such) and had a relaxing evening at home.

At about 9:45, we got a call from the husband. They were just checking to see if we were home yet, because Ben was saying that he would rather just come home instead of having the sleepover. In an offhand way, he mentioned that they were still at the friend’s house. It was really too chilly to swim very much in the pool, so they went on paddle-boats in the lake. Now they were sitting around a fire roasting marshmallows.

I guess I kind of froze. I didn’t process what he was saying right away. I just said that we were here, and they could drop Ben off on their way home. I didn’t even ask to speak to Ben. I did ask if Ben was unhappy about something, but he said no – Ben just said he missed us and wanted to spend the night at his own house.

When I got off the phone, a kind of sick feeling in my stomach started. I thought they were around the block. They’re at a lake? Where is this lake? Paddle-boats? Were there life preservers? It’s almost ten at night, and I don’t know where my 7-year old son is, but he’s not around the corner having a sleepover with a friend.

John and I talked for a while about this. Maybe it became too big a thing. I’m not sure.

Anyway, I ended up calling back to ask if they were on their way. They weren’t. The kids were watching tv inside the house, the adults were still outside. I asked where exactly they were – a town maybe 10 miles or so from here.

So then I said that we were a little upset about this. My understanding was that they were swimming at their friend’s house this afternoon. I thought they would be at their house, and that by now Ben would be asleep. We really needed to give permission for a trip out somewhere else, especially if it involved any kind of boat on a lake. Also, it was too late for him to be out at a stranger’s house. I said that really wasn’t cool with us. We needed always to know where exactly Ben was. In future, if plans change, we really needed to be kept informed so that we could decide if the new plans were ok with us.

He said sure, he could understand, ok. They were headed back now.

At 11, they finally arrived. I was waiting on the front steps when they drove up. Both boys were asleep in the back seat. Ben was barefoot and still wearing a swimsuit. I ushered him into the house – told him to get into his pjs and get into bed. We agreed that John should stay inside because he was very angry and he tends to say things he would regret later. Ben went right to him, and they headed over to Ben’s room.

I wasn’t planning on saying much. I thought it would be better to discuss it the next day, but she went on the offensive. What’s the big deal? She had told me she was going swimming at their friends’ house. The boys were with them. It was fine.

Well, my understanding was that Ben was around the corner. I repeated that John and I have to grant permission for outings, especially if they involve water. I didn’t hear anything about staying out until 11 at night at an unknown location.

She argued that it wasn’t her fault if I didn’t realize it was a different friend than I had assumed. She said that they love Ben and he had a great time and they were with him. She intimated that I was questioning her trustworthiness. I said it wasn’t a matter of trust – if we didn’t trust them, Ben wouldn’t be out with them at all. We just needed to know where Ben was – all the time – and it was our parental job to decide whether or not to grant permission for his activities outside the house.

She said I was over-reacting. They were just over a friend’s house and decided to stay.

I said that the bottom-line is just that this is my kid, and this is my rule. I need to know where he is, and I need to give permission for changes in plan.

She started to argue some more – and I finally raised my voice and said, “Look, that’s it. It’s non-negotiable. These are the conditions under which my son goes anywhere without one of us.”

She said “you are so mean” and shouted at her husband to get back in the car. They took off.

I came back inside the house, tucked Ben into bed. He was cold and sleepy so I cuddled with him for a few minutes until he dozed off again. John and I stayed up and tried to process what happened. He finally went to sleep, but I was up until about almost four with a moderate amount of anxiety. I kept getting up and pacing, going outside. I was very thirsty. When I would get back into bed, I felt very tense and uncomfortable, and I would get up again. I felt like I needed to go outside to get enough oxygen. I didn’t have heart palpitations or anything like that, but there was a physical side to it. I’m guessing it was probably just adrenaline. It wasn’t really anger, but really kind of a somewhat panicky anxiety. I was finally able to relax by listening to music on my iPod and distracting myself so that I would stop thinking about it. Unfortunately, I woke up at the same time as always and couldn’t go back to sleep.

I don’t think I handled the situation very well. Part of why that might have been is that once I realized that Ben was off somewhere and I didn’t even know where he was or all of the people he was with, I felt like I had been a dangerously irresponsible parent and felt overwhelming fear and guilt. How could it be that I’m sitting in my house late at night and my son wants to come home and I don’t even know where he is to go pick him up?

It wasn’t unexpected that she would have gone on the offensive, and I am also somewhat predictable in not allowing myself to be bullied into compliance with anyone or anything. I knew that would be a problem, which is why I spoke to the husband about my concerns first. I should probably have just said a firm “good night” and discussed it at another time when I wasn’t so… well… freaked.

John pointed out that we would have handled it completely differently if we had their kid with us. First of all, if we said we were going somewhere to swim for a couple of hours in the afternoon, we would have told them where it was. If we decided to stay for dinner, we would have called to say there’s a change in plans, etc. Being out on a boat in a lake, being out at someone else’s house in another town, keeping the kids out (and up) just isn’t something it would occur to us to do when we were taking care of someone else’s kid.

The other thing is the practical side of the matter. In a way, it would be just as easy just to cut things off – they can get to be a bit draining at times. I really like them, but sometimes it’s kind of intense. On the other hand, the boys really like each other, and there aren’t many other children in the neighborhood. Their kid will be clamoring to see Ben starting about… now. Last night had an air of finality, but they adore their kid and it’s going to be hard to deny him. Also, their schedule is very unpredictable at times and I think they rely on us in ways that will be very inconvenient for them to have to cover in some other way. And I do like them, even if it is sometimes difficult. I suspect that she is escalating still (“working herself into a tizzy” is John’s description), but I’m also guessing that there will be some attempted contact within the next couple of days. The problem is, it will probably still be in attack mode, and I’m not going to be able to deal with that very well if it is.

This is one of those occasions when I would be really good at giving perspective and advice – if only it weren’t me. I am too close to the situation, and my maternal protective mode is in overdrive.

So I’m asking you – especially parents – to tell me anything that occurs to you as you read this. It will give me a way to bracket and look at it from different sides. I would really appreciate your thoughts and advice.

Perspective? Comments? Suggestions?

Republican Culture of Corruption: 2007 So Far is a pretty good list – see any themes?

On this Larry Craig scandal in particular, I’m struck again by how destructive it is when people cannot accept themselves for who they are. There is a strange doubling of the personality. People talk about hypocrisy, but it’s worse than that. It’s worse because it’s a deeper problem than just “not walking the talk.”

People who share the traits that you find irritating in yourself are the most irritating of all, aren’t they? I have a nervous giggle sometimes. I used to have to meditate on Scully from X-Files before giving lectures so that I could be professional about it. If I was around someone else who also giggled when they were nervous, it would be an almost unbearable experience. Even now, when the laughter is a softer thing (it morphed away from the Woody Woodpecker/Horshack sound of my childhood) it is still incredibly irritating to me from time to time – and probably to other people, too. I’ve tried to come to terms with this part of me that I personally find so unattractive. I’m still working on accepting it – and I’ve found the more I accept it, the less intrusive and harsh it becomes – and the less it bothers me when others do the same thing. The more I hated it, the worse it became.

I’ve never understood why sexuality seems to be the most important hot-button issue to so many Americans. We’re a schizophrenic culture in that way – Puritan, and yet… the guests on Jerry Springer. When we have a more realistic and healthier view of sexuality, things are better all around. If you track the relationships between power, religion and sexuality…. more on that another time.

Suffice to say, when you deeply reject part of yourself, the part of you that is rejected becomes more and more important – and darker and more looming. I’m familiar with this dynamic in another way too – it’s a really big problem among Jehovah’s Witnesses. More people are disfellowshipped because of sexual behavior than for any other reason, and at the same time domestic abuse and pedophilia are in some ways hidden and protected. It says a lot about the dynamics of belief-systems and their effects on real people.

It’s interesting that so many high-profile “virtuous” people split out to a seamy side. Jungian therapy would be a good thing… get creative about self-integration.

It’s really no big surprise to me that some of the people who are most focused on being anti-gay are actually repressed homosexuals. And it’s no surprise that some of the big “family values” people are so fond of prostitutes. The more stake you have in appearing to be something you can’t really ever be, the more that the parts of you that you can’t accept come back to haunt you – and it’s always in a darker and darker guise. The return of the repressed.

Larry Craig insists he’s not gay. It’s implausible, I think, but it’s also a measure of how deeply he rejects himself that he takes such an unwise strategy. On the other hand, it really bothers me that he’s being railroaded not because of criminal behavior, but because of sexual behavior. I find it disturbing that homosexual behavior becomes an automatic witch hunt, and all the joking I see is in very poor taste. Is this really what elections should be about anyway? Look at all of the other issues in the list I linked at the beginning.

It really bothered me at the time that Mark Foley could be claimed to have lost the election for the Republicans – not the war? economic policy? any of the other important issues?

Moms mobilize because their children are exposed to lead paint on their Chinese import toys. Good – great – we need mobilized moms! How about holding this government responsible for cutting the funding for the inspectors? What about the issue of child labor in China? Only American kids matter, then?

People in Atlanta have gotten really, really worked up about Michael Vick’s actions. Yeah, he’s a thug. I wish more American athletes were less like pond scum. Yeah, it’s terrible how the dogs were mistreated. But do we see this reaction to American torture policies? Should we put dogs in the cells so that Americans will care?

Americans are exhibiting more and more hysteria and mob behaviors.

We will only get what we deserve if we can’t stop and think and get our priorities straight.