Losing Faith in Humanity

I'm not sure how much more of the nightly news I can handle. Tonight all of the local news stations reported on a little girl who wrote an essay and won a trip to New York for a Hannah Montana makeover and concert tickets. She wrote a heart wrenching story about how her father was killed in Iraq on April 17th and her mom was the best and she wanted her mom to have a special holiday and winning this trip would really make their holiday better. So, she wins the contest and the little girl and her mother go to New York to live it up for free and get what every 8 year old girl wanted for Christmas - to see Hannah Montana. The little girl was being interviewed by a local reported and asked about the essay she'd written about her dad being killed. She just stood there like a deer in head lights as you see her mother run in from the background to pull her away saying that she did not want her daughter discussing the incident. (Not that it matters, but this mother looked totally shady). I guess someone got suspicious and did a little investigation and come to find out there was only one soldier killed in Iraq on April 17th and it was someone with no relation to their family. There are so many things wrong with this situation. 1. There is a good possibility that this little girl had nothing to do with that letter at all and it was all her mother's idea. What a great lesson to teach your daughter: Lie and take advantage of the good nature of others to get what you want. 2. If she did have her daughter write that letter she should be sentenced to a stoning by all the children that actually have lost their father's in Iraq. (I know I run the risk of sounding like Bill O'Reilly here), but that is such a disrespectful and insulting thing to lie about. This woman is despicable. I'm sure all of the children that did lose their fathers this year have other things on their minds besides Hannah Montana anyway. It's parents like this that make me want to quit teaching.

The next story on the nightly news started like this, "A warning tonight: don't buy ground beef from the side of the road." Are there really that many idiots that would do that that we need to run this story? I think I'll just stick to the reruns of Seinfeld and Scrubs at 5, 6, and 10 from now on.