Month: May 2005

  • TUESDAY POLITICS

    In the spirit of peace activism, as represented yesterday by Thich Nhat Hanh, this morning I discovered an activist I’d never heard of before – John Dear. I was noticing that no one seemed to have read the article I linked to at the end of yesterday’s post, so I thought I’d post it right out here in my blog today because I liked it so much. Upon looking up more about its author, I found that John Dear is a Jesuit priest and the author/editor of 20 books on peace and nonviolence, including most recently, “The Questions of Jesus” and “Living Peace” (both from Doubleday). He is currently organizing a demonstration at Los Alamos, New Mexico for August 6th, Hiroshima Day. For his web site, click here. It would seem this young man, a native of North Carolina, has been arrested over 75 times in acts of nonviolent civil disobedience and has organized hundreds of demonstrations against war and nuclear weapons at military bases around the country. Here is another article about him, and here is his prayer:

    God of peace, bless the mass murderers who organize the deaths of millions of your suffering people from Iraq, Afghanistan, and Palestine to Haiti, Sudan and Colombia, who ignore the cry of the poor from Africa to Latin America, who heed the voice of the superrich, who lead the world toward the brink of destruction, specifically, namely, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and their killers, these modern day Caesars and Pilates who crucify the world’s poor.

    Bless all those in the U.S. imperial forces, the Joint Chiefs, the generals, the commanders, the bombers, the bombmakers, the pilots, the obedient soldiers, the recruiters, the marines, the torturers, the CIA agents, all who kill, who promote killing, who organize the killing, who order the killing, who fund the killing, all servants of death.

    Bless all murderers and warmakers around the world, all who blow people up, who use violence for revolution or political gain, all who profit from war, all the corporate billionaires and their lawyers.

    Bless those morally retarded, possessed, law abiding, obedient citizens who build and maintain nuclear weapons at Los Alamos, Livermore Labs, Oak Ridge, and elsewhere. Bless those who guard the nuclear bunkers, manage them, and prepare to push the button.

    Bless the executioners on death row, the judges who sentence people to death, the lawyers and prosecutors who legalize murder.

    Bless all Wall Street brokers and bankers and businessmen and corporate executives who reap a profit off the poverty, misery, squalor, hunger and death of the world’s poor.

    Bless all the brutalized and brutalizing in prisons, all police officers, FBI agents, immigration agents, marshals, prison guards, sheriffs, and law officers who hurt and imprison your victimized people.

    Bless all the senators, congress people, governors and Chief Justices who run the American empire which crushes and kills people everywhere.

    Bless all racists, all sexist men, all who hurt children, all who refuse to love, all who shut people out, all who dehumanize others, and all the pharmaceutical and insurance company managers who oppose universal healthcare, who prevent free medicine from healing those with AIDS and HIV.

    Bless the editors, reporters, news anchors and advertisers who run the media which supports the culture of war, who publish the myths, tell the lies and announce the bad news, who look for profit instead of searching for truth.

    Bless those who destroy the earth, who bulldoze the rain forests, who run the logging companies, who steal the oil, who pollute the air, poison the oceans, hunt your creatures, destroy the ozone, operate nuclear power plants, radiate your land, risk global warming and spread the plague of cancer through their nuclear industries.

    Bless all the empire’s chaplains who honor the forces of war with your name, all the mean priests, bully ministers, law and order bishops, cardinals and popes who love power more than you, who punish and condemn, who refuse to welcome and forgive, who seek control and domination instead of your reign of justice, equality and peace.

    Forgive them. They know not what they do.

    May we all resist the structures of violence and makers of war.

    May we all be converted to the wisdom of nonviolence, compassion and disarmament.

    May we all one day be blessed with the gift of your peace, a new world without war, hunger, poverty, injustice or nuclear weapons. Amen.

    Deep Thought: “Too bad Lassie didn’t know how to ice skate, because then if she was in Holland on vacation in winter and someone said “Lassie, go skate for help,” she could do it.”
    Today I am grateful for: Minutes
    Guess the Movie: “I ain’t draft dodging. I ain’t burning no flag. I ain’t running to Canada. I’m staying right here. You want to send me to jail? Fine, you go right ahead. I’ve been in jail for 400 years. I could be there for 4 or 5 more, but I ain’t going no 10,000 miles to help murder and kill other poor people. If I want to die, I’ll die right here, right now, fightin’ you, if I want to die. You my enemy, not no Chinese, no Vietcong, no Japanese. You my opposer when I want freedom. You my opposer when I want justice. You my opposer when I want equality. Want me to go somewhere and fight for you? You won’t even stand up for me right here in America, for my rights and my religious beliefs. You won’t even stand up for me right here at home.” Answer: Ali, 2001. Winner: fashionaddict786.
    World’s Computers Infected by Racist Spam from German Neo-Nazi Party
    by Doug Ireland
    If you’ve been getting e -mails with subject lines like “Bloody Self-Justice,” “Multi-Kulturel=Multi-Kriminell,” or Turkey in the EU — with a short message saying “read for yourself” and links you’re supposed to follow — then you’re the victim of a Sober.Q worm sent to infect your computer by the NPD (German National Party), a neo-Nazi, anti-Semitic party that has scored heavily in some parts of the country by preaching racist, anti-immigrant xenophobia. So reports Der Spiegal Online this morning. This brown-shirted worm is attacking computers all over the planet. (This actually happened to me on my work computer. Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: 9:01 pm
    + = Glad the prayer got passed along by some of you.
    - = Hard to be at work these days.

  • MONDAY BOOK

    The Sutra on the Eight Realizations of the Great Beings

    It’s a tiny book that sits on the shelf above me and when I’m feeling especially in need of a little guidance I take it down to remind myself of its gentle message. It’s so small you can read it here online. Thich Nhat Hanh (pronounced tick-naught-han) provides the commentary to this version. He was only 16 when he joined the monkhood in Vietnam. Now he is 77 and one of the most popular Buddhist leaders in the world. He’s also a poet, a teacher and a master in Zen Buddhism, blending the Theravada and Mahayana traditions of an Eastern religion that dates back 2,500 years and emphasizes human transcendence over the traditional Western concept of God. He has built a worldwide reputation for his devotion to the pursuit of peace and his adherence to the spiritual practice of mindfulness. He was exiled from his native Vietnam decades ago for his anti-war efforts and now spends much of his time at his main monastery, called Plum Village, in southern France. Here is my own breakdown of the eight realizations:

    1. Everything changes.
    2. All pain comes from wanting something.
    3. The simpler the better.
    4. Spiritual growth takes work.
    5. Pay attention with an open mind.
    6. Practice generosity to everyone.
    7. Let go and let god.
    8. Be of service.

    Deep Thought: “If you ever discover that what you’re seeing is a play within a play, just slow down, take a deep breath, and hold on for the ride of your life.”
    Today I am grateful for: Mercy
    Guess the Movie: “Look, I’ve read all the books. I know that in 10 years we’ll be bosom friends with the Germans and the Japanese. Then I’ll be pretty annoyed that I was killed. “ Answer: The Young Lions, 1958. Winner: Silverthorn.
    A Prayer for Our Persecutors
    by John Dear
    “Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you.” (Matthew 5:43)
    “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” (Luke 6:28)
    A few weeks before he died in 2002, the great peace activist Philip Berrigan was asked what we could do about George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and the U.S. warmakers.
    “We have to do two things,” he answered. “We have to pray for them and resist them.” (Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: 8:46 pm
    + = My grandson, GeneralHog has just started his own blog.
    - = Found the dead mouse stuck behind a bookcase today.

  • PEOPLE WHO KNOCK ME OUT
    (See sidebar for others)

    Florence Wald (1917-present)

    A little over 20 years ago I started working at the hospital where I still work part-time today. There were four doctors in my department and all of us were about the same age. Two weeks ago, one of them came into the office on a Friday and announced that his doctor had ordered him to stop working. That weekend he went into the ICU and never came out. It turns out he’d had a rare blood disorder the last 7 years of his life and had kept it so low-key that I was unaware he was sick until this past year. It was quite a shock to me, the first time someone I knew that well and who was close to my age just up and died. It’s been kind of a gloomy few weeks for me since then and I’ve had dying on my mind more than I would have ever wished. So I picked someone to write about today who did something about it.

    Standing five feet tall at 88 years old, this is the person who founded the hospice movement in America. Her name is Florence Wald. She was born in New York City and began her nursing career at the Henry Street Settlement there and served in the Signal Corps in World War II. By the late 1950’s, she became aware of an Englishwoman named Cicely Saunders who was writing articles in medical journals about end-of-life care. By 1963, she was Dean of Yale University School of Nursing when Saunders was invited to give her first talk on hospice care in this country. Wald invited her to speak to the nursing students and faculty. Saunders described the core of hospice treatment today: generous control of symptoms; attention to the patient’s psychological and spiritual needs; care and support for the family as well as the patient. Florence Wald was so inspired that she resigned her deanship at Yale and started working with a small group in New Haven toward founding the first hospice program in the United States. Connecticut Hospice would treat its first patients in 1974. Today the Hospice Movement is taken for granted pretty much anywhere you live. Medicare began to cover it in 1982. Medicaid covers it in most states. Most private insurance companies cover it. You can find out pretty much anything about it here. My old friend, the doctor, went fast and in the hospital, but for many the end of life takes longer. Thanks to Florence Wald, families have a resource today to help them all make this journey as peacefully as possible.

    Deep Thought: “I wish I had a dollar for every time I spent a dollar, because then, Yahoo!, I’d have all my money back.”
    Today I am grateful for: Melodrama
    Guess the Movie: “You can put a cat in an oven, but that don’t make it a biscuit.” Answer: White Men Can’t Jump, 1992. Winner: thenarrator.
    400 and Counting: IRAQ’s Grim Death Toll for May
    by Trevor Royle, Diplomatic Editor
    “WE don’t do body counts,” was the infamous retort by US general Tommy Franks when he was asked about Iraqi civilian deaths. To date nobody knows the exact figure, but one thing is clear: it is being added to with a relentlessness which is enraging Iraqis and worrying coalition commanders. (Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: Oops forgot to sign out last night.

  • THURSDAY WHATEVER

    Yes that’s a photo of yesterday in Baghdad, the jewel of democracy created by Bush and Co., as our boys respond to yet another car bombing pushing the death toll in less than 2 weeks to more than 400 in this happy land. My Vanity Fair came for June and thank god the editorial by Graydon Carter expressed my sentiments exactly because I’m sure not hearing them expressed anywhere else lately. Here’s an excerpt:

    Excuse me, but what ever happened to the war in Iraq? You remember it, surely. You must – it’s still going on. It is the war that has taken the lives of more than 1550 US troops and an estimated 20,000 Iraqi civilians, and caused life-altering injuries to more than 6,000 other American soldiers and countless more Iraqis…The war is not gone, but, in this land of serial obsessives, it is forgotten. Iraq has been canceled; its 15 minutes are up; it’s so last year…For the more than a quarter of a million brave American souls whom we have sent over there to do our blood work, the war is anything but over. It may have disappeared from the corridors of power and the front pages of the nation’s newspapers, but in Iraq, in brutal heat and living conditions, the conflict grinds on, hour after horrific hour. During the month of March, when the nation’s politicians and news media gorged themselves on the death throes of poor Terri Schiavo, 32 more US troops were killed in Iraq and 362 were wounded. The truth is, we just don’t have the stomach or the attention span for war the way we used to. Which means we should probably get out of the business.

    And I see Bush signed a bill today for $82 billion more to spend on the war. I’m guessing he plans to pay for it out of our Social Security funds and the pension plans lost by United Airlines and others soon to follow. Let’s see what was he doing today when the little plane flew into White House air space – mountain biking? How fun.

    Deep Thought: “Life is a constant battle between the heart and the brain. But guess who wins. The skeleton.”
    Today I am grateful for: Refrigerator magnets
    Guess the Movie: “Who is Keyser Soze? He is supposed to be Turkish. Some say his father was German. Nobody believed he was real. Nobody ever saw him or knew anybody that ever worked directly for him, but to hear Kobayashi tell it, anybody could have worked for Soze. You never knew. That was his power. The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.” Answer: The Usual Suspects, 1995. Winner: cordelia_naismith.
    Suicide Bombers Target Police, Civilian and Military Targets
    By Neil MacDonald
    In Iraq, violence continues as the new government starts discussing a permanent constitution. Insurgents struck at police and military targets in a series of morning attacks, while one suicide car bomber detonated his explosive-packed vehicle in a crowded civilian market. (Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: 8:20 pm
    + = Got my lawn mowed by my very own daughter.
    - = Bad bad experience at work today.

  • WEDNESDAY MOVIE

    The Woodsman

    I’ve been hesitant to review this film (out on DVD) because of its subject matter, but as a Kevin Bacon fan I’d have to say this is his best work yet and really deserves attention. Playing a pedophile who has just been released from prison (the specifics of his crime are never explained though it seems his sister might have been the victim), he gets a job in a factory where he meets a feisty woman (played with gusto by his wife in real life, Kyra Sedgwick) who is drawn to him without knowing his secret. He is hounded by co-workers who find out his status and by a cop with a hatred of child molesters. But the film is not written to make his role sympathetic. It proceeds with careful realism, showing his struggle to stay under the radar in the outside world, not to give in to his instincts, and his antipathy toward his own nature. Don’t worry, you won’t have to watch any actual attacks. What you will see is a tremendous performance and a subject that is currently in our faces on TV pretty much every day in a sensationalized way but here treated with the careful attendance to detail it deserves. If you’re looking for comedy or escape, this isn’t it – if you’re looking for thought-provoking, it is. (And in case you’re interested here is an article about pedophilia – its causes and typologies.)


    Deep Thought: “When I think of all the hours and hours of my life I have spent watching television, it makes me realize, Man, I am really rich with television”
    Today I am grateful for: Lymph glands
    Guess the Movie: “ It’s past ten. My daughter is in pain. I don’t understand why she has to have this pain. All she has to do is hold out until ten, and IT’S PAST TEN! My daughter is in pain, can’t you understand that! GIVE MY DAUGHTER THE SHOT!” Answer: Terms of Endearment, 1983. Winner: AskDennis.
    Apocalypse Soon
    The Risk of inadvertent nuclear launch is unacceptably high
    by Robert S. McNamara
    Robert McNamara is worried. He knows how close we’ve come. His counsel helped the Kennedy administration avert nuclear catastrophe during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Today, he believes the United States must no longer rely on nuclear weapons as a foreign-policy tool. To do so is immoral, illegal, and dreadfully dangerous. (Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: 8:43 pm
    + = June Vanity Fair arrives.
    - = Still cleaning mouse crap out from behind kitchen appliances.

  • (UPDATE 8:23 pm: Thanks everybody for the great discussion and I say Vive la Revolution!)

    TUESDAY POLITICS

    I know it’s been 6 months since the election and politics is pretty much a dead subject here on Xanga, so I expect this will not generate much interest, but I read the remarks below on a forum I visit and thought they were worth sharing. I’ve been getting the definite impression that Hillary Clinton is not only going to run in the next Presidential election but that she may even have a chance of winning. It really pisses me off that when we finally get a woman candidate for this highest office she seems to be selling out to the corporate right just like almost every other politician these days. Maybe I’m wrong – maybe there’s nothing to worry about. Maybe you know something I don’t. Until I hear different, I’m going to be afraid – very afraid.

    The leading and most probable Democratic Presidential candidate for 2008 is Hillary Clinton. She has always been unabashedly pro-Iraq war and occupation. Her move to the redefined center is in other areas.

    Her most notorious retreat is on her previous pro-choice position. Once almost the very symbol of feminism, Hillary has betrayed feminism many times over. Her role as an enabler of Bill’s infidelities was a harbinger of things to come. On 01-24-05, Hillary gave a speech commemorating the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision [01-22-73]. In it, she advocated a goal of reducing the number of abortions to zero. Her solution for teenage pregnancy is celibacy buttressed by “religious and moral values.” How lovely. Bush gave us the faith-based initiative. Hillary plans to give us a faith-based war on teenage pregnancy. She may yet win over the Christian fundamentalists.

    click here

    Many have observed that Hillary, though a controversial figure to some, would potentially capture 50% of the vote at the outset of a Presidential run. Some have even speculated that she won’t run for reelection as Senator in 2006 to prevent having to vote on controversial issues from 2007 through 2008. Everyone who knows her believes she has a blind ambition to become the first female American President.

    click here

    Hillary also seems quite willing to sacrifice civil liberties to protect children and even late teenagers from Internet, TV and videogame sleaze. Decrying media sex and violence seems to be one of her potential wedge issues. Parents unaware of what their children are doing, fearful of what their children are doing and incompetent to monitor their own children may latch onto Hillary like white on rice. If Hillary includes an attack on Hollywood as a major component of her campaign, there will be only one way she can deliver if elected. She will have to agitate for censorship and intrusive electronic devices to spy on people’s viewing habits. For the sake of protecting the family, civil liberties will likely be flushed down the toilet. How is this different from the current administration’s policy of meddling in bedrooms?

    click here

    On the issues of separation of church and State and gay rights, Hillary is useless. Her alleged feminism has always absolutely precluded lesbian issues.

    click here

    One could argue that, as a proponent and the author of her husband’s universal healthcare plan in 1993-94, Hillary could at least give the U.S. better healthcare. She continues to argue that healthcare is a moral imperative. Just one problem. Where’s the money for universal healthcare? It’s tied up in Iraq and the military-industrial complex, both of which Hillary vigorously supports. Hillary rightly criticizes Bush’s humongous national debt and mind-boggling budget deficits. She won’t borrow to provide universal healthcare. Where will the money come from? Who knows? Maybe Hillary will plant money trees in the White House garden.

    Since Hillary is blathering about God, religion and morality lately, I feel entitled to make a moral distinction between her and John Kerry. I’ve criticized Kerry for his shortcomings. His dualism on Iraq was maddening. He said it was the wrong war at the wrong time at the wrong place. He also said he would wage a tougher, smarter war in Iraq than Bush. In December of 2003, when asked about Iraq, he surprisingly said, “Did I expect George Bush to fuck it up as badly as he did? I don’t think anybody did.”

    Okay. It’s delusional for Kerry to think he could get better results in Iraq by waging a tougher, smarter war. But at least Kerry can see that what has happened in Iraq is totally unacceptable. Hillary thinks the Iraq occupation is going reasonably well and the U.S. should stay there for as many years at it takes to complete the mission. That makes Hillary twice as delusional as Kerry. That also makes Hillary twice as acceptable to the mega-corporations seeking new contracts in Iraq or seeking to extend their already existing contracts. Halliburton, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics and all the contractors getting billions of dollars of taxpayer money have no reason to oppose a Hillary Clinton Presidency. Kerry, on the other hand, given his dualism, alleged flip-flopping and basic decency, well, who knows what Kerry would have done if elected? Corporate America isn’t into competition or risk taking. They needed Kerry like they needed a hole in the head. Hillary, on the other hand, would provide a perfect cover for their theft.

    A Hillary Clinton Presidency would be perfect for the mega-corporations in other ways. The hysteria over having a woman President would clog the mainstream media for years and years. The hysterical gossip over how often and with whom Bill, if he’s still alive, was committing infidelities would clog the mainstream media for years and years [Bill’s heart seems even more precarious than Cheney’s]. The hysteria over some cosmetic improvements she would make would clog the mainstream media for years and years. Her very election would exonerate the Bush White House from the lingering charges of electronic ballot fraud in the 2004 election. Howard Dean, apparently already co-opted on the Iraq war issue, would bray about how he engineered a comeback for the Democratic Party.

    What about the Republicans in 2008? For the first time since 1952, neither an incumbent President nor an incumbent Vice President will be a candidate. The Republican candidates will devour each other in the 2008 primaries. That does not bode well for the general election. If the Republican candidate, whoever he is, bashes Hillary too hard, he will only assure that nearly every female vote goes to Hillary. The Republicans and their Christian fundamentalist allies, in general, should be so disgraced by 2008 that Hillary’s election might become more of a coronation.

    Sure, there will be hard-core right-wing extremists and hard-core Christian fundamentalists who will fight against Hillary Clinton as if she were the Devil. But the mainstream of America is willing to vote for her and I predict that corporate America will allow her to win.

    But it will be a hollow victory. Barring unforeseen circumstances, it will be a victory I will not participate in. The game is still rigged.

    As Dennis Kucinich once said:

    “I don’t know why the Democratic Party even exists if it can’t advocate for universal health care and ending the war in Iraq.”

    Deep Thought: “It’s interesting to think that my ancestors used to live in the trees, like apes, until finally they got the nerve to head out onto the plains, where some were probably hit by cars.”
    Today I am grateful for: Luck
    Guess the Movie: “That boy is alive. We are gonna send somebody to find him. And we are gonna get him the Hell… outta there.” Answer: Saving Private Ryan, 1998. Winner: soobee72.
    Democrats and Iraq
    by Marty Jezer
    How many readers recognize the name Tom Hayden? Veterans of the Vietnam Era anti-war movement will likely remember him as an anti-war leader and the author of the “Port Huron Statement,” the idealistic founding statement of Students for a Democratic Society. With Jane Fonda promoting her memoir, younger people may know of him as her second husband, the activist spouse between French movie director Roger Vadim and American media mogul Ted Turner.
    The American public should know about Tom Hayden. Not only was he right in his analysis of the Vietnam War, but also his experience (and books) about community organizing still hold relevance. As an activist writer Hayden spoke with moral clarity. And though he was sometimes a little too militant for my political sensibility, he was willing to promote caution when compromise was necessary. Had Robert F. Kennedy lived to win the 1968 presidential election, Hayden would have been one of his advisors. Hayden subsequently became a Democrat and served in the California legislature until term-limits forced his retirement. (Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: 9:24 pm
    + = turtle_dove visiting for several days – yay!
    - = Recordbreaking rain and that’s saying a lot for Portland, Oregon.

  • PEOPLE WHO KNOCK ME OUT

    Suzanne Valadon (1865-1938)

    First off, the day being not quite over here in rainy Oregon, I’m wishing all xangan mothers a retrospectively lovely day and hope you soaked up some love. Here’s a mother I’d never heard of before who definitely got her share.

    Born in 1865 in France to an unmarried laundress, Suzanne Valadon was a strikingly beautiful girl who became a circus acrobat at 15 and after a fall ended that career took up artist modeling in Paris. She modeled for Degas, Toulouse-Lautrec, and Renoir and had affairs with them all. (Guess which painter did the paintings I posted. The last one is hers.) She also observed their techniques and became an artist herself. She was good enough as a painter to have acclaim and financial success but was overshadowed by her famous son, also born out of wedlock to a father whose identity she never revealed. Her son’s name was Maurice Utrillo. Valadon painted still lifes, floral art, and landscapes but was best known for female nudes. She also did portraits, including one of Erik Satie with whom she had an affair when she was 28. It was the only intimate relationship of his life. The following year she became the first woman admitted to the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts. A perfectionist, she worked for thirteen years on her oil paintings before ever showing them. A free spirit, she was known to wear a corsage of carrots, keep a goat in her studio to “eat up her bad drawings,” and to feed caviar to her “good Catholic” cats on Fridays. At 31 she married a stockbroker but at 44 she left him for the 23-year-old painter, André Utter. She married Utter in 1914 when she was 49, but this marriage too did not last. She died on April 7, 1938 at 73. Amongst those who attended her funeral were her artist friends Andre Derain, Pablo Picasso, and Georges Braque. Today, some of her works can be seen at the Centre Georges Pompidou, in Paris and at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City. Now there’s a woman who must have said (like Molly Bloom) “yes I said yes I will Yes.” Lordy lordy. (Read another blogger’s take on her here.)

    Deep Thought: “If you ever go temporarily insane, don’t shoot somebody, like a lot of people do. Instead, try to get some weeding done, because you’d really be surprised.”
    Today I am grateful for: Being lost and found
    Guess the Movie: “This is where they fought the battle of Gettysburg. Fifty thousand men died right here on this field, fighting the same fight that we are still fighting among ourselves today. This green field right here, painted red, bubblin’ with the blood of young boys. Smoke and hot lead pouring right through their bodies. Listen to their souls, men. I killed my brother with malice in my heart. Hatred destroyed my family. You listen, and you take a lesson from the dead. If we don’t come together right now on this hallowed ground, we too will be destroyed, just like they were. I don’t care if you like each other of not, but you will respect each other. And maybe… I don’t know, maybe we’ll learn to play this game like men.” Answer: Remember the Titans, 2000. Winner: fashionaddict786.
    This Mother’s Day My Mom Wants to Know Where Did my Tax Money Go
    by Marc Pilisuk
    My mother is 97. She is very kind and also very wise. I sent her a necklace for Mother’s day, but she is going to tell me that she doesn’t really need it. Instead she wants to remind me that Mother’s day was started by women who did not want their kids to go to war. She wants to know why the government is trying to turn the very social security system that keeps her going into something of a gamble for her grandchildren and great grandchildren. She suspects that it is because the really big benefits of this scheme will go to Wall Street bankers who are already pretty rich. Now that I managed to file my taxes, I have time for a few questions about what the government is doing with my money. I am seventy-one years old and still working so I can help my mom and also pay for care for my disabled wife to live at home. Naturally, I like to see my government making choices that benefit people with real needs. So I wrote to President Bush and asked him whether any of the programs he is supporting end up in larger returns for people like me, or do they all end up with returns that benefit people who are more like him. (Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: 10:20 pm
    + = All in all, it was an okay Mother’s Day.
    - = Mice in the kitchen and rain in my brain and I can’t believe I’m up this late.

  • FRIDAY FIVE

    Well, it’s meme day anyway, so here’s my answer to the one I got tagged with. The buck stops here though unless you want to respond with your own answers.

    Find five things you could be and complete the sentence on how it would contribute to society:

    1. I could be willing to tell my own story so that some descendent years from now can look back down the stream that has carried them and find perhaps a clue or two to the great mystery of how it all evolves.
    2. I could be a lover of animals, willing to take responsibility for a few and delight from many, and willing to alter some living habits for their sake.
    3. I could be a proactor for my health, diligent in protecting and supporting it so that I may stay here long enough yet to further understand the miracle and be of use.
    4. I could be a student of voluntary simplicity, attempting to lighten the load of material clutter of all sorts in order to see and support the true beauty of life.
    5. I could be an internal traveler, done with outer geography, packed and ready for meetings of the mind.

    Deep Thought: “I’d like to see a nature film where an eagle swoops down and pulls a fish out of a lake, and then maybe he’s flying along, low to the ground, and the fish pulls a worm out of the ground. Now that’s a documentary!”
    Today I am grateful for: Home
    Guess the Movie: “Reagan usually does the driving. Stolen switch car. They leave it running… on the curb. It look sparked from the distance. When they run they dump the vehicle and they vanish… like a virgin on prom night. I mean they vanish, swishh…” Answer: Point Break, 1991. Winner: soobee72.
    New Rule to Open National Forest to Roads
    New Federal Rules Will Open Up to 58.5 Million Acres of National Forestland to Road Building
    by John Heilprin
    The Bush administration, in one of its biggest decisions on environmental issues, moved Thursday to open up nearly a third of all remote national forest lands to road building, logging and other commercial ventures.
    The 58.5 million acres involved, mainly in Alaska and in western states, had been put off limits to development by former President Clinton, eight days before he left office in January 2001. (Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: 9:44 pm
    + = Got an orchid from turtle_dove for Mother’s Day – super!
    - = It’s going to rain on Mother’s Day – rats.

  • THURSDAY WHATEVER

    ZabaSearch

    Just thought you’d like to know how easily anyone can get your address and phone number and a background check. This is a website that provides your name, dob, addy, phone number and even a picture to anyone!

    CLICK HERE.

    This is an easy way to get your ID stolen. If you are on there, send a message to info@zabasearch.com and tell them you want off. They will send you a message telling you how.
    Keep checking and make sure they don’t re-list you.
    And while you’re at it, read this article about ZabaSearch sent by nullwinkle.


    Deep Thought: Whenever someone asks me to define love, I usually think for a minute, then I spin around and pin the guy’s arm behind his back. NOW who’s asking the questions?”
    Today I am grateful for: Laughter
    Guess the Movie: “You think you’re God Almighty, but you know what you are? You’re a cheap, lousy, dirty, stinkin’ mug! And I’m glad what I done to you, ya hear that? I’m glad what I done!” Answer: On the Waterfront, 1954. Winner: thenarrator.
    An Open Letter to Howard Dean
    by Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich
    Dear Chairman Dean,
    Speaking before an ACLU crowd last week in Minnesota, the home state of Paul Wellstone, you were quoted as saying, “Now that we’re there [in Iraq], we’re there and we can’t get out…. I hope the President is incredibly successful with his policy now.” Did these words really come from the same man who claimed to represent the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party, and who had recently campaigned on the antiwar theme? What’s changed? (Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: 8:46 pm
    + = Hey Cinco de Mayo and I completely forgot.
    - = Grey grey day.

  • http://www.lostboysfilm.com/WEDNESDAY MOVIE

    Lost Boys of Sudan
    (Film site)

    Sudan has been engaged in a 20 year civil war between Christian and Muslim sects and an estimated two million lives have been taken. I’m so clueless about the geography of Africa that I had to look up exactly where Sudan is, since the film doesn’t really dwell on the history of this war that caused 26,000 boys to walk hundreds of miles from their villages to safety in a Kenyan refugee camp in the late 1980’s. Typically in African pastoral society, young boys do the daily work of herding a family’s goats and cattle. That’s how thousands of them came to be away from their homes when their villages were attacked and wiped out by military forces of the central government. Bottom line is that these boys, most from the Dinka or Nuer tribes of Southern Sudan, braved lion attacks, militia fire, and the crossing of the River Gilo where thousands drowned, were eaten by crocodiles, or shot. Then after years in the camps, 3600 of them were chosen by aid agencies in 2001 to come to America, where they were scattered around the country to make their way. This is the story of two of them – Peter and Santino – who begin their American adventure in Houston, Texas. Peter eventually moves to Kansas City in an attempt to get the education he couldn’t find in Houston. What was really gripping to me about their story is how they make their way in a world that has no idea what they have survived, how they are treated differently even by African-Americans because their skin is blacker, how the religious community around them deals with their plight, how it might as well be humans from two different planets interacting. Every adolescent feels terminally unique – watch this film to find out what that description really means. Superb.

    Deep Thought: “If you go flying back through time, and you see somebody else flying forward into the future, it’s probably best to avoid eye contact.”
    Today I am grateful for: Kangaroos
    Guess the Movie: “So that’s why everyone around here treats me like some dime-store floozy. They all think I’m screwing the boss. And you just love it, don’t you? It gives you some kind of cheap thrill like knocking over pencils and picking up papers. I’ve put up with all of your pinching, poking, staring and chasing me around the desk because I need this job. But this is the last straw. I’ve got a gun out there in my purse. Up until now I’ve been forgiving and forgetting because of the way I was brought up, but I’ll tell you one thing. If you say another word about me or make another indecent proposal, I’m gonna get that gun of mine and I’m gonna change you from a rooster to a hen with one shot. And don’t think I can’t do it. ” Answer: Nine to Five, 1980. Winner: AskDennis.
    Peace in Sudan: Good News for People or Oil Companies?
    by Frida Berrigan
    The new year brought a whisper of good news. In the first week of January, Sudanese rebels and the Khartoum government signed a pact ending one of Africa ‘s longest wars. Since 1983, more than two million people have died, and another four million have fled their homes in fighting that pitched North against South. (Rest of article here.)
    End of Day: 8:51 pm
    + = Attended my granddaughter’s 3rd grade play – what a smash hit!
    - = Cats brought a mouse in early this morning (3:30 am) and now it’s somewhere in the house…stay tuned.