When I began this blog in 2001, I was appalled by President Bush's headlong rush to an illegal war (we were not in fact under attack). As time wore on and Bush began his assault on the Constitution and any people bold enough to criticize, I believed that "the republic is endangered more by actions of our own government than by those of any terrorist." With the election of a high-minded, compassionate, intelligent man like Barack Obama, my fears have ceased.
"Honor them with peace, not war"
United for Peace
Great president
Traveling in a wild region of the Caucasus, the Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy was befriended by a devout Circassian chief who wanted to hear about the world outside his mountains.
After Tolstoy went on at length about the powerful leaders of Europe, the chief insisted: "But you have not told us about the greatest general and ruler of the world. We want to know something about him. He was a hero. He spoke with a voice of thunder, he laughed like the sunrise, his deeds were strong as the rock and sweet as the fragrance of roses.
"He was so great that he even forgave the crimes of his greatest enemies and shook brotherly hands with those who had plotted against his life. His name was Lincoln and the country in which he lived is called America. Tell us of that man."
--quoted by Richard Lederer
I could never say say such things about President Bush.
Palema
8:33 PM
Mortgage defaults surge in NYC
The number of low- and moderate-income families in the New York metropolitan region who are seriously behind on their mortgage payments is soaring, according to new federal and city data and housing experts...
...The increase in the number of homeowners in default on federally insured loans for one- to four-family homes -- defined as 90 days behind on their monthly mortgage payments ? is occurring across the nation, the federal data show, with the rate more than doubling in the last decade.
--NY Times, 3/27/02
Palema
6:06 AM
We need to help kids develop effective filtering and software systems that will reside in the hardware that sits upon their shoulders..,
Nancy Willard, director of the Center for Advanced Technology in Education at the University of Oregon, quoted in the N.Y.TimesMonday.
Willard was objecting to federal legislation requiring schools and libraries to use internet filters on their computers.
Palema
7:17 AM
We're no safer now than we were Sept. 10
Most of the pawing and groping, the peering at shoes and the breaking of fingernail files is farcical. The farce descends into madness when cretins want to strip-search a 79-year-old nun with a hip replacement and confiscate a Medal of Honor from an 80-year-old war hero (and former governor). None of this stuff is going to stop a determined hijacker who has checked baggage with a bomb in it and boarded the plane.
--Andrew Greeley in the Chicago Sun Times 3/22/02
Palema
10:54 AM
Cheney...
Is Dick Cheney Dead Yet?" is the lighthearted domain aname for a blog I came across today. A good deal of the news consists of updates like " Nope not dead yet."
It brightened my day.
Palema
5:13 PM
Bush Watch So as Bush declares his lack of concern about Osama bin Laden while rushing off to plan nuking Iraq in the fullness of conservatism triumphant, the most obvious response is that this conservatism's economic and moral justification has already been revealed as fraudulent. The complete truth may well be that we're witnessing the systemic mental illness of the American wealthy classes...
I thought Bush is an idiot; I thought Harvard and Yale ought to be ashamed of themselves for giving him degrees. But now they're saying he's mentally ill! Does this mean he'll have job protection under the ADA?
Palema
12:11 PM
It is better to marry than to burn.
That was the opinion of St. Paul, writing to a fledgling church in Corinth.
... It is good for a man not to touch a woman. Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.... .
--I Corinthians 8:1-2
... But if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn
--I Corinthians 8:9
The Catholic Church, reeling under the scandal coming to light of many priests sexually abusing young people in their parishes, probably ought to listen to this piece of St. Paul's advice, though it's not clear to me that married abusers are more restrained than unmarried ones. It is said that most case of priest abuse deal not with young children but with boys in their early teens.
The Rev. Stephen Rossetti, a priest and psychologist who is one of the Church's authorities on the issue, believes the Church doesn't have a greater incidence of sex abuse than any other group of adult men who deal with young people. "There are about 40,000 active priests in the United States. I think if you took 40,000 male basketball coaches and scout leaders, the rates would be similar," he said. "That's my clinical opinion, but I have no data to support that because there aren't any." He's just guessing/hoping.
Whether or not the Church has a greater incidence, it does have a bigger problem. Priests are held to a different, higher standard. Priests have taken a vow of celibacy, which coaches and scout leaders have not. Priests purport to be moral counselors, which coaches and scout leaders do not (though they may toss in their own moral views along with practical instruction).
Absolute power corrupts absolutely
Catholic Church is guilty of a tremendous abuse of power. I think the Catholic Church has a bigger problem with sex abuse and/or pedophiles than a protestant church with the same number would, because it insists on itself as mediator of God's Word, whereas Protestant churches expect ministers to give guidance, not pronouncements. When your soul is at stake in the Catholic Church, you'd better do what your priest says; not necessarily so in a Protestant church, where you have the responsibility of exercising your own judgment. If it is hard for a child to say 'no' to an adult in authority, how can he say 'no' to God?In the U.S., the Catholic Church claims special protection of The Constitution and avoids taxation and many regulations that apply to other organizations. To protect its own reputation and authority, it has used this Constitutional protection to avoid publicity. Even now that the scandal has been made public, numerous bishops are refusing to turn over names to prosecutors; instead they claim the right to decide themselves whether there is a viable criminal case.
The Catholic Church strives mightily to influence public policy in a number of areas touching on moral concerns, yet won't tolerate public scrutiny. It is thus guilty of a double standard, perhaps a result of forgetting that the Church is not God.
- Notes.
- For stories on other churches' problems, see the Detroit News religion page.
- I realize that the remarks above may seem anti-Catholic to some people, and if so, I apologize. This web log concerns itself with questions of abuse of power and is mostly directed toward the U.S. Government. In this matter, however, we have a strong instance of abuse of power, and I claim the right to discuss it in an otherwise political arena since it involves questions of public policy and how this private and protected entity deals with those questions.
Palema
8:08 AM
Moore or less....
Michael Moore vs. the Police... the cops didn't come off as abusive, but rather as matter-of-fact and straight-forward. They didn't act like they were there to arrest droves of people for trespassing. I understand that some people, hearkening back to the days of the Civil Rights movement or more recently the Seattle protests, would probably have been willing to be arrested.
However, such a sentiment is laughably misplaced here. It's one thing to get arrested for illegally occupying a location as a form of protest -- you're fighting for equal rights, or an end to apartheid, or against the exploitation of globalism. Those are noble causes. What cause would someone have been arrested for on Friday night?
The right to have some famous guy scribble his name on their book.
That's not a noble cause. That's not a progressive cause. That's the kind of non-cause that young neo-liberals look at as a major infringement on their rights, while not giving a whit about the working conditions of the blue-collar janitor who wants to go home at a reasonable hour. Yes, we all cheered for the San Diego unions fighting for workplace rights for janitors and printing press operators, but when push comes to shove, we want that celebrity's autograph!
--Kynn Bartlett
I have friends who are big Moore fans, members of or sympathizers with the Greens. While I agree with many of their points, I think they are terribly misguided in their actions. Don't they know how easy it would be to take over the Democratic Party -- and win some elections?
The party was opened up to primaries inthe 70s. It takes a little work, as any election campaign does, but really no more for the outsiders than for the insiders.
But no, they prefer to stand on the outside complaining, like a child whining in the rain that it's getting wet, instead of coming inside, or grabbing a raincoat.
Kinda pisses me off.
Palema
5:07 PM
Some Republicans troubled by enforcement of 'patriotism' (aka Keep your mouth shut)
Patriotism is a learned behavior, sort of. It is learned in the sense that it is not something innate. .... It comes upon us in the same way that the flu virus comes upon us. Only it is more debilitating.
--R.C. Sproul, The Trouble with Flag-Wavers
...Republicans are not in the mood to answer critics. We're bomb-lobbing for Uncle Sam, mom and apple pie. Who could disagree? At the root, that's the rub. You can't disagree; at least, not without coming off like some sort of grade-A, America-hating jackass.
...Said G.K. Chesterton in The Defendant:'My country, right or wrong,' is a thing that no patriot would think of saying. It is like saying, 'My mother, drunk or sober'— a line that, when fitted for Bush, has special merit.
--Joe Miller, My War, Drunk or Sober
The quotes above are taken from writings of conservatives who believe down to their socks that big government is bad and that liberals demand adherence to a certain line of thought while conservatives are free thinkers, and must have suffered some cognitive dissonance before they sorted things out. (In my view, there are sheep and thinkers on all sides)
GOP responses to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle's questions about Bush foreign policy did not reply on point, but rather chastised him for asking. [Trent Lott: How dare Sen. Daschle criticize President Bush while we are fighting our war on terrorism, especially when we have troops in the field? ] . Such responses delight the sheep conservatives but have the thinking conservatives worried. They immediately see the conflict with their views and are not afraid to say so.
In reading the columns quoted above, I find myself disagreeing with their views on other topics, but not on this, as Sproul said: if you don’t want to be free, do nothing, and think nothing. If the government wants your opinion, they’ll give it to you.
Palema
5:44 AM
Far-flung crash debris a mystery
CNN.com - Transcripts ...the FBI and the state police here have confirmed that have they cordoned off a second area about six to eight miles away from the crater here where plane went down. This is apparently another debris site, which raises a number of questions. Why would debris from the plane -- and they identified it specifically as being from this plane -- why would debris be located 6 miles away. Could it have blown that far away. It seems highly unlikely. Almost all the debris found at this site is within 100 yards, 200 yards, so it raises some question....
This is from a transcript of a newscast that aired Sept. 13, 2001. I don't know if there were updates clarifying why there was crash debris so far afield. If any readers have seen an explanation of this, I'd be interested too.
Thanks to Tom McAlister from Taxpayers Bridge for the head's up!
Palema
5:32 PM
Le Jeu des 7 Erreurs
All is not well with the Government Truth Machine
Pentagon Game: Hunt the Boeing and test your perceptions!
Take a look at these photographs and try to find evidence to corroborate the official version. It's up to you to Hunt the Boeing!
-- L'Asile utopique
Thank you to France, which has often been our friend, for questioning the Official Line.Here is another indication that our government is lying to us. [Our newspapers and our Congress are such wimps about this, it's amazing. Whatever is happening, it is not a 'defence of freedom' because freedom is already gone.]
The Pentagon explosion was a good idea of the Bush gang, in that it made the World Trade Center attack seems more like an attack on the U.S. What was not a good idea was the whole 'terrorist' rationale to bombing Afghanistan in order to secure oil rights for Texas. It's my feeling that if Texas wants to go to war to futher its economic goals, it ought first to secede from the Union -- they've been wanting to do this for some time, and I agree it's a good idea! -- and then do what ever they want on their own. Then the US stands a far better chance of installing a rational, even possibly peace-loving, president.
I wouldn't mind saying good by to Florida either. We could make Puerto Rico and Guam into states; then we wouldn't have to waste all those flags with 50 stars on them. See, I've thought of everything!
Palema
6:12 AM
One Toke Over the Harvard Line?
Washingtonpost.com
Here's a vignette we're dying to see on the ABC broadcast of Sunday's Ford's Theatre Presidential Gala: When Stevie Wonder sat down at the keyboard center stage, President Bush in the front row got very excited. He smiled and started waving at Wonder, who understandably did not respond. After a moment Bush realized his mistake and slowly dropped the errant hand back to his lap. "I know I shouldn't have," a witness told us yesterday, "but I started laughing."
--Lloyd Groves, Washington Post
Palema
6:48 PM
Sen. Wellstone
I sent an email to Sen. Wellstone in Minnesota and got a nice email back.
Palema
6:22 PM
responsible for the ocean
Yeat's poem The Second Coming seems as true today as it did in 1919 when published. Read these lines:
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Yeats produced the idea, utterly novel in its time and still something to be reckoned with, that evil is mundane, that is, it does not arise from some extraordinary force (like the devil) but arises from ordinary people and circumstances failing to work at being good, fromfailing to pay attention.
We keep telling ourselves how good we are and blind ourselves to the harm we create in the world. This is characteristic of people and governments. It is entirely an understandable thing to do, and yet --if we want really to be moral beings -- we must not do that.
Instead we must confront ourselves, confront the meanings and implications of our own actions. We must struggle to make ourselves aware of the impact we have on other people and on our surroundings.
The U.S. Navy used to have a saying You're responsible for your own wake. It's a response to the question, 'Whaddam I, in charge of the whole ocean?' The answer is yes. Being responsiblefor your own wake is the minimum to be expected from each of us. The world might be in better shape if each of us expanded our responsiblity to cover more of the ocean. We can't sit around hoping that possibly God will handle this and it's not our problem. A trap that belief in god lays for people is that they often expect, indeed have faith that god will work things out for the best in the end.
I say to all you believers: If you want to go to heaven, you'd better get busy and start taking some of the burden off god's shoulders. It's obvious that he either can't handle the job, or didn't ever consider it part of his job description. You wonder sometimes what your purpose in life is? Maybe this is it. Now don't start trying to clean up other people's behavior first. Start sweeping your own side of the street, as they say. Once you are perfect, you can start working on the rest of us. :-)
Now, as for non-believers: if there is no god to do this work, it's up to you. Same thing. Get busy.
Read the rest of Yeats' poem.
Palema
6:14 AM
test post
OK, just checking this out... it doesnt look right to me
Palema
3:20 PM
Copyright © 2001-03 Pam Shorey
(except the specific sources credited in quotes)
|
|