November 24, 2007 archive

Pony Party: Whatever Edition

I am thematically challenged today. Those who know me well would say that is nothing new. Sometimes I turn floundering into an art form.

I have to thank Ek for putting excerpts of Cyrano in Hollow Stars Gazette. It has reminded that it is time to re-read Anna Karenina. Every few years I crack it open and the interesting part is that at different points in my life I have either identified or embraced certain characters in the book. After that I will crack open the Brothers Karamazov. I seriously regret not taking a Russian lit course in college.

Docudharma Times Saturday Nov.24

This is an Open Thread: All thoughts are welcome

Headlines For Saturday: New York loses mean streets image as murder rate plunges: In Bush’s Last Year, Modest Domestic Aims: Wal-Mart Extends Its Influence to Washington: Bombers kill up to 35 in Pakistan

PM Howard concedes Australia poll

Australian Prime Minister John Howard has admitted defeat in the country’s general election, and looks set to lose his parliamentary seat.

Mr Howard said he had telephoned Labor leader Kevin Rudd “to congratulate him on an emphatic victory”.

USA

New York loses mean streets image as murder rate plunges

The city of New York, once widely feared for its mean streets scarred by random violence, is on course for its lowest murder rate in four decades with this year’s total expected to be below 500.

Aided by burgeoning affluence and a decade of “zero-tolerance” policing, a steady decline in the Big Apple’s violent crime rate has left the city basking in a new-found glow of safety. Criminologists suggest that killings by strangers have become so rare that the police cannot reasonably be expected to stamp out the problem any further.

Music and Pathos

Before Jane’s Addiction and Cake there was Alice Donut

I think I saw them play with the Butthole Surfers…I know the Butthole Surfers guy was in my kitchen sweating and screaming for a while.  It was all a blur.

MADONNA’S BOMBING SARAJEVO

much much more below

Random Japanese Stuff

People are constantly effusive about the Japanese education system. What’s so great about it?  That students are not encouraged to be curious beyond what is being taught them: Japanese classrooms are case study for controlled chaos. A majority of the students just ignore the teacher. Bullying is a constant. Its not only done by the students the teachers  also actively participate.  I’m sure you want your child going to school six or seven days a week.

Japan has been ruled by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) since 1954. As with any single conservative party rule they strive to be the first ones to create a future to past type nation. They dnai any complicity for example of Japanese Imperial Army human rights violations during the Second World War

Japan is so modern that there was a crisis over the secession of who was  to become the next emperor. Why was there a crisis? Because in a modern country one cannot allow a female to assented the imperial throne that would smack of being open minded and modern when it comes to women’s rights.

Funkalicious Friday!

Howdy folks! Just got back on line and this is late and thrown together quick….but there is a secret hidden theme in tonight’s Funkalicious Friday! See if you can figure it out and here is a hint: The first video has nothing to do with the secret theme! (hmmmmm, except maybe the year?) I just think it’s cool!

Who ever guesses what the prize for guessing right is gets a prize too!


via videosift.com

Friday Night at 8: Obstacles

Last week, I tried to explain as best I could what I felt could be part of a solid, sound, moral, ethical and spiritual basis to rely upon in fighting for social justice.  To be a witness rather than a bystander when confronting man’s inhumanity to man.  In that essay, Journey to the Core of the Human Spirit, I tried to be as substantive as I could about an aspect of ourselves that is in so many ways intangible and open to misinterpretation.

This essay will be about an even more seemingly intangible phenomenon.

It’s all well and good to have an ethical and spiritual foundation in order to fight for social justice.

But as in all dangerous and difficult quests, once you set out, obstacles appear.

My latest obstacle is not a huge one, but it is extremely irritating!

When I enter and comment in diaries about immigration (yes, over at the Great Orange Satan, but it could be anywhere among Democrats), I have found a new meme floating around.  It goes something like this:

“Yeah, and if you don’t agree 100% with them then they call you a racist or a xenophobe!”

There are hundreds of variations on this tired theme.  One of the most annoying (though, in retrospect, funny if it weren’t so sad) new variations I encountered was when someone said that calling a person a racist is using the “biggest beat stick” be it secular or religious and thus implying this was akin to both hate speech and, perhaps, causing someone to lose their life in a fiery explosion from hell.

So I have tried to come up with an answer to that meme, to overcome this obstacle to real dialogue.

Reprint: FBI & American Psychological Association Attack Patient Confidentiality

(The following was first posted on January 7, 2007 at the Daily Kos website. It is being reprinted here as of significant interest to readers of this blog. I have no reason to believe that anything important has changed since this article was originally written. One exception might be the peregrinations undertaken by the American Psychological Association on the question of interrogations, which can be followed in numerous other articles at my blog. Another exception would be revelations that emerged during the year regarding psychologist participation in U.S. government torture, and this additional material is included in the following text in the form of an editorial emendation.)

I recently came across an FBI report on a conference jointly sponsored by the FBI and the American Psychological Association. Given the recent and ongoing controversies over the use of psychologists and other medical personnel in U.S. torture programs abroad, I thought a close examination of the matter of this conference could be interesting. — What you will read may shock you (especially if you are interested in mental health practice). It will certainly enlighten you, and help fill in the gaps that exist in our understanding of U.S. interrogation techniques, the “war on terror”, and the government campaign to curtail our liberties.

Friday Philosophy: Hatred



I gave myself an assignment on Tuesday.  I decided I needed to write about one of those topics I have the hardest time with.  I assigned myself the the topic of Hate.  I’ve also had difficulty writing about Love.

Go figure.

Once upon a time I appeared in an anti-hate commercial, part of the the Hate Free Zones campaign sponsored by the Arkansas Progressive Network back in the  late 90s.

My partner (at the time) and were seen walking along the riverfront in Little Rock, an interracial lesbian couple, one of us transsexual and the other bisexual.  The commercial displayed all sorts of human targets of hate, set to the music of INXS’ Mediate.  The final video scenes showed the burned out station wagon at the scene of slaying of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner.

PONY OPEN THREAD: it’s the LEFT OVERS stupid!

From the master of such things as left overs… I give you Martha Stewart’s take on the day after…

Leftovers can serve as the main ingredients for dishes you might not otherwise make. Sliced turkey can become the main ingredient in an open-faced sandwich, a turkey-and-green-chile burrito, or a turkey-salad sandwich. Leftover mashed potatoes can be used to make gnocchi or a potato-chive souffle; sweet potatoes can be turned into sweet-potato biscuits or sweet-potato butter. Even the turkey bones can have a second life: Use them as the basis of a delicious turkey stock, which can be frozen for up to four months and used in any recipe calling for chicken stock.

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