Cafe Now

Traffic Rerouting--www.debismith.blogspot.com

2007-05-04T11:00:00.000-07:00

Another traffic rerouting. I'd love to get to Cafe Now more often, but it just isn't happening these days. It's taking me forever to get my blogs the way I want them. It'd be easy if I didn't have so many different personalities.

What I'm currently thinking, and obviously that is want to change, Cafe Now will be the place I write my observations, ponderings, and things I like to contemplate or recommend.

And for now here is where I'll be posting current published writings. It'll probably mostly consist of my ongoing profile series for my local newspaper, but it'll be something new at least once a week, which is more than I can say for any of the other stuff.

Electronic Intelligence

2007-04-13T23:07:00.000-07:00

My ipod reads my energy. I'm sure of it. Tonight, after two days of agonizing over my taxes that are due in three days, I took a break to do some of the dishes that've been piling up. Wanting to listen to some music, I got out the ipod, put it on shuffle, donned the headphones, and got to work with the sponge, soap, and day old dishes. What's the first song my ipod decides to play? Out of 1669 songs that my husband and I have loaded since getting it three months ago? Taxman. By The Beatles. No shit.

The second song was from Rodrigo Y Gabriela, a group that I've been listening to, almost exclusively, for the past few months.

It'd be a bit disconcerting if it weren't so fascinating and coincidental.

It reminds me of an email I got a couple months ago from a man I interviewed. Jordan Pease, the director of the Rogue Valley Metaphysical Library. One day, while working feverishly on the article that profiled him, Jordan sent me an email:

Hi-
You’ve got to try this if you haven’t already. It’s called “20Q” and it’s an amazing Artificial Intelligence Technology (AI) demonstration website in the form of a guessing game.

Players think of something and answer 15-30 questions about it (yes, no, maybe, unknown, etc) and the computer will guess correctly nearly every time you play!

It is downright spooky how accurate it is, especially with such seemingly vague questions. They claim it’s 80-98% accurate, and so far I’d agree.

20Q.net Try it.

Maybe my ipod has some of the same inherent intelligence. Yeah, a pretty whacko proposition. But the fact that Taxman was the first song it played has me wondering.

When a library closes in a community . . . does it make a sound?

2007-04-07T10:04:00.000-07:00

Yesterday's closure of the Jackson County Library System in Southern Oregon, due to lack of funding, is the largest ever shuttering of libraries in the history of the United States.

The doors at Ashland's public library were locked at 5pm on Friday, April 6th.

In a staged protest/sit-in--proposed by several young library patrons
and carried out with the help of supportive adults--a large group of
young people, ranging in age from 5-16, refused to leave the
library until Malcus Williams, an officer with the Ashland Police Department showed up (as part of the plan) to escort them out.

The following is a video I shot and edited for the local newspaper.

Tomãs Lockwood: Living in the Great Outdoors

2007-03-23T13:28:00.000-07:00

This is the video that accompanies the Daily Tidings profile on Tomãs Lockwood, published by The Daily Tidings on 3/21/07

Tomãs Lockwood has lived outdoors, by choice, for 24 years. Believing that the earth is his home, he doesn't consider himself homeless and prefers being referred to as an outdoorsman.

In this video, Tomãs talks about riding the rails to Ashland, why he picks up litter, why he's not homeless, and some of his thoughts on panhandling.

The two halves of god

2007-03-02T11:04:00.000-08:00

I just had an epiphany and had to come write it down before it slips away. Not sure I should share it publicly, but here goes.

I was sitting on the toilet-- yes, epiphanies can happen anywhere--and I picked up the Sept/Oct 2006 issue of Spirituality & Health that a doctor friend loaned me. I'm reading an article by Louise Danielle Palmer titled: Empowered by the Sacred.

It's an article about the "living mystic" Andrew Harvey and I've just finished reading the 7 aspects of the "Great Death" that he teaches about. The author of the article then writes:

In the course of evolving as a species, we have discovered one-half of the God-power within us: the power to destroy.

And all of a sudden it came to me that this is why the bible seems to describe two completely different gods. It's something people rarely attempt to explain and understand, but remains a glaring inconsistency nevertheless.

If God is truly within, and not something outside and over us, then she/he/it (Holy Sheheit, the middle h being silent, as a group of us laughed about a number of years ago) is evolving right alongside/inside us and/or because of us. And whether a parable, prophecy, or just an interesting story, the bible shows us how God/we evolve from being judgemental, vengeful, and destructive to forgiving, compassionate, loving, and creative.

When I imagined, in a very brief flash, asking God/The All/Source if this was true--the impression that came back was of a bunch of gleeful beings jumping up and down saying, "yes, yes, yes, that's it!"

I was stopped in my tracks when I read the above words "we have discovered one-half of the god-power within us," now I continue reading the paragraph to find out what comes next:

...Now, Harvey believes, we must embody the other half: the power within us to create.

Now that I write it down, it seems so simple and obvious that I wonder that it felt so epiphanous. Maybe everyone else already knew this, but I'd never thought of it this way. The thought/revelation gave me goosebumps, and it's something I want to spend some more time pondering.

Blog Maintenance

2007-02-27T19:34:00.000-08:00

Okay, doing a little housecleaning here. Putting the writing links on the sidebar. Next up is adding to my quote blogs. I've had piles of books/scraps of paper/magazines/etc., that I want to pull quotes from--really good quotes. Damn, there's just so much I want to do.

And then . . . maybe some good ole fashioned blogging? Imagine that.

Cafe Sometimes and Other Writings

2007-01-16T01:31:00.000-08:00

Maybe Cafe Now wasn't a good name for a blog that I only get to once in a while. Maybe I should have called it Cafe Sometimes.

Thing is, I took a paid writing gig and haven't had the time to get here and write my little meandering thoughts and observations. Thought the least I could do to nurture the place was to post some of the pieces I've been writing for my local newspaper. They're mostly profile pieces of some of the unique and interesting people that make up our vibrant little community of Ashland.

I offer some of them here as glimpses into what it means to be human in a world that seems to be increasingly uncertain.

Ely Schless: Inventor
Pam Derby: Compassionate Listener
Tish McFadden: Musician, Teacher
David Gall: Postman
Bill and Shirley Patton: The Patton Tree

The Year's Most Underreported Story(s)

2006-12-23T00:46:00.000-08:00

From Geov Parrish, Working for Change

The Year's Most Underreported Stories

Siberia's permafrost is melting: Why is this an important story? Because Arctic permafrost, which in Siberia covers endless miles, contains massive amounts of methane. The melting soil releases the methane into the air, where it is now expected to massively and irrevocably accelerate global warming. It's a process that has already begun, but just. This massive climate bomb literally has the potential to end civilization. Its discovery should have not only been the year's top story, but an impetus for all humanity to unite in a common struggle for survival. Maybe in 2007. Or 2009, when someone who believes in science occupies the White House.

Driving Mr. Booth

2006-11-20T21:13:00.000-08:00

A very rough cut/trailer of a movie I hope to one day complete: Driving Mr. Booth

A View From New Zealand

2006-11-17T14:59:00.000-08:00

Most of the responses I get to my essays are from the U.S., but I usually also get a handful from Down Under, Britain, lots from Canada, the Middle East, and sometimes from even more remote locales. By and large the feedback is positive. (Maybe too much preaching to the choir.) Anyhow had an interesting dialogue recently with an expatriot now living in New Zealand. Comes across as a bit shrill, but then again maybe we here in America are all just a bit too anesthetized as we muck about the mess we've made/inherited/allowed/ignored... Thought I'd post the exchange here, she makes some valid points worth considering.

Pardon the odd formatting, as I've yet to figure out how to deal with the bugs that attend copying/pasting of other docs, emails, etc.

Her First Email

I read your column on Common Dreams. It, among others, sparked this column that will appear in our newspaper on Saturday, Nov 25. I thought you’d be interested.

The breast-beating from the left-wing commentators in the United States has been deafening. Don't hate us! they cried to the world. It's that jerk in the White House! Now that we've finally noticed, we'll fix things! Just watch the midterm elections!

It was all a bit too facile, not to mention a few decades late. The US has elected only two presidents with a conscience in 30 years - Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. And Americans didn't actually like either one much, certainly not as much as they like George W in the days following 9/11.

The rest of their leaders have been scum like Richard Nixon, who hired a couple of aides named Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld to run his own little dirty war. You might remember it: Vietnam.

The same thugs came back to run the Iraq fiasco, and still Americans - or at least a few left-wing commentators - want us to think George W is some recent aberration. He isn't.

They also seem to think the latest Iraq war is a one-off. Don't they recall the dress rehearsal in 1991? And who do they think invented Saddam Hussein to begin with?

Saddam started out as just another in a long line of bloodthirsty dictators the US has been propping up for 50 years or more on every continent except that big island to our left.

Why on earth should anything change now?

Americans get the leaders they deserve. And one of the reasons they get such jerks is that so few of them give a damn. The midterm elections saw 40 percent of registered voters turn out. That's 40 percent of those registered, not those eligible to vote. That's considered standard for congressional elections. They get a little more excited about presidential elections, but not much.

So if most don't vote, and the few who do elect the same old thugs, why on earth should the world expect anything in America to change? Not only do Americans not care about running roughshod over the rest of the world, they don't even care about each other. One glance at the ever-widening gap between the immensely rich (a list that contains Bush I and II, along with many in Congress) and the poor proves humanity's in fairly short supply in the world's richest democracy.

Having said that, if so few vote, can you really call America a democracy any more?

Deborah Sloan, news editor of the Manawatu Standard, is a dual US-New Zealand citizen. She escaped from the US in 1988.

My Response (perhaps a touch defensive)

Hi Deborah,

Thanks for writing. Just want to clarify a couple things. I don't consider myself a left wing commentator. I'm more a 41 year old stay at home mother who has been finally starting to pay attention to what's going on in my country, and because of my country--and as I've said before, am ashamed. Periodically I write pieces that Common Dreams chooses to print. The purpose behind my pieces is to try and wake others. I'm sorry that I, and others more competent and supposedly "responsible" than I, don't do a better job of owning up to our history. And to the way we are/have been creating havoc all over the world (although most of my pieces have something to do with that, some in more detail than others). However, my purpose will continue to be trying to wake the slumbering masses. And in my opinion, it means first waking them to what's going on NOW. Not what's transpired in all these tens-if not hundreds-of years past that've brought us here. If my house caught on fire I wouldn't waste time standing in the hallway explaining to my children why it caught fire, or the meaning or consequences of the fire. That can come (necessarily so) after we've safely escaped (and hopefully put out the fire).

I'm curious what your deeper thoughts are regarding these midterm elections. I can say that I'm guardedly hopeful. Yes, there's A LOT of work that needs to be done. Yes, many of us consider this two party system we have to be a farce. Just "one party posing as two." But it certainly feels like people are starting to pay attention. And like they sent a message yesterday. Better late than never is a horrible cliché here, but it's true. And it's a better turn of events, or at least appears to be so, than what could have happened. Especially considering the vote tampering that must have occurred in some places. In your opinion, what is the predominant view from New Zealand? And how would you suggest we change things? And surely New Zealand isn't perfect? (Although there's been many times these past few years I've thought our family should escape there as well. But hanging around a little while longer and doing the odd little bits I can to try and help everything from going completely up in smoke is appealing as well.)

Thanks again for writing,
Debi

Her Response

Debi: I have been trying to think of an optimistic response for you. I cannot find one. The rot in America began long ago, and just because the Democrats are now in power in Congress doesn’t mean the killing will stop in Iraq in the power vacuum the US has created (and was told it would create – remember the French and Germans that Rice kept calling “Old Europe”, when everyone castigated the French, calling them cowards, and ordered freedom fries? Remember that?); it doesn’t mean the US-manufactured landmines and cluster bombs will stop killing children in Cambodia and Afghanistan and Lebanon; it doesn’t mean the US will all of a sudden start backing the United Nations and, god forbid, pay its annual dues so the only hope most of the world has for peace can operate; it doesn’t mean Americans will stop spending billions on botox and divert that money to house the half-million war veterans who are homeless in America, not to mention the suffering thousands of schizophrenics …

It’s pointless to continue. The list is endless. And I see no hope that America will ever come right. It’s why I left nearly 20 years ago, and lately I’ve been looking pretty far-sighted, as more and more Americans flood into New Zealand.

Is New Zealand perfect? Of course not. But neither is it a super power that can run roughshod over the rest of the world without a thought, quite frankly, setting up a real possibility for world instability avoided since WWII. And New Zealand does a damn sight more for its downtrodden than the US does. We don’t have homeless shelters because we have state housing and a decent social welfare system, even though we haven’t anything like America’s wealth. Hospital treatment is free to everyone, because the people think it’s important. And doctor visits and medicines are heavily subsidized by taxes. Rich and poor attend the same public schools and private schools are few and far between – and little cachet is attached. And while there is disparity between Maori and Europeans, it is nothing like the intractable divide between blacks and whites. Our parliament includes poor and rich alike, and our prime minister is a woman (of little money), as is our chief justice. And when fewer than 90 percent of New Zealanders vote in an election, it’s considered a scandal. A scandal.

I appreciate what you and others are trying to do, but I don’t think you will wake the slumbering masses. They certainly didn’t look up from their fast-food trough for this past election, the numbers show. So the wealthy and powerful of America will continue to bully the rest of the world with impunity.

Deborah Sloan

Dear World

2006-11-02T20:17:00.000-08:00

(Published by Common Dreams on 11/2/06)

Dear World,

How are you doing? What have you been up to lately? Sorry it's been so long since I've written.

I was actually in the middle of writing an open letter to President Bush when I thought of you.

I was asking him, respectfully of course, about his insistence that Senator John Kerry apologize for his botched joke. Perhaps you've heard of all this nonsense? You must think we're pretty ridiculous. I mean look at all that's going on in the world, and all Bush and his friends (including a mostly compliant media) want to talk about the past couple of days is a poorly thought out and delivered joke. Big deal. I'm sure that Kerry, a veteran himself, meant nothing disparaging against his fellow soldiers, past or present. Anyhow, I was asking him why he would insist Kerry apologize for a stupid joke when he himself so stubbornly refuses to apologize for anything/everything he has done wrong the past five plus pretty botched years of his presidency. Things that have had consequences of such greater magnitude that, to say the least, it boggles the mind.

Like refusing to apologize for not taking those pre 9/11 warnings seriously. Refusing to apologize for sitting in a classroom reading a story about a pet goat for seven long minutes after learning that the country was under attack. Refusing to apologize for the lies he told and cooked intelligence he used to start a war of aggression against a sovereign nation. He continues to bullheadedly refuse to apologize for all the miscalculations that have been made since, at every turn along the way, in that illegal war. Refuses to apologize for all the thousands and thousands and thousands of stolen Iraqi lives. Refuses to recognize, and then apologize for, the fact that his lies and deceptions have also directly led to the deaths of over 2800 (to date) brave men and women from the United States.

(By the way, speaking of bad jokes, what about those not so funny wmd jokes Bush told that one time?)

I could go on and on with all the things that I would suggest Mr. Bush apologize for. And I'm sure you could think of a bunch more to add. Yet even just one of the things already mentioned are more egregious, by far certainly, than Kerry's blunder and would be enough to win a debate regarding who has more to apologize for, don't you agree? But this joke thing is just more political slime slinging anyway. I wish I could say that everyone here can see that. That it's obviously just a rerun of an overused play from a tattered and pathetic book that never should have been used in the first place. Unfortunately I can't say that, but I do suspect that with the redundancy of the plays being called, eventually (hopefully sooner rather than later) enough people on the other teams will figure it out and take advantage of it and counter with better and more effective plays. Or maybe the management of the Bush team will get canned. Or both. We can hope. One thing is certain, right now we desperately need change at all levels and in all divisions.

Anyhow, while in the middle of my letter/argument to Bush, I remembered reading something a while back that he'd told author Mickey Herskowitz. Herskowitz was hired in 1999 to ghost write George's autobiography (and was later replaced after he didn't show Bush in the most flattering light--surprise, surprise).

"He told me that as a leader, you can never admit to a mistake," Herskowitz said. "That was one of the keys to being a leader." (Of course, the whole "leader" moniker, as well as the "President" one, are debatable.)

Thus I realized, it would most likely be a waste of my time entreating Mr. Bush to apologize. (Yeah, I know--duh.) But, I do want to say it again for emphasis, albeit a bit differently: What a shame to our country, and a sham he is, to make so much about Kerry's stupid joke, considering all the mountains of damage done and lives wasted that he and his cronies have authored.

Apparently, according to Bush, I'll never make it as a leader, as my letter to you is mostly just one big apology. An apology from an ordinary, increasingly appalled and ashamed, American citizen.

There is so much to be sorry for. Especially so the past five years of Bush's presidency. Sorry that he and his administration didn't heed the warnings regarding an impending terrorist strike within the US. Sorry that he used the awful events of that day to justify a global and "long" (seemingly unending) war on terror that has, by all accounts, only increased terrorism. Sorry the good will that was directed at us immediately following 9/11 was so quickly squandered. Sorry that the will of hundreds of thousands of people around the world, saying no to war, went unheeded and unappreciated. I'm so sorry that we couldn't stop the war machine from its costly (yet so profitable to the warmakers) and oh so deadly crawl across Afghanistan and Iraq. Sorry that so many many innocent people were crushed in its path. Sorry that we invaded a country, under false pretenses, destroying its beauty, culture, infrastructure, lives.... Sorry that we then had the audacity to authorize no bid contracts for the rebuilding of it to the very people who destroyed it.

I'm sorry that we don't seem to appreciate the sickening absurdity of it all.

I'm sorry that our "leaders" don't seem to care about being good stewards of the earth. Sorry that they laugh in the very real face of global warming. (Especially since the US is such a big contributor.) I'm sorry for the very real problems around the world that they, and by extension-we, continue to ignore. Sorry that the focus continues to be mostly only in areas of the world that are abundant in valuable resources or that are deemed important for strategic reasons. Sorry that these reasons usually, if not always, have nothing whatsoever to do with humanitarian causes/crises.

Sorry that it might appear that we all, the people, permit these things, though I do hope you realize that appearances can be deceiving (maybe you've noticed that we have some issues with the integrity of our voting system).

I'm sorry for the exasperation and frustration and justified anger that you must feel when you observe our actions, and the actions of our government. I'm sorry for all the sleepless nights you might experience because of the big ass bully storming through your neighborhoods. (And, just to loudly clarify, I'm not referring to the mostly good men and women in uniform who are on the ground in these neighborhoods). I'm sorry that our current leadership is the bully. And that I and my fellow countrymen and women have so far failed to reign that bully in.

I'm sorry for all the things I don't know, and therefore can't act upon. And for all the things I do know and don't act upon.

I realize now that Bush and I are very much alike in one way. We both have many more things to be sorry for than we can list here.

Yes, I'm writing to tell you how sorry I am. But also to tell you that I'm not alone in my sorrow. I want you to know that there are many of us here, more than any of us probably realize (and coming from all walks and political persuasions)--who can't believe the scope of what has happened to our country--and because of our country--in such a short time. But an apology is fairly meaningless if there is no growth, no learning, no wisdom gained, no change in behavior, right? I know that. So, I'm here to tell you that we are intent on changing the direction of our country. There are far more of us who want to get along with each other and our neighbors than don't. I'm certain of that. So please hang in there with us as we go through these turbulent times. It's sort of like the teenage years in some ways. I know I feel a bit like a teenager here as I write to you. Yes, we know we have a lot to work on. And yes we know we have some growing up to do. And hopefully on November 7th you'll see an example of us doing just that. (Then again, if you don't, please remember that looks can be deceiving.)

Hope to write again soon. Take care.

Love and hugs,

Debi

Time

2006-09-22T16:44:00.000-07:00

Busy, busy, busy. So much to do, so little time. Like being in an army of ants marching to and fro, to and fro. So busy and confident that what we're doing is vitally important. And that our little universe is all that exists...

And what is time anyway? Besides an odd construct of human beings? Invented to help us measure and mark the passage of our days?

The baking of bread. The programming of TIVO (which I don't have but include so as to be, well, inclusive). The number of candles on a birthday cake. Airplane departures. The end of class. Due dates for library books. Time to get the teeth cleaned. The oil checked. The pap. The mammogram. The prostrate (another thing I don't have, but do want to be inclusive here!). Time to rise and shine. To watch the news. To have a glass of wine. To make dinner. To call a friend. Or mail that birthday gift. Time to get to soccer practice. To the movie. Time to plant the bulbs. The tomato starts. The seeds of change...

Time to move on to what I was really planning on writing.

But, not before making a note to myself:

Hey Debi, perhaps you should come back here at some time and revisit the above? Expand upon it? Write about all the ways time insinuates itself into our lives--like nothing else, perhaps, comes close to doing. About how we've created time only to end up becoming slaves to it...

Time to check in with my son who has just walked in the door. Or not. I guess it's time for him to check in with his new girlfriend.

Ah yes. Time.

I've been wanting to come here and write about so many different things. It's an interesting conundrum actually. The more you experience (whether good or bad)--the more you have to write about, but less time to write about it. The less you experience (whether good or bad)--the more time you have to write about it, but less to write.

Is that true? (I just sort of made it up as I was going along.) But maybe it's worth a consideration. When we're reading what someone else has written, is it possible that we are only getting the middle of the road account? Because the people really in the thick of it don't have time to make an accounting? Maybe the accounting we're getting is either from those moderately in the thick of things, or from the bystander's perspective? Leaving out--not all the time of course, but often I would imagine--the perspective we most need to hear, read, see, understand?

Maybe I'm wrong, I haven't given it a great deal of thought. But I'd like to.

Been away from the Cafe for a few days. Was here on the computer for so long with the last couple writing projects, and with trying to respond to emails regarding them (which I enjoy and consider important, but which is also a somewhat daunting and time consuming task), and with trying to stay up to date on current events, and... Well, I just sort of felt toxic from spending so much time here at the computer.

Time at the computer. Maybe I should take a picture. Always nice to add a little visual right?
Anyhow, so much of my time has been spent here at this little desk, sitting on this hard little chair, squinting in front of this little monitor, skrying for meaning, that I've needed to detox a bit. (Not to mention all the other things/people I've been neglecting lately.)

Yesterday was a rewarding case in point. In the amount of time I WASN'T on the computer I was able to take apart my malfunctioning (for over a year now) toaster oven. And fix it!! I'd figured I would just have to buy a new one. But with a screwdriver and a little resourcefulness, I was able to save $50, a small little chunk of landfill space, resources, air/water quality, transport fuel (whether to buy a new one or transport the old one to the landfill), etc. Lots of things saved and gained by just taking the time and initiative to try and figure it out on my own. And a good lesson for the kids who were watching. It was so much fun in fact that I'm thinking about hanging a shingle, and fixing other people's broken appliances. It's not the first time I've fixed something like that. But my favorite was probably that time a few years ago when my husband was laid up with a broken leg and I fixed the washing machine. That was REALLY rewarding. I had to take the whole thing apart. And when I put it back together and it worked? Wow. What fun. There've been other times. A pencil sharpener. Light fixtures. What have you. Maybe it's a calling. We'll see.

Interestingly, I was even able to accomplish this with only a mediocre result on that 7th grade math assessment I took (before asking my daughter to take it) yesterday.

There were 25 questions. I got 17 correct. Which, according to the evaluation, meant I was likely to exceed Grade 7 standards. Oh joy! Actually you can miss more than half and still be expected to likely meet Grade 7 standards. This math thing is a whole other subject for another day.

What the test taught me was that I don't remember how to measure angles.

But if my life--up to this point, and beyond my public education--had required that I know how to measure angles then I'm confident that I would be able to do it easily. It's just that my life, all 23 years post testing, has not required it. Or I've figured out how to do something another way. I should build my own house. Then I'll learn lots of things.

Like I said, it's a subject for another day.

And it looks like it's going to be another day before I get to write any more, as it's time to go pick up my car (wish I didn't have to as it's car free day here in Ashland). After all, it was time to get the brakes replaced.

Till next time,
Debi

Loose Change--2nd Edition

2006-09-21T18:35:00.000-07:00

Can't seem to post the video itself here, without it blinking obnoxiously. So here's a link to the updated version of Loose Change, brought to you by Dylan Avery, Korey Rowe, and Jason Bermas.
LOOSE CHANGE, 2nd Edition

It's interesting to note that, to date, it's been viewed by 1,776,869 people. And rated by 10,678.

Must See Documentary

2006-09-15T09:54:00.000-07:00

9/11 Press for Truth.

I've been hesitant to post the above video link here. I'm sure the filmmakers would prefer that you support them by paying for the dvd. But it must be seen.

Consider ordering a copy, then share it with your friends and family. Have a community showing. Check out the official showings of the film. If nothing else, head over here and make a donation.

Check this Out.

2006-09-15T09:46:00.000-07:00

The Coincidence Theorist's Guide to 9/11.
Lots of questions. And links.

An End to Our Illusion

2006-09-12T08:21:00.000-07:00

Published by Common Dreams on September 11, 2006

There are moments in history when the fabric of everyday life unravels, and there is this unstable dynamism that allows for incredible social change in short periods of time. People and the world they're living in can be utterly transformed, either for the good or the bad, or some mixture of the two.--Pulitzer Prize winning playwright, Tony Kushner

There are several images burned into my memory from that day.

My husband's heavy work boots.

My father-in-law in his underwear.

The steel blue of the sky.

The oddness of that plane flying into the building.

People jumping.

Towers falling.

It had started off as such a beautiful morning. Not quite the end of Summer. On the cusp of Fall.

Cusp: a point of transition, as from one historical period to the next. A turning point.

Cusp. Amazing how one word can say so much.

Our family was just the other side of a cusp, having moved to Southern Oregon just the previous month. It had been a complete leap of faith. After selling our home in Washington State three years prior, with the intent to move to Ashland, we'd ended up chickening out and floundering about. However, we eventually realized that even though it made very little sense financially, we really wanted to live in Ashland. Even if it meant living in a hovel. One of my favorite quotes, this one from John Burroughs, became our mantra, "Leap and the net will appear."

So here we were in Ashland, post leap, on a beautiful morning in September. My in-laws, who'd been very concerned (an understatement) regarding our decision to move were in town for a visit.

The first thing I remember about this morning was my husband, clad in his heavy work gear and boots, blasting into our bedroom. I immediately knew something bad had happened. There was his demeanor of course, but there was also our "no shoes in the house" policy that he was breaking.

"There's been an attack on the World Trade Centers. I just heard it on the radio when I left for work," he gasped.

I jumped out of bed. The door across the hall was open and I saw my father-in-law, a big man, sitting bleary eyed on the edge of the bed. He'd heard. I'll never forget the image of him sitting there. I don't ordinarily see him naked to his shorts, not even swimming trunks. But there he was, bare chested, in grey cotton boxers trying to rub the sleep away from his eyes. It's funny the things you remember.

The only tv in the house was in that room, and even though it hadn't been hooked up to cable, I got busy trying to get some sort of reception. We were desperate for news, to know what was happening, for understanding.

"Why would they want to do this to us?" my father in law asked.

The immediate response that came to my mind was: Why wouldn't they? Considering the way we meddle in everyone else's affairs (and this was pre-9/11 meddling), considering the way we consume 40% of the world's resources yet represent only 5% of the population, considering the way we create--because of our rampant consumption--about 1/4 of the world's greenhouse gasses yet refuse to sign the Kyoto protocol, considering there are 2.8 billion people who live on less than $2 a day and struggle desperately to meet their basic needs for water and food and medicine and...Why wouldn't someone want to do this to us? In fact, it's downright amazing that they haven't done it before.

These were the thoughts running through my mind and leaking by little bits out of my mouth.

We decided to move the television to the living room. We found a cable there that ran outside and up the wall to the roof, ending there and unconnected to any service but somehow enabling us to get a bit of scratchy reception . It was hard to determine at first if what we were seeing was live or was a replay. We soon realized though that the footage of flight 175 flying into the south tower was a replay. And that the horrifying footage of people jumping was live. As was the south tower falling. And then the north. As was the bright blue sky suddenly turning grey and black with thick smoke and ash.

How can so much life and meaning and existence and concrete and steel and elevators and commodes and computers and copy machines and file cabinets and desks with pictures on them...just be pulverized and cremated so quickly? In less than 12 seconds? How can this happen? How is it that we can sit here in the comfort of our living rooms, on a beautiful September morning, witnessing it?

Yes, it proved to be a cusp moment. A turning point from one historical period to another. A turning point for each of us as individuals, for our nation, and because we create such a big footprint--for the world.

In one brief moment, so much--more than we can even begin to imagine or detail here--was lost.

My original intention here was to write about the 9/11 truth movement. I've been wondering what the truth was ever since that fateful morning. I have so many questions. Questions that started the moment--was it Ari Fleischer? Condoleezza Rice?--said to us on that ashen day, "We never imagined that anyone could/would use airplanes as missiles. That we could be attacked like this." I couldn't believe, even on that day when I didn't yet know of all the evidence supporting my gut reaction--that they hadn't imagined or planned on how to deal with just such an attack. It just felt odd. Not quite right. Like when you run into your child leaving the kitchen and they've got bits of chocolate on the side of their face and under their finger nails and they say, even before you ask, "I didn't eat anything." It just smelled funny.

And things continued to smell funnier and funnier. Not funny like ha ha. Funny like bad. That-smell-makes-me-ill kind of funny. Smells that really intensified in September 2002 when Neil Mackay, in his article for Scotland's Sunday Herald, directed us to look at the Project for a New American Century (PNAC), and the document they authored in September 2000: Rebuilding America's Defences: Strategies, Forces And Resources For A New Century which is where we find the now famous line: Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event--like a new Pearl Harbor.

Five years after 9/11, the questions have only multiplied.

I'm just another regular person in a long line of regular people trying to understand. Just another regular person who spends time worrying about her kids, her marriage, what she's supposed to do in life, what happens in her name, what happens in her country, what happens in the world. Just another regular person spending a great deal of the time left over--after doing the laundry, swishing the toilet, trying to stretch a limited amount of income to cover groceries and the rent and classes for the kids and car insurance (not even considering being able to afford health insurance), sharing meals with friends and family, in search of the next great swimming hole...,--just another regular person trying to figure out what really happened on that fateful day in September. Asking questions regarding the day that was such a catalyst for so much.

Questions like these:

Why would our own government not be insistent on getting to the bottom of what really happened?

Why would they resist a formal investigation?

Why would they label anyone daring to question the "official version" as "aiding and abetting the enemy?"

What about those 19 hijackers anyway? Named so conveniently just three days after the attacks.

Why would it take a committee of grieved widows to demand an investigation?

Why does the "official version" not address or attempt to explain the collapse of WTC Building 7?

Why did NORAD not respond according to protocol?

What about the war games being carried out by the military the morning of 9/11?

Why did Bush continue reading about a pet goat if the nation was under attack?

Why was the evidence removed from the scene of this most heinous crime and immediately shipped overseas?

What about all the put options on American Airlines and United made prior to 9/11?

Why were Iraq and Saddam Hussein implicated when it was clear that they had no ties to 9/11?

Why did we ignore Saudi Arabia when they were the supposed home of most of the supposed attackers?

Why has Bin-Laden not been brought to justice?

What about the Bin-Laden/Bush family ties?

These are just a few of the questions. There are many more. And I had intended on detailing them here because part of me believes that in order to see where we are going we need to understand where we are and what brought us here. There are plenty of websites dedicated to trying to uncover the truth regarding 9/11. And they are worthy of a look. Questioning, is not, nor never should be, considered a fascist or terrorist trait. If something is the truth, it should be able to hold up to any kind of scrutiny. So we should, each and every one of us, question away.

But something within is begging me to put aside these questions for the time and give voice for a moment to the other part of me who believes that it's just as important, if not more so, to consider what kind of world I want to live in, what sort of world I want my children to inherit, to imagine it and work towards it. The events of 9/11, and those that have followed, force us to consider this.

9/11 was a crisis moment. Crisis, however awful and painful, creates change. Change creates opportunity. 9/11 was a moment we did not ask for. But it does offer us an incredible opportunity for change. Wouldn't the victims of that tragic day, suggest no less? Perhaps the question we most need to be asking is what kind of change do we want that to be? What kind of lasting and beautiful memorial can we create in honor of all those who have lost their lives, not only on 9/11, but in the wars born of that fateful day?

One of my favorite tunes at the moment is Michael Franti's I Know I'm Not Alone. This past week the San Francisco Chronicle ran a piece on Franti regarding his music and observations following a personal tour of Iraq and Palestine:

What surprised him most was the lukewarm reaction from the locals he got to the first song he played, "Bomb the World," an anti-war tune that includes the lyrics, "We can bomb the world to pieces / But we can't bomb it into peace."

"People told me afterward that they didn't want to hear songs protesting the war," Franti says. "They wanted to hear songs to make them laugh, dance and get on with their lives."

He went on to say regarding his new album Yell Fire!:

"I guess I took my cues from people on the street in Baghdad," he says. "I didn't want to make depressing music."

This reminded me of something I'd heard Julia Butterfly Hill say a few years ago. Julia had come to Ashland to give a presentation and said that perhaps the most effective way of bringing about needed change was to show people how rewarding and fun it can be. That perhaps it would be most effective, as Gandhi once said, to Be the Change.

Yes, there are questions. Questions that we deserve truthful answers to. But in the end it's what we the people, what humanity as a whole, imagines this world can be that will be the final truth of 9/11. It is the cusp we are on. It is our turning point. There is no question that we are being transformed, it's up to us though to decide if it's for the good. What will we choose?

Personally, I'm going to record a new image onto the tape of that morning. It is going to be a towering memorial. A memorial to our common humanity. To all that binds us. Not a physical building, but a flame that will continue to grow brighter and brighter as we come to more fully realize our true nature. As we come to fully realize that we are all connected. The caption on this image will be the words (if he doesn't mind) of Zen Buddhist Monk, Thich Nhat Hanh--We are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness.

Peddling Phony Links--Iraq & 9/11

2006-09-07T08:27:00.000-07:00

Another great animated cartoon by Mark Fiore
Phony

Aiding the Terrorists

2006-09-07T07:47:00.000-07:00

Bush's Tactics Aid the Terrorists
Matthew Stannard, San Francisco Chronicle 9/7/06

"When you have media organs viewing fear-mongering as a payday, senior politicians seeing fear-mongering as sound political strategy, and terrorists considering fear-mongering as a victory unto itself, where are citizens expected to find a voice of reason?"--Matthew T. Felling, Center for Media and Public Affairs

2006 State of the Union

2006-09-06T08:57:00.000-07:00

Bush's January 31, 2006 "The Enemies of Freedom" State of the Union Address, edited down to just the scare words. All clips are shown in the exact sequence they aired and only once each. How much longer is this tactic going to work for him?--www.belowgroundsurface.org

belowgroundsurface.org

Dave Lindorff on Impeaching the President

2006-09-05T19:57:00.000-07:00

Impeaching the President--An 8/25/06 NPR Here and Now interview with Dave Lindorff.

Dave Lindorff's top ten reasons to impeach President Bush (From his website: This Can't Be Happening:

10 Reasons to Impeach Bush...And One Reason Why the Cowardly Democratic Leadership Shouldn't Be Afraid to Do It

As prospects grow for a Democratic takeover of the House of Representatives, and perhaps even the Senate, this November, the idea of impeachment is gaining attention. Yet even as polls show increasing numbers of Americans supporting the idea of removing Bush from office before the end of his term, Democratic Party leaders keep backing away.

This is not simply bad politics. It is cowardly, wrong and dangerous.

Let's look at the facts.

President Bush has committed grave offenses against the Constitution and against the people of the United States. Among these offenses are:

1. Initiating a war of aggression against a nation that posed no immediate threat to the U.S.--a war that has needlessly killed 2500 Americans and maimed and damaged over 20,000 more, while killing between 50-100,000 innocent Iraqi men, women and children.

2. Lying and organizing a conspiracy to trick the American people and the U.S. Congress into approving an unnecessary and illegal war.

3. Approving and encouraging, in violation of U.S. and international law, the use of torture, kidnapping and rendering of prisoners of war captured in Iraq and Afghanistan and in the course of the so-called War on Terror.

4. Illegally stripping the right of citizenship and the protections of the constitution from American citizens, denying them the fundamental right to have their cases heard in a court, to hear the charges against them, to be judged in a public court by a jury of their peers, and to have access to a lawyer.

5. Authorizing the spying on American citizens and their communications by the National Security Agency and other U.S. police and intelligence agencies, in violation of the First and Fourth Amendments and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

6. Obstructing investigation into and covering up knowledge of the deliberate exposing of the identity of a U.S. CIA undercover operative, and possibly conspiring in that initial outing itself.

7. Obstructing the investigation into the 9-11 attacks and lying to investigators from the Congress and the bi-partisan 9-11 Commission--actions that come perilously close to treason.

8. Violating the due process and other constitutional rights of thousands of citizens and legal residents by rounding them up and disappearing or deporting them without hearings.

9. Abuse of power, undermining of the constitution and violating the presidential oath of office by deliberately refusing to administer over 750 acts duly passed into law by the Congress--actions with if left unchallenged would make the Congress a vestigial body, and the president a dictator.

10. Criminal negligence in failing to provide American troops with adequate armor before sending them into a war of choice, criminal negligence in going to war against a weak, third-world nation without any planning for post war occupation and reconstruction, criminal negligence in failing to respond to a known and growing crisis in the storm-blasted city of New Orleans, and criminal negligence in failing to act, and in fact in actively obstructing efforts by other countries and American state governments, to deal with the looming crisis of global warming.

Each one of these offenses (and it is not meant to be a complete list) would be sufficient on its own to require the president’s removal from office, and in some cases, where an actual statutory crime can be charged, his subsequent indictment and trial. Together they cry out for impeachment and removal.

What Happened to Our Sons?

2006-09-05T11:23:00.000-07:00

"What happened to our sons?" A question soulfully and poignantly posed by Michael Franti in his song I know I'm Not Alone , and in his movie by the same name.

It's a song I keep returning to again and again the past few weeks.

Funny, as I'm typing this another song of Franti's is playing on my local NPR station.
See You in the Light from his new album (which also includes I know I'm Not Alone)--Yell! Fire.

Fear Factor

2006-09-05T09:23:00.002-07:00

Interesting read over at The New Republic this morning.
Fear Factor
by John B. Judis

What is clear is that, once the arrests were made, the Bush administration used the threat to stoke public fears about "Islamic fascism" while portraying itself and the Republican Party as the only ones capable of quieting these fears.

Leaving us with the concern that--

...by hyping the danger--as he had previously done with the threat from Iraq's weapons of mass destruction--Bush administration officials create the possibility that the public, when it sees through the administration's attempt to manufacture hysteria, will turn cynical and not take seriously the need to remain vigilant in the face of a genuine threat from abroad.

To Fear or Not to Fear?

2006-09-03T12:46:00.000-07:00

In regards to my previous post regarding blogger problems and the article I'd been agonizing over, I'm happy to report that Common Dreams published my revised version of it today:

To Fear or Not to Fear?

I'll admit it. I'm afraid.

Afraid for my children. Afraid for my country. Afraid for the world...

My fear makes me wonder which part of the "long war" we'll be in when my son turns 18 two short years from now. It makes me wonder what kind of world he and my daughter might inherit. It makes me wonder about ALL the lives, whether barely an adult or mature in years, being risked for an illegal and immoral war of aggression (with another one looming on the horizon). It makes me wonder why we put up with the shredding of our constitution. With the demise of freedom and liberty and truth at home. It makes me wonder about all the innocent men, women, and children dying this very moment because of our current brand of "advancing freedom." It makes me wonder about all the nasty--present and future--repercussions of BushCo's "freedom agenda."

These are just some of the questions my fear makes me ask. It feels like a healthy fear though. The kind that begs difficult but important assessments and further questioning.

Like questions about another kind of fear...the kind used as a means of control. "In their remarks to the American Legion convention this week in Salt Lake City, President Bush and his Cabinet members have made it clear that their efforts to boost the administration's poll numbers and, more important, to maintain Republican control of Congress this November will be based on a campaign of fear." --Salt Lake Tribune, 8/31/06

In order to maintain their slippery grasp on power, this administration continues to use the only tool it's ever had in its cabinet. Fear. And this is the kind of fear we need to address if we are to heed Edward R. Murrow's passionate dictum--channeled again this week by Keith Olbermann--We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason.

Are we being driven by the wrong kind of fear? Does the following description fit?

The motives offered for such a deliberate programme of scaremongering vary, but hinge on the potential for increased social control that a mistrustful and mutually fearing population might offer to those in power. In these accounts, fears are carefully and repeatedly created and fed by the mass media and other sources-through the manipulation of words, facts, news, sources or data, in order to induce certain personal behaviors, justify governmental actions or policies (at home or abroad). --Wikipedia on culture of fear/constructed fear

Are we allowing ourselves to be manipulated and controlled, and into sacrificing precious liberties and freedoms and lives along the way, by fear? By carefully and repeatedly created fear perhaps?

This is not the first time history has dealt with the idea of "constructed fear" or of fear in general being used as a means of controlling the masses. The following example--an interview with Nazi leader Hermann Goering by Gustave Gilbert and documented in his 1947 book Nuremberg Diary--though perhaps familiar, is particularly compelling:

We got around to the subject of war again and I said that, contrary to his attitude, I did not think that the common people are very thankful for leaders who bring them war and destruction.

"Why, of course, the people don't want war," Goering shrugged. "Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war..? Naturally, the common people don't want war, neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship."

"There is one difference," I pointed out. "In a democracy the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can declare wars."

"Oh, that is all well and good," Goering replied, "but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."

Goering says it doesn't matter what we the people think or say, because we are easily brought to the bidding of the leaders through fear. Using fear is the secret to their power.

What if we, the common people, were to fully comprehend this? And act upon that comprehension? What would happen if we were to cut this power supply? By refusing to be manipulated any longer by fear?

Of course we want to have freedom and democracy and security for ourselves and others. Of course we don't want madmen or madwomen running around wreaking havoc all over the world, creating terror because of their own narrow and radical world-views, ideologies, and agendas. (Hmm...)

But if we are not to be considered by history as having been fully suckered by fear into an age of unreason--we must ask ourselves if more and more war is reasonable. If sacrificing more and more lives and money and resources and freedom--for a "freedom" that really isn't, for a "security" that really isn't, for a "democracy" that really isn't--is reasonable. We must ask if it's reasonable to drop more and more bombs, with our names written on them--literally, on thousands and thousands of innocent men, women, and children in foreign lands. If it is reasonable for there to be more and more gain for those few who believe in, profit from, and promulgate war as the only way--a war, by the way, that is fomenting terrorism rather than neutralizing it.

Do we really want this? Or this?

Do we the common people really believe that this is the reasonable way to establish security for ourselves and to advance freedom and democracy and peace for all? Is this the best we can imagine?

And if not, what can we the common people--aside from personally and collectively choosing not to be ruled and controlled by fear, do about it? If we recognize that we have a different kind of fear in common--a justified fear regarding our family, country, and world--what can we do?

For starters: We can demand an end to our illegal occupation of Iraq, and not stop until we achieve it. We can demand true and verifiable election reform. We can demand impeachment. Yes, impeachment. We can demand war crimes trials. We can demand serious media reform. We can demand political reform--including issues regarding campaign finance, getting lobbyists out of our government, and term limits. We can envision a world we the common people want to live in, and we can achieve it.

Yes, the list might seem daunting, especially when we realize it's just a beginning. But if we desire it, and have the will, we can achieve many things together.

After all--unless we allow ourselves to be herded by fear into an age of unreason--it is NOT the leaders of this great country who determine the policy.

Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country.

--Franklin D. Roosevelt

Blogger Difficulties

2006-09-01T18:26:00.000-07:00

(Blog update 9/6/06: Due to continued pinging difficulties, the post mentioned herein--Cutting the Power Supply--has been deleted.)

Having a great deal of difficulty with blogger and html on a previous post: Cutting the Power Supply. I pinged ORBLOGS with a blog update a couple days ago, and it didn't work. They looked at the source and discovered a big html problem with the earlier article. Said it was probably due to Blogger's WYSIWYG editor. I tried to edit the html. Some things improved, others got worse. Especially following the Goering quote where my writing continues on but in a quote format that I can't get it out of.

I've spent so much time on this article, writing it, submitting it for publishing, not getting it published, rewriting it, resubmitting it, not getting it published. Putting it on my own blog. Having my own blog not like it. Worked all day today, rewriting it again (it's a passionate topic if you haven't guessed) and resubmitting it. Too tired at the moment to do any more here regarding the sloppy looking former version than make note of the problems regarding it.

If someone else publishes the newest version, I'll post it here.

A Strong, Civil, Healthy Society?

2006-08-31T07:24:00.000-07:00

Checking in at Common Dreams this morning I see this headlined as the breaking story:
US Accused of Bid to Oust Chavez with Secret Funds.

"The goal of the programme is to strengthen democracy, which is consistent with President Bush's 'Freedom Agenda'," said a USAID official yesterday. "A strong civil society is a critical part of any healthy democracy, just as it is in the United States, England or anywhere else in the world."

President Bush's "Freedom Agenda." An agenda for a strong, civil society. As a critical part of a healthy democracy. Hmm. What the US might be trying to do to Chavez aside for a moment, what the hell is it trying to do to America?

For just one example, directly above this breaking story in smaller print is this article:
Number of Americans without Health Insurance Increases Again

46.6 million Americans lack health insurance. I and my family are four of them. Nearly 16 percent of America.

How can we have a strong, civil, healthy society when this administration and its cronies continue to focus all of its energy and our money in other countries trying to undermine and/or oust their presidents?

How can we have a strong, civil, healthy society with this?

"It's a bizarre situation where the pie is growing pretty dramatically but most people's slices are getting smaller," said Harry Holzer, a visiting fellow at the Urban Institute and former chief economist for the U.S. Department of Labor.
That wasn't true, however, for high-income workers. The 20 percent of U.S. households with the highest income accounted for more than half the total U.S. household income in 2005.

It's all just too absurd for words. But perhaps there's one that explains much of it.

Oil.

Keith Olbermann Channels Edward R. Murrow

2006-08-30T20:32:00.000-07:00

A must read transcript. A must watch video.
If you can't watch the video at MSNBC then try here.

Cutting the Power Supply

2006-08-21T13:35:00.000-07:00

(Post has been deleted due to blogger difficulties. The new version: To Fear or Not to Fear is posted above.)

Bush is Breaking the Law

2006-08-18T00:04:00.000-07:00

Thank you Jack Cafferty for the simpleton's explanation.
And thank you Crooks and Liars for posting the video of it.

How to reach 100,000 for under $1

2006-08-16T08:34:00.000-07:00

From the Freeway Blogger

It's the Consumption

2006-04-28T13:30:00.000-07:00

CNN.com posed a question to readers yesterday: "As gas prices soar higher and higher, Washington has rolled out a number of proposals to ease the pain at the pump: a $100 rebate check, delaying deposits to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, increased fuel efficiency, alternative fuel research and more. What do you think the U.S. should do to address the problem, both immediately and down the road?" This morning, while reading yesterday's responses, I observed that however well meaning and intentioned the comments were, not one person was suggesting that our voracious appetites might need to be curbed. That perhaps it's a drastic change in lifestyle that is merited.

So I fired off a response. But as soon as I pushed the send button, CNN changed their daily focus and I've yet to see where today's responses ended up. So I'm posting my response here.

What should the U.S. do to address the problem? We should be strongly encouraged to change the way we live. To make a lighter footprint on the planet. But hey, that would hurt the economy. Better to go shopping or fly to Disney World and keep believing that there will always be enough resources, crude or otherwise, to satiate our increasing appetites.

For instance, many well meaning people believe that ethanol is the answer.
But according to Wikipedia:

"Today the US Gas usage is approximately 360,000,000 U.S. gallons per day. 28.8% of the US surface area (~ 685,000,000 acres) would be required to grow the biomass required to produce enough ethanol to cover current domestic US gas demand. The US currently has 455,000,000 acres of arable land. There are currently about 80 million acres of corn planted in the US (~40% of the world's supply)."

(So...to support our 360 million gallons a day habit with ethanol, it'd take 685 million acres--almost 30% of total US surface area--of our arable land. And we only have 455 million.)

A $100 rebate check (attached to a bill that would open up drilling in ANWR) is asinine. Yes, increased fuel efficiency (technology that already exists and is in wide use in Europe but is discouraged here) and research into alternatives is important and necessary. But more importantly, we need to change the way we live.

Regime change, yes. But which one?

2006-04-09T12:40:00.000-07:00

Let's use a few nuclear weapons to smash yet another country and her people, ostensibly to keep them from being able to use nuclear weapons, ostensibly to keep the world safe from nuclear threats and a potential new "Hitler"...

When are we, in this country, going to acknowledge the absurdity and threat to the world--and ourselves-- that our government has become... and rise up and overthrow it?

The Iran Plans
Seymour M. Hersh--The New Yorker

One former defense official, who still deals with sensitive issues for the Bush Administration, told me that the military planning was premised on a belief that “a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government.” He added, “I was shocked when I heard it, and asked myself, ‘What are they smoking?’ ”

No Offense Mr. President, But...

2006-03-29T02:47:00.000-08:00

No offense meant Mr. President, but what exactly do you mean when you say that "terrorists like to kill?"

"Terrorists haven't given up; they're tough-minded, they like to kill "

I'm just wondering which kind of killing is okay and which kind is bad. What separates terrorists from the "good people" if you know what I mean? Because maybe I should be arming myself and all. Vigilant for terrorists in my own neighborhood. Do you have a manual that you recommend I peruse? "Terrorists and Not Terrorists, How To Tell the Difference" perhaps?

I'm just sort of confused because it seems our country is doing an awful lot of killing, by your count perhaps 30,000 and by other accounts upwards of 100,000 (possibly 298,000 when Fallujah is factored in, according to the 2004 Lancet study) and I'm trying to understand which kind of killing is okay. (Not to mention all the "coalition" lives that have been sacrificed in the process.)

I have a couple of kids I'm trying to raise and want to do right by them. It seems, by my accounting and yours, that we've killed a whole bunch, thousands at least, of Iraqis because you thought (or were told), erroneously it seems, they had weapons of mass destruction that could harm us.

Since you're the Commander in Chief (is that the proper way to address you?) I just figure you're the guy I should be asking these questions.

Respectfully awaiting your reply,
Debi Smith
Ashland, Oregon

Fat Tuesday---Today and After

2006-02-28T00:04:00.000-08:00

Who would have thought, a year ago, that the next Mardi Gras would mean so much to so many?

To people living in all parts of the world who now have more awareness of all things New Orleans and who, in their desire to express their solidarity, might for the first time be celebrating Mardi Gras.

Or to business owners in downtown New Orleans and in the French Quarter desperate for tourists to return and help create some semblance of recovery/normalcy.

Or to the victims and survivors most devastated–at least in the New Orleans area–who live just 3 miles away from the French Quarter and who are deeply conflicted and worried, or outright angry, that Mardi Gras celebrations send the wrong message to the country and the world.

Or to the media crawling all over the place like vultures on a piece of road kill. (Media attention in the region is necessary of course, and some are doing a balanced job of reporting. But those that are focusing solely on Mardi Gras, and will pack up and leave tomorrow, aren't helping the situation.)

Mardi Gras is on the brain. But for how long? How long will our attention remain after the last dirty beads and plastic beer cups are swept from the streets (for they will be swept from the commercial areas even while the rotting innards of homes–what once constituted the belongings, memories, and lives of thousands– still awaits cleanup even now, six months after the storm)?

A year ago I barely knew what Mardi Gras meant. Other than it was masses of people partying wildly in the streets. Throngs of inebriated women–and men– gleefully responding to the bawdy calls of, “show us your tits.” The goal? Strings of brightly colored glittering beads shipped in on containers from China. And somehow this all also had something to do with the Christian celebration of Epiphany, Lent, Easter, and Jesus. At least that was my meager and possibly somewhat inaccurate impression.

My only other association with Fat Tuesday , the climax of Mardi Gras, was that a church in the small town I once lived held a yearly Shrove Tuesday pancake feed. All day long volunteers sifted, stirred, poured, and flipped giant fluffy pancakes made from some jealously guarded secret recipe that had been handed down through the years. Church ladies--donned in white lace or 70's flowered aprons--served up these confections, which we dusted with powdered sugar, drizzled with lemon juice, and covered with cheap maple syrup all day long.

My kids and I looked forward to this tradition every year. Then four years ago we moved to a new community and have missed that simple little pancake feed ever since. Especially this year. Today I wish we had some place locally to go and be with others to celebrate tradition, and mourn and grieve together that which has been lost by so many, not just in New Orleans, but in numbers hard to comprehend all along the Gulf Coast. A pancake feed would be nice.

Perhaps this would be a good time to take a moment to pause and remember all the other many families and businesses and neighborhoods and communities and towns and cities so greatly affected, devastated, displaced, disintegrated, or physically disappeared by the sister storms Katrina and Rita and their cousins Neglect and Inadequate Response. These people need to be held in our collective consciousness as well. Say a prayer for them, or whatever it is your belief system prompts your heart to do. But let's not forget them.

In January my kids and I--along with a friend and her two children--traveled to the Gulf Coast to participate in a couple of relief projects. Because of the need to find volunteer opportunities that would be a good fit for our kids, we decided to focus our efforts in the New Orleans area. And New Orleans, instead of some other equally devastated area, became the focus of my thoughts.

I had never been to the south, much less the deep south. While following the media coverage of the catastrophe I found myself questioning the subsequent calls to rebuild New Orleans. "Why don't these people retreat? Just throw a white flag up to Mama Nature and say, 'I give. I retreat to higher ground.'" And, "How much money should we be throwing at this astronomical problem presented by geography and poor planning anyway?" I was pretty clear, because of these questions and assumptions, that I wasn't going to the region to help the people rebuild per say, but to be a support for them while they try to determine the course of their futures.

Boy was I in for a shock. First of all, no amount of online research, talk with friends and groups who'd been to the decimated region, or viewing of video and photos could prepare me for the amount, quality, and wide swath of the devastation that we viewed upon arriving on the Gulf Coast. Secondly, and more importantly, I was naively ill-prepared for the deep dark haunting beautiful painful meaningful incredible history of "these people" that I would encounter and be engulfed by while there and have been forever and profoundly affected by.

It was not about "these people." And it became quickly and painfully apparent, on a personal level I'd not anticipated, that something very valuable to our nation, and our humanity, was wasting, molding, rotting, fading away in the wake of the hurricanes and failed levees and inadequate (to be polite) response.

"These people" have a history in the region I couldn't begin to presume to fathom even if I devoted myself to it for the rest of my life. But, after having traveled there, I can pose the following, to myself and anyone else who cares to listen: Imagine living in the same place your whole entire life. As did your family before you. And theirs. Imagine the histories and stories and traditions and neighborly and community connections. The beautiful, even through difficulties that may present themselves, tapestry that is woven by this kind of beingness in place and time. Imagine that it's all you've ever really known. And then imagine it being pulled out, suddenly and completely, from underneath you.

And just to dispel any persistent or lingering myths, this not so imaginary scenario didn't just happen to a bunch of poor black people. Yes, one of the hardest hit areas in the New Orleans area was the Lower 9th Ward. But to the east of the Lower 9th, separated only by a street, is St. Bernard's Parish, predominantly white.

And regarding the Lower 9th, to dispel another myth, while perhaps monetarily poor, according to the Greater New Orleans Community Data Center and the 2000 Census, they had a 59% home ownership rate (compared to 46.5% in Orleans Parish overall) . When one 75 year old Lower 9th resident was asked in 2003 about this high rate of ownership, she replied: "This was one of the first subdivisions that was designated for African Americans. The idea was just so wonderful to be able to buy a lot for $250, to build a house and be a homeowner. When my family first came here, we cut a street, a path really, to get back to this lot. In the Ninth Ward, you've got a group of people who have stayed because we wanted to - because we've got an investment in this community.” Imagine that, investment in their community.

As of the 2000 Census, St. Bernard's Parish was home to 67,229 people. Following the storm and flooding due to the failed levees, Parish president, Henry "Junior" Rodriquez, declared all of the parish's homes unliveable. And according to Wikipedia, "It should be noted that this is the first time in FEMA history that an entire parish/county had the severity of damage as St. Bernard received from Katrina."

It's easy for some of us to consider relocating. It is for me. I've done it. Several times. And driving through the unbelievably decimated neighborhoods of both locations left me in wonder at what great pool of tenacity and fortitude and desire these people draw from that enables them to even consider beginning the incredibly daunting tasks before them. I'm not sure I could do it. And, admittedly some aren't. But for most, it's not like that. These are a people of strength and character and history like I've never met before. And I was incredibly mistaken to have previously thought it was a no brainer, that they should just move on.

These people want to rebuild their shattered lives. In the place they've always lived. And being with them for just a short time, I began to understand why. And the value of their desire. And the importance of it-- to them, and to the rest of us.

They can't do it alone. And by no means does one celebratory Mardi Gras six months after the storm mean they are back on their feet. I now realize that their celebration is much more than glittering beads and drunken bawdy behavior. Their celebrations are of their incredible spirit. And today, what they want the world to see is not that their lives have been salvaged...but what needs to be, and is worth, saving.

We, in this country, pat ourselves on the back often for being can do, resourceful people. And we do have a history, although somewhat spotted, of helping others in their greatest hours of need. We would be gravely mistaken, following the greatest natural disaster to ever befall our nation, to turn our backs on our own. Or to just send $20 to a charity and feel we've done our share (though all those $20 donations do help). We need to hold our government, which was to be by, for, and of the people, to their bound duty. We need to ask why more and more money, $244,045,540,000 (as of 2:10 am PST 2/28/06) is asked and granted for a war in a foreign land, and more and more lives are needlessly lost to it, (I'll refrain here from further debating this mis-begotten war), and neglecting in the process, the very torn fabric of our own nation.

It's about money and priorities. Whose? is the question.

While volunteering with Emergency Communities in Chalmette one afternoon (which I highly recommend), there were a couple local street musicians entertaining the returning residents who were gathered for lunch. In between a beautiful set of songs, Rosaline stopped and said, "Not to be political, but it's been projected that to rebuild and shore up the levees it will cost 16.9 billion dollars. That's approximately what George W. Bush spends in Iraq every 90 days. Enough said." And then she smilingly and peacefully resumed her serenade.

Yes, Enough Said.

But yet, it isn't really enough. There is so much more to be said, to be done, so many people hurting and waiting...and so many stories. It hurts that words to actually convey the breadth of this thing are so inadequate. I could keep trying for hours and would probably not ever come close.

It's 2:40 AM here on the West Coast. Fat Tuesday. And I have a pile of pancakes to make for my family in a few short hours. Maybe I'll invite some neighbors over. New traditions to create and old ones to honor. And many people for us to hold in our hearts and not forget today...or after today.

What kind of effect does one want to have?

2005-08-01T02:23:00.000-07:00

I'm beginning to believe that by spending so much time focusing on the negative things happening in the world, I'm actually giving the negativity more power. My conundrum has long been: how to be aware of what's going on but not get pulled into its negative grasp. It's not that we should bury our heads in the sand, ignoring what's happening, going about our lives oblivious and ignorant. But is focusing on the negativity the best way to help? That's the conventional wisdom of course. But what if there's a different way?

My bent, for a long while, has been on trying to get everyone to realize the problems. Hmm. Realize the problems. Couldn’t that also be inferred to mean: make the problems realized/happen? Or as my Webster's dictionary defines it: to bring into concrete existence.

For too long now, I’ve spent time paying attention to a negative reality. Feeding off of it really. And you are what you eat after all. It seemed to start in earnest with the whole 9/11 thing. The conspiracy behind it. Then one thing led to another. I’ve spent untold hours online perusing every sort of information portal. To be honest, feeding mostly off of doom and gloom. 9/11 was an in-house operation, let me count the ways. The Iraq war, a dishonest abomination, let me count the dead and dismembered bodies. The environment is falling apart, don’t breathe the air, can't drink the water. Milk will kill you, let me dump all the cheese and milk and puss (only to buy more next week). Chemtrails, rfids, depleted uranium, big brother, mad cow disease, electromagnetic radiation, mainstream media, vote fraud, peak oil, earthquakes, the draft, you name it. Doom, doom, doom. My nickname around the house is “Debi Downer". "But", I protest, "I'm just trying to be informed."

My 12 year old daughter hasn't wanted to hear any of it. Saying it depresses and worries her. No wonder. However, when she saw me reading the other day--something about “The Guns of August” and Cheney’s supposed goal of invading Iran right after Congress goes on its summer break--she wanted to know what the bad news was. Insidious, the effect one person can have. But there’s the point. One person can have an incredible effect on those around him/her, and beyond. The question is: What kind of an effect does one want to have?

I think I would like my life to be an example of what I believe to be possible. That we can achieve anything. Anything we set our minds to. While I may note that there are terrible things happening, I can choose to re-frame them in my mind's eye and envision a positive outcome. I can visualize whirled peas. I can foster a more positive outlook and share that with my family and those around me, always being mindful of my thoughts and guarding against their current proclivity to turn towards the dark side.

What do I think we can create by focusing our intentions in a positive way? I think if enough of us desire and envision it, we will see war end.

But wait, I’m reminded of something my 15 year old son was quick to point out a couple of weeks ago during an incredible discussion regarding the principles of the book, Ask and It Is Given, “If half the United States envisioned a pull out from Iraq, there would still be another half, potentially, that thinks/believes it’s the right thing. Can your will, (should your will), overpower theirs?”

So, let me rephrase. I think we can create the experience of peace for ourselves and any who desire it. I think we can heal ourselves and those who wish to be healed. I think we can create the experience of a healthy and nurturing environment. I think we can create abundance. I think we can create anything we can imagine. We do already. We create exactly that which our thoughts are focused on--be it positive or negative. Look at your own reality and see if you can't see this to be true. Pay attention to your thoughts throughout the day. Compare them to what you are experiencing.

To create and experience the reality we desire, we need to do more than just say we desire it. We have to make sure our thoughts are in agreement with what we say we want. Science is beginning to prove that thought affects matter. That all is vibration. And not that thought affects matter in a fixed way. Science is able to demonstrate that a quantum particle's response varies, depending on the thought directed at it.

If you say you desire something, but are constantly focusing on the opposite of that something, that’s what you’ll experience.

One of the ideas that I struggle with but am really intrigued by is the idea that there is enough. For everyone. And that there is room for all variety of thought and choice and belief. It's so expansive feeling, and yet runs so contrary to our usual way of thinking. Our modern day society is almost completely based on the idea of having to fight for what we need or believe. That we have to get what we need before someone else does. Or prove our way is the right way. Or protect what we need and want before someone else steals, or takes, or uses it up. The war in Iraq is just such an example. And in the environment. In education. The boardroom. Religion. The buffet line. But what would happen if people started imagining, focusing on, and seeing themselves get what they need? Trusting it to be there? For everyone? Be it water, food, electricity, medicine, whatever? And beyond needs even? Do you feel the shift inside when you consider the idea that there might be enough for everyone? That there might be no need to fight for what we need and believe? Do you notice the sense of relief, of an inner relaxing? Even if just very momentary?

These ideas do, however, also raise the question in many minds, including my own, of the necessity for restraint and conservatism, environmental stewardship and social justice. If everyone suddenly believed they could have anything they desired, what would happen then? Can the earth really support such a concept? Can humanity?

But what if it's not the earth's ability to provide that causes problems, but our own minds? Our own fears? Our own belief in a limited universe? What if, when we change our minds, the reality we experience collectively changes? Perhaps whatever we imagine can be. Maybe once we recognize how potent and creative we are, and how connected to the all, we cease behaviors and having desires that are a detriment to it.

And perhaps some of this smells like a bunch of bullcrap. “If an Iraqi desires peace, all he has to do is focus his thoughts on it and it’ll happen?? If a hungry person in Niger desires food, all she has to do is imagine it? Yeah right!! And what about global warming and genocide and desertification and...”

I can certainly hear the roar of protest. But, what if, what if it does matter what we focus our thoughts on? What if, by focusing on positive outcomes, we could change the world?

Errant Planes

2005-05-16T00:10:00.000-07:00

Last week a small plane flies into the restricted airspace of the Nation's Capitol. By all accounts it was just a mistake, as possibly evidenced by the freezing of the 69 year old pilot when approached by the Black Hawk helicopter. And if that didn't paralyze him enough, two F-16 fighter jets rushed to the scene, dipping their wings and dropping flares. Thank goodness the 36 year old student pilot had his wits about him or there might really have been a national emergency at the White House.

But this isn't about the errant, and possibly clueless, meanderings of a pilot and his plane. This is about how the government, NORAD, and the FAA handles air security. I've been expecting someone to draw a corollary on this one, and excuse me if I haven't seen it, but what about 9/11? I'm not a historian of FAA protocol, and perhaps I'm talking out my arse, but I do believe that FAA and NORAD regulations regarding restricted air space on the morning of 9/11 were fairly similar to what they are now--the fugly war on terrorism at home and abroad, all the personal sacrifices to civil liberty, gargantuan debt, etc., we've had forced on us aside.

Two things. Questions.

Thing one: Why the huge, and costly, evacuation of the White House and nearby government offices last week, but no evacuation of the second tower or the Pentagon on 9/11...when NORAD, FAA, and the air traffic controllers all KNEW there were big errant planes flying around, ostensibly bent on becoming missles of death? (Oh that's right, there was a full scale war game going on that morning and everyone "in charge" believed that the planes they were seeing on their screens weren't actually real? Nevermind the actual television footage of actual carnage?)

Thing two: Why does our "commander in chief" continue to not be kept abreast of critical emergencies? The White House security level is raised to its highest, Red. But the president is kept blissfully unaware as he continues frolicking on his bike, probably dreaming about his pet goat.

For more information on air security protocols, war games, and evidence regarding government complicity on 9/11, see:
1
2
3
4 I declare a bad war.

Crimes of the Century

2005-05-14T00:19:00.000-07:00

I actually believe this very important article by David Michael Green, a professor of political science, titled Stop the Crime of the Century is misnamed. I'd title it The Second Crime of the Century.

What was the first you ask?

9/11.

And not because I believe 19 hijackers, acting in accord with a former CIA guy named Usama, or Osama, were the sole, if at all, perpetrators of 9/11.

Why would I say that?

(Please give my answer a chance before you call me a traitor, tell me to go to France, or call Homeland Security.)

An easy place to begin would be checking out a transcript of David Ray Griffin's talk regarding government complicity in 9/11. If you're only familiar with the "official" version of 9/11 you might be in for a surprise. If so, please suspend your disbelief, read (or listen via many different internet links) to the talk Mr. Griffin, theologian and author, gave to University of Wisconsin students on the 18th of April and which was telecast via CSPAN2 on April 30th and May 7th (way to go CSPAN!). If, after reading the transcript, your interest is sufficiently piqued--and it should be--this will only be the beginning of your trip down a very interesting, and disturbing, rabbit hole.

Let me know if you need any directions for the journey. I'd be happy to supply you with a variety of credible links.

Ditto what Mr. Green suggests, except let's add an s to the end of crime so that we can really get the job done right.

...........................................................................................

Decided to look up the lyrics to Supertramp's Crime of The Century. Seem especially appropriate to include here. I love Supertramp by the way. And I think my all time favorite song might be School.

Crime of the Century, by Supertramp

Now they're planning the crime of the century
Well what will it be?
Read all about their schemes and adventuring
It's well worth a fee
So roll up and see
And they rape the universe
How they've gone from bad to worse
Who are these men of lust, greed, and glory?
Rip off the masks and let's see.
But that's no right - oh no, what's the story?
There's you and there's me
That can't be right

The "Ultimate Educational Experience"

2005-05-13T21:50:00.000-07:00

A substitute biology teacher in Gunnison, Utah facilitates a class in the dissecting of a live dog. The dog was sedated. And the dog was scheduled to be euthanized.

Questions anyone?

"The teacher is standing by his decision and calls it the ultimate educational experience. Principal Anderson said he supports the lesson and it will be allowed to continue because the students are learning."

What's next, live dissection of sedated death row inmates? Gitmo prisoners? The terminally ill? I could go on, and it'd probably include something sarcastic about "ultimate educational experiences" regarding the substitute teacher and his principal, but I'll refrain.

I can, unfortunately perhaps, imagine what was going through this teacher's mind. And he's probably going to take a public flogging, however justified or not, regarding it. What's most distressing is that this kind of "educational experience" has much more to do with desensitizing impressionable students than teaching them anything about the digestive tract of the unwanted dog or how to be a compassionate human being.

When I was in high school, I wrote a paper regarding my distaste for dissecting anything. I didn't mind the biology class so much. The teacher I rather liked, although he always smelled a little too much like booze. Though the booze probably contributed to his fairly lax teaching style and somewhat humorous and sarcastic nature which most of us--except those who most wanted to learn biology--enjoyed. But when it came to being told I had to dissect frogs whether I liked it or not, I tried to stage a mini revolt. It wasn't that the teacher made me feel violated. More like the system was making me feel violated.

I wrote an article intended for the school newspaper merely suggesting that if one didn't feel destined for a field in biology or medicine, why should they be forced to dissect frogs? For one, I liked frogs. And, just a few years earlier, they had been the subject of many of my favorite childhood stories and personal imaginings. And now I'm being coerced into dissecting them?

I worked for the school paper and submitted the article for final approval. Soon thereafter, along comes the well meaning head of the newspaper department and, taking me by the arm, tells me that it's an inappropriate piece. Incredibly, as I consider it now, I was even directed to speak to the principal about it, who chastised me about my subversive attitude, and told me firmly, "you mustn't question."

Well...this is why our family homeschools. For one, to create our own ultimate educational experiences. Like focusing on community service, sustainable living, human and animal rights, global politics, clean water and air,...the list of potential ultimate educational experiences is endless. But, to be honest, we homeschool mainly to preserve the natural, and necessary, questioning ability of young people. We aren't perfect at it. There are plenty of times we don't do the best job of encouraging or answering the questions. But question we must. All of us. Everything. And I sure question the thinking that says it's okay to dissect live, however sedated, dogs.

the space between

2005-04-02T00:39:00.000-08:00

hah. i keep thinking i can do this. unedit myself. but i can't. i keep backspacing, erasing, rewriting. can i really get to the real me? e.e.cummings comes to mind. he didn't even capitalize (then again, maybe he did). proper spacing. am i doing even him right? it's the ongoing conundrum. i like that word. conundrum. how to be real? without being so worried people won't get it? but is that a problem? thinking people should "get it?"

what i'd really like to do is find the unedited version of myself. of everyone. the real in me, the real in you, the real in everyone. it fucking pisses me off that i can't access that more freely. that i can't find that part of myself more easily. that that (that that??) real person inside. is she even there? hello??

just came from an amazing party. a party of friends. a place where i feel welcome and free to be real. this is a big thing. a thing so rarely understood and realized. yet...i'm still not sure where i fit within. the space between. "the space between." isn't that a david matthews lyric? maybe not. i suck at knowing who sang what. but it's a verse that comes to me. maybe i should google that. "the space between."

okay, that took me forever. to add a link to dave matthews "the space between" lyrics. not even sure it worked.

so what did i really hope to impart with this writing? this is the thing... everything we each say in each moment has more of an impact than any of us realize. i was at this party tonite and more than once (another song comes to mind "more than once") someone told me that what i'd said some other time, a few months ago or several years ago, made an impact on them. now i'm not suggesting that what i might say is so important, it's a suggestion that what each and any of us says in any moment might make a difference.

the space between offers so much. it's an infinite place whereby we can learn and be and know more than we ever knew was possible.

how can we judge what another does? how can we know and ascertain what another might have been here to do?

i had an interesting, and long, conversation with a man who was very close to a person who recently chose to leave this plane via suicide. was that a necessary choice? we can't decide. can't judge. but we can agree that what we need to do is pay attention to each present moment. and, i suspect, the people who choose to leave here would suggest we do pay attention, be present, be now.

how to be now? what a question. how to be now? how to be present in a world that suggests an ignorance to things difficult? how to be present with a world that doesn't make any sense? how to be present in a world that seems to be against life and joy?

how to live in this moment?

back to the unedited part. who am i? who are you? who are we? who are we all together? (another bunch of lyrics?) all interesting questions. and where is the unedited part? the part that really speaks? the part that really matters?

damn. it's a whole other bunch of questions i have to add to my to do list.

to be continued again...

Filling Station

2005-03-31T09:36:00.000-08:00

It's a beautiful sunny day here in Southern Oregon. Just returned from refueling the car and dropping my daughter off at a class. Was listening to Kila while the tank was filling. Watching the pansies blowing in the breeze, marveling at how nature always seems to dance rhythmically to whatever music I might be listening to. Watching all the traffic blow by. Trying to juxtapose all my observations with my ongoing frustration with the state of things on this blue marble of a planet and my own inertia regarding necessary change.

I asked the station manager, after I'd paid my bill, what he thought was going to happen with gas prices. He replied, "Three dollars by summer." I mentioned I'd recently overheard someone say, "Four dollars in one month." He said he didn't see it going much over $3.50, but added that he is pretty certain we'll never, ever, see it go below the two dollar mark again. He told me how he hears people talk about a big government conspiracy regarding gas prices. "It's not that," he said, "it's China. Their increasing consumption is driving up the prices of everything. Gas, steel, etc." I know that he's correct, and I'm surprised by his awareness of the issue. He surprises me even further when I ask him if he's familiar with the idea of peak oil. I suggest that it isn't just China's increasing appetite that's fueling the problem (pun intended), it might also have something to do with the oil supplies themselves. After the peak, the oil becomes more and more expensive to extract. By some accounts, we are at the peak. Others have us past it. Regardless of where the peak is, most agree there is one and that if we haven't already passed it--barring any new big finds--it's nevertheless approaching fast and bringing with it a big change in the way we live.

He says he's familiar with the idea, and says he's been thinking about these issues for several years. He doesn't want to see the price go up, "I pay just like anyone else does," he says. But he also says he thinks if gas took a major leap in price, it'd be the thing we all need to get us off our butts, "but no, they bring it on so incrementally that we don't pay much attention. Get frustrated, yes, but not enough to do anything about it." He then shares an idea he's pondered the past couple of years, one which I say surprises me being that it's coming from a man managing a gas station. He tells me he thinks people should boycott a gas company. "Take Chevron, for example," he says, "get everyone, I mean everyone, to boycott Chevron for a month. It'd kill them. And then the next month, boycott another company. Then we'd get some changes." Then he goes on to tell me that his station doesn't have any room for price gauging. In fact, he shares, they'd go broke if they didn't offer their other services, like the car wash. There's a big difference between a service station and a gas company of course, but I wonder if we'd be barking up the wrong tree to boycott gas companies. Perhaps we need to boycott automobile manufacturers.

According to the Jan/Feb 05 issue of Adbusters: "The EPA repeatedly bows to industry pressure. It has allowed corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) to stagnate for a decade; worse, it is only starting to amend loopholes that allow 'light trucks'- read: SUVs, now 50 percent of cars sold in the US-to avoid tighter fuel economy standards--If standards for light trucks were identical to cars, US oil consumption would drop by one million barrels a day. And worse yet, automakers routinely sidestep laws by altering cars to qualify as light trucks. Or they swallow the fines: BMW recently paid a paltry $28 million fine for not meeting CAFE standards, calling it a price of doing business."

Come to think of it, maybe we should boycott the government...

The station manager and I start talking fuel efficiency, alternative fuels, existing technologies. He points to his brand new sports car (with a 'support the troops' ribbon on the back). He was told it would get 18mpg/city. Instead it gets 9mpg. He's considering getting a different car. I mention that our family has been considering biodiesel. We both agree though, that the best thing we could do is drive less. My driving is something I consider daily. I've made some changes here and there. But rearranging one's life to NOT revolve around the ease of transportation the automobile provides isn't always the easiest task. It should be. But our lives have become so complex and complicated--interesting since all the technology surrounding and consuming us was supposed to make things so much easier--that it's hard, for me anyway, to stop long enough to make the necessary changes.

This morning's conversation comes on the heals of my reading the above mentioned Adbusters magazine the past few mornings (when I could have been using the time to wake my daughter earlier and walk to class with her). It's full of correlations to this conversation. One article talks about the issue of China's adoption of western consumer values and its increasing love affair with the automobile. Setting up a nightmare scenario whereby it's predicted the now 12 million cars on the roads of China will turn into 160 million by the year 2020. In another article I read the following:

One of the most common 'When I was a kid' stories goes something like this: "I had to walk two miles to school. Even in the depths of winter. And it was uphill both ways." Embellishment aside, walking to school is a basic rite of passage for countless children around the world. But these days, horror stories of child abductions have many urban and suburban parents in such a state of anxiety that they insist on driving their children everywhere. So, even if the school is just down the block, everyone hops in the minivan for the five-minute drive. Five times a week, twice a day, vehicles queue and idle in front of schools throughout North America and beyond."

This is absurd. We're slowly poisoning our children with all this idling-literally and figuratively-while we mindlessly guzzle up the last of a precious resource that if conserved might just be responsible for saving our child or grandchildren or grandchildren's children down the road. And this is just the beginning of what we're doing and not doing when we allow our lives to be controlled by fear and "convenience."

I laugh at the gas station attendant for driving a 9 mpg sports car. I laugh, nervously, at myself for not readjusting my life to be in fuller accordance with my beliefs, for I am one who drives her daughter one mile to go to school. Short term "protection", long term death sentence. Absurdities.

To be continued.

Night Pages

2005-02-06T01:40:00.000-08:00

Writing guru Julia Cameron suggests morning pages. I prefer night pages. Sometimes.

Listening to Natalie Merchant's "Ophelia" in my headphones. Husband just went to bed. "It's 12:45, maybe you should go to bed", he says on his way up. Just makes me want to stay up longer.

Sitting here trying to process life.

Had a great evening. Great day actually. Not the one I'd originally planned. Plans are funny that way.

Kids were both away (overnights on Friday) and I ended up having the whole day to myself. Funny how that happens more and more the older they get. Funny how hard I miss them, and how much I enjoy my alone time all at once. Is this what happens? The tearing apart of the mothering self?

I'd imagined doing a little housework and then walking downtown to get a coffee and write. When the coffee hour had long passed, I thought I might go to my favorite local pub, get a beer, and write. But instead, I just kept cleaning, organizing, and puttering around the house. One project lead to another. Washing an old (10 years?) Playmobile container and the slimy dinosaurs it had housed for the past several years (trying to remember the times my kids had played with them, so innocently in the mud), trying to find matching socks in the "misc" sock basket (where does the sock fairy take all those socks?), sifting through a pile of old "favorite" books, cleaning out and organizing the game cupboard (including the Disney memory game my daughter used to love playing, and finding myself wondering about the fact that we'd ever supported anything "Disney.")

It was, I suppose, a day spent sifting memories. A day spent contemplating how things are one moment deemed important--like so many old toy dinosaurs-- only to be quickly discarded. There's a big lesson in there.

My daughter (now 12) came home, and seeing my pile of things to get rid of says, quite emphatically, "you're not getting rid of those games." She has a difficult time letting go of the things she's outgrown. So do I. But the housing of these things takes time. The housing and organizing and storing of memories takes up a lot of space. Mental and physical. Why is it so hard to let go of them? Are we afraid the memories will disappear if we discard the items that represent a certain time in our life?

I had an interesting conversation with a friend last week. I've known him for a couple of years, and was surprised to suddenly learn that his family had experienced a house fire a number of years ago. I asked him what that was like. He said that it was actually a very good experience in some ways. Before, he'd felt it was important to keep physical belongings/items intact in order to preserve memories. After losing so many things however, he realized that the memories remained irregardless of the presence (or not) of the item. He said it was an incredibly freeing experience.

I wonder how many people pay for storage units, pay monthly mortgages or rent, just to house memories they're afraid of losing. I wonder how many of us spend our Saturdays organizing, cataloguing, sifting, pondering over, finding storage for, or tending garage sales of, the amazing amount of stuff that enters our lives. And often, we're talking about unwanted, unsolicited-- though often generously offered--gifts that we'd never have purchased ourselves. You know what I mean. All those gifts that come from grandparents, aunts and uncles, friends, schoolmates. We're an incredibly generous lot. Aren't we? And so much of it is more burden than gift.

Probably the best gift anyone can give another is nothing. "What I choose to give you today is nothing. Happy Birthday. Happy Kwanza. Merry Christmas. Happy Father's/Mother's/Valentine's Day, etc." Nothing. Nothing.

The gift of nothing. What a concept.

But it's not just the gifts from others that cause such painful consternation. We buy a good deal of it ourselves. "If I just get that one item, I'll be happy." "I'll finally be fulfilled." "My life will finally be organized."

I recently bought a new bath mat. I'd been looking for a new bath mat for several years. Up till the time I bought one, we'd used old towels. You know, gotta have something to sop up the overflow of water. Something to absorb the moisture as one steps out of the shower. For some reason, I convinced myself that a bath mat would make things easier in this department and that it would be a wise purchase. Funny thing about bath mats, they are so thick they hold water too long. Never dry out. And bath mats aren't an easy thing to run through an apartment sized washing machine. But an old towel is. Now I have a sopping wet, mildewy bath mat sitting in a bag on my front porch (where it's been for two weeks getting more mildewy) that needs to be taken to the laundromat. So much for making my life easier.

The older I get, the more I realize, the less I need. Should I rephrase that? Is it proper grammar? How can I be simpler?

I keep watching the birds outside my kitchen window. There's a tree out there and even though it's mid-winter, it's full of rotting (but obviously still edible) apples. Birds of every stripe and color swing back and forth on the fruit, pecking to their heart's content. I watch. And as I watch I'm reminded of a biblical verse I recall from my fundamentalist upbringing. Something about how the creator provides for even the birds of the field.

Why is it that we humans worry so? Why are we so afraid about being provided for? Why don't we trust that our needs will be met? Why do we continue to argue, fight, and conduct wars over resources that we think are necessary to our livelihood? Why is this fight fought primarily by people that espouse a belief in God? You know...the god who says he will provide for all necessities? Brings to mind other biblical events, the ones where the Israelites didn't trust. Where they thought they had to take matters into their own hands.

Didn't this leave them wandering?

And so I guess we go around and around and around. Always circling.

And while I could go round and round and round about my own organizing, sifting, worrying about what to keep, what to honor, what I need, what to worship, what to discard, how best to make a difference in the world, etc., perhaps the lesson is the same. A question. Several questions. What do we give our attention? What do we give our time? And why?

Are we trying to store up gifts? Are we trying to create a legacy? Are we trying to get rich? Are we trying to prove we led valuable lives? Are we trying to prove we were somebody? Are we, out of fear, trying to prove that we existed? If so, I suspect, it's because we don't know and trust who we really are.

And that's why, every once in a while, I find myself wondering what it would be like (god forbid) to lose everything (materially) in a house fire. Why I wonder what it would be like to have nothing but the clothes on my back and my family (clothed and fed) at my side. To be here without all the detritus that we accumulate as time goes on, Disney Memory Games, dinosaur toys given as a promotion 10 years ago by the local bank, or that ugly sweater Grandma sent on my child's 8th birthday.

It's not the stuff. It really is not the stuff. It's the moments. And one day, I'll get it. One day, we'll all get it. Hopefully it's sooner rather than later. For I fear our getting it means much more than any of us realize. Yet I also tend to believe that there is no time limit. That there is enough time in the whole wide universe for each of us to get it in our own due time. Therein lies the beauty of the whole thing. The beauty of life. Of reality. Or our co-existence.

Hmm. I never did get to the thing I'd intended to write about here. Maybe next time. Whatever that means. For while this moment deems itself important to me, and maybe (or not) to you, in the end, it's all we're really guaranteed. What shall we make of it? Nothing that you have to organize, shift around to different piles, take back to the department store with the "gift receipt", haul off to Goodwill, the dump, or the local "free box" (an innovative concept in my own community that at least makes you feel like you're donating to a good cause...until you see a friend pilfering through it happy to find a free Gap sweatshirt). (Not that I don't look through the free box pile myself.)

On Blogging

2005-01-29T09:49:00.000-08:00

So...here goes. My first foray into the blogging world. What number am I? How many bloggers exist? Let me go google that...

A blogger at blogit.com has the same question:

How many bloggers ARE there?
Does anyone really know?

Blogit's answer: We have thousands of members; we do not provide exact numbers for competitive reasons. Posted by BlogitStaff-Becky on December 5, 2004 at 6:17 AM

Now what competitive reason could Blogit have for not sharing how many bloggers they have?
Is it little fish syndrome? They want to appear big, so they can't admit they're actually pretty small? I have no clue about blogit. Haven't done a websearch of them (and probably won't). But in my own new blogging opinion, they're not doing themselves any pr favors by avoiding the question this way. No offense Becky.

I read more search results:

Technorati tracks over 3.5 million blogs worldwide, up from about 100,000 two years ago. The Pew Internet study estimates that 11% of adult U.S. Internet users regularly read blogs. A new weblog is created every 5.8 seconds, resulting in about 15,000 new blogs a day. Most bloggers update their weblogs regularly: there are about 275,000 posts daily, or about 10,800 blog updates an hour.

These statistics appear to be, while no publish date is available, fairly recent. So, it looks like my little blog is one of some 15,000 that were created just today. A very small fish in a very big ocean here.

Here are some interesting thoughts and blog stats from a blogger in Australia:
from:
Have you ever wondered how far this blogging thing has extended? How many bloggers are there? Where are they from?

Blogcount attempts to answer some of these questions and more. The results are staggering....here's a taste.

Blogger alone has 1.5million registered users. Their number of users grew 14% in the 60 days after 11 March!

Blogstreet's list of blogs grew 27% in a similar period and Technorati tripled the number of blogs it watched in a recent two month period.

Live Journal has 1,090,084 total accounts, with over half of them presently active. Of these 62.2% are Female users and 37.4% are male! (which is pretty different to the God Blog Gender Survey that I did where I found that at least 54% of Christian bloggers were Male!)

18 year olds are the biggest users at Live Journal, most seem to fall between the age of 15 and 25 years old.

The median update rate of weblogs.com pingers is every three days.

Poland now has 100,000 blogs, again 62% are written by women, 75% are under 20 years old.

Iran has 12,000 blogs, but here 76% are male.

During the recent War, 4% of Americans got their war coverage from Weblogs.

This Site has crawled 437,986 blogs. In that list 205,898 are written in English. After that the most popular languages were Portuguese, Polish, Farsi, Spanish, German, Italian, French and Icelandic(in that order). 101,831 are hosted with Blogspot, 14,841 are with MT, 14,172 are with Pitas and 13,106 are with Blogger.

Wow - those are some amazing statistics....the amount of data that is flying around the net purely from blogs is massive. You've got to wonder how useful a lot of the data is, and what impact so many people putting their ideas, dreams, feelings etc out into the datasphere is having on our crazy little world!?

I didn't intend to center my first blog on blogging. But it's interesting stuff. Technorati shares its opinion on the amount of data-blogging flying around the net:

The power of weblogs is that they allow millions of people to easily publish their ideas, and millions more to comment on them. Blogs are a fluid, dynamic medium, more akin to a “conversation” than to a library (which is how the Web has often been described in the past). With an increasing number of people reading, writing, and commenting on blogs, the way we use the Web is shifting in a fundamental way. Instead of primarily being passive consumers of information, more and more Internet users are becoming active participants and creators of content. Weblogs allow everyone to have a voice.

And it's high time everyone recognized the power of their voice, no matter how small it may seem in the larger sea of things. We just never know when that one small thing we say, or do, or write, or share, might be the thing that makes a difference somewhere.

In the web article Digital Media and the Internet: The Question of Utopia Amanda Griscom writes:

...today's digital utopia has been given a space to grow that's far bigger than a painter's canvas and more substantive than the imagination. As of now --- and only the cornerstones have been lain --- it's a horizontally distributed (anti-hierarchical) network of computers within which millions of people can actually communicate and travel and make money and meet friends and buy products and argue and pray and develop communities. The utopia that we are (perhaps inadvertently) attempting to construct in cyberspace seems to satisfy the utopian ideals that have been hovering above Western civilization since ancient Greece.

Gotta love the "anti-hierarchical" part.

We're talking here about the power we as individuals have to shape the world together.

We must not, in trying to think about how we can make a big difference, ignore the small daily differences we can make which, over time, add up to big differences that we often cannot foresee.--Marian Wright Edelman

I like to believe in the hundredth monkey principle. Or in this case, the millionth blogger principle.

We all have a voice. Thank you blogspot, blogit, blogstreet, and a multitude of other websites that host the many independent, thoughtful, maddening, enlightening, and thought provoking words of we the people. It's a difference we make, that we may not yet foresee, and which is changing the world--one word at a time. I feel privileged to be a part of it (no matter how small, and seemingly irrelevant that part may appear to be).

So, this ends my first blog. Not sure if I've done it "right." Been struggling with pasting links and quotes, moving back and forth, saving drafts, coping with a mini crash, using the spellchecker, etc. But, it's a start. Looking forward to more time spent here.

A Pre-Blog Archive

2005-01-29T01:20:00.000-08:00

Published on Friday, December 24, 2004 by CommonDreams.org

A Christmas Story

by Debi Smith

On the longest night of the year, I was at my computer struggling to compose a holiday greeting. It was about two in the morning and I decided to take a break and search online for an interesting Christmas story. Our family had been invited to come to a friend’s house the following evening to share in an old fashioned poetry and story reading,"something Christmas related," my friend had said.

Our families met a couple of years ago when their nine year old daughter joined the soccer team I was coaching and which my own daughter was on. They pulled up to the first practice in an old Toyota which sported Montana license plates and a "Free Tibet" sticker. They had just moved to town.

The mother soon proved herself to be one of the most thoughtful, compassionate, and generous people I’ve ever known; surreptitiously leaving me baked goods in my car from the bakery she and her husband were operating, offering to help out whenever and wherever needed, and always positive and enthusiastic. In our chats after practice, we soon learned that we had many things in common: similar parenting styles, similar eclectic and somewhat radical ideas about education, similar values and approaches to living... Our daughters, and our families, were soon hitting it off and it wasn’t long before we got together and shared a meal.

It’s funny how laying food out on a table tends to encourage the laying out of our most deeply held beliefs as well. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that the ancient and almost sacred act of breaking bread makes us feel safe, nourished, and trusting enough to be ourselves. The topic soon turned to politics.

Somehow, politics had never been a direction our afternoon chats had wandered, surprisingly, considering how much time I was then spending researching the events of September 11th and the disturbing conclusions I was coming to and so vocal about with everyone else.

But here we were breaking bread together and talking politics for the first time. I quickly realized I’d made an incorrect assumption. Never assume that just because someone drives a car with a "Free Tibet" sticker on the back it automatically means the passengers are politically liberal.

Thus began an interesting and somewhat tentative friendship with Libertarian leaning Bush supporters.

My new friend and I continued to have wonderful dialogues about mothering, schooling, etc. Our families still shared meals, though with a tacit agreement to avoid discussing politics. Over time however, concurrent with the Bush administration’s rush to war in Iraq, the dinner dates and get togethers began happening less and less frequently. This didn’t stop the kids however, who still continued to have their play-dates and sleep-overs.

Kids don’t care what someone’s politics are. It’s not that they don’t care in the sense of being un- interested. In fact in the past few months I’ve been surprised at how many times I overheard kids asking their friends--whose parents represented the entire political spectrum--who they were "voting" for, and regardless of the answer, would continue on happily with whatever they were mutually engaged in.

Shortly before November’s election, my friend’s daughter showed up for her classes at the local homeschooling center our family also attends–a place widely regarded as being fairly liberal (though political labels are such an ineffective way of defining anyone). She’d just been to a Bush rally the previous day and was covered from head to toe in Bush placards and buttons. My first feeling upon seeing her was one of frustration and dismay. I’d had my own Bush experience the previous day in which I witnessed first hand a very disturbing assault upon civil liberties and was feeling especially concerned about the direction our country was headed. Seeing this young girl so gleefully supporting Bush almost sent me over the edge. Almost immediately however, I caught myself in another faux pas. This one perhaps more major than the last. How could I worry about the demise of civil liberties on one hand and be upset with an eleven year old for exercising hers on the other?

Two days later I observed this same 11 year old girl, still sporting her Bush buttons, giggling and eating lunch with a friend. Her friend wore a hand painted "Kids for Kerry" t-shirt festooned with Kerry buttons. They certainly didn’t seem to be having any problems with each other.

These events and observations brought about a needed shift in my perceptions. Which in turn also seemed to precipitate a positive shift, despite political differences, in the friendship our families shared. Even so, however, there’s been one nagging question I’ve been unable to ignore. How could they be supportive of Bush? It’s a question I’ve regularly, and timidly, pondered asking them.

When my friend called this week inviting our family over for a holiday gathering, asking us to bring along a reading, I told her that we’d love to attend and that I’d be sure to bring along something "anti-christmas or political" to read. It’s the most "political" thing I’ve said to her in months. It was met with silence. I laughed. For a moment she’d thought I was serious.

Trying to find an interesting Christmas story or poem to share, I googled "a Christmas story." The search returned 605,000 results, the first of many being for the 1983 children’s movie of the same name. Obviously I needed to narrow my defining operators so I added the word peace to my search. I knew this would turn up a plethora of results as well, but was especially interested in finding a story I could share that talked about peace. Jesus was the prince of it after all.

My search returned 48,900 results. I haven’t a clue what 48, 899 of them were however, because the very first one was all I needed. It was THE story I knew I was looking for.

The story, published on December 9, 2004 by the well regarded University of Wisconsin-Madison student newspaper, and written by Nick Barbash– a sophomore majoring in political science and international studies–is titled "A Christmas story of peace and love."

Here was the retelling of a story–a true story–that happened 90 years ago this Christmas Eve, about soldiers in a time of war laying down their weapons for a brief moment in time, and coming together to celebrate their humanity.

Sometime around 9 p.m., a company sergeant-major in the North Staffordshire Regiment reported to his commander that several dozen German soldiers had climbed out of the trenches and were lighting candles and singing songs. The commander peered out over the parapet and was astonished to see a single unarmed German soldier walking toward them bearing a white flag. He crawled out of the British trench and met the soldier halfway across the battlefield, where he discovered the German had been a waiter in England before the war and was interested in trading cigars for brandy. He took the British commander to a group of German officers, and it was agreed there would be an unofficial truce until midnight of Christmas night.

All along the Western Front, hundreds of soldiers on both sides poured out of the trenches into no man's land to celebrate Christmas with the men they had sworn to kill...

The opposing sides exchanged candy, liquor, cigarettes and plum pudding. They roasted a pig. They played an enthusiastic soccer game on the frozen ground...They sang carols of the season, never caring that some of them sang "Stille Nacht" while others sang "Silent Night." They helped bury each other's dead and recited prayers for peace together.

As I read, a dim recognition of the story came from some remote corner of my memory. Maybe I’d read a version of it somewhere, or perhaps I’d heard about it on TV, or maybe a history class mentioned it, or maybe it’s just some primal knowing that humankind has the potential for such things. Nevertheless, I was stunned. I immediately began searching the internet for more details. I wanted to verify the story, but was also incredibly intrigued and wanted to learn more. Apparently, many people through the years have tried to chalk the story up to being mostly legend. But in a 2001 interview in the National Review, Stanley Weintraub, author of Silent Night: The Story of the World War I Christmas Truce, tells how he became convinced it was more than myth.

In 1985 I published a book about the five days leading up to the Armistice in November 1918, A Stillness Heard Round the World: The End of the Great War. While researching it I discovered the abortive informal armistice in 1914 that had bubbled up from the ranks on Christmas Eve. Although it clearly happened, and survivors had been on a BBC television documentary in 1982, the event had taken on the quality of myth. I determined to find out more, particularly to grasp the mythic power that the truce seemed to possess, and to examine it from both sides. I had begun my earlier book with the line, "Peace is harder to make than war," and as I worked on Silent Night that line became even more meaningful. Although I was working on other books at the time, including two on World War II and several biographies, every time I went to England or Germany on other research, I dipped into files of newspapers for January 1915, as troops mesmerized by the miraculous Christmas peace, a sort of waking dream they could hardly believe, wrote home about it. In those pre-censorship days, the letters were often sent on to local newspapers, which printed them. Then I went to the military archives. It was all real — even the football games (our soccer) in No Man's Land. I even found some of the scores.

In 1998, BBC News ran a story based on the book Christmas Truce which was written by Malcolm Brown and Shirley Seaton.

The Christmas truce of 1914 really happened. It is as much a part of the historical texture of World War I as the gas clouds of Ypres or the Battle of the Somme or the Armistice of 1918. Yet it has often been dismissed as though it were merely a myth. Or, assuming anything of the kind occurred, it has been seen as a minor incident, blown up out of all proportion, natural fodder for sentimentalists and pacifists of later generations.

But the truce did take place, and on some far greater scale than has been generally realised. Enemy really did meet enemy between the trenches. There was for a time, genuine peace in No Man's Land. Though Germans and British were the main participants, French and Belgians took part as well. Most of those involved agreed it was a remarkable way to spend Christmas. "Just you think," wrote one British soldier, "that while you were eating your turkey, etc, I was out talking and shaking hands with the very men I had been trying to kill a few hours before! It was astounding!"

I can’t help but wonder. How many of today’s servicemen and women deployed in Iraq, or how many of the so called "insurgents" who are really mostly just regular people resisting an illegal occupation, or how many of the innocent bystanders and victims of war would really just prefer a nice meal together, an exchange of simple gifts, and perhaps a nice game of soccer rather than all the senseless killing and dying currently taking place?

Weintraub doubts that the kind of truce that took place in No Man’s Land 90 years ago could ever happen again, saying at the end of his interview, "To see a common humanity in likely future opponents seems unlikely. A Christmas truce could not happen again without a mutual respect for the values of Christmas."

I see his point, but I’d like to respectfully disagree. I have much more in common with my Bush supporting friend than a shared holiday. Our humanity is not bound by our religious beliefs, by what we do for a living or live to do, by what color our skin is, by how much money we have or don’t have, nor even, as I now realize, is it bound by what our politics might be. Our humanity is much bigger and deeper than that.

I shared Nick’s story at the reading last night. I also shared the poem, Christmas in the Trenches, written twenty years ago by John McCutcheon. It was met, despite all the mixed political viewpoints in the room, with resounding applause. We ourselves were meeting in our own No Man’s Land after all, rising above our petty differences and recognizing something more deeply shared.

Another Christmas truce like the one that took place all along the Western Front in the winter of 1914 may be unlikely. And sending cards proclaiming "Peace on Earth and Goodwill to All" are but meaningless and futile exercises if we can’t find that space between the trenches–that no man’s land that is really everyman’s– where we, if even for only but a moment, see ourselves and our humanity reflected in another’s eyes. Deep down we know we share something greater than the values of the few but powerful people asking us to kill each other. Deep down we know we share something far greater than the values proclaimed by any one religious, political, or cultural belief.

It is my wish for humanity that we start living more fully that which we deeply know. For when we do, No Man’s Land will cease being littered with the awful detritus of our fear and in its place will bloom the hope, life, and dreams we all commonly share. And then we shall finally know the true meaning of Christmas and Peace on Earth.

(The following piece was published in Truthout's election blog immediately following the November 2 election. Unfortunately, they disabled all the hyperlinks which supported each of the questions.)

An Invitation to the Conservative Right from a Liberal Lefty
By Debi Smith
Ashland, Oregon

Contrary to the catchy heading of this letter, I actually rather disparage labels. For one, they really don’t paint an accurate and complete picture of who an individual is. We’re far more nuanced than that. Right? I could be wrong but I’d bet there’s at least one area in your life where you might tend to be at least a little more liberal than conservative. I know I can admit the reverse. In fact I’ve been accused before of being a closet conservative. But labels shmables. They’re like suffocating little boxes. They trap us and our thinking capabilities inside, and perhaps even worse, they create division. Division which is now being reflected in our families, friendships, communities, churches, places of work, and has become a widening chasm threatening to engulf our entire country...no matter what our labels read.

Perhaps the only way we can avoid disappearing into this chasm is to come together and begin dialoguing and listening to each other - compassionately. Not hysterically or with crazed, shrill, frantic voices. Let’s leave that to the far left and right talking heads that get paid mass sums to rile us up. This is an invitation to the real people that make up this country. Not the pundits, pollsters, media, politicians, or the corporations that have bought and paid for all of them. No, this is an invitation to regular folk. To the moms, dads, grandparents, sons and daughters - of every color, social status, educational background, and belief system - who, in one unbelievably diverse and amazing tapestry, form the fabric of this great country. I’m almost certain that if we sat down in a room together and each made a list of the things most important to us, we’d find ourselves agreeing on many of them. But how often do we consider that? Perhaps this would be a good place to begin. Discovering what we agree on. What we tend to disagree on is how to go about achieving the things we believe in, a much bigger and inherently more difficult task yes, but one that’s made easier by gaining a modicum of understanding into why we each believe the way we do. A task made easier by first recognizing our shared and incontrovertible beliefs, hopes, dreams, and desires. For example, I assume we would agree that we both want access to clean water? How about healthy air? Can you see where I’m headed?

But...before we discover what we agree on, a pressing question looms above all others and begs answering. There are close to 56 million people in this country (or more, if you take into account all the voting irregularities in Ohio alone), along with a large portion of the world citizenry, who are very confused and completely flabbergasted as to why you’ve just re-elected George W. Bush. If for no other reason than the fact he lied to you regarding Iraq. Not just one lie, but many. Saddam was not involved in 9/11. Iraq was not an imminent threat to the United States. There were no weapons of mass destruction. And to date, 1145 American Troops and 145 Coalition Troops have lost their lives fighting in this unjustifiable war.

I know you don’t want to hear it, but many of us are also wondering about a seeming contradiction of yours. Why do you go around wringing your hands about the sanctity of all life but ignore the murder of thousands and thousands of innocent people in Iraq? Approximately 100,000 Iraqi civilians - men, women, children, grandparents - have been blown to bits by our precision smart bombs and administration lies. And why do you then, to top off this absurd contradiction, re-elect the very person responsible for the murder? If Jesus is someone you admire and look up to, can you imagine him supporting all the lies and bombing of thousands and thousands of innocent people whose only mistake was being born in the middle of the richest triangle of oil on the planet? And if you can’t, could you please explain this contradiction? I hope you don’t think this is just an angry diatribe. It’s just that I can’t wrap my head around it and maybe you can help me understand your reasoning. (And in case you think I’m 100% pro abortion, you’d be wrong. One of those nuances I mentioned.)

Okay, so there’s one big question off my chest. But before I sign off, I’d like to ask just a few more questions...if you don’t mind.

Why did you vote for a man who has the worst job creation/loss record since Herbert Hoover?
Why did you vote for a man who wants to take away your overtime pay?
Why did you vote for a man who doesn’t care what kind of air you and your children breathe?
Why did you vote for a man who wants you to pay more for your prescription medications?
Why did you vote for a man who doesn’t heed the warnings of scientists regarding global warming?
Why did you vote for a man who has been the worst steward of the land in presidential history?
Why did you vote for a man whose real interest seems to be pleasing his corporate financiers?
Why did you vote for a man who took the largest budget surplus ever and turned it into the largest deficit?
Why did you vote for a man who, in 2001, ignored specific and credible reports that an attack was eminent?
Why did you vote for a man, who at every turn, tried to block credible investigations into the 9/11 attacks?

Again, I must ask, why did you vote for a man who took this country to war on lies?

Why did you vote for a man who sends your children, ill-prepared, to that war and then cuts their benefits?
Why did you vote for a man who has so far spent between 145 and 200 Billion of your dollars on this war?
Why did you vote for a man whose friends are the happy beneficiaries of much of this money?

This is by no means a complete list of my questions, but it’s a good start. Perhaps we can meet for coffee sometime, your place or mine, and you can help me understand why you’ve just re-elected George W. Bush. Then maybe over a second cup of coffee we can begin that list I mentioned. The one where we talk about our hopes and dreams for our children, and their children. About what sort of legacy and world we’d really like to leave them. Maybe from that place where we agree, we can gently move into the less agreeable areas with more respect for each other. We need to define our vision for America. You and I, the regular folks. If we don’t, I fear the creaking jaws of the growing divide will one day open big enough to swallow us all. We owe ourselves, and all future generations, here and around the world, better than that.

Looking forward to the pleasure of your reply and hoping you’ll take me up on that coffee.

Sincerely,
Debi Smith

Published on Thursday, October 21, 2004 by CommonDreams.org

To Be Silenced, Or Not to Be: That is the Question

by Debi Smith

"Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us."
--Justice William O.Douglas

Last week, both vice presidential nominee John Edwards and President George W. Bush visited Southern Oregon. Considering the area is relatively rural, sparsely populated, and Oregon is a state that usually gets little attention in a presidential election, it was an unprecedented and rather exciting occasion. I decided to try and get tickets to both events for my kids and myself.

Getting tickets from the Jackson County Democratic Party Headquarters for the Edwards event was pleasant and easy. They didn’t ask me to declare a party, didn’t ask who I was voting for, didn’t ask me to provide personal information or a DNA sample.

Not so at the Jackson County GOP headquarters. First they wanted to know my name, address, phone number, email, and my driver’s license number. "Do they really have the time, funds, and need to run all this data through some security check? What are they afraid of?" I asked myself. But hey, if it’ll get me some tickets, I’ll grudgingly fill out the application.

It didn’t get me the tickets. "Are you a Bush supporter?" I was asked. I explained that I was a registered Independent and not necessarily a Bush supporter. "Are you going to vote for Bush?" I was asked. "No," I honestly, and out of curiosity to see what would happen, replied. I was summarily told that if I wasn’t planning on voting for Bush, I wasn’t welcome. "John" came over to make sure I got the message. I told him I’d taken my kids to similar events (we saw Clinton and Gore in 1996) and didn’t he think it was good to get my kids involved in the democratic process early? To take them to events such as these and let them make up their own minds? I guess not. He just kept repeating, in a rather intimidating way, that if I wasn’t a supporter, I wasn’t welcome. (Funny how he wasn’t worried about how this sort of attitude might affect the future of the Republican Party. Hmm.)

I initially found the whole thing absurdly funny even though I was shaking (intimidation will do that to you) as I walked out of GOP headquarters. As the day wore on and the more I reflected on the starkly different experiences I’d had at both headquarters, the more frustrated and indignant I became. What is happening in this country that my children and I are kept out of a rally for the man who is currently our president? I had no intention whatsoever of causing any disturbances or protesting the event in any way. We’re a homeschooling family that uses a variety of life experiences and opportunities as our classroom. This was simply just another unique event for my children and I to attend and learn from.

Incidentally, I observed nary a protest during the entire Edwards rally the following day, despite the fact there had been no effort to keep anyone out based on their viewpoints or political affiliations. Why couldn’t the Bush Campaign and the GOP behave in the same congenial and democratic fashion I wondered, and again asked myself, "What are they afraid of?" I even tried to come up with a new acronym for the GOP. Grand Old Paranoia came to mind.

Feeling more and more outraged by the sanitation of the Bush event, I decided to attend the unWelcome Bush rally to be held in Jacksonville. Jacksonville is a tiny little dot on the map (pop. 2245). It’s a well-preserved gold mining town that now houses museums, tiny boutiques, eateries, and small inns. Bush would be spending the night here following his presumptuous and premature "Victory Rally" being held a few miles away in Central Point. A politically active friend of mine had organized the peaceful demonstration and had spoken several times with local authorities, informing them of the event, and asking all the pertinent questions. She was told that as long as people remained on the sidewalks, there should be no problem and that they were there to protect the president as well as our right to peaceably assemble.

Our group started out small, 70 or so people carrying signs, water bottles, video cameras, and children. As the evening wore on more people began gathering—Bush supporters, and protesters alike. There were several blockades, manned by security, at different intersections to the west of where we were. People, to my knowledge, were respecting the requests not to move beyond the blockades as well as continuing to respect the request to keep to the sidewalks. When a helicopter started making low passes overhead, a portion of the motorcycle motorcade came by, and a throng of riot cops made their appearance guarding the west end of the block, we assumed the President was on his way. Everything continued to remain fairly calm, even with the mixture of chanting from both sides.

Suddenly, an officer within the line of riot cops ordered the crowd to move back two blocks to 5th Street. They allowed about four seconds for this to sink in and then started pushing us back by moving forward in a line. The sidewalks could not contain the sudden movement of people, and subsequently the streets became crowded and chaotic. If their desire for us to move had been communicated earlier, or if that portion of the street had been blocked off to begin with, people probably would have, in general, respected it, even though we were in our legal right to be in the vicinity. But instead, the authorities in charge chose to create confusion and conflict instead of wisely diffusing it ahead of time. And the result was an unnecessary melee: sudden gunfire; people running, falling, being shot with pepper bullets; children upset by the gunfire, and coughing from the pepper; women who were carrying their children being grabbed and pushed violently; people daring to ask questions being forcibly pushed and intimidated. It must be reiterated, this event was organized to be peaceful, non-violent, and family friendly. And, even though there was a mixed demographic on the street, the event remained non-violent and relatively peaceful…except for the actions of a few of the less than restrained riot cops. Riot cops, who were, we have to remind ourselves, taking orders from a higher command.

I fully expected to see the presence of the secret service, the snipers, and a multitude of officers at this event. What I didn’t expect to see was a completely unnecessary use of extreme force in a situation that clearly didn’t warrant it. If there was, and to my knowledge there wasn’t, anyone doing something illegal or outside their constitutional rights, then why couldn’t a couple of these well-trained officers peacefully remove the offenders? I was at the front of the crowd when the mayhem broke out and I saw nothing that would warrant shooting pepper bullets, especially into a crowd so full of young children.

After returning home from this disturbing event, I turned on the news. The only thing that aired on my local NBC affiliate regarding the event was an interview with a Bush supporter in the darkened street. I did learn later that a couple other outlets offered a slightly more balanced, though still sanitized, viewpoint. Several independent video clips documenting the overuse of force have also been sent to various media outlets over the past few days, and to my knowledge, none have been aired. More sanitation. Could this be happening all over the country? How many valid stories are going unreported by the major media? Or are so sanitized as to be a faint glimmer of the actual truth?

Who runs this sanitation department?

Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.
--Harry S. Truman, 33rd president of the U.S.

After about 10 minutes of Internet research, I observed a picture beginning to develop. And, my friends, the picture isn't pretty. Yes, the silencing is happening all across America. At Presidential visits, during peace rallies, non-violent demonstrations, in high schools where kids draw anti-war pictures in art class, in small towns where people put dissenting comics on their car. All these events have resulted in visits, interrogation, and intimidation by the Secret Service. When you begin to notice the larger pattern of thought control, intimidation, and downright attack upon the very bedrock of our nation’s guiding principles by the people who are sworn to uphold it, a sick feeling begins building in your gut.

In answer to my question, ‘who runs this sanitation department?’ Dave Lindorff, investigative reporter, journalist, and columnist succinctly explains, "White House advance teams and the Secret Service have routinely instructed local police at cities where the president or vice president plan to visit to remove demonstrators—particularly those carrying signs which might mar the TV imagery of a triumphant presidential motorcade or rally—and pen them in, often in fenced-in enclosures, well away from the event and the media. The result is news coverage that has seemed to suggest a universally adored administration."

The AFL-CIO, commenting on the well documented suppression of free speech and intimidation witnessed during the FTAA Ministerial in Miami last November said, "Some are calling the repression witnessed…the ‘Miami model.’ The Miami model calls for authorities to foment irrational fears about peaceful political protest in order to legitimize suppression of our rights. This climate of panic enables top police officials to harass and intimidate protestors and sympathetic members of the public…. These tactics are designed to discourage ordinary Americans from exercising their Constitutional rights to free speech and free assembly. People in America should not have to fear violent attacks funded by their own tax dollars when they participate in peaceful and permitted demonstrations. These tactics are part of a larger strategy of the Bush Administration to chill political dissent and stifle civil liberties here in America."

At the very Bush rally I was refused entrance to, three teachers (who were craftier than I when trying to obtain tickets) were kicked out for the crime of wearing t-shirts that said, "Protect our civil liberties." Reportedly, a rally volunteer said the shirts were "obscene." These three women were even threatened with arrest if they did not leave the event.

How have we come to such a point where advocating for protection of our civil liberties is obscene?? Of course, that’s a silly question come post 9/11, right? Obviously, 9/11 (which was the all too convenient"catastrophic and catalyzing event, like a new Pearl Harbor" that the neo-cons had been frothing at the mouth for since writing their thesis Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century in 2000) meant that in order for ordinary American citizens to experience security we’d have to give up many of our freedoms. Duh. Fall in line sheeple. Don’t ask questions. Don’t be unpatriotic. Don’t dissent. For heaven’s sake, go shopping. Go to Disney World. But whatever you do, don’t think… your security’s at stake.

Yes, our security is at stake. We are in the midst of a massive takeover (some would say corporate) of this country. But the real enemy isn’t some nefarious terrorist out there. It isn’t in those shipping containers Kerry mentions. It isn’t in Iraq. It isn’t in your neighborhood mosque or at the peace rally down the street or in the underbelly of the next plane you ride. You know why Bush lost interest in Bin Laden? It’s because he knows who the real enemy is, and where he resides. And no, let's not blame this all on Bush.

Aside from believing the enemy within is much larger than George W. Bush, I also believe a big chunk of the blame belongs on the media’s doorstep. In a few short years, media ownership has been consolidated into fewer and fewer (for profit) hands. According to the website www.corporations.org/media/ "In 1983, 50 corporations controlled the vast majority of all news media in the U.S." And in 2004? "Only 5 huge corporations -- Time Warner, Disney, Murdoch's News Corporation, Bertelsmann of Germany, and Viacom (formerly CBS) -- now control most of the media industry in the U.S. General Electric's NBC is a close sixth."

These mega-conglomerates are in the business of selling you something. And the closer you look, the fishier it smells. But don’t take my word for it. You owe it to yourself, and your country, to more deeply investigate the wily purveyors of our nation’s "news." One current and particularly egregious example of media totalitarian boot stomping is Sinclair Broadcasting. The same Sinclair Broadcast Group that in April forbade its ABC affiliates from showing Ted Koppel's 40-minute tribute to fallen troops in Iraq, because the programming appeared to be "motivated by political agenda", has the audacity to order, yes order, their stations to preempt regular programming, days before the election, to air a film that attacks Senator Kerry's activism following the Vietnam War.

Sinclair Broadcast Group, the country’s largest owner of TV stations, has also, among other things: required journalists to read pro-Bush statements (verbal loyalty oaths), refused to air ads criticizing Bush and/or featuring video clips of the President making false claims, and have aired "news stories" written and paid for by the government. And this isn’t being "motivated by a political agenda"??

Freedom Chips Anyone?

At first glance this may seem completely off the subject, but what about the fact that the state of Virginia is contemplating inserting RFID chips in all state issued drivers licenses? As per Kent Willis, Executive Director of the ACLU of Virginia:

"Almost everyone carries a driver’s license, and RFID chips allow people to be tracked. This proposal would allow anyone to set up an RFID reader to capture the identities and personal information of every person who comes within range. FBI agents, for example, could sweep up the identities of everyone at a political meeting, protest march, gun show, or Islamic prayer service."

This morning, I mentioned this RFID program to my son, asking him how he’d feel if he lived in a country that monitored your every move via a chip that was implanted in your driver’s license, internal passport, or even worse, your body (technology that was just recently approved by the FDA, by the way). He nonchalantly replied that he wouldn’t necessarily like it but that it wouldn’t be any big deal. I talked to him about civil liberties, about privacy issues, about the freedoms this country fought long, hard, and bloody battles to obtain. Unfortunately, I wasn’t very convincing. But fortunately, he doesn’t get all his schooling from me. He’s also enrolled in several classes outside the home and this afternoon I walked in to find him doing some homework for one of them…reading excerpts from George Orwell’s 1984.

I know people are probably tired of all the Orwellian analogy. But this is just the tip of the iceberg. And we’re headed for a terrible sinking if we "stay the course." I sat down to look through the excerpts my son had been reading, remembering back to when I’d read the book as a teen. Included in the reading homework was the preface Walter Cronkite wrote in 1984 for that year’s edition of Orwell's novel. It reads, in part:

…If not prophecy, what was 1984? It was, as many have noticed, a warning: a warning about the future of human freedom in a world where political organization and technology can manufacture power in dimensions that would have stunned the imaginations of earlier ages.

…That warning vibrates powerfully when we allow ourselves to sit still and think carefully about orbiting satellites that can read the license plates in a parking lot and computers that can tap into thousands of telephone calls and telex transmissions at once and other computers that can do our banking and purchasing, can watch the house and tell a monitoring station what television program we are watching and how many people there are in the room…And we hear echoes of that warning chord in the constant demand for greater security and comfort, for less risk in our societies. We recognize, however dimly, that greater efficiency, ease, and security may come at a substantial price in freedom, that law and order can be a doublethink version of oppression, that individual liberties surrendered for whatever good reason are freedom lost.

…It has been said that 1984 fails as a prophecy because it succeeded as a warning--Orwell's terrible vision has been averted. Well, that kind of self-congratulation is, to say the least, premature. 1984 may not arrive on time, but there's always 1985.

Or 2004.

Yes, I blame this neo-oppression on the Bush cabal, I blame the media, but I also blame myself, and everyone else like myself, who just hasn’t had the time, or taken the time rather, to pay sufficient attention. To question. To reason. We were born into very fortunate circumstances—our country having fought long and hard for the opportunity to be self-determining, democratic, and free. Yet we have mostly squandered that gift by our inattention and often slobbering focus on all things material. It’s we the people who’ve handed over our power to the media, to corporations, to the government. We’re the ones who left the store, leaving the door wide open and the keys in the till. A few months ago I ran across a rather chilling and haunting quote:

What no one seemed to notice...was the ever widening gap...between the government and the people....And it became always wider....the whole process of its coming into being, was above all diverting, it provided an excuse not to think for people who did not want to think anyway...and kept us so busy with continuous changes and 'crises' and so fascinated...by the machinations of the 'national enemies,' without and within, that we had no time to think about these dreadful things that were growing, little by little, all around us....Each act... is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join you in resisting somehow....But the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds or thousands will join with you, never comes. That's the difficulty. The forms are all there, all untouched, all reassuring, the houses, the shops, the jobs, the mealtimes, the visits, the concerts, the cinema, the holidays....Suddenly it all comes down, all at once. You see what you are, what you have done, or, more accurately, what you haven't done (for that was all that was required of most of us: that we do nothing). You remember those early meetings of your department in the university when, if one had stood, others would have stood, perhaps, but no one stood....You remember everything now, and your heart breaks. Too late. You are compromised beyond repair.
--An excerpt from Milton Mayer’s "They Thought They Were Free, The Germans 1938-45" (1955, University of Chicago Press)

Hopefully history has taught us what we must now do before it’s too late. Before we are compromised beyond repair. First, we must take responsibility for becoming better informed, and we must do so by seeking out a wide variety of information. Secondly, we’re approaching what’s probably the most important election in our nation's history. The powers that be have tried, successfully it seems, to drive a wedge through the middle of this country’s heart. Not since the civil war or the civil rights movement have we been so vehemently divided. Does the term "Divide and Conquer" ring a bell? Now is not the time to allow ourselves to be silenced or divided. We must speak out. We must listen to each other. Up to and following this election, we must continue to build bridges through the use of informed dialogue and compassionate listening. It can, does, and will make a difference. We must not be silent. For as Thomas Jefferson said, "All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent."

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