You are here: Home / Archives for Justice

GOP, Rape and the New Rage

October 26, 2012 by

This is the world of the future for women if the GOP takes the White House. The following may be sound ideological, even strident, I won’t apologize for this now or at any time in the future. I apologize for my offending your delicate sensibilities on this subject, stop reading now if you are of the opinion a woman should not be the ultimate Sovereign of their procreative health and choice. Please stop reading now if you are of the opinion old men, government or religious institutions should have greater authority over a woman’s body integrity than the individual woman.

This is the platform of the GOP.

“Faithful to the “self-evident” truths enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, we assert the sanctity of human life and affirm that the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed. We support a human life amendment to the Constitution and endorse legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children. We oppose using public revenues to promote or perform abortion or fund organizations which perform or advocate it and will not fund or subsidize health care which includes abortion coverage. We support the appointment of judges who respect traditional family values and the sanctity of innocent human life. We oppose the nonconsensual withholding or withdrawal of care or treatment, including food and water, from people with disabilities, including newborns, as well as the elderly and infirm, just as we oppose active and passive euthanasia and assisted suicide.”

Please note in the above the absence of any exceptions, none. Not to save the life of the already born woman, not for rape, not for incest.

Since Ronald Reagan invited the Religious Right into the GOP, there has been a slow march toward every greater misogyny, punishing women for our sexuality and choosing to express it. Essentially, punishing us for having a vagina and using it was intended, something more than spitting out baby after baby.

The following are some of my favorite quotes from elected GOP members across the US:

“I’m very proud of my pro-life record,” Ryan told WJHL-TV in Virginia in an interview aired Thursday. “I’ve always adopted the idea, the position, that the method of conception doesn’t change the definition of life.”

Paul Ryan, VP Candidate WJHL.com Interview

“First of all, from what I understand from doctors, (pregnancy from rape) is really rare,” Akin told KTVI television in an interview widely distributed by Democrats. “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”

Representative Todd Akin ( R ), Fox News interview

“I struggled with it myself for a long time, but I came to realize life is that gift from God,” he said. “And I think even when life begins in that horrible situation of rape, that it is something that God intended to happen.”

Representative Richard Mourdock, Indiana Senate Debate

“Understand though, that when we talk about exceptions, we talk about rape, incest, health of a woman, life of a woman. Life of the woman is not an exception.” Duckworth accused Walsh of allowing a woman to die rather than get an abortion, and Walsh said that was unfair. After the debate, he explained further to the press, NPR reports. He told CNN: “This is an issue that opponents of life throw out there to make us look unreasonable. There’s no such exception as life of the mother, and as far as health of the mother, same thing, with advances in science and technology. Health of the mother has been, has become a tool for abortions any time under any reason.” He told WGN: “With modern technology and science, you can’t find one instance … there is no such exception as life of the mother, and as far as health of the mother, same thing.

Representative Joe Walsh, ( R ), Illinois ongoing Debate and interviews

I lived something similar to that with my own family. She chose life, and I commend her for that. She knew my views. But, fortunately for me, I didn’t have to.. she chose the way I thought. No don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t rape.

Scolforo: Similar how?

Smith: Uh, having a baby out of wedlock.

Scolforo: That’s similar to rape?

Smith: No, no, no, but… put yourself in a father’s situation, yes. It is similar. But, back to the original, I’m pro-life, period.

Tom Smith ( R ), Reporters Interview
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Mitt Romney started his political life ambivalent toward the issue of women’s right to choose. His mother was firmly Pro-Choice during her Senate race. According to Mr. Romney he has always been personally Pro-Life and politically willing to keep a foot in both camps until he started this run for the Presidency. Now he is firmly and without exception in debt to the Religious Ideologues who hold the GOP in their hot hands, ready to turn the clock back and push women into the kitchen and the closet. Early in this run Mitt stated he was Pro-Life without exception, gaining the support of the crazies. Since that time he has moderated his stance, now he will make exceptions for Rape, Incest and the life of the already born and enfranchised woman, to save her life.

Keep in mind though, Mitt has said without equivocation it is his goal to overturn Roe v. Wade. It is his plan to defund Planned Parenthood. He fully supports disallowing the tax exemption for any health insurance policy that includes Abortion as a covered service. His Vice Presidential pick has co-sponsored five (5) anti-abortion bills all of which were dubious in their language, infantilize women and further strip them of their legal rights,  personal authority and body integrity.

My personal favorite is the Sanctity of Life Act, this little gem of a bill would have stripped SCOTUS and all other courts of their authority to hear challenges and rule, while at the same time making abortion mostly illegal for any and all reasons, no exceptions. Paul Ryan and Todd Akin were co-sponsors on this treat, not once but they introduced this in multiple sessions of congress.

Before I end my tirade I want to remind women and men, these ‘Sanctity’ of the sperm, because this is what they are, bills are nothing more than attempts to diminish women. Attempts to define the ‘life’ of a zygote as having greater value than an already born women; they are rubbish. When Mitt Romney or Paul Ryan call the social issues, particularly women’s issues such as our right to determine our health and future nothing more than a distraction from the ‘real’ issues of the day they show their true colors. The men I quoted are not on the right side of history and those who pick up the banner and run with it are running backwards and make me afraid.

These Bills not only want to strip women of their right to access safe and legal abortion, they will take many safe forms of contraceptives off the market. They will make IVF illegal. They will make most forms of stem cell research illegal. Some of the Bills introduced, including Paul Ryans would give a Rapist the right to sue his victim to prevent her from crossing state lines to obtain an abortion if the worst were to happen.

I fully support your right to be Pro-Life, whether for religious reasons or because you truly believe life begins at conception. This is your right.

Stay out of my business. Make your decisions based on your personal beliefs and choices. Do not interfere with my right to make my decisions based on my personal beliefs, my doctor’s medically sound advice and what science tells me. I love science and believe in it.

When someone says to me these things don’t matter they make me cringe. When they say these are distractions I realize they believe that 51% of the population of this nation, women; their mothers, daughters, wives don’t matter. But I am not a special interest group any longer, I am part of a majority. I am a bread winner, in fact the primary bread winner. I am not a distraction, but if the GOP wins my daughters and granddaughters might just once again become distractions, less than or not enough.

I fear for our daughters in the world the GOP wants to create. I fear for our daughters in a world where Rape is no longer a violent assault but something equivalent to having a child out of wedlock, or maybe ‘Gods will’, another form of conception. I fear for our daughters who might not have access to safe, affordable and certain contraceptives and will be subject to the same condemnation I was as an eleven-year-old Rape Victim with nowhere to turn and no one to protect me.

Is this the world we want for our daughters? Is this the world we fought for?

Filed Under: Series: Platforms & Ideologies Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

On My Knees

October 13, 2012 by

I haven’t forgiven this doesn’t mean I want them dead it just means I don’t forgive their violence. It also means I think sometimes, those days when crawling out of bed are so hard, I want them to hurt like I hurt. Some days, those days when I think I will breakdown and call the doctor begging for something stronger than Ibuprofen 800 for pain management I think Damn them to hell forever, I don’t want to live my life this way and my fury rises up and I weep. I cannot help the way I feel I am not a saint, my halo has not been granted.

For about eight years, I have been an activist in the criminal justice system. I speak in a program called Victim Impact inside of the Prison system of Texas. I speak to offenders in Federal, State and Juvenile lock-up and to the Parole groups ordered into the program. I do not speak out of hate or revenge; I don’t speak to hammer a captive audience with anger. I speak because I hope each time to touch one heart; just one would be enough for me. One heart that will leave the room with a different perspective on the relationship between themselves and their acts, their victims that includes their own families, their children and of course, the person they directly harmed.

I have spent eight years telling my story. There are some days when I walk into the rooms and look out at the faces I am decimated by their youth. I ask how many have children, they all raise their hands and I consider the lives of my three offenders, just children themselves twenty years ago at the time our lives intersected, each with at least one parent behind bars at the time they kidnapped and shot me three times. Their histories are the genesis of my activism, the framework of my thinking about how we each create the ever-expanding ripples through our judgment, acts, remorse and yes-even forgiveness.

Over the years, I have evolved, I thought. I believe each of us has the ability to reform our life, that with few exceptions each of us has the capacity to change our lives. If I didn’t believe this, I could not walk through the gates of prisons, stand before violent offenders, and say I believe they have the capability to make positive change. If I didn’t believe compassion and empathy existed, even in the most hardened of humans, I could not stand before them and say to them…

“You have the ability to change the life of your children. You have the ability to change your own life by tapping into your empathy.”

Now I have to ask myself is all I do and all I say simply a panacea for my ego or perhaps simply a pragmatic intellectual exercise that I haven’t truly absorbed into my heart and spirit. Perhaps, it is something else altogether. Perhaps what I say only applies to everyone else, offenders and victims together but not to me and not to my offenders. I have run into a brick wall, the wall of my intellect fighting my heart. My heart is winning today. My heart won last Wednesday and has won every day since Wednesday since I opened the letter from the Texas State Board of Pardons and Paroles.

“This is to inform you Your Offender has been granted Parole”

Charge: 2 Counts Attempted Capital Murder w/Deadly

Sentence: 35 years, 20 years

Sentence Date: April 13, 1993

Release Date: March 9, 2027

Parole Granted: October 4, 2012

When I opened that letter I was sitting at my desk, on the phone with my heart sister Red I think I went silent, the tears started, my heart stopped. I am not a Saint. I am barely human. My heart sister didn’t know, I slipped from my chair to my knees and had I not been on the phone with her my primal scream would have shook the walls. Instead all I could do is ask her to stop, stop talking please give me a minute, please let me read to her what I had just silently read to myself. The tears continued as I sobbed, I had already memorized the words though I didn’t have to read them. My life, dammit My Life.

My letters to the Parole Board obviously did not matter. My discussion with the head of the Parole board at Powledge Unit, none of that mattered. Clearly, I could have simply ignored all of that and the outcome would have been the same. My life, all the days I can’t move without wanting to fall to the floor that is worth twenty years. There is something far worse though, something that is causing me to want to crawl into my closet and stay there, re-examine myself closely.

I am not a saint, not that I have ever proposed I was. But I thought I was better than this. Better than demanding my pound of flesh. Better than demanding revenge. I did not realize I had not reconciled my pragmatic intellectual self, the part that believes remorse, rehabilitation and re-entry is not only possible but the hoped for outcome. I did not know this about myself, did not understand I had not brought my heart and mind together that I meant it, but not about MY OFFENDERS. I did not know this would cause me such fury.

I didn’t know I lacked compassion I think this devastates me more than I can even begin to measure.

I didn’t know I was false a sham. This also devastates me.

Filed Under: Series: Crime and Punishment Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Race 2012, What is Race

October 9, 2012 by

I received a request to answer the question of “what is race”, directly from Monica who is our fearless leader and coordinator for Race 2012. Then today Totsymae also asked the question along with, “what does it mean to you?” These are difficult subjects especially during these days; we have tried hard in this nation to pretend we don’t have a race problem. Perhaps a better way of saying this, as a nation we have tried to pretend with the election of Barack Obama we no longer have a race problem, obviously we elected a “Black Man as President”.

What is race? Do we have the language, polite or otherwise to answer that question adequately?

I am adopted. I look different from my family; in fact, I was told not infrequently I looked ‘exotic’. Being visually different was my first taste of what it meant to be different, my father said it didn’t matter. It did though. Not because children are discerning or born biased, they aren’t but they are born with an eye for what is dissimilar and an ear to learn what those differences mean, or to fear those differences. Fear translates into hate, humans hate what they fear; humans hate what poses a threat to their survival. Eventually those reactions become visceral if not addressed, thus a new racist is born.

What is race?

It is what defines our differences; these are purely physical characteristics. Without the physical characteristics, the markers of ‘race’ we would be unable to visually identify a person as belonging to specific racial groups unless they self-identified. The truth is race is a social construct that allows us to demonize or aggrandize a group of people based on nothing more or less than their physical characteristics. Humans have used differences, be they cultural, religious or the obvious physical to commit atrocities against each other since the dawn of humankind. We haven’t changed since we first learned to walk upright; we have only gotten more creative in our genocidal tendencies.

What is race?

When we look at our President, we don’t say we elected our first bi-racial President. We don’t acknowledge his Anglo Saxon heritage, indeed, we also forget his Indonesian stepfather; we only see his Blackness and for many White Americans that Blackness infuriates. That fury has broken the barriers of polite discussion of race; it has pulled out all the stops of racial etiquette and public avoidance of accusations of racism. Truthfully, there are

Ann Dunham and a young Barack Obama

those who take great pride in their blatant racism, forgetting our President had a very ‘White’ mother and was raised by very ‘White’ grandparents. Instead, they demand his Birth Certificate, certain this very Black man could not be born in the United States of America. Never has a seated President been treated with such disrespect, during his term in office. But then, never has a President of the United States appeared to be a Black Man.

What is Race? It is part of what we hold up as who we are. It shouldn’t be relevant, but it is. I am first Human, then a woman, then American, then part of an amazing and somewhat dysfunctional family that happens to share the DNA of many different cultures and going back generations.

What is race?

It is nothing more than a way to group and identify those unlike ourselves based on differences that have no real relevance other than our personal notion of beauty. In this nation, what is race? It has become something more, hasn’t it? Race has become an insidious and ugly framework for Class, which is really just another way to say ‘poverty’ and ‘wealth’. Race is a social construct, made up and sustained by those who would hold on to power. It is that, nothing more and nothing less.

Race is a grouping and a tick mark on the Census, the employment application, the TSA checkpoint or the show me your papers police check. It is that, nothing more or less. Race is what we agreed would define us as groups of people so we could pick and choose who would win or lose in society. Race divides our cities creating pockets of destitution, hopelessness and lost opportunity for our children, our future.

We have developed an entire polite language, a racial etiquette for our public discourse. One day soon, we will have to say enough, we will have to begin to hold each other and ourselves accountable and allow ourselves to say

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

what needs to be said without being offended by whose lips say it. We will have to allow talk across the lines of the construct of race, reach through the smog of polite speech and recognize each other for our good intent get our azzes off our shoulders and begin to speak plainly about the problems of Race within the country. We will have to speak across Color, Culture, Religion and Polite Society and across the Racial Etiquette, we have developed if we are to ever fix what is broken and truly achieve the dream that was spoken on the 28-Aug-1963 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

Finally, what does it mean to me?

Mildred and Richard Loving, 1967

It means beyond Loving vs. St. of Virginia my husband and I can go out to dinner anywhere and anytime without some ijit with an attitude giving us the stink eye, failing to provide us with service, or worse offering their opinion of our pairing.

Other times it means I have to revisit the scene of the crime, the day three young Black men kidnapped and shot me simply because they wanted to kill a ‘White Person”, each time they come up for parole I am reminded hate and prejudice runs both ways. Still other days I have to defend my personal position on Racism and Prejudice, why I don’t hate an entire ‘race’ for the act of three individuals. Yes, I am asked this often by both sides and my answer is always the same; I don’t even hate them why would I hate perfect strangers? Or even better, all three of them were teenagers should I hate teenagers? It makes as much sense. Yet even when I explain, most people think I am lying.

What does it mean to me? It means someday, maybe not in my lifetime or even in the lifetime of my children, we will finally destroy the construct of ‘Race’, when enough of us finally stop relying upon it to divide us or define us.

My humanity, gender and experiences define me. My appearance and gender define me only if it limits me by the decisions or perceptions of others. The perception of others as to my race it is just that perception and assumption, I never self-identify.

Filed Under: Presidential Race 2012, Series: Race in America Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Race 2012, Platforms & Ideology

October 4, 2012 by

This nation has taken on the inequity of education at every level from K through university as part of the on-going debate. The question we have to ask ourselves is it only poverty that drives the inequity or is there something else at work is there a racial undercurrent, still. It is hard to ask the question, hard to look at the year and think back to the days of Civil Rights marches, sit-ins, busing and finally forced school integration and have to ask; have we really not come any further than this?

There are some things we can see in black and white, there is no question there is a lack of parity. What is not so easy to determine is why. It is easy to say this is pure institutional racism, brush our hands together and move on to the next subject. Is that enough, have we solved the riddle? I don’t think we have, the inequity built into our education system has been with us for a very long time, it is the outcome of how we fund and administer our local schools. It is only natural, eventually, as poverty forces people together into communities, schools along with other services would suffer the consequence of economic decline.

It isn’t just poverty that divides us. Unless we cannot absolutely avoid it, we will always seek out communities where we are comfortable. We will always seek out a place to settle where the people look like us and sound like us.

Ruby Bridges, New Orleans 1960

It is natural, we might not even realize we are doing it; it is our own deep-seated fears and underlying prejudice driving us on, informing our choices. We might not be Racist, we might not be a raging flaming outright Bigot but these are very different animals from carrying that seed of fear and that ember of racial bias. We are by nature Xenophobic; we fear what is different from us.

I am not a Racist!

Except where racism is overt, where the neo-Nazis, KKK and others of their ilk march down city streets decked out in well-pressed sheets or Para-military gear, racism hides behind polite social forms. Since the signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 there have been changes in what is accepted in our public discourse regarding race we have even found a racial etiquette, at least until recently. This etiquette though, this burying of the Jim Crow era overtness has given way to new resentments and new racial dog-whistles.

  • Government Intervention
  • Welfare
  • Affirmative Action
  • Title I
  • Drug War

What does all this mean when it comes to education? It is an unfortunate truth, the very communities that have been ripped apart by our failed policies and barely concealed bias, have failing schools. We covertly accept some children, within some communities will not thrive and thus set up the circumstances for them to fail while paying lip service to hoped for success.

I am not going to try to hide my disdain today; the following quotes are taken directly from the GOP Platform, you can read all about their thoughts starting on page 35 [2]:

The Republican Party is the party of fresh and innovative ideas in education.

periodic rigorous assessments on the fundamentals, especially math, science, reading, history, and geography; renewed focus on the Constitution and the writings of the Founding Fathers, and an accurate account of American history that celebrates the birth of this great nation;

We renew our call for replacing “family planning” programs for teens with abstinence education which teaches abstinence until marriage as the responsible and respected standard of behavior. Abstinence from sexual activity is the only protection that is 100 percent effective against out-of-wedlock pregnancies and sexually-transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS when transmitted sexually. It is effective, science-based, and empowers teens to achieve optimal health outcomes and avoid risks of sexual activity.

We support keeping federal funds from being used in mandatory or universal mental health, psychiatric, or socio-emotional screening programs.

Republican Governors have led in the effort to reform our country’s under performing education system, and we applaud these advancements.

Now let me just quickly give some examples of what one Republican Governor has done as part of the reform of his under performing system.

  • Removed Thomas Jefferson from history books as part of the Enlightenment. Why you ask? Well because he was a known Deist who coined the phrase “separation of Church and state”; can’t have that coming out of the mouths of one of our Founding Fathers. He is still in the History Books, obviously can’t remove him completely but he isn’t mentioned as one of the key figures of the Enlightenment.[1]
  • Added a section called the unintended consequences of Affirmative Action. In the meantime, there is a section about the positive aspects of slavery in America and the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade is now referred to simply as ‘Atlantic Triangular Trade’. [1]

Can you begin to guess who this genius of Educational reform is? This stellar representative of a GOP Right Wing-nut might be? This would be President? Oh, I won’t hold you in suspense; it is my very own Governor Rick Perry. Only in Texas would they think to screw the pooch of Education this deep, keeping in mind a very large portion of our students are poor, Hispanic or Black.

The GOP promotes school choice, so do I so should we all. The GOP also promotes vouchers and privatization of our education system, here is where the GOP and I part ways. Families with no means to send their children outside of their communities, no transportation, no extra funds for school uniforms will not be in a position to ‘choose’ schools outside of their immediate communities. School choice is only for those with true choices, true means beyond the single ‘voucher’ for tuition and possibly books. The meme of borrowing money from your parents doesn’t begin to touch on what poverty means to those whose entire communities have been decimated by it.

Private industry will not build schools or invest in communities that represent no return on that investment, no profit. What does this mean? It means public funds will be all that remains and will be even more limited so long as we continue to limit public funding to property tax collection. It means after the Unions have been busted, public school teacher ranks have been further demonized and decimated and school text have been bastardized by boards with agendas, our children our future will be left in failing systems with no hope and no future.

Is this Race Based? It is poverty based and has the unintentional effect of further kicking the can down the road, closing the door on dreams and opportunity for those who would like to live the once real American Dream.

Is this Race Based? Perhaps a more important question is this truly unintentional or is it simply the new more polite Jim Crow.

http://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_sdi.asp

http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2012/2012006.pdf

http://www.census.gov/prod/2011pubs/acsbr10-05.pdf

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/13/education/13texas.html?_r=0

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/education/22texas.html?fta=y

[2] http://whitehouse12.com/republican-party-platform/

http://www.democrats.org/democratic-national-platform#moving-america

Filed Under: Presidential Race 2012, Series: Platforms & Ideologies, Series: Race in America, Social Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Fraud or Ideologue

August 16, 2012 by

Want it all, blood, bones all of it. Never mind you might need it someday just turn on the spigot and start sending your lives work, your earnings, your retirement and anything else you might have to me. I don’t need it but I want it, dammit.

Ignorance is a terrible thing and we are a nation well on our way to being entirely and willfully ignorant. We believe anything that sounds good and fits our personal worldview, our narrow pathological, all too often simplistic and ideological sociopolitical porches.

Summer Vacation Sure Hope They Speak ‘Merican

Yes, I said porch. Most Americans have not traveled further than their own front yards, haven’t expanded their knowledge of the world beyond their most recent vacation to Disney World and the children’s ride of ‘It’s a Small World’, even that annoyed them when the song was in languages they couldn’t understand.

This is America, Dammit! Speak English.

We want our country back. We want to take our country back.

Have your heard these slogans? I certainly have and I constantly wonder about them, wonder first who wants the country back and who they want to take it back from. Then I wonder, just where the hell do they want to take the country back to?

Tea Party Rally

So what do these fearful people look like? These people who want their country back. Do they look like me? Some of them certainly do, my guess is most of them do. The difference between them and me, they haven’t the wherewithal to consider the consequence of regression, a return to our past. Then you have the new generation, those who weren’t part of the change, weren’t part of the Civil and Equal Rights battles, they don’t have a clue and are simply repeating the mistakes of the past. They have been educated in a system that promotes ignorance, refusing to provide historical context or train our young to think.

What is the result of this drive to “Take our Country Back”? It is a great question here is the answer.

VOTER SUPPRESSION.

If your ideas suck the only way to win an election is to gerrymander districts and suppress the vote.

In the meantime, the GOP accuses the current Administration of attempting to block Veterans from voting in Ohio. This is of course, not the case at all. What they were attempting to do is expand early voting for all citizens of the State and keep early voting in place, not just for Veterans but for everyone. As I said previously, you are not allowed your own facts.

Patrick Murphy explains Veteran Voter Suppression in Ohio

The truth of the matter is, this is turning into the nastiest fight we have seen and we, the people are allowing it to continue without even a whimper. We refuse to hold any politician accountable and we allow media to direct the traffic of misinformation and outright lies into our homes and across the airwaves. Worse, we enable this trash into our schools so the next generation is even more poorly informed, less able to correct what has been so terribly mangled. We sit back wringing our hands thinking to ourselves, ‘Oh no, will I survive the onslaught? Will my Social Security be safe? Will my Medicare be there when I need it?” We fail entirely to consider the overarching horror story that is this nation’s future if we do not correct the regressive policies that are rolling toward us with ever-increasing vigor as we fail to take action.

In Florida the recent elections had a 6% turnout. Our apathy will be its own reward. The GOP doesn’t need voter suppression, we are our own worst enemy!

I leave you with this little diddy, one of my all time favorites I think Audrey II or Twoey is a great play on the current Tea Party / GOP. What say you?

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Nevermore Forever

August 6, 2012 by

I sat back yesterday, I watched and I wept. Yes, I wept. In fact, I am still weeping, I can’t stop my tears from falling.

Israelites encounter undrinkable, bitter water on their journey

Every single time I read anything about the Sikh temple murders I start crying again. Not because I am personally related to any of the victims, rather because I am connected through my humanity, through my empathy and through my compassion for their loss.

We should, all of us be connected to them, weeping for them and reaching out to them in their pain with our sympathy. We should all be standing shoulder to shoulder with them offering our human compassion. We should all be offering to mourn with them.

When will it be enough?

When will there be enough innocent lives piled at the door of the NRA and those who do their bidding for sane people to say ‘no more’.

When will we say we have seen enough senseless death on our streets, in our town squares, in our public buildings, our schools and places of worship to demand change and stand up to the bullies. When will we stop, as a nation and a people, kowtowing to these tyrants with corporate money and an agenda that has nothing to do with our safety, our peace of mind and everything to do with xenophobia and fear-mongering. When?

Isn’t enough?

What will it take for us to change the hearts of the heartless?

I am not going to throw statistics out there of all the innocents dead this decade, or even this year; these numbers are easily found. I am not going to rail at those who demand their rights in the face of the horrifying and senseless violence; this clearly falls on deaf ears. I will only say this; I am speechless, heartbroken in truth at the depths we have fallen, the bitter water we drink and call it sweet.

I leave you with this, because this is what the victims will not have –

525,600 minutes or another Season of Love

Filed Under: Guns & Violence, Society Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Rapprochement or End Game

July 27, 2012 by

Egregious actions and the complete lack of human empathy, compassion and ethics is what this week has brought to us in the wake of Aurora. I will not go on a tear about Gun Rights or my position on them, yes, I have one and it might surprise many who know my history. What I will do though is pull some very real actions and words from this past week’s headlines and talk about why we are completely out of control as a nation, that we casually accept this behavior and these words. That many of us think nothing of these ‘Leaders’, elected or otherwise vomiting their vitriolic and noxious thinking into the airwaves without a single person standing up and saying to them;

SHUT THE F’ UP YOU VILE EXCUSE OF A HUMAN BEING

Example One – Rep. John McCaherty (R-High Ridge)Missouri will be raffling off an AR-15 at a fundraiser to be held 27-August-2012. According to him and his office this has been planned since April and it is simply, well too

Rep. John McCaherty

late to change the prize to be awarded for a donation of $25. Never mind, this is the same gun used in the Colorado Mass Murder of 12 people last week, never mind whoever wins will not have had a background check before picking up said Assault Rifle and will be perfectly capable of killing everyone at the raffle if they come prepared. No, never mind any of that, John McCaherty is planning to go ahead with his Raffle (note he has renamed it a Drawing) but he is praying for the families of the dead.

Example Two – Kenneth Roop, 52 of Cape Coral, Florida who on Wednesday the 25thof July for no reason other than he damned wall wanted to shot and killed a door-to-door steak sales man, Nick Rainey 30. He didn’t have to

Nick Rainey shooting victim

shoot him the second time in the back of the head, after he was down, indeed in his statement to the police Kenneth claimed his victim had screamed ‘You shot me’, in an antagonistic manner after he had shot him in the shoulder the first time. Using words, we have heard from another ‘Stand your ground’ defense, Roop claims he was still in fear when he shot Rainey in the back of the head ‘for effect’. It should be noted, this isn’t the first time Roop has been in trouble with the law for brandishing guns at unarmed persons, at the time those involved believed he wasn’t in full control of all his senses.

Dr. Jerry Newcombe

Example Three – Dr. Jerry Newcombe, of Truth in Action Ministries. Could not wait for the victims to be identified or their families to be notified before he was jumping on the Biblical bandwagon and blaming this tragedy on our Secular nation. Yes, this self-serving bottom feeder was already writing his pronouncement of damnation as they were announcing the numbers of dead and wounded. He was already blaming society and secularism, along with the loss of prayer and Christianity from our public institutions, as if the Constitution and our foundation demanded this from its beginning. This pompous jackass didn’t even have the decency to ‘pray’ for the victims of the tragedy.

Azzhats, all of them.

Of course, the list goes on when it comes to gun violence and the responses to the tragedy of Aurora. My question though is simply this, when we take the time to look at just these examples don’t we ask ourselves what is wrong with the world we have created for ourselves? Can’t we do better than this? Are we so entrenched in our views it is impossible for us to take a step forward, to meet halfway across the table, sit down for détente and find a reasonable middle that will show our respect for each other and our future.

The following are some Facebook postings I came across, at the time I was stunned. Now I am simply numb.

In fact this isn’t true. The shooter in Colorado obtained his guns legally. The shooter in Florida was a legal gun owner. This is at best disingenuous.

This is nearly as good as comparing guns to cars. Yes, it is true guns don’t kills people. People with weapons in their hands kill people. People who purchase weapons with the ability to fire 400 rounds per minute. People with guns in their hand, inanimate objects with only one purpose, to kill living things; unlike a rock or a car. I find the arguments those who insist their rights to gun ownership without a single restriction to be fabulously narcissistic. In the face of terrible tragedy this is the best you can do, defend your right to kill and wrap it in God, the Bible and the Constitution.

I say this all the time, I will always land on the side of being a Nation of Laws. I will always land on the side of defending the Constitution no matter how offensive I might at times find it. But this, this complete lack of empathy for the victims of tragedy is offensive because I am a human being with compassion and concern for my fellow humans, those I share this soil with. All I can say, grow up and get over yourselves. Start serving more than your own self-interests.

I apologize for my rage. I will hopefully move on from here.

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Now What America?

July 21, 2012 by

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Declaration of Independence, Adopted 4 July 1776, Continental Congress of America

What has happened since those significant words were adopted by this nation? Did they mean what they wrote? Well we know they meant to be inclusive only to the extent of their understanding of human and man at the time of the writing. Since the time they wrote those words we have expanded their meaning, but now it seems we are contracting them again. Contracting them how far is the question.

Let’s talk about misdirection, the idea that what is important is directly before us but we look the other way. Focused on what is not important, not relevant to our public or national lives or future. We stare mindlessly at the little screen, listen thoughtlessly to those who will never live in our neighborhoods, walk in our shoes, work in our factories or send their children to our schools; we listen as they tell us what to think, feel and fear about our neighbors. We grow ever more terrified of those who mean us no harm, certain they will bring about the demise of all we ‘hold dear’, the American Way of Life, The American Dream. All the while, that dream has left the building, tripped blithely out the door with a wink, a nod and a secret handshake.

We all stood by and let it happen. In truth, we applauded the sleight of hand, the magic trick that stripped us with each presidential term since Ronald Reagan of opportunity and Rights, more of our chance at achieving the much-vaunted American Dream. Meanwhile, our cities, suburbs, schools all become more dangerous. We not only fear for the lives of our children each day we send them off to school, we have to fear they will not have the basics of literacy the competency necessary to compete in the world of the future in a world that increasingly is leaving our nation behind in basic skills, as well as, new sciences and innovations where once we led the world.

The American Dream popularized and defined most accurately perhaps by James Truslow Adams in Epic America:

“But there has been also the American dream, that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for every man, with opportunity for each according to his ability or achievement. It is a difficult dream for the European upper classes to interpret adequately, and too many of us ourselves have grown weary and mistrustful of it. It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position.”[i]

What is your chance of achieving a slice of The American Dream? The better question might be if you are a parent, what is the chance your children will do as well or better than you in life? The outlook isn’t good for either you or your children today.

Charts courtesy Mother Jones

Where does this leave us? We have been fooled into believing we are the best, the greatest nation in the world. We no longer are, we have in fact been sold down the muddy river our futures and that of our children ransomed for a pushcart and extra bullets at Wal-Mart. Fewer of our children will graduate from college and have a job in the coming years or if they do they will be saddled with tens of thousands of dollars of debt they will be unable to pay in their lifetime. Violence is escalating across the nation, yet those in high office refuse to have a conversation about gun control for fear the NRA will spank them, withholding their future support at election time.

We are a nation on the brink of failure. We have failed our children by looking away. We have failed future generations by refusing to take action when we could. Instead of rising up and saying HELL NO, when we had the chance to do so we looked away, we sat idly by enthralled by our cheap toys and two-bit entertainment; we allowed our nation to fall into disrepair. No matter what we call ourselves, Progressive, Liberal, Democrat, Libertarian, Republican, Conservative, New Whig, Green; we have failed our children and our nation. We have looked away for far too long, allowing those in power to strip us of our voice through misdirection and outright lies.

The question is:

Now What America?

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Welcome to the Revolution

July 16, 2012 by

“For Negroes are not the only victims. How many white children have gone uneducated, how many white families have lived in stark poverty, how many white lives have been scarred by fear, because we have wasted our energy and our substance to maintain the barriers of hatred and terror?

So I say to all of you here, and to all in the Nation tonight, that those who appeal to you to hold on to the past do so at the cost of denying you your future.

This great, rich, restless country can offer opportunity and education and hope to all: black and white, North and South, sharecropper and city dweller. These are the enemies: poverty, ignorance, disease. They are the enemies and not our fellow man, not our neighbor. And these enemies too, poverty, disease and ignorance, we shall overcome.”

Where did we go wrong? I am inclined to believe complacency plays a large role but more than this is the determined actions of those shadow and moneyed figures who have for nearly 60 years worked aggressively to turn back the hands of time.

Some believe this is a dial back to the 1950’s; a time when the little woman met hubby at the door with a Martini and dinner was on the table at exactly six pm. Dysfunction hidden behind a wall of smiles and silence, everyone in agreement to speak softly and pass the mashed potatoes. Children, bright and shiny faces smile up at their teachers and learn by rote their ‘A,B,C’ and who the enemy is, the big bad Communist behind the brick and razor wire www.sitcomonline.comwall.

It is the world of Beaver and Wally Cleaver.

The fifties were a time many look back on with great affection, considering this the idyllic time in our nation’s history, but was it? What is it about the era that is so attractive to so many; shall we explore the difference sixty year’s makes in the history of a nation and our memories.

  • Taxes – could it be we had a lower marginal tax rate during the idyllic 1950’s? Is this what the attraction is? No, this isn’t it, the average top marginal tax for those wonderful ‘job creators’ during this time was 85%, that’s right one of the highest rates in our history; of course back then we didn’t call them job creators, we called them wealthy and expected them to contribute to the health of our national coffers for the good of the nation.
  • Jobs – we had them back then, at least some of us did. Minorities weren’t in the workforce in any meaningful way, certainly not as a threat to the “American” way of life! Women? Well we have put awww.squiddo.com real dent in things! Our numbers have grown since the 50’s by 394%. We have girded our dainty loins for battle and skipped blithely into every single arena of high crimes, chicanery and flimflam and demanded our seat at the table! I suppose this does cause angst, the competition likely makes many uncomfortable.
  • While we are talking about jobs – we should look at the other reason we had jobs, fair trade policy and practices! That is right, since the 1950’s our borders for trade have sprung wide open. While this prying loose of trade polices began after WWII, the grease was applied by the Lord of Free Trade, President Ronald Reagan with GATT and applied even more liberally by his predecessors in trickery, right up through present day WTO trade agreements. These agreements keep import Tariffs at all-time lows while doing nothing to address trade imbalance with those nefarious ‘Favored Nations’ and slips through the cracks the idea that Americans are ill prepared, to stupid even to fill the jobs available in the market those requiring on-going infusions in the tens of thousands from other, smarter temporary forces of resources who will work for half as much while Americans languish.
  • Civil Rights – perhaps the most reprehensible problems of the time machine bunch. Why you ask? What we are seeing today is a return to the policies and programs of that time, a return to a time of Jim Crow and Plessy v. Ferguson; a time when it was legal to separate, abuse even kill a man or woman based solely on the color of their skin. Segregation, voter suppression and separate but equal were all at play and fully supported by the courts and those elected to offices both high and low.
  • Now we have the issue of SEX, that’s right SEX. Blue laws throughout the land controlled who had it and with whom it was legal to have it with, even in some cases in what position it was legal to have it in and on what does of the week. But it wasn’t just sex it was the purpose of sex and women were the receptacles, the bearers of children! Both contraception and abortion were illegal in all cases. In most states so was pre-marital sex but only women were ever prosecuted as lewd women. Men? Well they were just being men.

“ I pledge allegiance to my flag and the republic for which it stands, one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

Recognize the above? No? It is the original Pledge of Allegiance written by Francis Bellamy (1855-1931), a Christian Socialist who frankly would be rolling in his grave were he to know that his simply pledge of commitment to the Flag and Country has become such a historical point of contention. The Pledge of Allegiance was said in schoolrooms throughout the nation daily by schoolchildren from Kindergarten Wikipediathrough High School, with exactly the words above.  It was not until June 14, 1954 by Joint Resolution of Congress after being introduced by President Eisenhower the words ‘One Nation Under God’ were added to the Pledge, hardly historical and certainly not the intent of our Founding Fathers.

So let’s do a quick synopsis, shall we? What do these historians want to return to?

  1. Higher taxes
  2. Jim Crow
  3. Voter Suppression
  4. Segregation / Separate but Equal
  5. Protectionism, return of tariffs
  6. Blue Laws, criminalization of Abortion and contraception
  7. Removal of God from Public sector including money and Pledge of Allegiance

No, I don’t think they want the list above. They want a selected set of the list above. Clearly, we are moving on a fast track toward achieving some of these. I think President Johnson had it dead to rights in his Civil Rights speech of 1965; the enemy is poverty, ignorance and disease. It is truly unfortunate today we have all these running rampant and even being promoted.

What think you?

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

TB and Rick Scott in Perdition

July 9, 2012 by

Beware cold blooded slide of Florida Cottonmouth

Yet another example of malfeasance by Florida Gov. Rick Scott and the rest of the motley crew. Of course, at this stage of the game who of us aren’t surprised, it seems corruption and misconduct is the name of the game in the Sunshine State. The venality of Gov. Rick Scott is only exceeded by his on-going thumbing of his nose for federal law and the safety of others. Honestly, as a Texan I thought no Governor could be worse than the that other Rick, yes I do mean Rick Perry. However, Rick Scott truly has my own Rick beaten hands-down, in fact Rick Scott could beat Rick Perry for downright snake in the grass mean, crooked and degenerate with one hand tied behind his back.

What am I going on about you ask? Is this the Voter Suppression Rick Scott has pursued with such glee? Or the suppression of Doctors by the NRA in the infamous ‘Docs vs. Glocks’ case? Maybe it was the grab for power in his sidelined attempt to dictate Foreign Policy; with the misguided piece of legislation, he signed in May and struck down by U.S. District Judge K. Michael Moore. Or perhaps it is his on-going fight with the EPA and his denial of their authority over Clean Water and greenhouse gas emissions.

No, it is none of these things, although all of the above show his complete unsuitability to serve as a Governor of a State within the United States of America.

The latest sampling of this egotistical maniac’s complete disregard for public safety and more importantly human life is far worse. It is especially worse when you consider the primary victims of his latest decision do not look like him, are not in the same economic stratosphere and are highly likely not part of his primary in his voting bloc. So what is the Great Terrible that Gov. Rick Scott has done?

Wouldn’t want to step in it. Vile and clings long afterward.

The CDC report went out in April, but as early as February 2011, it was already known Florida was struggling with the worst outbreak of Tuberculosis in the past sixty (60) years. What did that bastion of compassion for the weak and downtrodden do about the potential threat to public health do you ask; absolutely nothing other than hide the facts, sweep those nasty’s  under the carpet of Sawgrass and Alligator shit (pardon me).

The facts as they are known:

Three thousand (3,000) people potentially have been exposed to a possibly deadly and drug resistant strain of Tuberculosis. Of these only 253 have been found and one third have tested positive for exposure.

Ninety-nine (99) people are infected. Of these six (6) of them are children. Most of those infected are poor, many are Black men. Many have not been treated in time to stop the disease from progressing and have or are wasting away.

Thirteen (13) thus far are dead.

I suppose the thinking by Rick Scott and his cronies is those that have been exposed, those that have thus far died or will die; well, they are simply ‘NOT LIKE ME’. As one of the articles so eloquently put it;

“Believing the outbreak affected only their underclass, the health officials made a conscious decision not to not tell the public, repeating a decision they had made in 2008, when the same strain had appeared in an assisted living home for people with schizophrenia.”

Since most of those infected appear to have been exposed to the killer disease in the states jails, soup kitchens and homeless shelters it is apparent they have indeed made the same heartless decision. The same NOT LIKE ME decision. Why waste time and energy, certainly why waste money that could be better spent on LIKE ME people and programs that LIKE ME people support.

I am stunned by the callousness, the heartlessness of Governor Rick Scott. He is one of many GOP state leaders intent on destroying the very heart of our nation. He though is the poster child for the GOP and their march to perdition.

The heat isn’t Global Warming Rick.

My suggestion, stay the Hell away from Florida!

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/07/08/florida-accused-of-concealing-worst-tuberculosis-outbreak-in-20-years/

http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2012-07-08/health/os-ap-fl–tuberculosis-report-20120708_1_tuberculosis-outbreak-tuberculosis-cases-health-agency

http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/editorials/scott-has-more-strikeouts-than-hits/1239081

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
«Previous Page
Next Page»