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“And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”
Probably my favorite biblical quote, from my favorite Christmas movie; but was it on Christmas? Historical records show that the birth undoubtedly was not on December 25th. If anything, Christmas is celebrated on December 25th to coincide with the Winter Solstice and other pagan traditions that center around the birth of the Sun God and Yule. So what does Christmas and the entire Holiday Season mean to the growing multitude of people that no longer subscribe to a particular faith? What does it mean for the people who respond to the question of faith by saying, “I’m spiritual but not religious”? Does it go beyond a family gathering, parties and gifts? Is there a deeper mystery that can be felt without a label? Something bigger than oneself or one’s community?
Christmas has always been my favorite holiday. It’s the only one that my family, friends and community celebrate that encompasses an entire season and in which the idea is family, peace, goodwill and giving. I like that. It makes me feel child-like in alot of ways, no matter how old I get. But what are we celebrating?
Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus; Jews memorialize an ancient miracle of God; African-Americans contemplate their heritage; Buddhists observe the enlightenment of the Buddha; Pagans welcome the Solstice.
The majority of these celebrations center about a historical event. But what if I posit that all we have is the present? That the past and future do not exist except within the present? That we can only interact with anything or event in the present, or “the Now”. What do these historical events mean then?
I have long struggled with the inconsistencies between my foundational religion of Catholicism and my current frame of reference in regards to spiritual matters. Bridging the gap has been difficult at times, but only when I focus on the worldly details. Taoists explain this by saying “when a finger is pointing at the moon, you lose sight of all the heavenly glory by focusing on the finger”. What does the birth of the Christ into our world mean? The oil lasting for 8 days? The enlightenment of the Buddha? The heritage of African descendants? Does the history or factual certainty of it matter? What are we celebrating, what are we memorializing? How do we interact with it Now? What is the deeper mystery? What helps to illuminate the fact that what brings us together is far more powerful than what tears us apart?
Very simply - miracles happen Now, enlightenment happens Now, our heritages culminate in the Now, The Christ-Consciousness is born Now - in each of us.
It is the birth of peace into our hearts. A miracle of compassion for our fellow brothers and sisters. Our heritage of “peace on earth, goodwill towards men”. This is enlightenment. This can happen Now, with or without historical events. As a great man has astutely and profoundly stated, “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for… we are the change we seek”. We are the peacemakers, the healers, the friends, the confidants, the guardians.
Peace be with you this Christmas. This is our gift to each other.
“Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it is called the present.” - Master Oogway
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Thursday, December 4, 2008
A Legacy
As our current President makes his press tour and gathers all his senior advisors to start the whitewashing of our long national nightmare... let us remember and continue to tell the stories of war and deceit to our children and our children's children. We must never forget the true legacy of our millennial presidency.
An appropriate post by Bob Cesca:
Sorry, Mr. President, But Your Legacy Is More Awful Than You Think
June 11, 2008
The Huffington Post
Rest assured, Mr. President, that despite what you told the Times Online today you won't be remembered solely as a war mongering president.
"Look, I think that in retrospect, you know, I could have used a different tone."
Different tone? Ya think?
War mongering is a significant aspect of your legacy, but I think we can conclude, and without much debate, that your legacy will also be one of criminality, failure and a degree of incompetence rarely achieved by any American president, much less one whose deficit of character is rivaled only by his nearly unprecedented lack of humility in the face of his unprecedented roster of inadequacies.
Sorry.
As it turns out, you won't have much control over your legacy and the history of your administration anyway. You might have some cursory input, but no-one really takes you seriously anymore and anything you put forth will be taken as just another work of fiction; another bit of propaganda.
Your legacy will ultimately be written by those of us who have been actively documenting your presidency in real time -- millions of voices authoring the narrative of your awful regime and preserving it with digital clarity one trespass at a time.
And everywhere we look, we can plainly observe your smirking, affectless footprint.
Death, poverty, war, pain, ignorance, blind patriotism, joblessness, and abandoned homes. And guess what? We're writing it down on the Internets. Your history, Mr. President, is being written at this very moment by those of us who are watching our homes collapse in value and our friends and relatives sent to places like Ramadi and Fallujah and, in some cases, Walter Reed or worse. Your history, Mr. President, isn't going to be settled and published decades from now. It's being published immediately and without the fog of memory to obscure the ugly details.
These ugly details are exhaustively researched and easily accessible.
And as they congeal into a single eight-year narrative, it's my hunch that every tragedy experienced during this dark ride will be regarded as a means to a specific end: your election to a second term and the election of successors who will carry on with your sinister tradition. The centerpiece of this tradition -- the through line of your presidential narrative -- has been, simply put, endless war for the sake of re-election.
In fact (and contrary to your present lamentation) you wanted war even before you took office. War, by your own definition, would all but guarantee a second presidential term. You told your pre-2000 autobiographer, Mickey Herskowitz:
"One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief... My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it...If I have a chance to invade...if I had that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency."
Four years later, as you ramped up your re-election campaign, you told Tim Russert:
"I'm a war president. I make decisions here in the Oval Office in foreign policy matters with war on my mind."
You didn't sound ashamed of your tone back then -- when you were running for your second term. Everything you managed to accomplish during your presidency was directed towards maintaining this manufactured "war president" facade. Without it, you would have been either defeated in 2004 or impeached a long time ago.
So how did you do it? History will show that you bought off the American people with $300 checks and massive tax cuts for Paris Hilton and Dick Cheney. You ruthlessly exploited the deadliest foreign attack on American soil and, subsequently, terrorized this nation and its corporate media into giving you more latitude than you otherwise deserved. You attempted to dumb down our public schools because, in your view, an educated electorate is a dangerous electorate -- less susceptible to war mongering and propaganda, right? You ignored the destruction of an entire American city because the majority of its residents probably didn't vote for you or contribute to your campaign for war in the first place. And your entire foreign policy has been constructed around deliberately inciting anti-American sentiment, thus fueling more war.
It turns out, Mr. President, that your only success is something which you appear to be walking back: your war mongering -- your cynical, self-serving and bloody "bring 'em on" legacy -- and, with it, your re-election in 2004.
If you were half the man your dwindling supporters claim that you are, you would own this actual legacy of yours, Mr. President.
If you were a better man, you would own the horror you've created for yourself and generations of Americans to come. You would take responsibility for more than your pathetic "tone" and "rhetoric" -- you would take responsibility for all of it: the lies, the casualties, the mistakes, the crimes and the cover-ups. Instead you're presently flying around the world saying that you "wanted to solve this ... in a diplomatic fashion" when we all know, based on numerous reports from insiders ranging from Scott McClellan to Richard Clarke that this is simply not true.
Your legacy, Mr. President, isn't just about war mongering. We're going to see to it that your legacy is almost entirely about how you lied us into an unnecessary war as part of an almost unspeakably horrible strategy for re-election -- as a way to mask over your inadequacies as a leader and to somehow delude future Americans into believing that your two-term presidency deserves special renown.
So good luck with all of that "different tone" crap. It's not going to work. Sorry.
An appropriate post by Bob Cesca:
Sorry, Mr. President, But Your Legacy Is More Awful Than You Think
June 11, 2008
The Huffington Post
Rest assured, Mr. President, that despite what you told the Times Online today you won't be remembered solely as a war mongering president.
"Look, I think that in retrospect, you know, I could have used a different tone."
Different tone? Ya think?
War mongering is a significant aspect of your legacy, but I think we can conclude, and without much debate, that your legacy will also be one of criminality, failure and a degree of incompetence rarely achieved by any American president, much less one whose deficit of character is rivaled only by his nearly unprecedented lack of humility in the face of his unprecedented roster of inadequacies.
Sorry.
As it turns out, you won't have much control over your legacy and the history of your administration anyway. You might have some cursory input, but no-one really takes you seriously anymore and anything you put forth will be taken as just another work of fiction; another bit of propaganda.
Your legacy will ultimately be written by those of us who have been actively documenting your presidency in real time -- millions of voices authoring the narrative of your awful regime and preserving it with digital clarity one trespass at a time.
And everywhere we look, we can plainly observe your smirking, affectless footprint.
Death, poverty, war, pain, ignorance, blind patriotism, joblessness, and abandoned homes. And guess what? We're writing it down on the Internets. Your history, Mr. President, is being written at this very moment by those of us who are watching our homes collapse in value and our friends and relatives sent to places like Ramadi and Fallujah and, in some cases, Walter Reed or worse. Your history, Mr. President, isn't going to be settled and published decades from now. It's being published immediately and without the fog of memory to obscure the ugly details.
These ugly details are exhaustively researched and easily accessible.
And as they congeal into a single eight-year narrative, it's my hunch that every tragedy experienced during this dark ride will be regarded as a means to a specific end: your election to a second term and the election of successors who will carry on with your sinister tradition. The centerpiece of this tradition -- the through line of your presidential narrative -- has been, simply put, endless war for the sake of re-election.
In fact (and contrary to your present lamentation) you wanted war even before you took office. War, by your own definition, would all but guarantee a second presidential term. You told your pre-2000 autobiographer, Mickey Herskowitz:
"One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief... My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it...If I have a chance to invade...if I had that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency."
Four years later, as you ramped up your re-election campaign, you told Tim Russert:
"I'm a war president. I make decisions here in the Oval Office in foreign policy matters with war on my mind."
You didn't sound ashamed of your tone back then -- when you were running for your second term. Everything you managed to accomplish during your presidency was directed towards maintaining this manufactured "war president" facade. Without it, you would have been either defeated in 2004 or impeached a long time ago.
So how did you do it? History will show that you bought off the American people with $300 checks and massive tax cuts for Paris Hilton and Dick Cheney. You ruthlessly exploited the deadliest foreign attack on American soil and, subsequently, terrorized this nation and its corporate media into giving you more latitude than you otherwise deserved. You attempted to dumb down our public schools because, in your view, an educated electorate is a dangerous electorate -- less susceptible to war mongering and propaganda, right? You ignored the destruction of an entire American city because the majority of its residents probably didn't vote for you or contribute to your campaign for war in the first place. And your entire foreign policy has been constructed around deliberately inciting anti-American sentiment, thus fueling more war.
It turns out, Mr. President, that your only success is something which you appear to be walking back: your war mongering -- your cynical, self-serving and bloody "bring 'em on" legacy -- and, with it, your re-election in 2004.
If you were half the man your dwindling supporters claim that you are, you would own this actual legacy of yours, Mr. President.
If you were a better man, you would own the horror you've created for yourself and generations of Americans to come. You would take responsibility for more than your pathetic "tone" and "rhetoric" -- you would take responsibility for all of it: the lies, the casualties, the mistakes, the crimes and the cover-ups. Instead you're presently flying around the world saying that you "wanted to solve this ... in a diplomatic fashion" when we all know, based on numerous reports from insiders ranging from Scott McClellan to Richard Clarke that this is simply not true.
Your legacy, Mr. President, isn't just about war mongering. We're going to see to it that your legacy is almost entirely about how you lied us into an unnecessary war as part of an almost unspeakably horrible strategy for re-election -- as a way to mask over your inadequacies as a leader and to somehow delude future Americans into believing that your two-term presidency deserves special renown.
So good luck with all of that "different tone" crap. It's not going to work. Sorry.
Monday, December 1, 2008
Lest We Forget...
With the terror attacks in Mumbai, let us remember the Great Soul that led the way to peaceful coexistence for the children of India and Pakistan... even if only for a short while.
When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it--always.
When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it--always.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
A Letter for a California Courthouse
Let us remember on this Veterans Day that countless men and women gave their last measure of devotion to the cause of freedom.
California Proposition 8. Five months from the passing of the law allowing gay marriage in the State of California, that right was swiftly taken away. I found it disturbing that one of the core proponents of this measure was Pastor Rick Warren and his Saddleback Church. You’ll remember Pastor Warren from my article entitled “Faith and Politics” and his call for a more civil national discourse.
A terrible irony was not lost on me. On the same day that we voted in the first African-American President – a man who will serve his term during the 150th anniversary of the Civil War and the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Movement – another group of individuals were stripped of their rights and turned into second-class citizens.
In my opposition to Proposition 8 and all its brother and sister laws; I was reminded of a letter that spoke to the core issue for humanity and our unending search for truth and freedom. I beg the leave of Dr. King’s memory to talk again of Civil Rights. I do not speak for Dr. King or purport that he believed as I believe. I do not presuppose that he would have agreed with my thoughts of what constitutes Civil Rights. I speak of the struggle for freedom that is the foundation of our spirit and the hope that Dr. King would have understood that religion is not a tool for division nor a rationale for bigotry.
What follows is my interpretation of portions of “A Letter from a Birmingham Jail”. I apologize in advance if this offends some; that is not my intent. Rather, let us look honestly into the mirror we raise on ourselves when we divide the world into us and them. As a reminder: I am not gay, I do not have many people I know directly who are gay - this issue is above personal experience of prejudice, it speaks to all of humanity.
“I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in New Jersey and not be concerned about what happens in California. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all directly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial “outside agitator” idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.
We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. For years now, we have heard the word “Wait!” It rings in the ear of every homosexual with piercing familiarity. This “Wait” has almost always meant “Never”. We must come to see that ‘justice too long delayed is justice denied’.
When your first name becomes “faggot”, your middle name becomes “queer” and your last name becomes “dike”; when you see the picket signs outside the courthouses reading “God is Your Enemy” and the signs at funerals of AIDS victims reading “Fags Burn in Hell”; then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair.
If I have said anything in this letter that overstates the truth and indicates an unreasonable impatience, I beg you to forgive me. If I have said anything that understates the truth and indicates my having a patience that allows me to settle for anything less than brotherhood, I beg God to forgive me.”
California Proposition 8. Five months from the passing of the law allowing gay marriage in the State of California, that right was swiftly taken away. I found it disturbing that one of the core proponents of this measure was Pastor Rick Warren and his Saddleback Church. You’ll remember Pastor Warren from my article entitled “Faith and Politics” and his call for a more civil national discourse.
A terrible irony was not lost on me. On the same day that we voted in the first African-American President – a man who will serve his term during the 150th anniversary of the Civil War and the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Movement – another group of individuals were stripped of their rights and turned into second-class citizens.
In my opposition to Proposition 8 and all its brother and sister laws; I was reminded of a letter that spoke to the core issue for humanity and our unending search for truth and freedom. I beg the leave of Dr. King’s memory to talk again of Civil Rights. I do not speak for Dr. King or purport that he believed as I believe. I do not presuppose that he would have agreed with my thoughts of what constitutes Civil Rights. I speak of the struggle for freedom that is the foundation of our spirit and the hope that Dr. King would have understood that religion is not a tool for division nor a rationale for bigotry.
What follows is my interpretation of portions of “A Letter from a Birmingham Jail”. I apologize in advance if this offends some; that is not my intent. Rather, let us look honestly into the mirror we raise on ourselves when we divide the world into us and them. As a reminder: I am not gay, I do not have many people I know directly who are gay - this issue is above personal experience of prejudice, it speaks to all of humanity.
“I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in New Jersey and not be concerned about what happens in California. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all directly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial “outside agitator” idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.
We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. For years now, we have heard the word “Wait!” It rings in the ear of every homosexual with piercing familiarity. This “Wait” has almost always meant “Never”. We must come to see that ‘justice too long delayed is justice denied’.
When your first name becomes “faggot”, your middle name becomes “queer” and your last name becomes “dike”; when you see the picket signs outside the courthouses reading “God is Your Enemy” and the signs at funerals of AIDS victims reading “Fags Burn in Hell”; then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair.
If I have said anything in this letter that overstates the truth and indicates an unreasonable impatience, I beg you to forgive me. If I have said anything that understates the truth and indicates my having a patience that allows me to settle for anything less than brotherhood, I beg God to forgive me.”
Thursday, November 6, 2008
An Open Letter To Our Leaders
Note: Please feel free to copy this letter and forward it to your representatives. We must speak the truth to power, even if we are in support of that power.
Now that the biggest election in our lifetime is concluded, I want to issue an urgent request. An untold amount of damage has been, and is being, done to our Constitution and our government by the Bush Administration. The majority of the change that I believe President-Elect Obama is calling for needs to come from you, our representatives. I will preface this by saying that I am in complete support of President-Elect Obama and have been volunteering my efforts for his campaign since the beginning of the primaries. I believe in his ability to govern and his ideas and vision for our country.
I believe that our first priority is a return of all Constitutionally-appointed powers to all branches of government. Power needs to be taken back from the Executive Branch and returned to its rightful place within the Legislative and Judicial Branches of government. The partisan rancor that was the hallmark of the Bush Administration must stop. We must have the checks and balances, brilliantly developed by the Framers, in order to back away from the current movement towards tyranny and despotism.
I urge you to work with the Obama Administration in the interests of your constituents and your country, without bitter partisanship and with hope for the future. I also urge you to never again sign over your Congressional powers to the Executive Branch.
Please represent our desire to return this country to its basic values and once again live out the creed of “a government for, of and by the people.”
Now that the biggest election in our lifetime is concluded, I want to issue an urgent request. An untold amount of damage has been, and is being, done to our Constitution and our government by the Bush Administration. The majority of the change that I believe President-Elect Obama is calling for needs to come from you, our representatives. I will preface this by saying that I am in complete support of President-Elect Obama and have been volunteering my efforts for his campaign since the beginning of the primaries. I believe in his ability to govern and his ideas and vision for our country.
I believe that our first priority is a return of all Constitutionally-appointed powers to all branches of government. Power needs to be taken back from the Executive Branch and returned to its rightful place within the Legislative and Judicial Branches of government. The partisan rancor that was the hallmark of the Bush Administration must stop. We must have the checks and balances, brilliantly developed by the Framers, in order to back away from the current movement towards tyranny and despotism.
I urge you to work with the Obama Administration in the interests of your constituents and your country, without bitter partisanship and with hope for the future. I also urge you to never again sign over your Congressional powers to the Executive Branch.
Please represent our desire to return this country to its basic values and once again live out the creed of “a government for, of and by the people.”
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Hold Firmly, Without Wavering, To The Hope That We Confess.
The arguments have been won and lost, phone calls placed, letters written, doors knocked, voters registered, speeches made, debates won - hope has been rekindled.
Now it is up to all of us. Use your power and use it wisely, do not give up the precious gift of your voice in the molding of this nation and our world.
And as Scripture states:
"Hold firmly, without wavering, to the Hope that we confess."
Rest in the peace that is our home, Madelyn Dunham - and thank you, your boy did good.
Now it is up to all of us. Use your power and use it wisely, do not give up the precious gift of your voice in the molding of this nation and our world.
And as Scripture states:
"Hold firmly, without wavering, to the Hope that we confess."
Rest in the peace that is our home, Madelyn Dunham - and thank you, your boy did good.
Monday, November 3, 2008
Letters to an Editor
What follows is a list of letters I have written to local and national newspapers in my small effort at making the case for Senator Barack Obama. Some have been published, some have not - all have come from a deep and abiding love of this country and a faith in the inevitable awakening of the American citizen - they can only grab power if we look the other way.
10/30/2008
On November 4th, we will yet again exercise the fundamental tenet of our democracy and cast our ballots. It has never been more important to take a stand for the America we all love than now. At the dawn of a new millennium, at a turning point in our nation’s history and after eight years of faithless stewardship; let us ask our leaders for temperance, reasoned judgment, intellect and wisdom. Let us ask our leaders for vision and for inspiration. Let us wake our apathetic society and mold this country into what we believe it can be. Let us shorten the distance between the world as it is and the world as it could be. Let us decide that at this time, in this election, we will face the myriad challenges confronting us as our Founders intended – E Pluribus Unum – Out of Many, One.
Vote.
10/16/2008
Reasoned thought and real evidence play no part in the current McCain campaign and the echo chamber that is Right-leaning television, radio and print media.
When the bottom began to fall out of our economy, Senator McCain stated that the “fundamentals of the economy are still strong”. Two hours later, he declared that the economy was in crisis. He then “suspended” his campaign to return to Washington to fix the problem – the exact opposite happened. From that point on, his responses to the evolving economic crisis have been erratic at best, dangerously unwise at worst. They have changed policy as quickly as the news cycle can report – with no cohesive vision, no foundations laid out to build an evolving policy upon. They were tactical changes meant to appease and distract specific constituencies and run out the clock to November 4th.
When his poll numbers continued to drop, his campaign stated that “if we continue to talk about the economy, we lose”. Seriously? If you talk about the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression, if you talk about the biggest crisis to effect the next President, you lose? I think that speaks volumes about the readiness of Senator McCain to assume the Presidency.
9/4/2008
The Republican party has really surprised me. I understand that not everyone thinks the same on any issue; that's a big part of what makes America work. But I feel that there is a huge difference between the speeches and overall feel of the DNC compared to the RNC. The DNC blasted the McCain campaign for being "more of the same"; an allusion to continuation of the Bush Administration’s policies. This is the plain truth, Senator McCain himself has stated that he voted with Bush “over 90% of the time, more than most of my colleagues”. What I did not hear during the DNC were personal attacks upon the character and history of John McCain. That's class – honoring someone's service, stating that you fully believe that they love their country as much as anyone else but saying that you differ in where to take this country and how. That's a politics I want to be a part of.
That brings us to the headline speaker last night. Sarah Palin in her first real meeting with the American people. She didn't talk about how they wanted to help rebuild America at home and abroad – she dismissed Obama personally through mockery, sarcasm and distortions of truth. This after Obama himself publicly defended her family's right to privacy during a political campaign. Attacks and lies, all the while the bloodthirsty crowd screamed for more… they cheered and cheered while everything noble and good about their party burned to the ground. America is wounded, our Constitution being shredded and true leadership lying dead on the the spear of neo-conservatism. And all they have are attacks, sarcasm, mockery and lies… even if lies by omission. A week went by and she was linked to half a dozen scandals and questionable situations – but questions on those are sexist, right? Except if they happen to Hillary, than it's a woman politician “whining”, right? Or if they happen to Obama, then it's just the American people vetting a nominee, right? To see if he's "one of us", right? Whatever that means.
9/2/2008
I am writing today regarding the hypocrisy of the current Republican party. Senator McCain chose the unheard of Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, to be his running mate. This comes on the heels of a pre-general election campaign message that derided Senator Obama for his apparent “lack of experience”. This campaign message was taken so far as to claim the web site www.notready08.com. Let’s take a look at experience:
Senator Obama was a community organizer on the Southside of Chicago, he served on the Illinois State Senate for 8 years, served as a congressional Senator for 4 years and has been campaigning for the Presidency for over a year and a half. As a point of interest, Chicago is rated as the 3rd most populous city in the US with over 3 million residents and Illinois currently boasts a population in excess of 12.8 million people.
Governor Palin was a member of the Wasilla City Council for 4 years, served as Mayor of Wasilla for 6 years and has been Governor of Alaska for a year and a half (the same amount of time Senator Obama has been campaigning). As a similar point of interest, Wasilla currently boasts slightly over 8,000 residents with the state of Alaska boasting under 700,000 residents.
Now, with experience being the biggest argument Senator McCain has been making, what does a pick like this mean? Have they ever believed their own argument or was it purely political posturing? Is she prepared to be a heartbeat away from the presidency? Was she an attempt to peel away women voters whom the McCain campaign seem to think vote because of similar reproductive organs rather than similar political viewpoints?
With the first real decision made within their respective Presidental careers, Senator Obama chose Senator Joe Biden and Senator McCain chose Governor Palin. It seems that Senator Obama’s experience created the ability for good judgement. I can’t say the same about Senator McCain’s.
8/05/2008
Why has the McCain campaign stooped to such an idiotic level, accusing Senator Obama of being a celebrity in the vein of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears? Senator McCain seems to want the American voter to temporarily forget that Senator Obama is just that, a Senator in the United States Congress, who is one of two people to represent the entire state of Illinois. He also wants the public to forget that Senator Obama is a Harvard-educated lawyer, the first African-American to be the president of the Harvard Law Review, a former community organizer on the south side of Chicago, a constitutional law professor and a former member of the Illinois State Senate. To top all of this, Senator Obama is the first African-American to win a major political parties nomination for President and the only candidate (ever) to have over 1.5 million private small dollar donors, break fundraising records, run one of the most strategically brilliant campaigns in modern history and accurately assess the issues facing us not only domestically, but abroad.
Has the McCain campaign forgotten about their former ally in the office of Governor of California, who just happens to be one of the biggest action movie stars in history? If they have, have they also forgotten about the former Governor of California who happened to reside in the White House for 8 years and who Republicans can’t line up fast enough to use his legacy as a political tool? When is Senator McCain actually going to give us some “straight talk”?
7/31/2008
I am writing in response to what we have come to know as the “commander-in-chief threshold”. Supposedly, Senator McCain has crossed it due to his service in the military and his years in the Senate. To tell you the truth, his campaign over the last year and a half has made me wonder what skills he has brought with him other than an inability to understand that there is a difference between Sunni and Shia, that Czechoslovakia does not exist, that drilling in ANWR and off the OCS would only benefit the oil companies, that Iraq needs to come to an end, that Afghanistan and Pakistan are where our enemies are currently located, et cetera, et cetera.
Conversely, we continually hear the talking points of “Who is Barack Obama?”, “Is he one of us?” (I’m afraid to ask what this REALLY means); “Does he have what it takes to be President?” Let’s take a look at some of the things he has done just during this campaign:
1) He has run, arguably, one of the most precision-operated and record-breaking campaigns in our history. They had specific goals and specific strategies on how to achieve them. The operation and management of a campaign is the only real assessment tool available to see how a candidate would deal with a Presidential Administration.
2) His assessment on our presence in Iraq has been echoed by the Prime Minister of Iraq and, begrudgingly, by both the McCain campaign and the Bush Administration (they hate to use words like timetables or “time horizons”)
3) He has shown his ability to operate on the world stage, something the McCain campaign has yet to do. They goaded him into traveling overseas and complained when it blew up in their face.
4) He has laid out his plans on all the issues that face us as a nation, rather than spending time and money attacking the McCain campaign.
5) He has shown his ability to articulate and debate his vision for America countless times.
So with just a few of these highlights, what are people really saying when they ask if he can be Presidential? He has outperformed with every test thrown at him and done it with the grace and dignity of a Statesman. It’s been quite awhile since we’ve seen one of those, maybe America has forgotten what real leaders look like.
10/30/2008
On November 4th, we will yet again exercise the fundamental tenet of our democracy and cast our ballots. It has never been more important to take a stand for the America we all love than now. At the dawn of a new millennium, at a turning point in our nation’s history and after eight years of faithless stewardship; let us ask our leaders for temperance, reasoned judgment, intellect and wisdom. Let us ask our leaders for vision and for inspiration. Let us wake our apathetic society and mold this country into what we believe it can be. Let us shorten the distance between the world as it is and the world as it could be. Let us decide that at this time, in this election, we will face the myriad challenges confronting us as our Founders intended – E Pluribus Unum – Out of Many, One.
Vote.
10/16/2008
Reasoned thought and real evidence play no part in the current McCain campaign and the echo chamber that is Right-leaning television, radio and print media.
When the bottom began to fall out of our economy, Senator McCain stated that the “fundamentals of the economy are still strong”. Two hours later, he declared that the economy was in crisis. He then “suspended” his campaign to return to Washington to fix the problem – the exact opposite happened. From that point on, his responses to the evolving economic crisis have been erratic at best, dangerously unwise at worst. They have changed policy as quickly as the news cycle can report – with no cohesive vision, no foundations laid out to build an evolving policy upon. They were tactical changes meant to appease and distract specific constituencies and run out the clock to November 4th.
When his poll numbers continued to drop, his campaign stated that “if we continue to talk about the economy, we lose”. Seriously? If you talk about the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression, if you talk about the biggest crisis to effect the next President, you lose? I think that speaks volumes about the readiness of Senator McCain to assume the Presidency.
9/4/2008
The Republican party has really surprised me. I understand that not everyone thinks the same on any issue; that's a big part of what makes America work. But I feel that there is a huge difference between the speeches and overall feel of the DNC compared to the RNC. The DNC blasted the McCain campaign for being "more of the same"; an allusion to continuation of the Bush Administration’s policies. This is the plain truth, Senator McCain himself has stated that he voted with Bush “over 90% of the time, more than most of my colleagues”. What I did not hear during the DNC were personal attacks upon the character and history of John McCain. That's class – honoring someone's service, stating that you fully believe that they love their country as much as anyone else but saying that you differ in where to take this country and how. That's a politics I want to be a part of.
That brings us to the headline speaker last night. Sarah Palin in her first real meeting with the American people. She didn't talk about how they wanted to help rebuild America at home and abroad – she dismissed Obama personally through mockery, sarcasm and distortions of truth. This after Obama himself publicly defended her family's right to privacy during a political campaign. Attacks and lies, all the while the bloodthirsty crowd screamed for more… they cheered and cheered while everything noble and good about their party burned to the ground. America is wounded, our Constitution being shredded and true leadership lying dead on the the spear of neo-conservatism. And all they have are attacks, sarcasm, mockery and lies… even if lies by omission. A week went by and she was linked to half a dozen scandals and questionable situations – but questions on those are sexist, right? Except if they happen to Hillary, than it's a woman politician “whining”, right? Or if they happen to Obama, then it's just the American people vetting a nominee, right? To see if he's "one of us", right? Whatever that means.
9/2/2008
I am writing today regarding the hypocrisy of the current Republican party. Senator McCain chose the unheard of Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, to be his running mate. This comes on the heels of a pre-general election campaign message that derided Senator Obama for his apparent “lack of experience”. This campaign message was taken so far as to claim the web site www.notready08.com. Let’s take a look at experience:
Senator Obama was a community organizer on the Southside of Chicago, he served on the Illinois State Senate for 8 years, served as a congressional Senator for 4 years and has been campaigning for the Presidency for over a year and a half. As a point of interest, Chicago is rated as the 3rd most populous city in the US with over 3 million residents and Illinois currently boasts a population in excess of 12.8 million people.
Governor Palin was a member of the Wasilla City Council for 4 years, served as Mayor of Wasilla for 6 years and has been Governor of Alaska for a year and a half (the same amount of time Senator Obama has been campaigning). As a similar point of interest, Wasilla currently boasts slightly over 8,000 residents with the state of Alaska boasting under 700,000 residents.
Now, with experience being the biggest argument Senator McCain has been making, what does a pick like this mean? Have they ever believed their own argument or was it purely political posturing? Is she prepared to be a heartbeat away from the presidency? Was she an attempt to peel away women voters whom the McCain campaign seem to think vote because of similar reproductive organs rather than similar political viewpoints?
With the first real decision made within their respective Presidental careers, Senator Obama chose Senator Joe Biden and Senator McCain chose Governor Palin. It seems that Senator Obama’s experience created the ability for good judgement. I can’t say the same about Senator McCain’s.
8/05/2008
Why has the McCain campaign stooped to such an idiotic level, accusing Senator Obama of being a celebrity in the vein of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears? Senator McCain seems to want the American voter to temporarily forget that Senator Obama is just that, a Senator in the United States Congress, who is one of two people to represent the entire state of Illinois. He also wants the public to forget that Senator Obama is a Harvard-educated lawyer, the first African-American to be the president of the Harvard Law Review, a former community organizer on the south side of Chicago, a constitutional law professor and a former member of the Illinois State Senate. To top all of this, Senator Obama is the first African-American to win a major political parties nomination for President and the only candidate (ever) to have over 1.5 million private small dollar donors, break fundraising records, run one of the most strategically brilliant campaigns in modern history and accurately assess the issues facing us not only domestically, but abroad.
Has the McCain campaign forgotten about their former ally in the office of Governor of California, who just happens to be one of the biggest action movie stars in history? If they have, have they also forgotten about the former Governor of California who happened to reside in the White House for 8 years and who Republicans can’t line up fast enough to use his legacy as a political tool? When is Senator McCain actually going to give us some “straight talk”?
7/31/2008
I am writing in response to what we have come to know as the “commander-in-chief threshold”. Supposedly, Senator McCain has crossed it due to his service in the military and his years in the Senate. To tell you the truth, his campaign over the last year and a half has made me wonder what skills he has brought with him other than an inability to understand that there is a difference between Sunni and Shia, that Czechoslovakia does not exist, that drilling in ANWR and off the OCS would only benefit the oil companies, that Iraq needs to come to an end, that Afghanistan and Pakistan are where our enemies are currently located, et cetera, et cetera.
Conversely, we continually hear the talking points of “Who is Barack Obama?”, “Is he one of us?” (I’m afraid to ask what this REALLY means); “Does he have what it takes to be President?” Let’s take a look at some of the things he has done just during this campaign:
1) He has run, arguably, one of the most precision-operated and record-breaking campaigns in our history. They had specific goals and specific strategies on how to achieve them. The operation and management of a campaign is the only real assessment tool available to see how a candidate would deal with a Presidential Administration.
2) His assessment on our presence in Iraq has been echoed by the Prime Minister of Iraq and, begrudgingly, by both the McCain campaign and the Bush Administration (they hate to use words like timetables or “time horizons”)
3) He has shown his ability to operate on the world stage, something the McCain campaign has yet to do. They goaded him into traveling overseas and complained when it blew up in their face.
4) He has laid out his plans on all the issues that face us as a nation, rather than spending time and money attacking the McCain campaign.
5) He has shown his ability to articulate and debate his vision for America countless times.
So with just a few of these highlights, what are people really saying when they ask if he can be Presidential? He has outperformed with every test thrown at him and done it with the grace and dignity of a Statesman. It’s been quite awhile since we’ve seen one of those, maybe America has forgotten what real leaders look like.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Let Judgment Roll Down As Waters, And Righteousness As A Mighty Stream.
Canton, Oh - October 27, 2008
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Echos of Abraham
Posted on http://www.bobcesca.com/
FOREVER
Posted by Elvis Dingeldein.
My great-great-grandmother’s great-great-grandfather was a man named Minor Wilkes, who was born in New Kent County, Virginia, in 1734. He died in 1811, and left a will bequeathing to his many children various and sundry workaday items: a feather bed; a saddle and bridle; the odd cow and sheep; a whiskey still (though he declares, oddly, that “only my wife is to have the use of it”); a few calves and hogs. But scattered throughout Minor’s will he also passed on the following less-fungible property to his wife and children:
I lend my wife two Negroes Ned & Pat during her natural life; I give to my daughter Jincey Winn one negroe man Julis to her and her heirs forever; I give to my daughter Ann Winn one negroe man Stephen; I give to my daughter Patsey Winn one Negroe Girl Clary; I give to my daughter Susanna Wilkes one Negroe boy Dick; I give to my daughter Sally Snead…one Negroe Girl Lucy to her and her heirs and assigns forever…
Forever. How crushingly apt that promise must have felt to Ned or Pat or Lucy in 1811, the Emancipation Proclamation still half a century in their futures. And with what speechless wonder would they gaze upon the figure of Barack Obama, nearly two centuries after their lives and liberties were handed down like chattel in Lunenburg County, Virginia. But where the sight of a free African-American man standing at the threshold of our country’s highest office might have stunned them to awed silence, how effortlessly fluent that property of Minor Wilkes’s would have been in the fierce rhetoric stoking the fires of the McCain campaign and its feverish legions of “real Americans.” Ned and Pat, Lucy and Stephen would have no trouble deciphering the epithets and slanders hurled at this black candidate for president, and they would understand immediately that maybe things hadn’t changed in this country so much after all.
Like many white Americans of a certain social caste with deep roots in the antebellum South, I’ve always suspected my ancestors were slaveholders. It was an unconscionable but not uncommon joke on the Country Club fairways of my hometown in southern Mississippi that “those people” -- or the singular “that one” -- ought not get too uppity, as our great-great-grandfathers probably owned theirs, and they hadn’t had a steady job since. I grew up laughing at these jokes because adults did, because I didn’t know any better, because my parents and their parents were infallible. But until very recently -- until I found Minor Wilkes and his Last Will and Testament while on a search for my family’s shameful American roots -- I had no real proof that my forebears owned human beings, and they certainly had no names.
Ned. Pat. Julis. Stephen. Clary. Dick. Lucy.
Five “Negroe” men and two women. Handed down as property, with the hogs and the cows and the feather beds, to the children of Minor Wilkes and their heirs, forever. When my great-great grandmother’s great-great grandfather signed that document on March 9, 1809, it was notarized by Messrs David, William and Jesse Abernathy and became a legal document empowering Minor’s heirs to the lawful enslavement of seven human beings. They had names, and hopes, and dreamed of change. They had mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers, scattered to the four corners of a burgeoning Republic that had failed, 33 years before, to liberate all of those equally-created amongst us. That Declaration made a promise of parity once again under siege by agents of intolerance and the subtle noose of insinuation.
That my forebears owned black men and women bears no weight on my respect for Barack Obama or my decision to vote for him. I’m a proud American and a Democrat and Senator Obama most closely represents my political and moral ideology. That my forebears owned black men and women is, however, one of the many reasons I would never vote for Senator John McCain or his craven, feckless and vapid running mate. That an American politician could so easily forfeit his sacred and hard-won honor to the altar of race-baiting and fear-mongering in pursuit of office defames the memory of those seven Negro men and women in my own ignominious personal history, and sullies the House that for them and generations of their kin would always be White. If Barack Obama represents the Better Angels of our national character, then John McCain and Sarah Palin are those shoddier souls that would have our house divided, forever unable to stand.
Ask Ned. Ask Pat. Ask Julis and Stephen and Clary. Ask Dick and Lucy. Ask them how a house divided fell upon itself, and so ground its foundations to dust that a man like Barack Obama could see it united again in Change, and Hope. Forever.
FOREVER
Posted by Elvis Dingeldein.
My great-great-grandmother’s great-great-grandfather was a man named Minor Wilkes, who was born in New Kent County, Virginia, in 1734. He died in 1811, and left a will bequeathing to his many children various and sundry workaday items: a feather bed; a saddle and bridle; the odd cow and sheep; a whiskey still (though he declares, oddly, that “only my wife is to have the use of it”); a few calves and hogs. But scattered throughout Minor’s will he also passed on the following less-fungible property to his wife and children:
I lend my wife two Negroes Ned & Pat during her natural life; I give to my daughter Jincey Winn one negroe man Julis to her and her heirs forever; I give to my daughter Ann Winn one negroe man Stephen; I give to my daughter Patsey Winn one Negroe Girl Clary; I give to my daughter Susanna Wilkes one Negroe boy Dick; I give to my daughter Sally Snead…one Negroe Girl Lucy to her and her heirs and assigns forever…
Forever. How crushingly apt that promise must have felt to Ned or Pat or Lucy in 1811, the Emancipation Proclamation still half a century in their futures. And with what speechless wonder would they gaze upon the figure of Barack Obama, nearly two centuries after their lives and liberties were handed down like chattel in Lunenburg County, Virginia. But where the sight of a free African-American man standing at the threshold of our country’s highest office might have stunned them to awed silence, how effortlessly fluent that property of Minor Wilkes’s would have been in the fierce rhetoric stoking the fires of the McCain campaign and its feverish legions of “real Americans.” Ned and Pat, Lucy and Stephen would have no trouble deciphering the epithets and slanders hurled at this black candidate for president, and they would understand immediately that maybe things hadn’t changed in this country so much after all.
Like many white Americans of a certain social caste with deep roots in the antebellum South, I’ve always suspected my ancestors were slaveholders. It was an unconscionable but not uncommon joke on the Country Club fairways of my hometown in southern Mississippi that “those people” -- or the singular “that one” -- ought not get too uppity, as our great-great-grandfathers probably owned theirs, and they hadn’t had a steady job since. I grew up laughing at these jokes because adults did, because I didn’t know any better, because my parents and their parents were infallible. But until very recently -- until I found Minor Wilkes and his Last Will and Testament while on a search for my family’s shameful American roots -- I had no real proof that my forebears owned human beings, and they certainly had no names.
Ned. Pat. Julis. Stephen. Clary. Dick. Lucy.
Five “Negroe” men and two women. Handed down as property, with the hogs and the cows and the feather beds, to the children of Minor Wilkes and their heirs, forever. When my great-great grandmother’s great-great grandfather signed that document on March 9, 1809, it was notarized by Messrs David, William and Jesse Abernathy and became a legal document empowering Minor’s heirs to the lawful enslavement of seven human beings. They had names, and hopes, and dreamed of change. They had mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers, scattered to the four corners of a burgeoning Republic that had failed, 33 years before, to liberate all of those equally-created amongst us. That Declaration made a promise of parity once again under siege by agents of intolerance and the subtle noose of insinuation.
That my forebears owned black men and women bears no weight on my respect for Barack Obama or my decision to vote for him. I’m a proud American and a Democrat and Senator Obama most closely represents my political and moral ideology. That my forebears owned black men and women is, however, one of the many reasons I would never vote for Senator John McCain or his craven, feckless and vapid running mate. That an American politician could so easily forfeit his sacred and hard-won honor to the altar of race-baiting and fear-mongering in pursuit of office defames the memory of those seven Negro men and women in my own ignominious personal history, and sullies the House that for them and generations of their kin would always be White. If Barack Obama represents the Better Angels of our national character, then John McCain and Sarah Palin are those shoddier souls that would have our house divided, forever unable to stand.
Ask Ned. Ask Pat. Ask Julis and Stephen and Clary. Ask Dick and Lucy. Ask them how a house divided fell upon itself, and so ground its foundations to dust that a man like Barack Obama could see it united again in Change, and Hope. Forever.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses...
An excerpt of an interview of General Colin Powell:
"Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer is no. That's not America. Is there something wrong with a seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing he or she could be president? Yet I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion that he is a Muslim and might have an association with terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America.
I feel particularly strong about this because of a picture I saw in a magazine. It was a photo essay about troops who were serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. And one picture at the tail end of this photo essay, was of a mother at Arlington Cemetery and she had her head on the headstone of her son's grave. And as the picture focused in, you could see the writing on the headstone, and it gave his awards - Purple Heart, Bronze Star - showed that he died in Iraq, gave his date of birth, date of death, he was 20 years old. And then at the very top of the head stone, it didn't have a Christian cross. It didn't have a Star of David. It has a crescent and star of the Islamic faith.
And his name was Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan. And he was an American. He was born in New Jersey. He was fourteen years old at the time of 9/11, and he waited until he could serve his country and he gave his life."
"Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer is no. That's not America. Is there something wrong with a seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing he or she could be president? Yet I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion that he is a Muslim and might have an association with terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America.
I feel particularly strong about this because of a picture I saw in a magazine. It was a photo essay about troops who were serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. And one picture at the tail end of this photo essay, was of a mother at Arlington Cemetery and she had her head on the headstone of her son's grave. And as the picture focused in, you could see the writing on the headstone, and it gave his awards - Purple Heart, Bronze Star - showed that he died in Iraq, gave his date of birth, date of death, he was 20 years old. And then at the very top of the head stone, it didn't have a Christian cross. It didn't have a Star of David. It has a crescent and star of the Islamic faith.
And his name was Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan. And he was an American. He was born in New Jersey. He was fourteen years old at the time of 9/11, and he waited until he could serve his country and he gave his life."
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Emancipate Yourselves From Mental Slavery
I visited the town of Salem this past weekend. I would seriously recommend for everyone to visit during the month of October – it’s Halloween Town, quite a fun time and many sites to see. As most people know, Salem’s biggest tourist attraction is the Salem Witch Hysteria of 1692 - the incident that Arthur Miller based his play "The Crucible" upon.
My thoughts today rest on the parallels to be found between Salem in 1692 and the current political landscape. The Witch Hysteria was fueled by a lack of reason and by fear – fear of the Devil, of evil, of the unknown. From that vantage point, they proceeded to try their fellow townspeople with flawed ideas including guilt by association and “spectral evidence” – a term that amounted to hearsay. 19 people were hung based on the “findings” of these trials and one man was pressed to death for, in essence, asking his accusers what he was being tried for. As an aside, the particular case of Giles Corey draws a strong comparison to the current debate raging over the reinstallation the Great Writ of Habeas Corpus to the detainees in Guantanamo Bay.
Reasoned thought and real evidence played no part in the Salem Witch Trials and innocent people were executed because of it.
Reasoned thought and real evidence play no part in the current McCain campaign and the echo chamber that is Right-leaning television, radio and print media.
When the bottom began to fall out of our economy, Senator McCain stated that the “fundamentals of the economy are still strong”. Two hours later, he declared that the economy was in crisis. He then “suspended” his campaign to return to Washington to fix the problem – the exact opposite happened. From that point on, his responses to the evolving economic crisis have been erratic at best, dangerously unwise at worst. They have changed policy as quickly as the news cycle can report – with no cohesive vision, no foundations laid out to build an evolving policy upon. They were tactical changes meant to appease specific constituencies, distract and run out the clock to November 4th.
When his poll numbers continued to drop, his campaign stated that “if we continue to talk about the economy, we lose”. Seriously? If you talk about the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression, if you talk about the biggest crisis to effect the next President, you lose? I think that speaks volumes about the readiness of Senator McCain to assume the Presidency.
So instead, they decided to try and “turn the page” on the crisis effecting, at this point, the global financial market. And so, Senator John McCain, the man whose 2000 race for the presidency was destroyed by a whisper smear campaign by Bush decided to employ the exact strategy with the same players. Simply amazing. We began to hear about Bill Ayers, the former Weather Underground member and about ACORN, the network of community organizations whose missions include voter registration.
They began saying that Senator Obama surrounded himself with “domestic terrorists” and that he was involved in organizations attempting voter fraud – two completely uninformed positions. They decided to run 100% negative advertisement and stir up the fear and division that already exists in this country. They decided to continually attempt to link Senator Obama with terrorism in every stump speech and surrogate remark. They decided to stand back and do nothing as the situation became increasingly volatile and dangerous – so much so that the Secret Service had to investigate attendees to the McCain/Palin rallies due to shouts of “Kill Him” and “Off with his Head” in reference to a Presidential candidate.
This entire time, the echo chamber spent untold time and resources on these issues. Not the economy, not the 2 wars hemorrhaging our blood and treasure, not the unlawful detainment of American citizens, not the scandal involving the Justice Department, not the move by the Bush Administration and Treasury Secretary Paulson to receive untold power over taxpayer money, not climate change, not the energy, education or healthcare crises. Sean Hannity, as an example, spent an entire show “uncovering” Senator Obama’s associations. And by associations, they mean anytime he represented an organization as a lawyer, spent time on a Board of Directors of a educational foundation, was a parishioner in a church that had a controversial pastor or anytime his name appeared in the same paragraph as anyone with a checkered past.
The problem with this line of reasoning, if it can be called reason, is that no one is free from guilt by association. Here is a short list that levels McCain and Palin’s charges of Senator Obama’s radicalism –
The Alaskan Independence Party, The Keating Five, Richard Quinn, John Singlaub & the U.S. Council for World Freedom, Senator Ted Stevens, G. Gordon Liddy, John Hagee, Rod Parsley, Thomas Muthee, Max Blumenthal, Rick Davis, Phil Gramm, Randy Scheunemann, William Timmons and ACORN (?)… yes, Senator McCain spoke at an ACORN convention and praised their involvement in voter registration.
The issue here is that a reasoned and thoughtful person understands that certain “associations” are a matter of circumstance while others may need to be investigated further. Senator Obama’s “associations” have been investigated by the American people – Senator McCain’s and Governor Palin’s have not. This has not stopped them from drawing inane correlations. We are all guilty if guilt by association becomes the standard by which we measure someone’s character.
In conclusion, I would like to offer a story that we should all meditate on. There once was a child that was born to a woman whose husband was not the father. When he was grown, he voluntarily became a homeless vagrant, shirking all of his responsibilities. He began to surround himself with hookers and bankers. He talked about overthrowing the government. He spoke out against the Church. He destroyed others property as a political statement. He socialized with terrorists and extremists. He hung around with drug addicts and the insane. He was a convicted felon on death row who was executed for attempting to overthrow the government and commit treason.
I know a lot of people who associate with him. Think for yourself.
My thoughts today rest on the parallels to be found between Salem in 1692 and the current political landscape. The Witch Hysteria was fueled by a lack of reason and by fear – fear of the Devil, of evil, of the unknown. From that vantage point, they proceeded to try their fellow townspeople with flawed ideas including guilt by association and “spectral evidence” – a term that amounted to hearsay. 19 people were hung based on the “findings” of these trials and one man was pressed to death for, in essence, asking his accusers what he was being tried for. As an aside, the particular case of Giles Corey draws a strong comparison to the current debate raging over the reinstallation the Great Writ of Habeas Corpus to the detainees in Guantanamo Bay.
Reasoned thought and real evidence played no part in the Salem Witch Trials and innocent people were executed because of it.
Reasoned thought and real evidence play no part in the current McCain campaign and the echo chamber that is Right-leaning television, radio and print media.
When the bottom began to fall out of our economy, Senator McCain stated that the “fundamentals of the economy are still strong”. Two hours later, he declared that the economy was in crisis. He then “suspended” his campaign to return to Washington to fix the problem – the exact opposite happened. From that point on, his responses to the evolving economic crisis have been erratic at best, dangerously unwise at worst. They have changed policy as quickly as the news cycle can report – with no cohesive vision, no foundations laid out to build an evolving policy upon. They were tactical changes meant to appease specific constituencies, distract and run out the clock to November 4th.
When his poll numbers continued to drop, his campaign stated that “if we continue to talk about the economy, we lose”. Seriously? If you talk about the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression, if you talk about the biggest crisis to effect the next President, you lose? I think that speaks volumes about the readiness of Senator McCain to assume the Presidency.
So instead, they decided to try and “turn the page” on the crisis effecting, at this point, the global financial market. And so, Senator John McCain, the man whose 2000 race for the presidency was destroyed by a whisper smear campaign by Bush decided to employ the exact strategy with the same players. Simply amazing. We began to hear about Bill Ayers, the former Weather Underground member and about ACORN, the network of community organizations whose missions include voter registration.
They began saying that Senator Obama surrounded himself with “domestic terrorists” and that he was involved in organizations attempting voter fraud – two completely uninformed positions. They decided to run 100% negative advertisement and stir up the fear and division that already exists in this country. They decided to continually attempt to link Senator Obama with terrorism in every stump speech and surrogate remark. They decided to stand back and do nothing as the situation became increasingly volatile and dangerous – so much so that the Secret Service had to investigate attendees to the McCain/Palin rallies due to shouts of “Kill Him” and “Off with his Head” in reference to a Presidential candidate.
This entire time, the echo chamber spent untold time and resources on these issues. Not the economy, not the 2 wars hemorrhaging our blood and treasure, not the unlawful detainment of American citizens, not the scandal involving the Justice Department, not the move by the Bush Administration and Treasury Secretary Paulson to receive untold power over taxpayer money, not climate change, not the energy, education or healthcare crises. Sean Hannity, as an example, spent an entire show “uncovering” Senator Obama’s associations. And by associations, they mean anytime he represented an organization as a lawyer, spent time on a Board of Directors of a educational foundation, was a parishioner in a church that had a controversial pastor or anytime his name appeared in the same paragraph as anyone with a checkered past.
The problem with this line of reasoning, if it can be called reason, is that no one is free from guilt by association. Here is a short list that levels McCain and Palin’s charges of Senator Obama’s radicalism –
The Alaskan Independence Party, The Keating Five, Richard Quinn, John Singlaub & the U.S. Council for World Freedom, Senator Ted Stevens, G. Gordon Liddy, John Hagee, Rod Parsley, Thomas Muthee, Max Blumenthal, Rick Davis, Phil Gramm, Randy Scheunemann, William Timmons and ACORN (?)… yes, Senator McCain spoke at an ACORN convention and praised their involvement in voter registration.
The issue here is that a reasoned and thoughtful person understands that certain “associations” are a matter of circumstance while others may need to be investigated further. Senator Obama’s “associations” have been investigated by the American people – Senator McCain’s and Governor Palin’s have not. This has not stopped them from drawing inane correlations. We are all guilty if guilt by association becomes the standard by which we measure someone’s character.
In conclusion, I would like to offer a story that we should all meditate on. There once was a child that was born to a woman whose husband was not the father. When he was grown, he voluntarily became a homeless vagrant, shirking all of his responsibilities. He began to surround himself with hookers and bankers. He talked about overthrowing the government. He spoke out against the Church. He destroyed others property as a political statement. He socialized with terrorists and extremists. He hung around with drug addicts and the insane. He was a convicted felon on death row who was executed for attempting to overthrow the government and commit treason.
I know a lot of people who associate with him. Think for yourself.
Monday, October 6, 2008
Truer Words Rarely Spoken
Bruce Springsteen - Vote For Change Rally - Philadephia, PA - October 4th, 2008
Friday, October 3, 2008
What Makes A Leader?
“No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States”
And so the Founding Fathers laid out the requirements for the highest office in the land. In the simplicity of these three requirements, I believe they showed, yet again, the level of their genius. Anyone can be President; there is no schooling requirement, no required flight hours, no measure for what would make a good President. It is as if the Founders stated that we must decide those requirements, if there are to be any – that if it is truly to be a government for, of and by the people; than those people need set a threshold for who shall lead them.
In the history of our 43 Presidents, we have had men from all walks of life – military leaders, senators, congressmen, governors, lawyers, professors, businessmen. All have brought different qualities – some good, some not – to the Presidency. But I think we can agree that the best Presidents have brought similar qualities and characteristics. Among these can be listed temperament, judgment, an ability to contemplate deeply the complexities within the challenges we face, an ability to articulate those thoughts and an ability to draw the greatest from our nation while stifling the worst.
At this moment in our 232 years – at a turning point in the dawn of a new millennium – I think we need to truly ask what we require of the leaders of our great nation. If we look to the beginning of our Republic, we see men who thought deeply, contemplating the nature of humanity and the need for self-governance. They paid heed to history and knew the ways in which ideology can replace reason, ignorance can replace wisdom and how, seemingly innocently, tyranny can replace democracy.
Do we want a leader ruled by reason and patience or by ideology and rashness? Do we want a leader who asks that we give up freedoms, however justified, for the promise of security? Do we want a leader who cloisters themselves with a handful of advisors and closes their ears to the wishes of the people? Or do we want a leader who listens and understands the plights of Americans and does their best to adjust policy to the interests of the people?
Let us ask our leaders for temperance, reasoned judgment, intellect and wisdom. Let us ask our leaders for vision and for inspiration. Let us wake our apathetic society and mold this country into what we believe it can be. Let us shorten the distance between the world as it is and the world as it could be. Let us decide that at this time, in this election, we will face the myriad challenges confronting us as our Founders intended – E Pluribus Unum – Out of Many, One.
Yes We Can.
And so the Founding Fathers laid out the requirements for the highest office in the land. In the simplicity of these three requirements, I believe they showed, yet again, the level of their genius. Anyone can be President; there is no schooling requirement, no required flight hours, no measure for what would make a good President. It is as if the Founders stated that we must decide those requirements, if there are to be any – that if it is truly to be a government for, of and by the people; than those people need set a threshold for who shall lead them.
In the history of our 43 Presidents, we have had men from all walks of life – military leaders, senators, congressmen, governors, lawyers, professors, businessmen. All have brought different qualities – some good, some not – to the Presidency. But I think we can agree that the best Presidents have brought similar qualities and characteristics. Among these can be listed temperament, judgment, an ability to contemplate deeply the complexities within the challenges we face, an ability to articulate those thoughts and an ability to draw the greatest from our nation while stifling the worst.
At this moment in our 232 years – at a turning point in the dawn of a new millennium – I think we need to truly ask what we require of the leaders of our great nation. If we look to the beginning of our Republic, we see men who thought deeply, contemplating the nature of humanity and the need for self-governance. They paid heed to history and knew the ways in which ideology can replace reason, ignorance can replace wisdom and how, seemingly innocently, tyranny can replace democracy.
Do we want a leader ruled by reason and patience or by ideology and rashness? Do we want a leader who asks that we give up freedoms, however justified, for the promise of security? Do we want a leader who cloisters themselves with a handful of advisors and closes their ears to the wishes of the people? Or do we want a leader who listens and understands the plights of Americans and does their best to adjust policy to the interests of the people?
Let us ask our leaders for temperance, reasoned judgment, intellect and wisdom. Let us ask our leaders for vision and for inspiration. Let us wake our apathetic society and mold this country into what we believe it can be. Let us shorten the distance between the world as it is and the world as it could be. Let us decide that at this time, in this election, we will face the myriad challenges confronting us as our Founders intended – E Pluribus Unum – Out of Many, One.
Yes We Can.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Why I Support Barack Obama
Dr. King once said that, if given the chance by God to live in any epoch of history, he would “take his mental flight” through the struggle of the Jews in Egypt, through the promised land, onto Greece past the discourse of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, through the Roman Empire, the Renaissance, the Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation. He said “Strangely enough, I would turn to the Almighty, and say, "If you allow me to live just a few years in the second half of the twentieth century, I will be happy... that only when it is dark enough, can you see the stars. And I see God working in this period of the twentieth century in a way that men, in some strange way, are responding--something is happening in our world.”
I feel the same way at the point in history that we currently find ourselves. I feel that we are at a turning point in history – a point where we can choose 2 very distinct paths. One path leads down the same dark trail we have tread for many years. A path of division and apathy, bred from years of cynicism in our government and our fellow man. A place where the mantra seems to be “as long as I get mine”, rather than “we’re all in this together”. The other path is a path of hope – hope that we are as good as our greatest history and better than our worst. That we can meet the challenges we face and overcome them in ways we can’t even imagine. That we can truly live the idea that is America.
This leads me to the question as to why I support Barack Obama. I remember the 2004 Democratic National Convention and the keynote speech that a then unknown Senator from Illinois gave. One that stated that “hope in the face of difficulty, hope in the face of uncertainty, the audacity of hope: In the end, that is God's greatest gift to us, the bedrock of this nation, a belief in things not seen, a belief that there are better days ahead” and that “there's not a liberal America and a conservative America; there's the United States of America. There's not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there's the United States of America.”. Sweeping oratory from a man I knew could do great things for this country; gifts like those come by rarely. Little did I know what was in store. In February of 2007, as a Valentine’s Day gift, I received a copy of “The Audacity of Hope” – it was as if someone had taken everything I've ever felt about America and crystallized it. As the primary season approached, I would often tell people to not count out this man against the Democratic legacy of the Clintons. His thoughtful, nuanced and inclusive vision of American politics was a rallying call – change was coming.
Then came the primaries and his win in Iowa; the New Hampshire primary and his seminal “Yes We Can” speech – I could understand what Caroline Kennedy said “I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them. But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president”.
I feel that as a nation, we have forgotten what a leader looks like and what their mission is; to inspire their people to the greatness that is within. We saw that in Franklin Roosevelt with the New Deal and the fireside chats. We saw it in John Kennedy with the space race and the Peace Corps – the level of national service that Americans felt. I always wondered what that must have felt like – not an abstract love of country but a concrete showing of it. I feel this now. At 31 years of age, I am knocking on doors, writing letters, registering voters to try and positively affect the world in which I live and that my nephews are growing up in.
I look at this time with hope and, strangely enough, with some regret. I look with hope in what we can achieve with a leader who challenges us to pull the best from ourselves to help rebuild the country we love. I look to the time that I can tell my nephews the story that; at this time, in this election, we stood as a people and said “Enough” to fear and division. That we knew what it meant to be inspired, not from a movie or a history lesson; but because we saw it every day walking down the street. That we had a leader that helped us believe again.
As for the regretful feelings – they are minimal and I take comfort in the words that Dr. King spoke and the feeling that we are put in a time and place for a reason greater than we know. I regret that this feeling was absent in my youth – that I grew up in the greed and excess of the 1980’s – the feeling of isolation and being adrift in the 1990’s – the Bush years. Would I have joined the Peace Corps? Been a medic in the military? Entered some sort of public service? Known the love of America from more than old film reels of a JFK speech, a history lesson or a Hollywood movie?
Barack Obama is writing a new politic. Through his entire campaign, he has risen above the knife-fights that are modern American politics. He has shown a thoughtful, nuanced and patient vision that is sorely needed in this powder keg of a world we now live. He has put forth policies that reflect, in my opinion, the best of America and shown the pragmatism needed to make those policies a reality. But above all, and most importantly, he has shown us, in his words, that “we are the ones we’ve been waiting for”.
I think that that will make a great bedtime story someday.
I feel the same way at the point in history that we currently find ourselves. I feel that we are at a turning point in history – a point where we can choose 2 very distinct paths. One path leads down the same dark trail we have tread for many years. A path of division and apathy, bred from years of cynicism in our government and our fellow man. A place where the mantra seems to be “as long as I get mine”, rather than “we’re all in this together”. The other path is a path of hope – hope that we are as good as our greatest history and better than our worst. That we can meet the challenges we face and overcome them in ways we can’t even imagine. That we can truly live the idea that is America.
This leads me to the question as to why I support Barack Obama. I remember the 2004 Democratic National Convention and the keynote speech that a then unknown Senator from Illinois gave. One that stated that “hope in the face of difficulty, hope in the face of uncertainty, the audacity of hope: In the end, that is God's greatest gift to us, the bedrock of this nation, a belief in things not seen, a belief that there are better days ahead” and that “there's not a liberal America and a conservative America; there's the United States of America. There's not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there's the United States of America.”. Sweeping oratory from a man I knew could do great things for this country; gifts like those come by rarely. Little did I know what was in store. In February of 2007, as a Valentine’s Day gift, I received a copy of “The Audacity of Hope” – it was as if someone had taken everything I've ever felt about America and crystallized it. As the primary season approached, I would often tell people to not count out this man against the Democratic legacy of the Clintons. His thoughtful, nuanced and inclusive vision of American politics was a rallying call – change was coming.
Then came the primaries and his win in Iowa; the New Hampshire primary and his seminal “Yes We Can” speech – I could understand what Caroline Kennedy said “I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them. But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president”.
I feel that as a nation, we have forgotten what a leader looks like and what their mission is; to inspire their people to the greatness that is within. We saw that in Franklin Roosevelt with the New Deal and the fireside chats. We saw it in John Kennedy with the space race and the Peace Corps – the level of national service that Americans felt. I always wondered what that must have felt like – not an abstract love of country but a concrete showing of it. I feel this now. At 31 years of age, I am knocking on doors, writing letters, registering voters to try and positively affect the world in which I live and that my nephews are growing up in.
I look at this time with hope and, strangely enough, with some regret. I look with hope in what we can achieve with a leader who challenges us to pull the best from ourselves to help rebuild the country we love. I look to the time that I can tell my nephews the story that; at this time, in this election, we stood as a people and said “Enough” to fear and division. That we knew what it meant to be inspired, not from a movie or a history lesson; but because we saw it every day walking down the street. That we had a leader that helped us believe again.
As for the regretful feelings – they are minimal and I take comfort in the words that Dr. King spoke and the feeling that we are put in a time and place for a reason greater than we know. I regret that this feeling was absent in my youth – that I grew up in the greed and excess of the 1980’s – the feeling of isolation and being adrift in the 1990’s – the Bush years. Would I have joined the Peace Corps? Been a medic in the military? Entered some sort of public service? Known the love of America from more than old film reels of a JFK speech, a history lesson or a Hollywood movie?
Barack Obama is writing a new politic. Through his entire campaign, he has risen above the knife-fights that are modern American politics. He has shown a thoughtful, nuanced and patient vision that is sorely needed in this powder keg of a world we now live. He has put forth policies that reflect, in my opinion, the best of America and shown the pragmatism needed to make those policies a reality. But above all, and most importantly, he has shown us, in his words, that “we are the ones we’ve been waiting for”.
I think that that will make a great bedtime story someday.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
9/11 was beyond politics, beyond race, beyond gender, beyond religion, beyond all things that are divisive in our country and our world. NO ONE has the exclusive claim to this tragic event in our collective history. To show such graphic imagery at a partisan political event is to walk on the graves of the people that lost their lives early that late summer morning. Never forget and always remember to speak the truth to power... it is all that keeps us free. My love to all of you this September the 11th, 2008. May they rest in peace and love in the world after ours and may we find some peace within our hearts to know the path home - David
via videosift.com
via videosift.com
Thursday, September 4, 2008
A Lack of Class
The Republican party has really surprised me. I understand that not everyone thinks the same on any issue; that’s a big part of what makes America work. But I feel that there is a huge difference between the speeches and overall feel of the DNC compared to the RNC. The DNC blasted the McCain campaign for being “more of the same”; an allusion to more of the policies of the Bush Administration. This is the plain truth, Senator McCain himself has stated that he voted with Bush over 90% of the time, more than most of his Republican colleagues. What I did not hear during the DNC were personal attacks upon the character and history of John McCain. That’s class – honoring someone’s service, stating that you fully believe that they love their country as much as anyone else but saying that you differ in where to take this country and how. That’s a politics I want to be a part of.
Conversely, The RNC speeches last night were anything but class. First up was Mitt Romney; the same man who was Governor of Massachussetts, lambasting the East Coast Liberal Media (the very one that gave McCain a free pass during the primaries), The East Coast Liberal community (where he made his fortune buying companies and laying off workers as well as governing one of the most liberal leaning states in the nation) and Big-Government liberals (Republicans have led Washington for 8 years and the governement is bigger than ever). Seriously? Do conservatives really believe these platitudes and arguments, if you can even call them that?
Next up was Mike Huckabee; not a bad speech other than stating that Palin got more votes in Wasilla, Alaska than Joe Biden in the primaries… that’s just laughable. One thing struck me with his speech though; the story about the school teacher teaching her students that our military men and women were the ones who earned everything for us and that we owe them everything in return. A very touching story. Unfortunately, it was a figurative spit in the face to our veterans. McCain railed and voted against the recent G.I. Bill to care for the veterans coming home from war as well as going along with the legalization of torture. No class. Just hypocrisy.
Rudy Giuliani... used to be America’s Mayor… now he just peddles condescension, mockery and fear. What has he got to be so angry about? Republicans have run this country for 8 years! What have they done that we should reward them with 4 more years… let’s see; they responded to 9/11 by invading Iraq on dubious reasons; they allowed, through redefinition, the torture of prisoners; they have tried to battle a terrorist network operating in 80 countries by occupying Iraq while letting Afghanistan fall again to fundamentalist theocracies; they presided over the torture and abuses of power at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and secret prisons abroad; they presided over the debacle that was the rescue effort for New Orleans after Katrina; they presided over the housing crisis, the failing economy, the weakening dollar; they allowed warrantless wire-tapping on every American citizen; they tried to actually defend the removal of the writ of habeus corpus – one of the ideals this country was founded on. And then to demean and dismiss an American citizen’s public service and say that community organizing is, in essence, a joke is beyond understanding. Community organizing is the last bastion of hope for the inner-cities decimated under Republican rule… people lost jobs, health insurance and dignity under Reaganomics and Bush’s policies. The Republicans have failed them; all they have is their community and leaders within it to help them organize. To dismiss a man who walked away from a life of assured privilege to help his fellow man in desperate times is an insult to America itself and Giuliani and the RNC should be ashamed. But they cheered it on just the same… cheered it on while their country crumbles.
Sarah Palin… classless and condescending to the end. She didn’t talk about how they wanted to help rebuild America at home and abroad – she dismissed Obama personally through mockery, sarcasm and distortions of truth. This after Obama himself publicly defended her family’s right to privacy during a political campaign. Attacks and Lies, all the while the bloodthirsty crowd screamed for more… they cheered and cheered while everything noble and good about their party burned to the ground. America is wounded, our Constitution being shredded and true leadership lying dead on the floor on the spear of neo-conservatism. And all they have are attacks, sarcasm, mockery and lies… even if lies by omission. A week went by and she was linked to half a dozen scandals and questionable situations – but questions on those are sexist, right? Except if they happen to Hillary, than it’s a woman politician whining, right? Or if they happen to Obama, then it’s just the American people vetting a nominee, right? To see if he’s “one of us”, right? Whatever that means.
I’ve included some of the distortions of truth that came out of the speeches last night. As Bob Marley is claimed to have said after people questioned why he would appear live in concert in front of the very people who shot him in his home: “the people that are trying to make the world worse never take a day off , why should I. Light up the darkness”May we light up the darkness, may the agents of fear see their delusions for what they are and may we truly live out the greatest idea, ever, that is America.
PALIN: "I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending ... and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. I told the Congress 'thanks but no thanks' for that Bridge to Nowhere."
THE FACTS: As mayor of Wasilla, Palin hired a lobbyist and traveled to Washington annually to support earmarks for the town totaling $27 million. In her two years as governor, Alaska has requested nearly $750 million in special federal spending, by far the largest per-capita request in the nation. While Palin notes she rejected plans to build a $398 million bridge from Ketchikan to an island with 50 residents and an airport, that opposition came only after the plan was ridiculed nationally as a "bridge to nowhere."
PALIN: "There is much to like and admire about our opponent. But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform - not even in the state senate."
THE FACTS: Compared to McCain and his two decades in the Senate, Obama does have a more meager record. But he has worked with Republicans to pass legislation that expanded efforts to intercept illegal shipments of weapons of mass destruction and to help destroy conventional weapons stockpiles. The legislation became law last year. To demean that accomplishment would be to also demean the work of Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, a respected foreign policy voice in the Senate. In Illinois, he was the leader on two big, contentious measures in Illinois: studying racial profiling by police and requiring recordings of interrogations in potential death penalty cases. He also successfully co-sponsored major ethics reform legislation in Congress.
PALIN: "The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes, raise payroll taxes, raise investment income taxes, raise the death tax, raise business taxes, and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars."
THE FACTS: The Tax Policy Center, a think tank run jointly by the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute, concluded that Obama's plan would increase after-tax income for middle-income taxpayers by about 5 percent by 2012, or nearly $2,200 annually. McCain's plan, which cuts taxes across all income levels, would raise after tax-income for middle-income taxpayers by 3 percent, the center concluded. Obama would provide $80 billion in tax breaks, mainly for poor workers and the elderly, including tripling the Earned Income Tax Credit for minimum-wage workers and higher credits for larger families. He also would raise income taxes, capital gains and dividend taxes on the wealthiest. He would raise payroll taxes on taxpayers with incomes above $250,000, and he would raise corporate taxes. Small businesses that make more than $250,000 a year would see taxes rise.
MCCAIN: "She's been governor of our largest state, in charge of 20 percent of America's energy supply ... She's responsible for 20 percent of the nation's energy supply. I'm entertained by the comparison and I hope we can keep making that comparison that running a political campaign is somehow comparable to being the executive of the largest state in America," he said in an interview with ABC News' Charles Gibson.
THE FACTS: McCain's phrasing exaggerates both claims. Palin is governor of a state that ranks second nationally in crude oil production, but she's no more "responsible" for that resource than President Bush was when he was governor of Texas, another oil-producing state. In fact, her primary power is the ability to tax oil, which she did in concert with the Alaska Legislature. And where Alaska is the largest state in America, McCain could as easily have called it the 47th largest state - by population.
MCCAIN: "She's the commander of the Alaska National Guard. ... She has been in charge, and she has had national security as one of her primary responsibilities," he said on ABC.
THE FACTS: While governors are in charge of their state guard units, that authority ends whenever those units are called to actual military service. When guard units are deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, for example, they assume those duties under "federal status," which means they report to the Defense Department, not their governors. Alaska's national guard units have a total of about 4,200 personnel, among the smallest of state guard organizations.
FORMER ARKANSAS GOV. MIKE HUCKABEE: Palin "got more votes running for mayor of Wasilla, Alaska than Joe Biden got running for president of the United States."
THE FACTS: A whopper. Palin got 616 votes in the 1996 mayor's election, and got 909 in her 1999 re-election race, for a total of 1,525. Biden dropped out of the race after the Iowa caucuses, but he still got 76,165 votes in 23 states and the District of Columbia where he was on the ballot during the 2008 presidential primaries.
FORMER MASSACHUSETTS GOV. MITT ROMNEY: "We need change, all right - change from a liberal Washington to a conservative Washington! We have a prescription for every American who wants change in Washington - throw out the big-government liberals, and elect John McCain and Sarah Palin."
THE FACTS: A Back-to-the-Future moment. George W. Bush, a conservative Republican, has been president for nearly eight years. And until last year, Republicans controlled Congress. Only since January 2007 have Democrats been in charge of the House and Senate.
Conversely, The RNC speeches last night were anything but class. First up was Mitt Romney; the same man who was Governor of Massachussetts, lambasting the East Coast Liberal Media (the very one that gave McCain a free pass during the primaries), The East Coast Liberal community (where he made his fortune buying companies and laying off workers as well as governing one of the most liberal leaning states in the nation) and Big-Government liberals (Republicans have led Washington for 8 years and the governement is bigger than ever). Seriously? Do conservatives really believe these platitudes and arguments, if you can even call them that?
Next up was Mike Huckabee; not a bad speech other than stating that Palin got more votes in Wasilla, Alaska than Joe Biden in the primaries… that’s just laughable. One thing struck me with his speech though; the story about the school teacher teaching her students that our military men and women were the ones who earned everything for us and that we owe them everything in return. A very touching story. Unfortunately, it was a figurative spit in the face to our veterans. McCain railed and voted against the recent G.I. Bill to care for the veterans coming home from war as well as going along with the legalization of torture. No class. Just hypocrisy.
Rudy Giuliani... used to be America’s Mayor… now he just peddles condescension, mockery and fear. What has he got to be so angry about? Republicans have run this country for 8 years! What have they done that we should reward them with 4 more years… let’s see; they responded to 9/11 by invading Iraq on dubious reasons; they allowed, through redefinition, the torture of prisoners; they have tried to battle a terrorist network operating in 80 countries by occupying Iraq while letting Afghanistan fall again to fundamentalist theocracies; they presided over the torture and abuses of power at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and secret prisons abroad; they presided over the debacle that was the rescue effort for New Orleans after Katrina; they presided over the housing crisis, the failing economy, the weakening dollar; they allowed warrantless wire-tapping on every American citizen; they tried to actually defend the removal of the writ of habeus corpus – one of the ideals this country was founded on. And then to demean and dismiss an American citizen’s public service and say that community organizing is, in essence, a joke is beyond understanding. Community organizing is the last bastion of hope for the inner-cities decimated under Republican rule… people lost jobs, health insurance and dignity under Reaganomics and Bush’s policies. The Republicans have failed them; all they have is their community and leaders within it to help them organize. To dismiss a man who walked away from a life of assured privilege to help his fellow man in desperate times is an insult to America itself and Giuliani and the RNC should be ashamed. But they cheered it on just the same… cheered it on while their country crumbles.
Sarah Palin… classless and condescending to the end. She didn’t talk about how they wanted to help rebuild America at home and abroad – she dismissed Obama personally through mockery, sarcasm and distortions of truth. This after Obama himself publicly defended her family’s right to privacy during a political campaign. Attacks and Lies, all the while the bloodthirsty crowd screamed for more… they cheered and cheered while everything noble and good about their party burned to the ground. America is wounded, our Constitution being shredded and true leadership lying dead on the floor on the spear of neo-conservatism. And all they have are attacks, sarcasm, mockery and lies… even if lies by omission. A week went by and she was linked to half a dozen scandals and questionable situations – but questions on those are sexist, right? Except if they happen to Hillary, than it’s a woman politician whining, right? Or if they happen to Obama, then it’s just the American people vetting a nominee, right? To see if he’s “one of us”, right? Whatever that means.
I’ve included some of the distortions of truth that came out of the speeches last night. As Bob Marley is claimed to have said after people questioned why he would appear live in concert in front of the very people who shot him in his home: “the people that are trying to make the world worse never take a day off , why should I. Light up the darkness”May we light up the darkness, may the agents of fear see their delusions for what they are and may we truly live out the greatest idea, ever, that is America.
PALIN: "I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending ... and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. I told the Congress 'thanks but no thanks' for that Bridge to Nowhere."
THE FACTS: As mayor of Wasilla, Palin hired a lobbyist and traveled to Washington annually to support earmarks for the town totaling $27 million. In her two years as governor, Alaska has requested nearly $750 million in special federal spending, by far the largest per-capita request in the nation. While Palin notes she rejected plans to build a $398 million bridge from Ketchikan to an island with 50 residents and an airport, that opposition came only after the plan was ridiculed nationally as a "bridge to nowhere."
PALIN: "There is much to like and admire about our opponent. But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform - not even in the state senate."
THE FACTS: Compared to McCain and his two decades in the Senate, Obama does have a more meager record. But he has worked with Republicans to pass legislation that expanded efforts to intercept illegal shipments of weapons of mass destruction and to help destroy conventional weapons stockpiles. The legislation became law last year. To demean that accomplishment would be to also demean the work of Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, a respected foreign policy voice in the Senate. In Illinois, he was the leader on two big, contentious measures in Illinois: studying racial profiling by police and requiring recordings of interrogations in potential death penalty cases. He also successfully co-sponsored major ethics reform legislation in Congress.
PALIN: "The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes, raise payroll taxes, raise investment income taxes, raise the death tax, raise business taxes, and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars."
THE FACTS: The Tax Policy Center, a think tank run jointly by the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute, concluded that Obama's plan would increase after-tax income for middle-income taxpayers by about 5 percent by 2012, or nearly $2,200 annually. McCain's plan, which cuts taxes across all income levels, would raise after tax-income for middle-income taxpayers by 3 percent, the center concluded. Obama would provide $80 billion in tax breaks, mainly for poor workers and the elderly, including tripling the Earned Income Tax Credit for minimum-wage workers and higher credits for larger families. He also would raise income taxes, capital gains and dividend taxes on the wealthiest. He would raise payroll taxes on taxpayers with incomes above $250,000, and he would raise corporate taxes. Small businesses that make more than $250,000 a year would see taxes rise.
MCCAIN: "She's been governor of our largest state, in charge of 20 percent of America's energy supply ... She's responsible for 20 percent of the nation's energy supply. I'm entertained by the comparison and I hope we can keep making that comparison that running a political campaign is somehow comparable to being the executive of the largest state in America," he said in an interview with ABC News' Charles Gibson.
THE FACTS: McCain's phrasing exaggerates both claims. Palin is governor of a state that ranks second nationally in crude oil production, but she's no more "responsible" for that resource than President Bush was when he was governor of Texas, another oil-producing state. In fact, her primary power is the ability to tax oil, which she did in concert with the Alaska Legislature. And where Alaska is the largest state in America, McCain could as easily have called it the 47th largest state - by population.
MCCAIN: "She's the commander of the Alaska National Guard. ... She has been in charge, and she has had national security as one of her primary responsibilities," he said on ABC.
THE FACTS: While governors are in charge of their state guard units, that authority ends whenever those units are called to actual military service. When guard units are deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, for example, they assume those duties under "federal status," which means they report to the Defense Department, not their governors. Alaska's national guard units have a total of about 4,200 personnel, among the smallest of state guard organizations.
FORMER ARKANSAS GOV. MIKE HUCKABEE: Palin "got more votes running for mayor of Wasilla, Alaska than Joe Biden got running for president of the United States."
THE FACTS: A whopper. Palin got 616 votes in the 1996 mayor's election, and got 909 in her 1999 re-election race, for a total of 1,525. Biden dropped out of the race after the Iowa caucuses, but he still got 76,165 votes in 23 states and the District of Columbia where he was on the ballot during the 2008 presidential primaries.
FORMER MASSACHUSETTS GOV. MITT ROMNEY: "We need change, all right - change from a liberal Washington to a conservative Washington! We have a prescription for every American who wants change in Washington - throw out the big-government liberals, and elect John McCain and Sarah Palin."
THE FACTS: A Back-to-the-Future moment. George W. Bush, a conservative Republican, has been president for nearly eight years. And until last year, Republicans controlled Congress. Only since January 2007 have Democrats been in charge of the House and Senate.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
45 Years
45 years ago today, Dr. Martin Luther King gave his eponymous “I Have a Dream” speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington. “Unity is the great need of the hour”, Dr. King proclaimed; this statement is as true today as it was in 1963, during the height of the Civil Rights Movement. Dr. King’s most famous speech set a ripple out in time and planted a seed in our collective future. We sowed that seed – with love and with hate, with unity and with division, with progress and with regression. Had we nurtured it only with love, we very well may have seen results sooner, but as it has been said by people wiser than me – “to everything there is a season”.
And now the spring has come to the winter of our discontent. A new shoot of hope has broken through the surface of that rocky soil that is our America and stretched it’s leaves to the sky for that first drink of sunlight. Today, 45 years from the proclamation of a dream, we as a people will formally nominate the first African-American EVER for President, Senator Barack Obama. I can not tell you what this means to us as a people, but I can try and tell you what it means to me: it means that we ARE marching forward to freedom, that we ARE seeing ourselves in each other, that, YES WE CAN make it to ‘The Promised Land’ that Dr. King saw. North, South, East and West, from mountain to desert, from sea to shining sea, are saying in one voice “This is our time, This is our moment – we can heal this nation – We can heal this world”.
No to anger and aggression, Yes to peace and compassion
No to fear and division – Yes to courage and brotherhood.
“I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every
hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain,
and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord
shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with.
With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a
stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling
discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this
faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle
together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing
that we will be free one day.
This will be the day, this will be the day when all of God's children will
be able to sing with new meaning "My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of
liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my father's died, land of the Pilgrim's
pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring!"
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. And so
let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let
freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring
from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let
freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.
But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi - from
every mountainside.
Let freedom ring. And when this happens, and when we allow
freedom ring - when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet,
from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when
all of God's children - black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles,
Protestants and Catholics - will be able to join hands and sing in the words
of the old Negro spiritual: "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty,
we are free at last!"
And now the spring has come to the winter of our discontent. A new shoot of hope has broken through the surface of that rocky soil that is our America and stretched it’s leaves to the sky for that first drink of sunlight. Today, 45 years from the proclamation of a dream, we as a people will formally nominate the first African-American EVER for President, Senator Barack Obama. I can not tell you what this means to us as a people, but I can try and tell you what it means to me: it means that we ARE marching forward to freedom, that we ARE seeing ourselves in each other, that, YES WE CAN make it to ‘The Promised Land’ that Dr. King saw. North, South, East and West, from mountain to desert, from sea to shining sea, are saying in one voice “This is our time, This is our moment – we can heal this nation – We can heal this world”.
No to anger and aggression, Yes to peace and compassion
No to fear and division – Yes to courage and brotherhood.
“I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every
hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain,
and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord
shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with.
With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a
stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling
discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this
faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle
together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing
that we will be free one day.
This will be the day, this will be the day when all of God's children will
be able to sing with new meaning "My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of
liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my father's died, land of the Pilgrim's
pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring!"
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. And so
let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let
freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring
from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let
freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.
But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi - from
every mountainside.
Let freedom ring. And when this happens, and when we allow
freedom ring - when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet,
from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when
all of God's children - black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles,
Protestants and Catholics - will be able to join hands and sing in the words
of the old Negro spiritual: "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty,
we are free at last!"
This is Our Time
Here are some of the passages that stirred the sleeping giant in me that were spoken at the DNC last evening:
The night started off with former President Bill Clinton, giving a ringing endorsement of Senator Obama and some phrases that truly capture what it means to be an American, especially in these times:
"Barack Obama knows that America cannot be strong abroad unless we are strong at home. People the world over have always been more impressed by the power of our example than by the example of our power.
"But on the two great questions of this election, how to rebuild the American Dream and how to restore America's leadership in the world, he (McCain) still embraces the extreme philosophy which has defined his party for more than 25 years, a philosophy we never had a real chance to see in action until 2001, when the Republicans finally gained control of both the White House and Congress. Then we saw what would happen to America if the policies they had talked about for decades were implemented. They took us from record surpluses to an exploding national debt; from over 22 million new jobs down to 5 million; from an increase in working family incomes of $7,500 to a decline of more than $2,000; from almost 8 million Americans moving out of poverty to more than 5 and a half million falling into poverty - and millions more losing their health insurance."
The man who followed Clinton is the very one I followed 4 years ago; Senator John Kerry. America was still under the spell cast by the Bush Administration and were allowing fear to run their lives and our country into the ground. He wasted no time showing these abuses of power for what they are:
"Never in modern history has an administration squandered American power so recklessly. Never has strategy been so replaced by ideology. Never has extremism so crowded out common sense and fundamental American values. Never has short-term partisan politics so depleted the strength of America's bipartisan foreign policy."
"So, the candidate who once promised a "contest of ideas" now has nothing left but personal attacks. How insulting to suggest that those who question the mission, question the troops. How pathetic to suggest that those who question a failed policy doubt America itself. How desperate to tell the son of a single mother who chose community service over money and privilege that he doesn't put America first."
"President Obama will shut down Guantanamo, respect the constitution, and make clear once and for all, the United States does not torture, not now, not ever."
"Four years ago I said, and I say it again tonight, that the flag doesn't belong to any ideology. It doesn't belong to any political party. It is an enduring symbol of our nation, and it belongs to all the American people. After all, patriotism is not love of power or some cheap trick to win votes; patriotism is love of country.
"Years ago when we protested a war, people would weigh in against us saying, "My country right or wrong." Our answer? Absolutely, my country right or wrong. When right, keep it right. When wrong, make it right. Sometimes loving your country demands you must tell the truth to power. This is one of those times, and Barack Obama is telling those truths."
And finally, with as much fanfare as was needed, Senator Joseph Biden:
"You know, you can learn a lot about a man campaigning with him, debating him, seeing how he reacts under pressure. You learn about the strength of his mind. But even more importantly, you learn about the quality of his heart. I watched how Barack touched people, how he inspired them. And I realized he had tapped into the oldest belief in America: We don’t have to accept the situation we cannot bear; we have the power to change it."
"I’m here for their future. I’m here for everyone I grew up with in Scranton and Wilmington. I’m here for the cops and the firefighters, the teachers and the assembly line workers, the folks whose lives are the very measure of whether the American dream endures."
"Our greatest presidents, from Abraham Lincoln to Franklin Roosevelt to John Kennedy, they all challenged us to embrace change. Now it is our responsibility to meet that challenge."
"Millions of Americans have been knocked down. And this is the time as Americans together we get back up, back up together. Our debt to our parents and our grandparents is too great. Our obligation to our children is too sacred. These are extraordinary times; this is an extraordinary election."
"The American people are ready. I am ready. Barack is ready. This is his time; this is our time; this is America’s time."
The night started off with former President Bill Clinton, giving a ringing endorsement of Senator Obama and some phrases that truly capture what it means to be an American, especially in these times:
"Barack Obama knows that America cannot be strong abroad unless we are strong at home. People the world over have always been more impressed by the power of our example than by the example of our power.
"But on the two great questions of this election, how to rebuild the American Dream and how to restore America's leadership in the world, he (McCain) still embraces the extreme philosophy which has defined his party for more than 25 years, a philosophy we never had a real chance to see in action until 2001, when the Republicans finally gained control of both the White House and Congress. Then we saw what would happen to America if the policies they had talked about for decades were implemented. They took us from record surpluses to an exploding national debt; from over 22 million new jobs down to 5 million; from an increase in working family incomes of $7,500 to a decline of more than $2,000; from almost 8 million Americans moving out of poverty to more than 5 and a half million falling into poverty - and millions more losing their health insurance."
The man who followed Clinton is the very one I followed 4 years ago; Senator John Kerry. America was still under the spell cast by the Bush Administration and were allowing fear to run their lives and our country into the ground. He wasted no time showing these abuses of power for what they are:
"Never in modern history has an administration squandered American power so recklessly. Never has strategy been so replaced by ideology. Never has extremism so crowded out common sense and fundamental American values. Never has short-term partisan politics so depleted the strength of America's bipartisan foreign policy."
"So, the candidate who once promised a "contest of ideas" now has nothing left but personal attacks. How insulting to suggest that those who question the mission, question the troops. How pathetic to suggest that those who question a failed policy doubt America itself. How desperate to tell the son of a single mother who chose community service over money and privilege that he doesn't put America first."
"President Obama will shut down Guantanamo, respect the constitution, and make clear once and for all, the United States does not torture, not now, not ever."
"Four years ago I said, and I say it again tonight, that the flag doesn't belong to any ideology. It doesn't belong to any political party. It is an enduring symbol of our nation, and it belongs to all the American people. After all, patriotism is not love of power or some cheap trick to win votes; patriotism is love of country.
"Years ago when we protested a war, people would weigh in against us saying, "My country right or wrong." Our answer? Absolutely, my country right or wrong. When right, keep it right. When wrong, make it right. Sometimes loving your country demands you must tell the truth to power. This is one of those times, and Barack Obama is telling those truths."
And finally, with as much fanfare as was needed, Senator Joseph Biden:
"You know, you can learn a lot about a man campaigning with him, debating him, seeing how he reacts under pressure. You learn about the strength of his mind. But even more importantly, you learn about the quality of his heart. I watched how Barack touched people, how he inspired them. And I realized he had tapped into the oldest belief in America: We don’t have to accept the situation we cannot bear; we have the power to change it."
"I’m here for their future. I’m here for everyone I grew up with in Scranton and Wilmington. I’m here for the cops and the firefighters, the teachers and the assembly line workers, the folks whose lives are the very measure of whether the American dream endures."
"Our greatest presidents, from Abraham Lincoln to Franklin Roosevelt to John Kennedy, they all challenged us to embrace change. Now it is our responsibility to meet that challenge."
"Millions of Americans have been knocked down. And this is the time as Americans together we get back up, back up together. Our debt to our parents and our grandparents is too great. Our obligation to our children is too sacred. These are extraordinary times; this is an extraordinary election."
"The American people are ready. I am ready. Barack is ready. This is his time; this is our time; this is America’s time."
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
The Fringes of History
I agree with Rachel Maddow. Any former Hillary Clinton supporter still supporting the McCain presidency is, as she eloquently put, “post-rational”. Barack Obama has the nomination. Hillary has said so since her concession speech in June. What are the arguments now? She received the popular vote. No, she didn’t, the only way they spun the numbers to show this was by excluding Michigan and every single caucus state (caucus states don’t release vote totals). Some people have argued about the unfair rules of the democratic primaries. This is a fallacy, they wouldn’t have had a problem with the rules if the Clinton camp had been able to win. Obama’s team understood and accepted the rules, played by them and had a clear-eyed, pragmatic vision as to how to achieve victory. To say that the rules were the reason that she lost is ignorant. The Clinton campaign had felt confident that the primary contest would be over by Super Tuesday. They felt no need to cover themselves in states following February 5th. Obama’s ground game in those states assured victory against a candidate who showed up a day late and much more than a dollar short. Some say she should have won because of her historic campaign, being the first woman to go so far in a presidential race. No question that it was historic and 2008 will be a year that shows a divergence and evolution in our collective history. But to have that as an argument, are we blocking out the current nominee for President?
Hillary’s speech at the DNC last night was exactly what it needed to be. She asked a very simple question; were her supporters only involved for her? Or were they involved with all the Americans that have become invisible in the last 8 years?
Needless to say, anyone still on the fringes of this baseless argument will be on the fringes of history. When their children ask about the election of 2008, they can weave a fantasy tale about how they were involved for the better, but they will still have to lay their own head on their pillows; in that quiet time when all you have for company are your thoughts and all they will be able to do is wish.
Hillary’s speech at the DNC last night was exactly what it needed to be. She asked a very simple question; were her supporters only involved for her? Or were they involved with all the Americans that have become invisible in the last 8 years?
Needless to say, anyone still on the fringes of this baseless argument will be on the fringes of history. When their children ask about the election of 2008, they can weave a fantasy tale about how they were involved for the better, but they will still have to lay their own head on their pillows; in that quiet time when all you have for company are your thoughts and all they will be able to do is wish.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
The work begins anew. The hope rises again. The dream lives on.
Monday, August 25th, 2008; the first night of the 2008 Democratic National Convention and the first time that many people in America may have seen why I do not only stand behind or for Barack Obama, but why I stand WITH Barack Obama.
First was Senator Edward “Ted” Kennedy, the “Lion of the Senate”, the only surviving brother of a family that truly embodied the flaws and greatness of the American people. His niece Caroline first described the campaign of Barack Obama as “never understanding what it felt like to be inspired the way people said my father inspired them… but I do now”. After a video tribute, the Senator himself, recovering from brain surgery to remove a cancerous tumor, appeared in front of the convention to show why and how he served over 45 years in the Senate. He spoke of the torch passing from his brothers’ generation to a new generation. He spoke of his lifelong pursuit of healthcare as a right for all people and not an expensive privilege for the few. He spoke of Barack Obama and America. He ended his speech with soaring rhetoric enough to wake the sleeping giant that is our American spirit:
“There is a new wave of change all around us, and if we set our compass true, we will reach our destination – not merely victory for our party but renewal for our nation. And this November, the torch will be passed again to a new generation of Americans, so with Barack Obama, and for you, and for me, our country will be committed to his cause. The work begins anew. The hope rises again. And the dream lives on.”
And then the headline speaker of the night, Michelle Obama. I will admit, this is the first time I had seen an entire speech of hers. She showed me, along with all America, why she and Barack are together. Her intelligence, her compassion, her fiery passion and love for her family and country were awe-inspiring and humbling. She spoke of her father, diagnosed with multiple sclerosis at 30 years of age, who never missed a day of work so that her family had everything they needed. Who gave her the opportunity to go to Princeton, then Harvard, and then enter a life of public service. Her oratory abilities are a match for even her husbands, I include several snippets here that affected me deeply. Please watch the speech to find the ones that speak to you:
“The people gathered together that day were ordinary folks doing the best they could to build a good life. See they were parents trying to get by paycheck to paycheck; grandparents trying to get by on a fixed income; men frustrated that they couldn't support their families after their jobs disappeared. Those folks weren't asking for a handout or a shortcut. See they were ready to work -- they wanted to contribute. They believed -- like you and I believe -- that America should be a place where you can make it if you try. And Barack stood up that day, and spoke words that have stayed with me ever since. He talked about "The world as it is" and "The world as it should be." And he said that all too often, we accept the distance between the two, and we settle for the world as it is -- even when it doesn't reflect our values and aspirations. But he reminded us that we also know what our world should look like. He said we know what fairness and justice and opportunity look like. And he urged us to believe in ourselves -- to find the strength within ourselves to strive for the world as it should be. And isn't that the great American story?”
“All of us driven by a simple belief that the world as it is just won't do -- that we have an obligation to fight for the world as it should be.”
“And that is the thread that connects our hearts. That is the thread that runs through my journey and Barack's journey and so many other improbable journeys that have brought us here tonight, where the current of history meets this new tide of hope.”
“And in the end, And in the end after all that's happened these past 19 months, the Barack Obama I know today is the same man I fell in love with 19 years ago. He's the same man who drove me and our new baby daughter home from the hospital ten years ago this summer, inching along at a snail's pace, peering anxiously at us in the rearview mirror, feeling the whole weight of her future in his hands, determined to give her everything he'd struggled so hard for himself, determined to give her something he never had: the affirming embrace of a father's love.”
“And as I tuck that little girl in and her little sister into bed at night, you see I think about how one day, they'll have families of their own. And one day, they -- and your sons and daughters -- will tell their own children about what we did together in this election. They'll tell them how this time, we listened to our hopes, instead of our fears. How this time, how this time, we decided to stop doubting and to start dreaming. How this time, in this great country -- where a girl from the South Side of Chicago can go to college and law school, and the son of a single mother from Hawaii can go all the way to the White House -- that we committed ourselves, we committed ourselves to building the world as it should be.”
My love to all of you, and as I’ve said before, my friends in Africa said it best:
“Pave the way. Obama is coming.”
First was Senator Edward “Ted” Kennedy, the “Lion of the Senate”, the only surviving brother of a family that truly embodied the flaws and greatness of the American people. His niece Caroline first described the campaign of Barack Obama as “never understanding what it felt like to be inspired the way people said my father inspired them… but I do now”. After a video tribute, the Senator himself, recovering from brain surgery to remove a cancerous tumor, appeared in front of the convention to show why and how he served over 45 years in the Senate. He spoke of the torch passing from his brothers’ generation to a new generation. He spoke of his lifelong pursuit of healthcare as a right for all people and not an expensive privilege for the few. He spoke of Barack Obama and America. He ended his speech with soaring rhetoric enough to wake the sleeping giant that is our American spirit:
“There is a new wave of change all around us, and if we set our compass true, we will reach our destination – not merely victory for our party but renewal for our nation. And this November, the torch will be passed again to a new generation of Americans, so with Barack Obama, and for you, and for me, our country will be committed to his cause. The work begins anew. The hope rises again. And the dream lives on.”
And then the headline speaker of the night, Michelle Obama. I will admit, this is the first time I had seen an entire speech of hers. She showed me, along with all America, why she and Barack are together. Her intelligence, her compassion, her fiery passion and love for her family and country were awe-inspiring and humbling. She spoke of her father, diagnosed with multiple sclerosis at 30 years of age, who never missed a day of work so that her family had everything they needed. Who gave her the opportunity to go to Princeton, then Harvard, and then enter a life of public service. Her oratory abilities are a match for even her husbands, I include several snippets here that affected me deeply. Please watch the speech to find the ones that speak to you:
“The people gathered together that day were ordinary folks doing the best they could to build a good life. See they were parents trying to get by paycheck to paycheck; grandparents trying to get by on a fixed income; men frustrated that they couldn't support their families after their jobs disappeared. Those folks weren't asking for a handout or a shortcut. See they were ready to work -- they wanted to contribute. They believed -- like you and I believe -- that America should be a place where you can make it if you try. And Barack stood up that day, and spoke words that have stayed with me ever since. He talked about "The world as it is" and "The world as it should be." And he said that all too often, we accept the distance between the two, and we settle for the world as it is -- even when it doesn't reflect our values and aspirations. But he reminded us that we also know what our world should look like. He said we know what fairness and justice and opportunity look like. And he urged us to believe in ourselves -- to find the strength within ourselves to strive for the world as it should be. And isn't that the great American story?”
“All of us driven by a simple belief that the world as it is just won't do -- that we have an obligation to fight for the world as it should be.”
“And that is the thread that connects our hearts. That is the thread that runs through my journey and Barack's journey and so many other improbable journeys that have brought us here tonight, where the current of history meets this new tide of hope.”
“And in the end, And in the end after all that's happened these past 19 months, the Barack Obama I know today is the same man I fell in love with 19 years ago. He's the same man who drove me and our new baby daughter home from the hospital ten years ago this summer, inching along at a snail's pace, peering anxiously at us in the rearview mirror, feeling the whole weight of her future in his hands, determined to give her everything he'd struggled so hard for himself, determined to give her something he never had: the affirming embrace of a father's love.”
“And as I tuck that little girl in and her little sister into bed at night, you see I think about how one day, they'll have families of their own. And one day, they -- and your sons and daughters -- will tell their own children about what we did together in this election. They'll tell them how this time, we listened to our hopes, instead of our fears. How this time, how this time, we decided to stop doubting and to start dreaming. How this time, in this great country -- where a girl from the South Side of Chicago can go to college and law school, and the son of a single mother from Hawaii can go all the way to the White House -- that we committed ourselves, we committed ourselves to building the world as it should be.”
My love to all of you, and as I’ve said before, my friends in Africa said it best:
“Pave the way. Obama is coming.”
Friday, August 22, 2008
Faith and Politics
Keith Olbermann once wrote that "The man who sees absolutes, where all others see nuances and shades of meaning, is either a prophet or a quack." How true this statement is and how more illumined it becomes; especially with the current oversimplification of our national discourse on faith and politics.
I would like to direct the majority of my opinion here to the recent Civil Forum held at the Saddleback Church in California under the mediation of Rick Warren. The event was meant as a civil discourse between Rick Warren and the two major-party nominees for the Presidency. It was meant to elevate our national discourse, to start construction on the bridge between faith and politics, to facilitate the eradication of the demonizing of people who disagree with us; whatever their reasoning may be. In my humble opinion, this did not happen.
On the most superficial level, this did not happen due to the apparent dishonesty of the McCain campaign; or by the dishonesty of Senator McCain himself. Rick Warren had said on several occasions that Senator McCain would be in a "Cone of Silence", thereby unable to have foreknowledge of the questions asked and, thereby, having to answer them without prior coaching. The McCain campaign themselves stated that Senator McCain was in a campaign motorcade for the first half of Senator Obama's interview and then in a green room (without, specifically stated, a broadcast feed) for the 2nd half. Why was this fact not stated when Rick Warren asked Senator McCain if the "Cone of Silence" was "comfortable"? In addition, why did Senator McCain ask, midway through the interview, when they could "get back to the question" about Supreme Court appointees when they hadn't yet reached that question?
It is interesting to note the irony in the use of the term "Come of Silence", as this was a device used for humor in the 1960's television show "Get Smart". In the show, The Chief would lower the "Cone of Silence" so as to avoid eavesdropping. Unfortunately, it only served to cause Maxwell Smart and The Chief to not hear each other while the conversation was quite audible to anyone outside of the cone.
On a deeper level, while I applaud Rick Warren's intentions, I have concerns over what seems to be an ever-growing section of, for lack of a better term, the "Religious Right". There seems to be a push to boil down the entirety of the Bible, and especially the message and enlightenment transmitted by Jesus, to several hot-button issues; the two frontrunners being abortion and homosexuality. Within the entire Gospel, Jesus does not mention these two issues directly at all. There is not even enough real evidence to show that he mentions them indirectly. Furthermore, most of the issues with homosexuality come from the Old Testament. Unfortunately, when we show that The Law approved the stoning of people who ate shellfish, we are told that the New Testament made a new covenant with the people of Israel. Unfortunately, there seems to be little rhyme or reason as to what parts of the Old Testament are still applicable and which aren't. What is able to be cherry-picked? Who decides?
We have all witnessed the lengths to which people have sought to force their position to be legislated in regards to these two issues. We have seen the polarizing effect from familial rifts to schisms within our entire nation. People have, at times, resorted to violent acts to prove their point. My main question is, with all of the horrors that we witness today including war, poverty, disease, starvation, genocide, climate change, etc.; are abortion and homosexuality the only issues to be receiving the majority of attention? Understand, I am not dismissing the incredible gravitas that an issue such as abortion entails, but I am asking why faith-based litmus tests for President don't involve the questioning of how they will handle the other issues I mentioned.
As an example, the "Evangelical Vote" has been lauded as one of the main reasons for President Bush's election and re-election. This is a President who, among other things, brought us into 2 wars, one of which was based on misdirection and coercion; presided over torture abuses in Gitmo, Abu Ghraib and secret prisons abroad; hired lawyers to redefine and allow, through semantics and legal maneuvering, the torture of prisoners; allowed illegal surveillance of every single American citizen; presided over the tragic debacle that was the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and supported the death penalty as a governor and president. How does an Evangelical, who believes so much in what Jesus taught, accept that the President in question goes against EVERY SINGLE tenant mentioned in the Gospels? Is it because he stated that "Christ" was his biggest political role model, which cost him nothing but the air needed to push the word through his lips? Is it that he proposes to overturn legislation based not on democratic and legislative principles, but upon his own belief in the rightness or wrongness of a given issue, no matter what the majority of Americans think or feel? Because he "sees absolutes" and can "see the soul" of a man like Vladimir Putin?
What follows are some of the examples of an unappreciation or lack of depth in dissecting an issue that, I feel, the audience in the Saddleback Church displayed.
When discussing the issue of abortion, Rick Warren loaded a question with the phrase "when does a baby have human rights?" This is not the issue considering that a fetus is not a baby until after birth. This is a perfect example of destroying the ability for thoughtful debate by inferring that someone who is pro-choice somehow approves of infanticide. This was further compounded when Mr. Warren likened 40 million abortions performed since Roe v. Wade to the holocaust. When Senator Obama proposed that having a President staunchly opposed to abortion did not help to lessen them and that the real issue deals with WHY people seek out abortions and can we limit the risk factors - he was met with silence.
In addition, I would like to know how many abortions were performed prior to Roe v. Wade? I would like the statistics of dead mothers along with this, since the illegality did nothing to stop chop-shop doctors from performing brutal procedures that killed both mother and fetus.
In addition, Senator Obama gave a well-thought, nuanced explanation that the quaestion of when life begins, from both a theological and scientific standpoint, were "above his pay grade", inferring the fact that both theologians and scientists have been debating this fact for centuries. This was met with silence. The audience seemed unable to grasp the concept that we cannot understand the Mystery completely; therefore, our understanding of surface issues such as these needs to be approached with humility and a complete acceptance of our ignorance. Conversely, when Senator McCain stated, with complete and utter certainty, that life begins at conception and that he would be a pro-life President and, in essence, work to completely overturn legislation based on his own ignorance of what a democracy is and how it operates; this was met with an almost instantaneous round of applause.
The first two questions on real issues facing America and the next President of the United States were about abortion and the definition of marriage. Not about the wrongness of war, not about the torture of "enemy combatants" in Gitmo, Abu Ghraib and secret prisons abroad, not about the genocide in Darfur and throughout Africa, not about the destruction of our planet, not the erosion of civil liberties under the Bush Administration, not about worldwide poverty and starvation. No, it was about abortion and the definition of marriage.
Is this how we plan to start building a bridge between faith and politics? Is this the best we can do? Is faith so weak as to crumble under the weight of who is able to get married? Shouldn't faith be a lightning rod of righteousness that holds our elected representatives accountable on issues they face every day and that we have very little control over? Who we decide to fight and why? How much innocent blood will spill? How we care for the planet that is our ONLY home and that is a gift from our Creator? How do we face the genocide of our brothers and sisters half a world away? How do we care for our children and their ability to lead us in the future? How do we care "for the least of these"? Should some of these be the lead-off questions by people of faith? Or should we try and fit our understanding of our world, our hearts, our God, into the space of a bumper sticker?
I would like to direct the majority of my opinion here to the recent Civil Forum held at the Saddleback Church in California under the mediation of Rick Warren. The event was meant as a civil discourse between Rick Warren and the two major-party nominees for the Presidency. It was meant to elevate our national discourse, to start construction on the bridge between faith and politics, to facilitate the eradication of the demonizing of people who disagree with us; whatever their reasoning may be. In my humble opinion, this did not happen.
On the most superficial level, this did not happen due to the apparent dishonesty of the McCain campaign; or by the dishonesty of Senator McCain himself. Rick Warren had said on several occasions that Senator McCain would be in a "Cone of Silence", thereby unable to have foreknowledge of the questions asked and, thereby, having to answer them without prior coaching. The McCain campaign themselves stated that Senator McCain was in a campaign motorcade for the first half of Senator Obama's interview and then in a green room (without, specifically stated, a broadcast feed) for the 2nd half. Why was this fact not stated when Rick Warren asked Senator McCain if the "Cone of Silence" was "comfortable"? In addition, why did Senator McCain ask, midway through the interview, when they could "get back to the question" about Supreme Court appointees when they hadn't yet reached that question?
It is interesting to note the irony in the use of the term "Come of Silence", as this was a device used for humor in the 1960's television show "Get Smart". In the show, The Chief would lower the "Cone of Silence" so as to avoid eavesdropping. Unfortunately, it only served to cause Maxwell Smart and The Chief to not hear each other while the conversation was quite audible to anyone outside of the cone.
On a deeper level, while I applaud Rick Warren's intentions, I have concerns over what seems to be an ever-growing section of, for lack of a better term, the "Religious Right". There seems to be a push to boil down the entirety of the Bible, and especially the message and enlightenment transmitted by Jesus, to several hot-button issues; the two frontrunners being abortion and homosexuality. Within the entire Gospel, Jesus does not mention these two issues directly at all. There is not even enough real evidence to show that he mentions them indirectly. Furthermore, most of the issues with homosexuality come from the Old Testament. Unfortunately, when we show that The Law approved the stoning of people who ate shellfish, we are told that the New Testament made a new covenant with the people of Israel. Unfortunately, there seems to be little rhyme or reason as to what parts of the Old Testament are still applicable and which aren't. What is able to be cherry-picked? Who decides?
We have all witnessed the lengths to which people have sought to force their position to be legislated in regards to these two issues. We have seen the polarizing effect from familial rifts to schisms within our entire nation. People have, at times, resorted to violent acts to prove their point. My main question is, with all of the horrors that we witness today including war, poverty, disease, starvation, genocide, climate change, etc.; are abortion and homosexuality the only issues to be receiving the majority of attention? Understand, I am not dismissing the incredible gravitas that an issue such as abortion entails, but I am asking why faith-based litmus tests for President don't involve the questioning of how they will handle the other issues I mentioned.
As an example, the "Evangelical Vote" has been lauded as one of the main reasons for President Bush's election and re-election. This is a President who, among other things, brought us into 2 wars, one of which was based on misdirection and coercion; presided over torture abuses in Gitmo, Abu Ghraib and secret prisons abroad; hired lawyers to redefine and allow, through semantics and legal maneuvering, the torture of prisoners; allowed illegal surveillance of every single American citizen; presided over the tragic debacle that was the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and supported the death penalty as a governor and president. How does an Evangelical, who believes so much in what Jesus taught, accept that the President in question goes against EVERY SINGLE tenant mentioned in the Gospels? Is it because he stated that "Christ" was his biggest political role model, which cost him nothing but the air needed to push the word through his lips? Is it that he proposes to overturn legislation based not on democratic and legislative principles, but upon his own belief in the rightness or wrongness of a given issue, no matter what the majority of Americans think or feel? Because he "sees absolutes" and can "see the soul" of a man like Vladimir Putin?
What follows are some of the examples of an unappreciation or lack of depth in dissecting an issue that, I feel, the audience in the Saddleback Church displayed.
When discussing the issue of abortion, Rick Warren loaded a question with the phrase "when does a baby have human rights?" This is not the issue considering that a fetus is not a baby until after birth. This is a perfect example of destroying the ability for thoughtful debate by inferring that someone who is pro-choice somehow approves of infanticide. This was further compounded when Mr. Warren likened 40 million abortions performed since Roe v. Wade to the holocaust. When Senator Obama proposed that having a President staunchly opposed to abortion did not help to lessen them and that the real issue deals with WHY people seek out abortions and can we limit the risk factors - he was met with silence.
In addition, I would like to know how many abortions were performed prior to Roe v. Wade? I would like the statistics of dead mothers along with this, since the illegality did nothing to stop chop-shop doctors from performing brutal procedures that killed both mother and fetus.
In addition, Senator Obama gave a well-thought, nuanced explanation that the quaestion of when life begins, from both a theological and scientific standpoint, were "above his pay grade", inferring the fact that both theologians and scientists have been debating this fact for centuries. This was met with silence. The audience seemed unable to grasp the concept that we cannot understand the Mystery completely; therefore, our understanding of surface issues such as these needs to be approached with humility and a complete acceptance of our ignorance. Conversely, when Senator McCain stated, with complete and utter certainty, that life begins at conception and that he would be a pro-life President and, in essence, work to completely overturn legislation based on his own ignorance of what a democracy is and how it operates; this was met with an almost instantaneous round of applause.
The first two questions on real issues facing America and the next President of the United States were about abortion and the definition of marriage. Not about the wrongness of war, not about the torture of "enemy combatants" in Gitmo, Abu Ghraib and secret prisons abroad, not about the genocide in Darfur and throughout Africa, not about the destruction of our planet, not the erosion of civil liberties under the Bush Administration, not about worldwide poverty and starvation. No, it was about abortion and the definition of marriage.
Is this how we plan to start building a bridge between faith and politics? Is this the best we can do? Is faith so weak as to crumble under the weight of who is able to get married? Shouldn't faith be a lightning rod of righteousness that holds our elected representatives accountable on issues they face every day and that we have very little control over? Who we decide to fight and why? How much innocent blood will spill? How we care for the planet that is our ONLY home and that is a gift from our Creator? How do we face the genocide of our brothers and sisters half a world away? How do we care for our children and their ability to lead us in the future? How do we care "for the least of these"? Should some of these be the lead-off questions by people of faith? Or should we try and fit our understanding of our world, our hearts, our God, into the space of a bumper sticker?
Graves' New Digs
Well hello out there in radioland... or the blogosphere, whatever. Some of you may have read some of my early works on MySpace, hopefully some will actually read a somewhat routine blog that looks MUCH cooler, who knows. Either way, this gives me an avenue for my opinions (some would say too many of them) and thoughts on a variety of topics. You never know what you might get when I post, so hopefully there'll be something for most anyone. Before I begin rambling too much, thanks for stopping by... as a final note, I'd like to thank the illustrious Jay West for his amazing idea for the title... hope you all enjoy, Good Journey.
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