Enhanced Photos from 1996

Gitmo News and Flag Burning

I am actually tired of blogging about politics but there is so much going on in the news. The Supreme Court surprisingly gave me a glimmer of hope with their recent decision on military tribunals for the Guantanamo Bay. In a 5-3 decision the Court stated that the president's commissions at Gitmo violate law of war and exceed Bush's legal authority. Why after five years have we not had a trail for these prisoners. After five years in absolute confinement. No access to their lawyers, no charges, no justice. It appears that we have not even ascertained who the majority of these prisoners are and if they even have any connection to Al Qaeda. Unfortunately, this administration has a very poor track record in finding appropriate links and evidence.
This court case does not even cover the rumored secret prisons in other countries. With my satellite radio I am able to listen to many democratic European nation broadcasts. Very often the words "United States of America" is followed with "Illegal Activities".
Meanwhile in the States the big story is Star Jones has left the View! All while the Republicans play politics with the war, the solders and the flag.
Here are some real facts from Think Progress
– Flag burning is a non-problem: As Sen. Robert Bennett (R-UT) has said, “I don’t want to amend the Constitution to solve a non-problem. People are not burning the flag.” One study found just 45 reported incidents in the over 200 years between 1777 and 1989, when the Flag Protection Act was first passed.

– Flag burning is protected speech: The Supreme Court has twice ruled that destruction of the flag for political purposes, although highly offensive to most Americans, is undeniably a political statement and a political expression.

– Amendment is vaguely worded: The amendment is “phrased in such broad and vague language” that it could could include censorship of images of the flag in works of art, advertising, or commerce. Last week, the Senate spent time debating whether “wearing a very skimpy bathing suit” decorated with the flag’s stars and stripes would constitute desecration.

I do not know where this quote originated, but I think it sums everything up well.

“I would prefer that someone burn the flag and wrap themselves in the Constitution, than burn the Constitution and wrap themselves in the flag.”

A Terrifying Message from Al Gore

Quote For The Week #4

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” -English philosopher Edmund Burke

World's Worst Profile

This is only half right. I do not thrive on my own, and I am a sucker for affection.

Your Personality Profile

You are elegant, withdrawn, and brilliant. Your mind is a weapon, able to solve any puzzle. You are also great at poking holes in arguments and common beliefs. For you, comfort and calm are very important. You tend to thrive on your own and shrug off most affection. You prefer to protect your emotions and stay strong.

The World's Shortest Personality Test

Home of Dick DeVos: Amoral Scam Artist

Here are some exerps fom a great artical posted at Michigan Liberal

Turns out there's hope for the Detroit News after all! As I theorized, yesterday's Amway Guy puff piece was in fact a prelude to some day 2 coverage that is - shall we say - LESS than flattering to Mr. DeVos the younger. Here's one of today's DN articles. Here's the other. They're absolutely required reading.

Good heavens, look at that $2.6 million house! Apparently the DN rented an aircraft of some kind in order to snap that picture! Whoo-wee! The Governor's mansion is a broken-down ghetto compared to that place.

The house picture is great, but IMHO, even better is that - for the first time in 2006 - a Michigan paper has broached the subject of Amway itself:
Robert FitzPatrick, a North Carolina business consultant who has studied multilevel marketing companies, says the case should be reopened. "Amway and its clones are ravaging huge numbers of people every year with this story that they have this special system for earning income," FitzPatrick said. He said the company had to go global to survive because it had worn out its welcome in the U.S. "The actual result: 99 percent of all who sign up and pay their money to distribute products don't make a profit and 80 percent of its products are bought by company salespeople and never resold," FitzPatrick said.
But wait, there's more...
"There is systematic fraud. Amway has been promoted as having no downside and potential of generating a six-figure income, but it has almost a 100 percent loss rate for recruits," he (former high-level Amway distributor Eric Scheibeler) said. Scheibeler says he and his wife "left the company about $100,000 in debt. There are people all across Michigan who have lost between $5,000 and $60,000."
99% of Amway/Alticor "distributors" never turn a profit, the company has been the subject of Dateline and 60 Minutes exposés, there exist "MLM survivor" groups, the guy who wrote the federal RICO statute has - under oath - compared Amway to THE MAFIA...and all of this is the work of A FEW disgruntled people?

NRA and Their Unwarranted Hatred & Paranoia of U.N.

The Left Behind Series is not the only place you will find lies and disinformation about the nature of the United Nations. The NRA, favorite of Militia groups and other potential home grown terrorists, is engaging in a letter campaign against the United Nations Conference on illegal small arms trade. I guess the NRA believes the second amendment gives them the right to sell weapons illegally. Check out portions of their diatribe in this article form CNN

UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- The chairman of an upcoming U.N. conference on the illegal trade of small arms has received more than 100,000 letters of complaint from Americans who say it could impinge on their constitutional right to bear arms, he said Wednesday.

Many of the letters contained a form message available on the National Rifle Association Web site that complains the June 26-July 7 conference will take place on the July 4 Independence Day holiday, U.N. officials said. The message argues that the conference is meant to limit Americans' right to carry weapons.

"And the American people will never let you take away the rights that our 4th of July holiday represents," says the form letter addressed to Prasad Kariyawasam, the conference chairman and U.N. ambassador from Sri Lanka. "Our freedoms are not to blame for the world's problems, and this is a battle you can never win."

In a news conference on Wednesday, Kariyawasam said he had received more than 100,000 of the letters. He noted that the conference would not meet on July 4 because the U.N. headquarters is closed for the holiday.

The conference is reviewing progress on implementing a program of action agreed to by all U.N. member states, including the United States, in 2001 that seeks to clamp down on the illegal trade of small arms such as pistols, assault rifles and machine guns.

It stems from findings that conflicts worldwide are often made more deadly and intractable by the availability of illicit small arms.

Kariyawasam said the conference will focus only on efforts to ban the illegal sale of weapons and would have no impact on private ownership.

"Contrary to what people say, especially in this country, this conference and program of action is not aiming to ban individual use of firearms if they are held legally," he said. "The U.N. program of action covers only illegal trade, illegal trafficking and illegal brokering."

Wayne LaPierre, the executive vice president of the NRA, said in a message on the NRA Web site that the conference seeks "a global treaty banning ownership of firearms."

The United States, including U.S. Ambassador John Bolton, will participate in this year's conference. A fact sheet on the U.S. State Department Web site says the United States supports efforts to stem the illegal flow of small arms.

U.S. mission spokesman Richard Grenell said his office has also gotten many letters from NRA members, just as it does from other non-governmental organizations before other major U.N. conferences. The NRA Web site also includes a form letter to Bolton.

"We have received thousands and thousands of letters from concerned members," Grenell said. "We have been in discussion with the group and understand their concerns."

Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Evangelical apocalyptic schlockfest snoops on gamers.

Spyware Revelations
By Chris Williams
Published Friday 23rd June 2006 13:56 GMT
from The Register (UK)
Watchers of right-wing Christian groups in the States say a new apocalyptic videogame released by cultish Revelations-based fiction series Left Behind is riddled with spyware.
Developers have incorporated software from an Israeli firm called Double Fusion. It incorporates video advertising and product placement into the game, and reportedly records players' behaviour, location, and other data to be uploaded to Left Behind's Bible-powered marketing machine.


Aimed at 13 to 34-year-old males, Left Behind: Eternal Forces casts the player as a director of God's Earthly militia, left behind in the Rapture to roam the streets of New York, battling Satan's minions and shooting unbelievers.
With plans to distribute 1 million copies in evangelical "megachurches" nationwide pre-Christmas, Eternal Forces has attracted criticism from religious and secular commentators for its pushing of a violent brand of Christian supremacy. Christian anti-videogame violence campaigner Jack Thompson said: "It's absurd. You can be the Christians blowing away the infidels, and if that doesn't hit your hot button, you can be the Antichrist blowing away the Christians."
In an interview on the series' website Greg Bauman of Left Behind Games explains: "Left Behind: Eternal Forces will help readers get a sense of the conflict and chaos of the time period portrayed in Left Behind and live out how they would defend themselves and their faith from the Antichrist and his Global Peace Keeping Forces." The United Nations, already organ of satanic machinations for many on the Christian far-right, features strongly in the game. Goat-footed demons reportedly emerge from UN peacekeeping humvees.
One reviewer noted: "The only way to accomplish anything positive in the game is to 'convert' nonbelievers into faithful believers, and the only alternative to this is outright killing them."®

Governor's Troubles Threaten G.O.P. in Kentucky

By IAN URBINA
New York Times

...15 indictments later, Mr. Fletcher's administration — including his self-titled Disciples, accused of being the ringleaders of the patronage scheme — is still feeling the sting as his approval ratings drop below 30 percent.

Most of his former backers, including his mentor, Senator Mitch McConnell, have distanced themselves from him, and Democrats point to the case as another example of Republican corruption and overreach. Mr. Fletcher was indicted on three misdemeanor charges; while on vacation in Florida in early June, he had his lawyer enter a plea of not guilty.

The accusations have threatened to reverse a tide that Republicans in the state have worked for more than a decade to turn in their favor. With the party controlling the State Senate and just shy of a majority in the House, many Republicans viewed Mr. Fletcher's easy victory in 2003 as the dawning of a new political era for the Bluegrass State.

[...]

Asked what adjectives he would use to describe morale in the administration, Stan Cave, Mr. Fletcher's chief of staff, paused before laughing. "I'm not sure you can print the ones I'd like to choose," Mr. Cave said. "So let's go with angry, frustrated, but still resolved to proceed."

He said that with a grand jury consisting entirely of Democrats and with perceptions of conflict of interest swirling around the case, he did not see how anyone could argue that the investigation was apolitical. The two judges who handled the case early later recused themselves.

But Mark Nickolas, a blogger who runs Bluegrass Report.org and is the former campaign manager for Representative Ben Chandler, Mr. Fletcher's opponent in 2003, made just that argument.

"The administration keeps peddling these ludicrous conspiracy theories," Mr. Nickolas said. "Really, what we have here is a microcosm of the Republicans' national problem, which is they play by their own rules even if it's against the law."

[...]

Despite a recent poll that found that 54 percent of the state's voters wanted Mr. Fletcher to resign, he remains upbeat. "Our folks have made some mistakes, and we have made some corrections," he said. "I think we will come through this."

(read entire story here)

Sky Burial

I have a fascination with extremism and fundamentalism, so I often tune into religious radio or television. Recently TBN aired an episode of a show called Travel the Road. It is basically a "reality" show, and I use the word reality very loosely, involving two young missionaries traveling to various countries. Their names are Tim and Will and from what I can gather they wander around underdeveloped and war torn countries with little to no understanding of the people they are encountering. They rarely speak the native language and usually have no grasp of the culture they are immersed in. The speak very condescendingly too and about the locals and often get lost.
I was disturbed by a recent airing of a mission trip to Tibet. Tim and Will enter an area where Sky Burials take place. The Sky Burial is a ritual common in Tibet were the corpses of the recently dead are taken to the top of a mountain, dismembered, and fed to vultures, and left to decompose naturally. Tim and Will, arrive (uninvited I assume) and begin filming a burial. The local Buddhists pay them little attention as the Missionaries ramble through discarded bones and hatchets. Neither Tim or Will explain that in Tibet the ground is too cold for burial and firewood is scarce for cremation. They do however, show extreme close up shots of vultures eating flesh and mumble about how evil this ritual must be. With no translator, they walk up to locals, point up to the sky and say "Jesus" and draw crosses in the snow. I am sure Paul would be proud.

Quote for the Week #3

When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. ~H.G. Wells


I saw this quote posted on The Crallspace. Check out his blog.

Corruption and coalition failures spur Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan

BY JAMES RUPERT
Newsday Staff Correspondent

June 17, 2006, 11:06 PM EDT

KABUL, Afghanistan -- The United States and its allies have been forced to launch their biggest military operation of the war here because in the 55 months since ousting the Taliban movement from power, they neglected to establish minimal security or governance in the country's south, analysts say.

That failure has let the Taliban walk back in through an open door, say Afghan and foreign officials in Kabul and the southern city of Kandahar. Afghan officials estimate thousands of Taliban guerrillas, many recently infiltrated from Pakistan, are in the five southernmost provinces, where their attacks culminated this spring in a spasm of bombings, ambushes and assassinations against scattered government targets....

Under coalition supervision since 2001, what has passed for "government" in the south amounts mostly to "corrupt, local warlords who allied themselves with U.S. forces," said Abdul Qadar Noorzai, the director in Kandahar of Afghanistan's government human rights commission. These local strongmen have taken control over the weak state bureaucracies and police forces, and much of the opium trade, Noorzai said.

Read whole article atNewsday

My Morning Rant

While the GOP continues to congratulate themselves on how patriotic they are, things continue to fall apart in Iraq and Afghanistan. I have never seen such a do nothing congress during such a perilous time. It is hard to accept that a majority of America can be easily distracted by the GOP's focus on superficial wedge issues such as flag burning, marriage amendments, and English as a national language. None of these issues have any value or bering to the future of the nation. The Republicans like to shout about "family values" but they are a party of "empty values." We should be more concerned about the marriage of "Church and State" and the corrupt union of War and Oil. There is currently no oversight on blbleightant war profiteering or the war in general. Since Bush took office the branch of government that is suppose to regulate and scrutinize the executive branch has instead become an extension of the executive branch.
The Democrats need to grow a spine and stop trying to appease both-sides on every issue. It is useless to reach out to a single minded demographic that will never vote for a "liberal." The Dems have been told for so long that they do not have the "moral high-ground" that they now appear to believe it. For decades the far right has been shouting about how wrong the left is. Reality and facts our on our side, its time we start shouting back.

Three Cavies Killed at Potter Park Zoo

I took this photo last May at Potter Park Zoo. One of my favorite animals there are the Patagonian cavies. They are large nervous rodents that resemble a cross between a rabbit and a tiny deer. Two stray dogs, at least one of them a full bread pit bull, killed three of these creatures and left one injured.
I know people who have had pit bulls as pets and never had a violent mishap or attack. I do know the pit bull is a favorite pet of drug dealers and many are used in illegal dog fighting. Now it appears we have them wandering the Lansing area. The article in the Lansing State Journal did not provide info on weather the dogs were captured or if animal control will be on the hunt. I hope they find who is responsible for these dogs but I'm guessing they were abandoned for some time.
No offense to people who like pit bulls, but I think those dogs suck.

Quote for the Week #2

I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.

-Mahatma Gandhi

Aqueduct and another Structure B&W.

Reflection Pool

Another pic from my brother's trip.

This looks familiar but I embarrassingly don't know the name of this monument.

Some Recognizable Sights

My Brother and his Mediterranean trip with Duke University

In 2004 my brother traveled with other Duke University students through the countries of the Mediterranean. He stopped by today to see us and gave me a photo CD of about 600 some photos. I have picked out some of the most intriguing ones and hope he will stop by comment one the less recognizable and more obscure sights.

In many regions my brother visited it is customary for men to hold hands when greeting each other or when being photographed together

Sam at Zoo and Memorial Day

Weekend Rambling

Anne and I accomplish allot around the house today, but there is till tons to unpack and install. We got our new land line so I can actually talk to people. My worthless cell phone is so bad I have had to go outside on the sidewalk to talk on it. My friend from Kentucky, Tiffany, called. It was good to hear how she and her family are doing. She is almost finished with nursing school. My brother is coming over tomorrow. Hope everyone is having a great weekend like us. Sam is counting stairs and playing with his trains. Anne is getting good at spinning yarn just like Gandhi. I'm updating this blog as much as possible but this house keeps me busy. It strange how I now enjoy cleaning and organizing.

BattleCry

Ron Luce and his militant version of Christianity has always disturbed me. During the 1990's his week long Acquire the Fire teen recruitment program merged sleep depravation, Christian Rock, and fundamentalism. His new traveling rally, BattleCry, provides youth with much of the same but in a shorter time span. Three hours of fear and hate theatrics including a staged raid of armed military firing blanks into the crowd of evangelical teens. This is done to further drive a wedge between moderate and fanatical Christians. BattleCry claims there will be no "Middle Ground" Mr. Luce is a George Bush appointee on an advisory committee on teen drug use and the event begins with a letter of support from President Bush. The letter is read as if it is a legal mandate to change our democracy to a theocracy. The line between church and state is further blurred. While congress continues to waste time and money on proposed gay marrage bans. I am profondly disgusted by the unholy marrage of the Religious Right and the Republican party.

This article is a month old but still relevant.

A Carnival of Theocrats
by WorldCantWait

Sun May 14, 2006 at 09:48:17 PM PDT

The people behind BattleCry, veteran Christian youth organizer Ron Luce and his backers (who include Charles Colson, Ted Haggard, and Pat Robertson) don't like the America where I grew up. And it's more than just the separation of church and state.

read it at Daily Kos

Talk2Action fire back at Layman over Left Behind Video Game.

I love the debate going on between talk2action and Christiancadre regarding this strange new item of Christian Merchandising. Most of all I love this image of Layman's greasy whopper.

People Who Get Thier Info from Cable News More Likley to be Wrong. Fox News Audience are the most Ignorant on Iraq.

"Media Matters"; by Jamison Foser

The defining issue of our time is the media. Whatever issue you care most about, media coverage of that issue is likely a key stumbling block to real, progressive change.

On May 26, we wrote that "The dominant political force of our time is the media." Last week, we elaborated on that, looking back over the past dozen years to establish that "[n]o matter who emerges as a progressive leader, or a high-profile Democrat, they're in for the same flood of conservative misinformation in the media."

This week, we turn our attention to another point we outlined on May 26:

The defining issue of our time is not the Iraq war. It is not the "global war on terror." It is not our inability (or unwillingness) to ensure that all Americans have access to affordable health care. Nor is it immigration, outsourcing, or growing income inequity. It is not education, it is not global warming, and it is not Social Security.

The defining issue of our time is the media.

What we meant by that, but didn't fully explain, was that more than any other issue, the media affect everything else. The Iraq war, for obvious reasons, is incredibly important, but it has little impact on outsourcing. Global warming may be among "the biggest moral challenges facing our global civilization," with dire consequences for the survival of the planet -- but we won't face that challenge as long as the media continue to falsely portray global warming as a matter of serious scientific debate.

Perhaps no recent issue offers a better example of how much flawed news reporting can shape the decisions we make as a nation than does the Iraq war.

Six months into the Iraq war, a study by the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) at the University of Maryland found that most people who get their news from Fox News, CNN, or the three broadcast networks had serious mistaken beliefs about Iraq -- that U.S.-led forces had already found weapons of mass destruction (WMD) there, that links between Iraq and Al Qaeda had been found, that world public opinion approved of the war in Iraq, or some combination of the three. Eighty percent of Fox viewers held at least one of these mistaken beliefs, as did 71 percent of CBS viewers, 61 percent of ABC viewers, and 55 percent of NBC and CNN viewers -- clear majorities in all cases. Nearly half of those who got their news from the print media held one of these mistaken beliefs; among consumers of public broadcasting, only 23 percent did.

These mistaken beliefs had serious consequences: People who believed Iraq had weapons of mass destruction were more likely to support the war; people who supported the war were more likely to vote for President Bush, and so on. The world's greatest democracy made a series of decisions about war and peace; life and death; and about the world we will pass on to our children, all based on faulty information.

For the whole article click here

Rawstory uncovers the 'real heroes' of Musab al-Zarqawi's fall

Larisa Alexandrovna
Published: Thursday June 8, 2006

Print This | Email This
The Wednesday death of terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi may have been brought about by a mixture of his own hubris, his ebbing credibility in the al-Qaeda network and the valiant efforts of a special operations unit knows as Task Force 145, RAW STORY has learned.

Although most reports cite Jordanian intelligence as having played a large role in identifying the location of a safe House in Baqubah where Zarqawi was killed on Wednesday, US and foreign intelligence sources tell Raw that in actuality, Jordanian intelligence involvement – if any – was minimal.

According to sources, five of Zarqawi's men were picked up in early May as part of an already ongoing effort by an elite US special ops force called by their older code name, Task Force 145, which had been scouring Iraq for Zarqawi since the insurgency began. In addition, another elite and much less known highly trained special unit, called also by their older code name, Gray Fox, was said to have been involved. Grey Fox, which used to be known as Intelligence Support Activity or ISA, provides signals monitoring among its varying specialty duties, sources say. The current code names for both Task Force 145 and Grey Fox are not provided in order to protect the safety of the forces on the ground.

During a raid in May of this year in the city of Yusufiyah, Task Force 145 not only captured Zarqawi's five associates, but also found the now infamous April 25th tape in which Zarqawi is shown to be posing Rambo-style dressed in all black, sporting western-style white sneakers and brandishing what appears to be a Squad Automatic Weapon (SAW).

Task Force 145, sources say, continued the series of raids into early June, capturing operatives that would provide information, eventually culminating in the killing of Zarqawi, 7-9 of his lieutenants and other associates in a safe house compound.

Task Force 145 is led by Army Lt. Gen. Stan McChrystal and made up of some of the most well-trained special operations troops (or "elite" forces,) including Delta Forces, SEAL Team 6, and Task Force Black, a British special air "saber" squadron.

Some sources say that the reason Zarqawi made the tape was to impress his higher-ups in the al-Qaeda terrorist network, most notably Ayman al-Zawahiri, head of Islamic Jihad in Egypt and the closest associate of Osama bin Laden.

Experts say that when Zarqawi saw his influence waning, he decided to make the video in an effort to bolster support and ignite his followers. Some believe that the making of the tape, ironically, is what may have led Task Force 145 to the city of Yusufiyah to begin with.

Sources also say that US dissemination of the tape--showing a fattened up Zarqawi wearing western style clothing--helped weaken his credibility, and allowed Task Force 145 easier access to information.

Correction: An earlier version of this article did not clearly state that TF145 and Grey Fox are two separate groups. Both are code names employed to protect the integrity of their missions.

Evil Idiot Wind

In honor of today's evil date 6/06/06, NBC's Today had Ann Coulter on to spew some hatred towards widows of 9/11.

LAUER: On the 9-11 widows, an in particular a group that had been critical of the administration:

" These self-obsessed women seem genuinely unaware that 9-11 was an attack on our nation and acted like as if the terrorist attack only happened to them. They believe the entire country was required to marinate in their exquisite personal agony. Apparently, denouncing bush was part of the closure process."

And this part is the part I really need to talk to you about:

"These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief parrazies. I have never seen people enjoying their husband’s death so much."

Because they dare to speak out?

COULTER: To speak out using the fact they are widows. This is the left's doctrine of infallibility. If they have a point to make about the 9-11 commission, about how to fight the war on terrorism, how about sending in somebody we are allowed to respond to> No-No-No. We always have to respond to someone who just had a family member die--

LAUER: But aren't they in the middle of the story?...

COULTER: ...Because then if we respond, oh you are questioning their authenticity. No, the story is...

LAUER: So grieve but grieve quietly?

LAUER: What I’m saying is I don’t think they have ever told you, you can't respond.

COULTER: Look, you are getting testy with me.



...I don't understand "the left's doctrine of infallibility"? It is the right that never fails to invoke a doctrine of infallibility by claiming that God is on their side. In fact the name of Ann's new book is "Godless", because if you disagree with her or Bush you can not be on the side of Christ or America. For Coulter it is not enough that we abide to fear we must also adopt hatred of all opposition or objectors. I know what she says is for shock value. Some defend her as if she is the Howard Stern of Politics, except she is taken seriously by her fans and supporters. What she says is not in satire but in pure hostility for the left or whoever she believes the left to be. There is even enough hate in her heart for 9/11 widows.

Sam: Early May of '06

Sam is always the optimist. Even when it rains.

Holiness Church on Tates Creek Rd in Kentucky

...By the way I have modified my blog so anyone can leave a comment, not just other bloggers, although their comments are appreciated too.

Good Times

I have a new obsession. Every week night, right about the time the house is finally clean and Sam is far off in dreamland, I like to wind down with an episode of Good Times. The show is only marginally funny at least in the second to last season that they are currently running on TVLand. The show jumped the shark when John Amos left the cast. Generalizations and obvious stereotypes by white writers aside, I am hooked simply by the nostalgia of a time I vaguely remember. I was not even in kindergarden by the time Good Times was cancelled. It is on just before the Daily Show, so it works perfectly into my late night television routine. I just thought I would share this.

Some old Photos from 1996.

I took these for my fist and only photography class. I think my old friend Moira Boehm was with me when I took these. We had that class together. Maybe she will google her name someday and find this. Drop a line if you do. I know I love to google my own name, but nothing yet has ever come up about me.
Had some old friends over yesterday, it was good to see them.
My back has been killing me, I did some major yard work yesterday, and despite it the backyard still looks like a field of weeds. Brandon is right I need to kill everything back there and then re-soil and replant this fall. The backyard needs allot of "Shock and Awe".

Something Still Stinks in Ohio.

...it is the 2004 election, according to a New Rolling Stone article.

"After carefully examining the evidence, I've become convinced that the president's party mounted a massive, coordinated campaign to subvert the will of the people in 2004. Across the country, Republican election officials and party stalwarts employed a wide range of illegal and unethical tactics to fix the election. A review of the available data reveals that in Ohio alone, at least 357,000 voters, the overwhelming majority of them Democratic, were prevented from casting ballots or did not have their votes counted in 2004 -- more than enough to shift the results of an election decided by 118,601 votes." -Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

For more evidence check out the article here

The Purpose Driven Life Takers

More scary crap brought to you by Christian Nationalists. I knew it would not be long before the religious right would embrace violent video games. They condone pro-wrestling, they support an illegitimate war, and they can not get enough war terminology crammed into their church sermons-"spiritual warfare" etc. Now they finally have their own Left Behind Video Game based on the Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins books. This new video game also has the support of Rick Warren author of A Purpose Driven Life. The video game will be passed out in several U.S. mega-churchs, the same market strategy that was used for Warren's book. The game takes place in New York after the "Rapture". As mercenaries for God, players shoot and kill non-evangelicals who refuse to convert while shouting "Praise God!"
For the whole story check out: The Purpose Driven Life Takers (Part 1)
and (Part 2)

Quote for the Week #1

The hottest places in hell are reserved
for those who, in times of great moral
crisis, maintain their neutrality. - Dante


A friend of mine has a song lyrics page at Today's Lyrics Featuring. In a similar fashion I will attempt to post a really good quote every week.