‘We Are Peacemakers’
A year ago this week, Israel and Palestinians attacked each other. About 1,400 Palestinians (mostly civilians) were killed and 20,000 of their homes destroyed in Gaza. On the other side during the 22-day conflict, 13 Israelis were killed, 10 of whom were soldiers and three civilians. This week six Texans will attempt a peaceful journey along with 1,362 other internationals representing 43 countries to enter the Palestinian land from Egypt from Wednesday, Dec. 30, to Thursday, Dec. 31.
Texas, World Recalls Gaza War
DALLAS, Texas — A year ago this week, Israel and Palestinians attacked each other. About 1,400 Palestinians (mostly civilians) were killed and 20,000 of their homes destroyed in Gaza. On the other side during the 22-day conflict, 13 Israelis were killed, 10 of whom were soldiers and three civilians.
This week six Texans will attempt a peaceful journey along with 1,362 other internationals representing 43 countries to enter the Palestinian land from Egypt from Wednesday, Dec. 30, to Thursday, Dec. 31.
The march organized by CodePink and endorsed by filmmaker Oliver Stone, author Naomi Klein, historian Howard Zinn, musician Roger Waters, among thousands of other activists, is aimed to break the ongoing Israeli seige on the 1.5 million people of Gaza.
The group requested that supporters call their local Egyptian embassies in order to allow the Gaza Freedom March uninhibited entry across the Egyptian/Gaza border.
Ann Wright, a retired U.S. Army colonel and lead organizer for the march, said that up until now, the Egyptian government had not prevented groups from crossing this year.
“No delegation, large or small, that has entered Gaza over the past 12 months has received a final OK before arriving at the Rafah border,” she wrote in a statement on the Gaza Freedom March website (www.gazafreedommarch.org).
Wright continued, “Most delegations were discouraged from even heading out of Cairo to Rafah. Some had their buses stopped on the way. Some have been told outright that they could not go into Gaza. But after public and political pressure, the Egyptian government changed its position and let them pass.”
The organizers say that the march was conceived in the spirit of Mahatma Gandhi of India and Nelson Mandela of South Africa.
“We are peacemakers,” wrote the march organizers in an open letter to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. “We are doctors, lawyers, students, academics, poets, and musicians. We are young and old. We are Muslims, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and secular. We represent civil society groups in many countries who came together and coordinated this large project with the civil society in Gaza.”
Dallasite Roger Kallenberg told The Dallas Observer that he intended to record the march for educational purposes for his fellow Texans.
“My goal is to have the world and particularly the Israeli government see the impact of last year’s war. We need to know what’s happening and how the arms makers of North Texas are contributing to that,” the retired teacher and Dallas Peace Center board member said.
Kallenberg, the sole Jewish delegate from Dallas contingent, also questioned the Israeli bombing in relation to the amount of Palestinian rocket fire through the course of the 42-year illegal Israeli-occupation of Palestine.
“How does dropping bombs and bulldozing houses reflect Jewish values?” he asked.
On the day Kallenberg was to arrive in Cairo, Egypt, Egyptian security forces showed signs that its regime was cracking down on the marchers before they had a chance to march.
To prevent them from leaving for Gaza on Sunday, Egyptian police temporarily held 30 internationals under house arrest in their hotel in el-Arish, which kept them from exiting the town. Police were still holding another group of eight marchers at a bus station, according to the website Rabble.ca. The police also broke up a commemoration of the Israeli invasion at a bridge in Cairo.
But the delegates were undaunted. For example, an 85-year-old Holocaust survivor staged a hunger strike along with other grandmothers in Cairo.
“I’ve never done this before, I don’t know how my body will react, but I’ll do whatever it takes,” American activist Hedy Epstein told AFP in solidarity with the Gaza solidarity march outside the United Nations building there.
Also hundreds of French delegates still camped outside the French Embassy in Cairo, chanting “Palestine Freedom!” despite the police’s indimidation of the group.
“The French Ambassador and his wife are outside negotiating with the delegates and the police and Egyptian authorities. It is a powerful action and the French invite solidarity and support – come wherever you can!” said a march spokesperson in an email.
Solidarity actions are also occurring across the globe this week to highlight the blood on each nation’s hands for participating in the siege in their own way.
Sixteen rights groups from Amnesty International to Oxfam jointly criticized world governments had “betrayed” civilians in the Gaza Strip by failing to stop the Israeli siege of the Palestinian area.
“My question is why does Europe and other donor countries not send ships with materials for construction. They can have Nato investigating these ships to make sure there is no security risk,” Mustafa Barghouti, an independent Palestinian politician and former minister of information, told Al Jazeera.
The Dallas Peace Center organized a peaceful demonstration outside the Texas-Israel Chamber of Commerce in Richardson, Texas, on Monday.
“We call on the members of the Texas Israel Chamber of Commerce like Alon Energy to ensure Gaza receives adequate fuel for generating electricity and use their considerable influence over the Israeli government to end the siege of Gaza,” said Leslie Harris of Code Pink-Ft Worth.
Other organizations participating in the demonstration were Code Pink of Greater Dallas, Code Pink-Fort Worth, North Texas Veterans for Peace, Peace Action Denton, and the UNT Campus Antiwar Network.
Last month the U.S. House condemned the Goldstone Report, an attempted by South African judge Richard Goldstone to keep Israel accountable for human rights abuses and war crimes up until and after “Operation Cast Lead” last year.
Israel never cooperated with the Goldstone who was in charge of the report by mandate of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC).
Human Rights Watch placed blame on both Israel and Hamas (the ruling party of Palestine) for refusing to bringing to justice their military personnel accused of rights violations during the war.
U.S. Citizens Attacked By Egyptian Riot Police In Cairo In Front Of U.S. Embassy
Peace activist Cindy Sheehan issued a report Tuesday regarding the Gaza Freedom March. Here is the breaking news as quoted by Sheehan:
CAIRO — Peace activist Cindy Sheehan issued a report Tuesday regarding the Gaza Freedom March. Here is the breaking news as quoted by Sheehan:
“One of my friends, Joshua Smith, just texted me from Cairo and said that some U.S. citizens of the Gaza Freedom March went to the U.S. Embassy today there to try and implore the staff there to intercede on behalf of the March to help get them into Gaza–they were not so warmly welcomed.
“Recently, almost 1400 people from around the globe met in Cairo to march into Gaza to join Gazans in solidarity and to help expose their plight after years of blockade and exactly a year after the violent attack in what Israel called “Operation Cast Lead” that killed hundreds of innocent Gazan civilians. So far the Marchers have been denied access (Egypt closed the Rafah crossing) and their gatherings have become increasingly and more violently suppressed.
“In my understanding of world affairs, embassies are stationed in various countries so citizens who are traveling can seek help in times of trouble, but this doesn’t appear to be so right at this moment in Cairo.
“Josh reports, and I also just got off the phone with my good friend and Veterans for Peace board member, Mike Hearington, that about 50 U.S. citizens were very roughly seized and thrown (in at least one case literally) into a detention cell at the U.S. embassy. We are talking about U.S. citizens here being manhandled by Egyptian riot police. According to Josh and Mike (who both just narrowly escaped), it appears that people with cameras are especially being targeted. Another good friend of mine, and good friend of peace, Fr. Louis Vitale is one of those being detained. Fr. Louis is well into his seventies!
“Josh posted this on his Facebook wall about his near-detention experience:
“‘We just got away. They were trying to drag me in but we kept moving… And most were dog piling another guy. Then they drug him into the parking lot barricaded riot police zone, lifted him up and threw him over the police and down into the zone. And attacking those taking pictures or attempting to.
“‘When I was talking to Mike he said that an Egyptian told him that all Egyptians are in solidarity with the Marchers and with the people of Gaza/Palestine, of course, but the “Big Boss” (the U.S.) is calling the shots.’
“Egypt is third in line for U.S. foreign aid (behind Iraq and Israel) and its dictator for life, Hosni Mubarek, is a willing puppet for his masters: the US/Israeli cabal. Israel could not pursue its apartheid policies without the U.S. and it’s equally important for this cabal to have a sold-out ally as its neighbor.
“Today also happens to be the anniversary of the 1890 U.S. massacre of Native Americans (Lakota Sioux) at Wounded Knee, South Dakota. It is sad enough that we are also living on stolen land, but also that the Israeli government had good teachers in disposing of its indigenous population!
“What are the Israeli settlements on the West Bank, if not stolen land from the indigenous population and what is Gaza if not a mega-reservation? As at Wounded Knee 119 years ago, the Israeli siege and attack on Gaza is nothing more than big bullies shooting fish in a barrel.
“Call the U.S. Embassy to demand the release of those detained/that permission is granted for the March to cross into Gaza: Telephone: (20-2) 2797 3300.
“Weren’t things supposed to “change” in the Age of Obama?”
Afghanistan’s Children Too Weak To Cry
A doctor who oversees a food program in Afghanistan said that malnutrion has caused mothers and their children to become too weak to cry.
AQCHA, Afghanistan — A doctor who oversees a food program here said that malnutrion has caused mothers and their children to become too weak to cry.
“Most of the children are too tired and hungry, they don’t have the energy to cry,” said Dr. Nasrullah Sulfane, an administer of the the World Food Program and UNICEF.
Sulfane told the Associated Press that attendance to obtain the free food has been successful.
To make it through winter, the villages in the network have been put on a high-protein diet.
Afghanistan already has the world’s highest maternial mortality rate and the second highest child mortality rate.
The feeding program began in August in a backlash against insurgents who killed aid workers.
No one knows how many Afghan children are malnourished today, but many widely believe the situation has gotten worse since 2004 when the government found that 48 percent were found malnourished.
The WFP spent only $319 million on humanitarian programs in Afghanistan.
Media, Poll: Bush Decade ‘Awful’
The media and polling are still unable to make up their mind about the Bush decade.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The media and polling are still unable to make up their mind about the Bush decade.
Neither can decide whether President George W. Bush’s terms were bad or really bad.
According to an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, 58 percent answered the last nine years were “awful” or “not so good.”
Only 12 percent said it was “good” or “great”
Responding to Time magazine’s description of “the decade from hell,” NBC said it was “not the decade from hell. But close.”
The poll found that the “greatest negative impact on America this past decade” was 9/11 (38 percent).
In second was the housing crisis (23 percent), followed by the Iraq war (20 percent), the 2008 stock market crash (11 percent), and Hurricane Katrina (six percent).
However, a whopping 74 percent of those polled said that economic prosperity erroded in the United States. Fifty-four percent said peace and national security declined. And 46 percent saw a declines in national health.
Con Man’s Scam Exposes Terror Alert’s Weakness: Report
A con man took the Department of Homeland Security for a ride, according to Playboy magazine.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — A con man took the Department of Homeland Security for a ride, according to Playboy magazine.
Dennis Montgomery convinced the Bush White House that he could break codes being broadcasted to Al Qaeda through Al Jazeera’s television signals.
As a result, the color-coded terror alert system rose to level Orange (high) in December 2003.
At the time then-DHS secretary Tom Ridge warned that coming were “near-term attacks that could either rival or exceed what we experience on September 11.”
Ridge has since admitted that he and his office were being used as polical tool for the Bush administration.
The Playboy report details Montgomery’s manipulation of the CIA’s Directorate of Science and Technology and his subsequent dismissal.
In the end, the French convinced the American intelligence community to see the light, reported Aram Roston.
“A branch of the French intelligence services helped convince the Americans that the bar codes were fake. The CIA and the French commissioned a technology company to locate or re-create codes in the Al Jazeera transmission. They found definitively that what Montgomery claimed was there was not. Quietly, as far as the CIA was concerned, the case was closed. The agency turned the matter over to the counterintelligence side to see where it had gone wrong,” Roston wrote.
Montgomery is still operating amongst other government agencies and has a string of lawsuit pending.
Cigna CEO To Get $73 Million Golden Parachute
The CEO of one of the nation’s largest health insurance companies is to receive a golden parachute worth just over $73 million.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The CEO of one of the nation’s largest health insurance companies is to receive a golden parachute worth just over $73 million.
Next week is when Ed Hanway is expected to claim this money when he steps down.
Hanway is known for presiding over Cigna as the company denied a liver transplant to Nataline Sarkisyan, a 17-year-old patient who later died.
Wendell Potter, a former Cigna spokesperson turned whistle-blower, said the heads of health insurance companies are not held responsible for such behavior.
“In our system today, there is literally no repercussions for insurance companies when they deny care, jack up rates, or do all the other things they do to screw over their customers. Ed Hanway did all those things as much as he could, and for that, he’s being rewarded,” Potter said.
Cigna’s stock was one of the many in the private health care insurance industry that skyrocketed after the announcement of the Senate bill on health care reform.
This bill was expected to pass the Senate on Christmas Eve amid cries against the wishes across the policial spectrum.
Public Health Group Opposes Hormones In Beef, Dairy Production
The oldest and largest association of public health professionals in the world now opposes growth hormones in beef and dairy production.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The oldest and largest association of public health professionals in the world now opposes growth hormones in beef and dairy production.
The American Public Health Association’s call for the ban on recombinant bovine growth hormone (rBGH) drew praise from other public health and consumer groups.
Noted Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter, “APHA’s resolution against this practice sends a clear signal that public health, not industry convenience, should guide U.S. food policy.”
APHA joins the American Nurses Association and the past president of the American Medical Association in opposition to rBGH.
The resolution recommends that asks the Food and Drug Administration to ban such growth hormones and schools, hospitals and others to quit serving products with these hormones.
Human intake of these hormones in foods are said to increase cancer risk.
About 31 Western nations have banned the use of rBGH.
The APHA resolution can be viewed at (www.apha.org/advocacy/policy/policysearch/default.htm?id=1379).
PBS To Distribute Bush ‘Think Tank’ Show
PBS will distribute a new show produced by President George W. Bush’s think tank housed at his Presidential Center.
DALLAS, Texas — PBS will distribute a new show produced by President George W. Bush’s think tank housed at his Presidential Center.
Two episodes of “Ideas in Action” are already head of its premire in February 2010.
The show will be moderated by the think tank’s executive director, Ambassador James Glassman.
The format for the show is a discussion on a “difficult issue with a balanced panel,” Glassman told The Huffington Post.
Panelists in the first episode on education include those from the Bush think tank as well as the Economic Policy Institute and the Progressive Policy Institute.
The show’s producer said that critics should watch the show before commenting on the think tank’s inclusion.
“The proof will be in the pudding,” he said.
Other conservative think tanks have had shows aired on PBS such as The Hoover Institution’s show “Uncommon Knowledge” (1997-2005).
Report: Immigrant Prisoners Being Held In Secret
Secret detention center across the United States are holding immigrants, according to a yet-to-be published report.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Secret detention center across the United States are holding immigrants, according to a yet-to-be published report.
The centers operated by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement are located in office parks and commercial zones, said the report.
“You actually walk down the sidewalk and into an underground parking lot. Then you turn right, open a big door and voilà, you’re in a detention center,” Ahilan Arulanantham, an ACLU immigration attorney told The Nation magazine.
Reporter Jacqueline Stevens said that these “subfield offices” for transferring prisoners do not meet conditions for military or civilian prisons.
In describing a center in Los Angeles, the report said that “B-18” was “an irrationally revolving stockroom that would shuttle the same people briefly to the local jails, sometimes from 1 to 5 am, and then bring them back, shackled to one another, stooped and crouching in overpacked vans.”
The report said that the immgrants were kept in these cells without sufficient mattresses or climate controls for heating and cooling.
There are reportedly 186 such detention centers, according to The Nation’s report due on Jan. 4, 2010.
12 Gitmo Detainees Go Home
Twelve detainees at the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, were sent home, according to officials at the U.S. Department of Justice.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Twelve detainees at the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, were sent home, according to officials at the U.S. Department of Justice.
The transfer included six Yemenis, four Afghans and two Somalis, the press statement said.
“Consultations with foreign authorities regarding these individuals will continue,” it said.
The total number of detainees is now below 200.
However, the rest of the inmates are to move to a maximum-security prison in Illinois.
Yemen’s embassy in Washington praised the release of its countrymen and the coming closure of the U.S. detention center in Cuba.
Roughly 100 of the remaining inmates are from Yemen, which has vowed to keep diplomatic ties with the United States.
100 Groups To EPA: Cap Carbon Emissions Scientifically
The Environmental Protection Agency should cap carbon emissions scientifically, according to a petition submitted by over 100 environmental groups.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Environmental Protection Agency should cap carbon emissions scientifically, according to a petition submitted by over 100 environmental groups.
Specifically, the groups want the cap on greenhouse gases to be set at 350 parts per million across the United States.
“It’s time to fully use our strongest existing tool for reducing greenhouse gas pollution: the Clean Air Act,” stated the legal letter supported by the Center for Biological Diversity and 350.org.
The petition is also supported by the nation’s preeminent climate scientist, Dr. James Hansen, as well as Dr. Michael Dorsey, assistant professor in Dartmouth College’s Environmental Studies Program and director of the college’s Climate Justice Research Project.
Stated Bill McKibben of 350.org, “The Clean Air Act is a bipartisan bill signed by a Republican president. Leading scientists at NASA and around the world say we need to get to 350 ppm. This petition simply asks EPA to do its job as science, the law, and common sense require.”
The Obama administration’s proposed reduction targets are too far below the need cuts of about 45 percent necessary to get back to 350 ppm. The world’s current atmospheric CO2 level is approximately 385 ppm.
The groups urge Obama to implement the Clean Air Act in order to work around the cap-and-trade bills awaiting consider in the Senate.
Tenderness Survives
Dennis Brutus is dead.
But tenderness survives.
The South African poet and former political prisoner passed away last Saturday at the age of 85 leaving behind an earthly climate still in disarray.
Yet he left us his poetry and his example.
While trying to flee South African under its oppressive apartheid rule in the 1960s, Brutus nearly died from a gunshot wound as he waited for an ambulance that would take blacks.
Whether he waited against his will or not, perhaps our health care debate here in the United States would have taken a different tone had Americans with health insurance refused care unless those without insurance received theirs for free.
But tenderness survives.
Years after creating the South African Sports Association in protest against the white supremist sports association, he refused inclusion into the South Africa Sports Hall of Fame.
Brutus explained, “It is incompatible to have those who championed racist sport alongside its genuine victims. It’s time — indeed long past time — for sports truth, apologies, and reconciliation.”
Perhaps professional sports would be more enjoyable if professional atheletes would take fewer endorsement deals from corporations using countries that actively enslave their workers to make products cheaper?
But tenderness survives.
Being a teacher in Africa reared by South African teachers, Brutus saw first hand how the Global North dominated the Global South under man-made market theology.
Thus, he preferred that no deal come out of the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, this past month.
“Better that there is no deal, so that ordinary citizens can make their choices and voices heard, against the marketing excesses for the rich allowing some to gorge themselves while others starve,” he wrote in an open letter.
But tenderness survives.
For his beliefs in human equality, Brutus was jailed in the same prison as Nelson Mandela in the 1960s.
At Robben Island, he wrote the poem “Somehow We Survive:”
“All our land is scarred with terror/rendered unlovely and unlovable/sundered are we and all our passionate surrender/but somehow tenderness survives.”
This is neither the last words of a great man nor the prayer of a dying world.
It’s a call to action from one who nurtured the good in otherwise complicated creatures.
In this New Year, let us be tender.
— Nathan Diebenow
Empathy
In an earlier column I mentioned disappearing eyebrows (as a sentinel of middle age). I was whining about all my eyebrows not being exactly where I expected them any longer, but instead sneaking off to other places. It occurred to me that nature begins to blur one’s vision about the time one should see one’s face up close and personal. Perhaps this is nature’s way of causing us less upset over our aging faces. What we can’t see won’t hurt us. Mother Nature never counted on magnifying mirrors.
In an earlier column I mentioned disappearing eyebrows (as a sentinel of middle age). I was whining about all my eyebrows not being exactly where I expected them any longer, but instead sneaking off to other places. It occurred to me that nature begins to blur one’s vision about the time one should see one’s face up close and personal. Perhaps this is nature’s way of causing us less upset over our aging faces. What we can’t see won’t hurt us. Mother Nature never counted on magnifying mirrors.
I’ve used a magnifying mirror for years, ever since I needed my first pair of reading glasses. Lately (since Zack’s recovering fingers can’t help), I use the mirror for other things like fastening jewelry clasps. This is more challenging that one might expect. Although everything appears larger and easier to see, it’s all mirror image or backwards, which makes it almost impossible for me to follow my own movements with any amount of coordination at all.
Ever fastidious (and fast becoming more farsighted), I purchased a 15X magnifying mirror last year after using one at my cousins’ house. WOWZA! It works great, but even my 20-something kids say it’s a horrifying experience — like becoming Gulliver in Brobdingnag (the land of the giants).
Zack’s one of the only people I know who removes his glasses to see up close. When we first met, I happily announced to him one of my “true-isms,” that “a farsighted man’s a middle-aged woman’s best friend.” That was before I discovered his close vision was just dandy. Murphy’s Law. So he removes his glasses to read, and I put mine on. And he probably sees my face as well as I do in my magnifying mirror. Oh, the horror of it!
Remember when your mother told you, “Turn on a light! It’s too dark to read in here! You’ll go blind!” Then you’d argue that the light was just fine. You weren’t having trouble seeing. This always confounded me. Well, guess what, as we age, we actually do need more light to see the fine print — or to thread that sewing needle. We need more light to see clearly what we previously saw with less light. Now I’m the one telling my kids, “Turn on a light!” And they can’t understand why I’m bothering them.
My mother used to ask me to thread her sewing needles for her. I was happy to do it. It seemed so easy. I never could understand how she could possibly have such trouble with it since she wore glasses. That should have helped, right? Now, even using my glasses, threading a needle is an adventure. How can things that were once so easy now be such a challenge?
Zack has problems doing things with his hands as he recovers from Guillain-Barre. I still must help him with buttons and many other tasks that involve small motor skills. It’s terribly frustrating for him. And while we’re talking about Zack, you might remember my previous comment about men being unable to pay attention to a woman for more than twenty seconds. (Nice segue, eh?) Well, I just read about another study done on this subject, and it’s been found that women listen using both sides of their brains while men use only one. Explains a lot, doesn’t it? I never should have shared this information, because Zack now uses it as an excuse. He says I can’t blame him for not paying attention, because he was only listening with half a brain. I told him if it were me, I wouldn’t admit it.
And while we’re on the subject of studies, my son (who’s always after me to exercise more) found a study that concluded this: weight loss isn’t as dependent upon exercise as once thought. (I can’t believe he shared this with me. Now I REALLY have an excuse not to do all that cardio). Turns out it’s more about portion control and lowering carb intake. Zack has always contended that a calorie’s a calorie. The study said that people who exercise get hungry and eat more. Duhhhhh. When I began my newest career as a ranch hand several years ago, I immediately proved this study right. No brainer.
That old Indian saying about not judging someone until you’ve walked in their moccasins is so true. But we don’t always have the chance to walk in other shoes (or perhaps not for years and years). We must use our imaginations to develop empathy and sympathy for others. So all you young folks out there, when one of your elders tells you to turn on more light, just smile and do it. And know that in thirty or forty years, you’ll understand why. You’ll probably own reading glasses, a 15X magnifying mirror and a treadmill you don’t want to use.
(Gene Ellis, Ed.D is a Bosque County resident who returned to the family farm after years of living in New Orleans, New York, and Florida. She is an artist who holds a doctoral degree from New York University and is writing a book about the minor catastrophes of life.)
My Wish List For 2010
2010 is the most important year for the world since 2009. Below is a list of how I would like things to be in this very important year:
2010 is the most important year for the world since 2009. Below is a list of how I would like things to be in this very important year:
Air Travel
I’d like to see pilots required to sit in the same kind of seats as passengers. That way, we’d be assured that no pilot would ever fall asleep during the flight.
Politics
At least one Republican should vote for a bill sponsored by a Democrat, and at least one Democrat should vote for a bill sponsored by a Republican.
No politician should be allowed to say, “I’m shocked that this issue has become so politicized.”
Once a month, the President should remind the American public how fighting in a particular country will make us safer. That way, nobody will turn to the person next to them every once in a while and ask, “I forgot. Why are we over there?
Fashion
An ordinance should be passed demanding that shoes should feel the same when you get them home as they do in the store.
Computers
Computer manufacturers should make sure that computers work right when you get them out of the box and plug them in.
When computers don’t work, they should respond when you yell at them.
Cell Phones
When entering a restaurant, people should be required to check their cell phones at the door the way cowboys had to check their guns.
Movies
At least one movie should be made by each studio that doesn’t involve time travel.
A law should be passed stating that if people behind you talk during a movie, they should be banished to the lobby and forced to sit one in front of the other as they continue their conversation.
Celebrity Watching
I wish that everybody would spend more time worrying about their own families than about those of actors, golfers, or former governors of Alaska.
I assume that next year there will be a mother who gives birth to nine babies. My wish is that this “nonomom” will get zero publicity.
Magazines
Somebody should pass a law outlawing magazines that smell more like perfume than a perfume counter.
Medicine
If a doctor has a magazine in his waiting room that is more than six months old, you shouldn’t have to pay for your visit.
I wish that medical experts would get together before issuing conflicting advice to the public.
Electronics
Every computer, cell phone, camera, audio device, etc. should come with a manual that you can actually hold in your hands.
Television
There should be a graphic superimposed over every news show saying, “News” so we can tell that it’s supposed to be a news show.
No political commentator should be allowed to spend more time criticizing a commentator on a different network than on discussing the issues.
I hope a law is finally passed to outlaw the contestant interviews in the middle of “Jeopardy.”
Public Facilities
I wish that restaurant bathrooms would stop having cutesy pictures on their doors to indicate which sex they’re for. Let’s get rid of the sometimes confusing drawings and just label them all “Men” or “Women.”
Economics
Let’s go for a whole year without “experts” pretending that anybody knows why the stock market really goes up or down.
Sports
Let’s go for a whole year, okay, a whole week without a big-time athlete being arrested.
I’d like to see Brett Favre finally retire. No, maybe he shouldn’t. Oh, okay. He should.
Dog Breeding
To those clever men and women who have mixed and created breeds such as Labradoodles (a Lab and a poodle mix), Jugs (a Jack Russell and a Pug), Peke-A-Teses (a Maltese and a Pekingese), and others, please slow down. Give it some real thought before you go ahead with more creations. I mean, does anybody really want to see a Great Dane-ahuahua?
Have a good year.
(Lloyd Garver has written for many television shows, ranging from “Sesame Street” to “Family Ties” to “Home Improvement” to “Frasier.” He has also read many books, some of them in hardcover. He can be reached at lloydgarver@gmail.com. Check out his website at lloydgarver.com and his podcasts on iTunes.)
Eat Your Heart Out, Jalopnik: Chile’s Unique Studebaker Museum
After finally getting sick and tired of listening to various people in Santiago go on and on about how misunderstood Pincohet had been and how this new guy Pinera hadn’t actually supported Pincochet at all even though his brother had been one of Pinochet’s original “Chicago Boys,” I decided to head south and visit Patagonia and the Chilean Andes instead. The Chilean Andes are wonderful! Being here is just like visiting Switzerland. They have mountains and German-speakers and alpine meadows and wooden chalets and lots and lots of dairy cattle. I kept expecting to see young Heidi to jump out from behind the edelweiss at any minute.
http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com
After finally getting sick and tired of listening to various people in Santiago go on and on about how misunderstood Pincohet had been and how this new guy Pinera hadn’t actually supported Pincochet at all even though his brother had been one of Pinochet’s original “Chicago Boys,” I decided to head south and visit Patagonia and the Chilean Andes instead. The Chilean Andes are wonderful! Being here is just like visiting Switzerland. They have mountains and German-speakers and alpine meadows and wooden chalets and lots and lots of dairy cattle. I kept expecting to see young Heidi to jump out from behind the edelweiss at any minute.
But the biggest surprise of all was that right here in the middle of Little Switzerland, I stumbled across a museum that was devoted mainly to Studebakers. I love Studebakers! I learned to drive on a 1953 Studebaker! This is my kind of place.
The dairy farmer who ran the museum, Bernardo Eggers, gave me a tour of the place. And I pretty much embarrassed myself by gushing all over those cars. They were fine! And here is the video to prove it: (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPrXPUJZNvg).
http://jalopnik.com/ is a specialty website out of Alameda, California, that is devoted to displaying old cars. I would imagine that if they hear about this museum, they will probably just jump on the next plane out to Puerto Montt. And as well they should. This museum is a jewel.
PS: From Chilean Patagonia, I took a bus across the Alps, er, I mean the Andes — over to Bariloche in Argentina. Bariloche is sort of a combination between Yosemite National Park and Fort Lauderdale/Myrtle Beach. It’s a beach town located on a Tahoe-sized lake in the middle of a national park. It’s got students on summer break and T-shirt stores and the most heart-stopping views of mountains you would ever want to see. And here’s a video to prove that too! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPrXPUJZNvg).
But you know what is the really best part about visiting Chile and Argentina? It’s WARM here! An American just walked into the bookstore I’m at and announced, “There are 27 inches of snow in Washington DC right now.” Good grief. I wish that all of you on the East Coast were here instead. Except of course for “our” Congressional representatives — they deserve to freeze their bottoms off for not passing a single-payer healthcare bill but going out of their way to hand over an additional 653 billion dollars to their favorite useless wars. Huh?
PPS: If you’re not totally burned out by looking at videos yet, here’s one that shows some Chilean cowboys corralling a steer by galloping their horses sideways. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJTY58dpQds)
2009 Was A Very Good Year?
For a year that started out with such brilliantly sparkling promise, it sure fizzled out early under the pall of brusque enmity.
For a year that started out with such brilliantly sparkling promise, it sure fizzled out early under the pall of brusque enmity.
On a purely personal level, my son, Pete, finally graduated from university last December. I say “finally” because it only took him 10 and a half years.
To date, he has yet to receive so much as a response into any inquiry for gainful full time employment.
So, he lugs his guitar and song repertoire to local bars, performing for drinks and… I was going to say tips, but the people where we live are so unsophisticated they don’t realize they’re supposed to extend gratuities to hardscrabble musicians — or waitstaff, for that matter.
Oh, the lad has a paying job at a retail department store, where management eliminates the expense of extending full-time benefits by limiting his hours to fewer than 30 per week (getting more than 20 is like pulling teeth with needlenose pliers).
Yes, Ebenezer Scrooge is alive and well, thriving throughout American commerce.
So, at 29, despite having earned a Bachelor’s degree Pete still lives with me and drives a 1997 Buick LeSabre that has been on the road in excess of 200,000 miles.
Well, I enjoy the company… and he’s a superb cook.
When it comes right down to the reality of life in today’s world, my son’s plight isn’t all that personal. Hell, even if he had graduated on time (in 2002 or 2003), the likelihood of finding a suitable job would have been minimal at best.
Had Pete found a “real” job, he might have entered into any number of obligations — rent or mortgage, car payments, utilities, credit cards, etc. — and then probably lost his situation, anyway, buried under an avalanche of debt.
One longtime friend was sent packing after years on the job, leading in short order to a house foreclosure; divorced and in his 40s, he now lives with his mother.
Two other friends are trying desperately to downsize, but can’t move because there are no buyers for their current dwellings.
Even the Veterans Administration went on a cost-cutting binge, reducing disability benefits for numerous recipients. After several months of angst fighting an attempt to cut my award 20 percent, the effort was stymied by my persistence and a stalwart VA healthcare professional.
The economic disaster left behind in the wake of the RoveCheneyBush trainwreck has everyone tied up in knots.
In the Twin Cities of Bloomington-Normal, Illinois, there are several neighborhoods people would visit during the Holidays because most homes put on grand displays.
(Okay, these were really status symbols of hardcore Right-wingers to one-up their neighbors, created by specialized companies that are paid to erect such exhibitions.)
This year, there are only a handful of homes among the local upper-crusters displaying any cheer whatsoever. Apparently, even the Republican elite, er, wealthy are hurting for disposable cash to shell out on non-essentials.
Look, don’t blame President Obama for the sorry economic state of affairs. The man inherited the worst downturn since 1930.
People are bitching about how he “promised jobs” that have yet to be created, but that isn’t entirely accurate. All across America there are infrastructure projects in the works, whether city streets or Interstate highways, that have put many in the construction field back to work.
These are improvements that went almost entirely neglected during the previous eight years; in that regard, he’s been good to his word.
However, anyone who was paying attention throughout the 2008 campaign knows Mr. Obama avoided a rosy scenario by continually reminding us that things were bound to get worse before they got better.
Unfortunately, every time the President does try to improve our situation — and do the work of the people, as we’ve overwhelmingly spoken out for — his efforts are squashed by the self-interested two-ton elephant that allowed the mess to be created in the first place.
It doesn’t help that the aforementioned elephant is aided and abetted by corporate greed and a mainstream media that infuses negativity into every endeavor at progress and change.
As 2009 moves out, all we can do is have the audacity to hope for clearing skies in 2010.
Happy New Year!
Shalom.
(Erstwhile Philosopher and former Educator Jerry Tenuto is a veteran who survived, somewhat emotionally intact, seven years in the U.S. Army. Despite a penchant for late-night revelry, he managed to earn BS and MA Degrees in Communications from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. On advice from a therapist, he continues to bang out his weekly “Out Of The Blue” feature in The Lone Star Iconoclast — providing much-needed catharsis. Jerry is also licensed to perform marriage ceremonies in 45 states.)
Okay, Maybe Fruitcake Doesn’t Threaten Humanity
Journalism can be a dangerous profession, even for those of us who never actually leave our desk unless a “situation” develops, such as the sudden and unprovoked arrival of free donuts. On several occasions, I have found myself in harm’s way as a dozen employees stampeded into the break room (which, according to the Fire Marshal, has a “maximum occupancy level of two, as long as no one is using the commode.”) It is at those times, while being crushed between fellow employees grappling for the last maple bar, that I am reminded of just how dangerous my job can be.
Journalism can be a dangerous profession, even for those of us who never actually leave our desk unless a “situation” develops, such as the sudden and unprovoked arrival of free donuts. On several occasions, I have found myself in harm’s way as a dozen employees stampeded into the break room (which, according to the Fire Marshal, has a “maximum occupancy level of two, as long as no one is using the commode.”) It is at those times, while being crushed between fellow employees grappling for the last maple bar, that I am reminded of just how dangerous my job can be.
But it doesn’t end there.
No.
Not for those of us with the courage to SPEAK OUT against what is wrong with the world. Or, in my case, what is wrong with fruitcake.
As you may remember (and judging by the number of fruitcakes that have been appearing on my desk, at my home, or through the window of my car, many of you do), it was last year around this time that I drew the wrath of fruitcake lovers everywhere after suggesting that untold numbers of people (source: Dan Rather) suffer from Fruitcake Disposal Anxiety Disorder.
To refresh your memory, FDAD occurs when the recipient of said fruitcake has feelings of anxiety over how to dispose of their gift in a way that is (a) respectful, without (b) inadvertently raising the terrorist threat level. I say this because, unlike its English counterpart, which is said to be moist and delicious, American fruitcake is known — like many U.S. food products — for its durability. This is especially true of commercially produced fruitcakes, which are primarily used to keep decorative tins from getting bent during shipping.
My flagrant disregard for fruitcake rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. Particularly those who were already on edge after waking up from the holidays in a rum-induced fog. I was besieged with e-mails and letters from readers like Lesley Hatcher of Panama City, Fla., and Dale and Yvonne Pretzer of Florence, Ore., who promised to change my mind about fruitcake by sending me homemade samples this year.
I had no reason to suspect this would actually happen, and that I would receive enough fruitcake to finish the retaining wall in my back yard. If I had, I would’ve also flagrantly disregarded beef tenderloin, and any Scotch over 30 years old.
But a promise is a promise. I said I would sample everything with an open mind and, in the event of a sudden fruitcake epiphany, seek immediate medical attention. After which, I would issue a formal apology to the fruitcake lovers of the world.
Just as soon as doctors had me stabilized.
Due to the volume of fruitcake I have been consuming, this process has taken longer than expected since I’ve spent most of the last few weeks hung over and picking candied fruit from my teeth. However, I’m willing to admit I may have overstated things when I called fruitcake a “threat to humanity.” The same goes for what I said about launching fruitcakes into space as a defense against alien invaders.
The truth is, I may have to renounce my title as “Ned Hickson: The Fruitcake Grinch,” as given to me by the Pretzers. I’m not saying I’ll be joining the Society for the Preservation of Fruitcake any time soon. Only that I’d be willing to put myself in harm’s way should we experience an unprovoked fruitcake attack again next year.
Which brings us to our next topic: My flagrant disregard for live-shipped Maine lobster…
(You can write to Ned Hickson at nhickson@thesiuslawnews.com, or at the Siuslaw News at P.O. Box 10, Florence, OR 97439.)
Merry Christmas 2009 — For The Chosen Few
The financial sector already has more than a $700 BILLION Merry Christmas. The big three auto-makers look like they may get additional “Christmas stocking” money added to the $15 BILLION received months ago. Citicorp still is licking its fingers, while GM already is refusing to repay its bonanza.
The financial sector already has more than a $700 BILLION Merry Christmas.
The big three auto-makers look like they may get additional “Christmas stocking” money added to the $15 BILLION received months ago.
Citicorp still is licking its fingers, while GM already is refusing to repay its bonanza.
According to Forbes, “Northwest’s CEO Doug Steenland exited the bankruptcy [last year] with a big pay package. On top of Steen land’s salary, reported at $516,384 dollars last year, he will get a total compensation package of more than $26.6 million in stock. That’s $5.8 million in stock options and $20.8 million worth of restricted stocks that will vest over the next four years. Northwest workers bore the brunt of the restructuring — after a $1.4 billion a year cut in labor expenses — pilots and flight attendant wages were cut by between 20 and 40 percent.”
Huge salaries and other perks for CEOs have drawn ire from investors and made splashy headlines. Home Depot chief executive Bob Nardelli was earning an average of $25.7 million a year – excluding stock options – before he was forced out in a furor over his hefty pay. He left with a severance package worth about $210 million.
Apparently corporate officers believe in capitalism when everything is going well for the company, but when things get crummy they believe in taxpayer socialism, a.k.a., bail-outs. As the book, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism points out:, capital and profits are kept private, but losses and risk are shifted to the public.
Merry Christmas everyone! Ho, ho, ho.
The majority of Americans still are losing their jobs and homes in record numbers, while Corporate America continues to seek government “bail-outs” in the BILLIONS that do nothing to actually bail-out companies because most are hording the money or using it to boost profits or to pay-off executives.
Where are the bail-outs for the remnants of America’s Middle Class? Where is the Merry Christmas for the majority of hard-working or hardly-working Americans?
Why aren’t legislators approving bills to bail-out taxpayers? What is the hold-up on creating jobs for Americans?
As for a citizen bail-out, give each taxpayer $200,000 to use as needed. After all, what’s another trillion dollars of tax dollars? It can be used to pay bills, as a down-payment on a house, pay off all or part of a mortgage or credit cards, put it in savings, buy a new car, start a business, etc. Doing this will put tax dollars back into the system. Banks would benefit and they could provide more loans. Interest rates would increase because there would be competition for investments. The auto industry and corporate sector would be helped. This is the priority solution. Bailing out Wall Street and Corporate America merely adds to the problem. We need to bail-out America from the bottom-up, NOT top-down.
Or, create jobs by offering tax breaks to companies who hire Americans. Another good option is to create government job immediately to repair and construct our ailing infrastructures, e.g., roads, bridges, tunnels, dams, etc. Doing so will ensure jobs that will provide non-working Americans with salaries to put back into our struggling economy.
Corporate America can NOT believe in capitalism only when it is profitable and then desire socialism when the going gets bad. They need to suck it up and deal with it.
Corporate America has been the economic priority for the past decade. We now are entering the era for regenerating the middle class before this endangered species becomes extinct, as are the saber-tooth tiger and wooly mammoth.
Peter Stern, a former director of information services, university professor and public school administrator, is a disabled Vietnam veteran who lives in Driftwood, Texas.
Galileo’s Moon
Four hundred years ago this month, in December 1609, Galileo began his telescopic study of the Moon and almost immediately found evidence that challenged the Aristotelian view that was fundamental to much of the scholarly and ecclesiastical thinking of the day.
Four hundred years ago this month, in December 1609, Galileo began his telescopic study of the Moon and almost immediately found evidence that challenged the Aristotelian view that was fundamental to much of the scholarly and ecclesiastical thinking of the day.
The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle set forth a world view that still influenced Galileo’s 17th century world nearly 2,000 years later. According to Aristotle, Earthly things, composed of earth, water, air, and fire, were imperfect, changing, and subject to death and decay, whereas heavenly bodies, composed of aether (quintessence), were of a completely different nature. They were perfect, eternal, and unchanging, thus objects beyond Earth were perfectly round with perfectly smooth surfaces.
Viewed with the naked eye, the Moon appears perfectly round, and even with its obvious darker and lighter areas, it could well have been perfectly smooth, like a multi-shaded marble.
But that’s not what Galileo’s telescope revealed. He saw what appeared to be mountains and other seemingly uneven terrain. After observing the same areas several nights and giving attention to the changing shadows they cast, it became clear to him that the Moon was not perfectly smooth. Indeed, in many ways, its surface resembled that of Earth’s — the Moon appeared more Earth-like than heavenly.
Being an astute mathematician, Galileo even used shadows and basic geometry to estimate the highest Moon mountains to be some four miles high.
He also noted that the Moon’s surface was covered with countless roundish areas of widely varying sizes. By studying their shadows, he determined that they were depressions in the Moon, although he never knew what caused them. We now know them to be craters formed from meteor impacts.
When the Moon is in its thin crescent phase, one can easily see its faintly lit night side, even with the naked eye. In Galileo’s day many assumed the glow came from the Moon itself, but from his observations, Galileo correctly deduced that earthshine — sunlight reflecting off Earth — produced the faint glow, showing that imperfect Earth could have an effect on a heavenly body.
Galileo’s lunar discoveries put the first cracks in Aristotle’s world view, and there were more to come which we will look at in future columns.
Sky Calendar
* Dec. 31 Thu.: The second full Moon of the month is popularly referred to as a Blue Moon, although it has nothing to do with its color.
* Jan. 2 Sat.: Earth is at perihelion, its nearest point to the Sun in its annual orbit.
* Jan. 7 Thu.: The Moon is at last quarter.
* Jan. 11 Mon. morning: A thin crescent Moon less than a moonwidth from the star Antares low in the southeast just before dawn.
* Jan. 13 Wed. morning: A very thin crescent Moon is to the lower right of Mercury near the east southeast horizon as dawn breaks.
* Jan. 15 Fri.: The new Moon produces an annular eclipse of Sun which unfortunately won’t be visible over the U.S.
Naked-eye Planets
(The Sun, Moon, and planets rise in the east and set in the west due to Earth’s west-to-east rotation on its axis.) Evening: Jupiter is the brightest object in the southwest; Mercury is just above the west southwestern horizon at dusk; Mars now rises late in the evening. Morning: Saturn is high in the south with Mars high in the west southwest.
(Stargazer appears every other week. Paul Derrick is an amateur astronomer who lives in Waco. Contact him at 918 N. 30th, Waco, TX 76707, (254) 753-6920 or paulderrickwaco@aol.com. See the Stargazer Web site at stargazerpaul.com).
Wife-Killing Attorney Got It Right On Seventh Attempt
It was sometime around Christmas 1928 that an Amarillo attorney made up his mind to murder his wife so he could be with his sweet young thing of a secretary.
It was sometime around Christmas 1928 that an Amarillo attorney made up his mind to murder his wife so he could be with his sweet young thing of a secretary.
Some men stick to the straight and narrow merely because temptation never crosses their path. Arthur D. Payne was such a man, a churchgoing pillar of the community smugly certain of his moral superiority and contemptuous of those weaker creatures sucked into the cesspool of sin.
Then one day in the fall of 1928, fate put the 40-year-old lawyer to the test. A beautiful blonde named Marilyn Miller answered his want ad for a secretary, and he hired her on the spot. The attractive young woman knew her looks had landed her the job and so did her employer, though weeks went by before he faced that fact.
While dictating a letter just after Thanksgiving, Payne blurted out, “I love you!” Marilyn scribbled the astonishing announcement on her notepad, did a dumbfounded double-take and looked up in wide-eyed surprise.
“It slipped out,” stammered the tongue-tied attorney. “But I mean it, Marilyn. I’ve fallen in love with you.”
The object of his infatuation confessed her feelings and burst into tears. “I know your wife. She’ll never give you a divorce.”
“She’ll have to,” Payne said firmly. “A man has a right to live.”
But he knew Marilyn was right. Eva Payne believed in the “until death do us part” portion of the marriage vow and would never consent to a legal breakup.
Contested divorces were hard to come by and ever harder to live down in the 1920s. How many clients would the small-town attorney have left, if he walked out on his faithful mate and their three small children?
It took strait-laced Arthur Payne less than a month to decide that the little woman had to die. He insured Eva’s life for $20,000 — more than enough to set up housekeeping with the new Mrs. Payne — and to begin planning her demise.
Separate bedrooms, tightly shut windows, and a gas jet were the ingredients of the first attempt, which occurred shortly before New Year’s. Payne retired for the night expecting to awake the next morning a merry widower, but Eva survived and blamed herself for absent-mindedly leaving on the gas.
Payne eagerly awaited the next opportunity, which came in February 1929 when Eva stayed in bed with a bad cold. After getting the children off to school, the concerned husband gave his unsuspecting spouse eight morphine tablets dissolved in a glass of orange juice. Eva drank the lethal concoction and quickly fell into a deep sleep.
Payne monitored her vital signs late into the evening. He was encouraged by her slow and erratic pulse, but her heart was still beating when he nodded off at 2 a.m.
Four hours later, Eva suddenly regained consciousness. The pesky cold was gone thanks to her wonderful hubby’s home remedy.
Marilyn, who had no idea what her lover was up to, was growing impatient. Payne begged for more time claiming his wife was on the verge of agreeing to a divorce, while in reality he had not mentioned the matter.
The homicidal husband’s next brainstorm involved a lookout at a nearby lake. He would entice Eva to the site with the promise of rekindling their romance and push the car with her inside over a cliff.
Everything went according to plan, until Payne tried to send his trusting bride plunging to her death. The car would not budge and with good reason. Eva had shifted the transmission, which he had deliberately left in neutral, back into gear.
Ten days later, Payne booby-trapped the broom closet with a shotgun, but Eva escaped with only a flesh wound to her right hand. A fiendish scheme to strand her in front of a speeding train failed because the incompetent killer ran out of gas 500 feet from the railroad crossing. The intended victim unwittingly foiled the sixth attempt on her life by removing an electric heater from a precarious perch over the bathtub.
But even the proverbial cat has only so many lives. Eva Payne’s short drive to downtown Amarillo on June 27, 1929, ended in an ear-splitting explosion that killed her instantly and maimed the couple’s 14-year-old son.
The authorities bought the grieving husband’s elaborate explanation that an unknown assassin had made good on a death threat but murdered his poor wife by mistake. The local newspaper editor, however, smelled a rat and assigned several reporters the task of tracking down the bomb components.
The journalists cracked the case and so did Arthur Payne when he was confronted with the irrefutable evidence. He dictated a 63-page confession but cheated “Old Sparky” by blowing himself to bits with a small bomb someone smuggled into the Potter County jail.
(Christmas Special! Order “Outlaws & Lawmen” and “Revolution & Republic” at regular price of $28.40 (s&h inc) and receive a free copy of “Secession & Civil War” — newest “Best of This Week in Texas History” collection. Mail payment to Bartee Haile, P.O. Box 152, Friendswood, TX 77549 or order on-line at twith.com.)
