Observing The Oblique

2004-04-12T23:32:00.000-07:00

CLIMBING SEASON!

Climbing season is upon us again! I'm gearing up for some spectacular climbs- my main goal this year is to summit Jefferson and Baker as well as do some scenic backpacking, rock climbing and mountain lake swimming. Ahhh. I'm so ready for summer this year.

2004-04-12T23:24:00.000-07:00

I have to quote my best friend here, who is a guy, and who recently said something hilarious. But the punchline is only funny because he's got a heart of gold.

We're joking around and I say, "So do you ever undress women with your eyes?" He huffs and in an offended way answers, "Well, I imagine them naked but I don't undress them!" And that's when I burst out laughing... "So in other words, you just cut to the chase?" And laughing he says, 'Well.. uh... I just get bored by the time I get to the socks..."

"Yes, I can see how that is SO much better than undressing them.. just fast forwarding to the good part." :-)

2004-04-12T15:43:00.000-07:00

A striking essay by this Mr. Bowman...

Some Dare Call It Treason-Wake Up America!
By Dr. Robert Bowman, USAF Ret.

I am a member of Veterans For Peace, an organization of thousands of combat veterans. All of us have put our life on the line for this country. Most of us opposed the recent invasion of Iraq. We also opposed the first Gulf War, and the sanctions that followed. We opposed the slaughter of fleeing Iraqis on the Road to Basra. We opposed the use of Depleted Uranium munitions. And we opposed the lies upon which the first Gulf War was based. But there was one good thing about that first Gulf War. It ended. And without a wholesale invasion of Iraq. Why?

Here’s what the first President Bush wrote about that in his memoirs:

“Trying to eliminate Saddam would have incurred incalculable human and political costs. Apprehending him was probably impossible. We would have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq. There was no viable exit strategy we could see, violating another of our principles. Furthermore, we had been self-consciously trying to set a pattern for handling aggression in the post-Cold War world. Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the United Nations mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression that we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the United States could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land.”

My brothers and sisters, it is just too darn bad his son can’t read!

I’ve been severely criticized for speaking out in opposition to this war. So have you, probably. We’re told that we’re aiding and abetting the enemy. We’re told that we should support the president no matter what. We’re told that patriotism demands that we support the war. They say that we’re abusing the freedoms that our troops are in the Middle East defending. They say we should be ashamed to be protesting while the troops are in the desert protecting our right to do so.

Well I say, Hogwash!

I feel an affinity for the troops over there in Iraq. They are my comrades in arms. I admire their sense of honor and sacrifice. I understand why some of them believe they should be there. They have neither the experience nor the wisdom to see past the lies they have been told. The truth is, they are not over there protecting our freedoms. Our freedoms are not under attack from Saddam Hussein or the remnants of his Baathist party. Our freedoms are under attack by John Ashcroft. They are threatened by John Poindexter. They are trampled by Donald Rumsfeld. They are disdained by Dick Cheney. And they are not even understood by George W. Bush. The battle to preserve our freedoms is not taking place in Baghdad and Tikrit. It is taking place in Central Park in New York City, in Lafayette Park in Washington DC, in Ghirardelli Park in San Francisco, and in River Front Park in Melbourne, Florida. The front lines go right down US 1 and up New Haven Avenue.

It is we, here at home, who are the foot soldiers battling to preserve our cherished freedoms by exercising them, in spite of opposition and ridicule. It is we who protect our civil rights through speaking out. We are the Minutemen sounding the alarm against tyranny. We are upholding the spirit of the American Revolution. We are preserving the freedoms that the troops in the desert have a right to come back to. The troops getting shot at in Iraq are not protecting us. We are protecting them, and their honor and their freedoms. We have just completed a forced march through hostile territory to defend their freedoms and ours, and the ideals America was founded on. We are protecting this nation by speaking truth to power. Let us do it loudly and fearlessly and courageously and joyfully, for we are the true patriots!

Here is the truth that we proclaim. This war has nothing to do with national security or freedom or democracy or human rights or protecting our allies or weapons of mass destruction or defeating terrorism or disarming Iraq. It has to do with money. It has to do with oil. And it has to do with raw imperial power. It is based on a pack of lies. And it is wrong. Those who forced this war on an unwilling world are guilty of flagrantly violating the U.S. Constitution, the UN Charter, and international law. What they have done is illegal, immoral, unconstitutional and TREASON.

It’s been said that somewhere in Texas there is a village looking for their idiot. Now that may be funny, but it misses the point. George W. Bush is not an imbecile. He is a TRAITOR.

Before this war started, we knew it would fracture NATO, split the United Nations, separate us from our allies, and destroy the great nation we inherited from our fathers who died in World War II. And it has. We knew it would make our beloved country feared and hated, an outcast from the world community, a pariah among the peoples, and the number one rogue nation on earth. And it has. It has done so based on a pack of lies. My sisters and brothers, that is not stupidity. That is TREASON.

We knew this sadistic corporate war would incense the Arab world, provide thousands of new Osama bin Ladens, and enormously increase the terrorist threat. And it has. We knew it would further endanger the American people and destroy our national security. And it has. That is not stupidity, it is TREASON.

The cabal of neoconservatives at PNAC who planned this war (Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Libby, Perle, Jeb Bush) even before W became president, knew the American people would not stand for it unless there was a new Pearl Harbor. 9/11 supplied that. Our government was warned. They were warned by the Clinton Administration. They were warned by 11 other countries. And they were specifically warned by an FBI agent that one of them was planning on flying a hijacked airliner into the World Trade Center.

They not only ignored the warnings, they made sure no fighter jets were scrambled to stop it. If they had just done nothing, and allowed normal procedures to be followed, the Twin Towers would still be standing and thousands of dead Americans would still be alive. This is not stupidity, it is TREASON.

As a combat veteran, I will not stand idly by and watch our security destroyed by a president who went AWOL rather than fight in Vietnam. Honor requires that I call this by its right name. It is TREASON.

As one who has devoted his life to the security of this country, I will not stand by and watch an appointed president send our sons and daughters around the world to kill Arabs for the oil companies without calling it by its right name. It is TREASON.

I joined the Air Force to protect our borders and our people, not the financial interests of Folgers, Chiquita Banana, and Exxon. We’ve had enough corporate wars. No more Iraqs. No more El Salvadors. No more Kosovos. No more Colombias. These are not isolated incidents of stupidity. They are part of a long, bloody history of foreign policy being conducted for the financial benefit of the wealthy few. It is a new colonialism. It violates our Constitution. It endangers our people. And it is TREASON.

As a pilot who flew 101 combat missions in Vietnam, I can tell you that the best thing our government can do for its combat veterans is to quit making more of them. Peace is patriotic; a preemptive war is immoral, illegal, unconstitutional, a war crime, and TREASON. I swore to uphold the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic. That includes a renegade president. Wake up, America! It is time for George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and the whole oil mafia to be removed from office and indicted for TREASON.

We are the people. We are sovereign. We are the patriots. The whole world is with us. Never allow anyone to intimidate you into silence. Wake up, America! It’s time to speak truth to power. God bless America, and God save us from the traitors in our government.

Dr. Robert Bowman was a Col. in the USAF and Chief of Technology Assessment under President Jimmy Carter and is a Catholic Bishop of The Apostolic Society of Franciscan Communities. email: isss@rmbowman.com, web site: www.rmbowman.com. He has been President of the Institute for Space and Security Studies since 1982. Before that he was Vice-President of Space Communications Company; Manager, Advanced Space Programs for General Dynamics; and Director, Advanced Space Programs Development for DoD, directing the “Star Wars” programs.

2004-04-12T09:20:00.002-07:00

WHEN RELIGION BECOMES EVIL....

So I'm reading Charles Kimball's "When Religion Becomes Evil" now and finding numerous quotes that are worth pause and deep consideration; quotes that I'd like to see discussed in more public ways. Despite the dramatic feel of the title (I'm waiting to see how he defines "evil"), Kimball extensively goes into the fabric of the world's major religions with refreshing honesty.

To put this one in context, Kimball is so far discussing both the extreme angles of Christianity as well as Islam. This is in no way unfairly critical or anti-Islam. He's speaking about the various contradictions within the major religions of the world and shares the saddening stories of Muslims who, when converting to Christianity, had received a death sentence and were refused by their family.

He says,

"All of this belies the central Islamic teaching that God created human beings as free and responsible agents. Muslims who believe they safeguard Islam through such stringent legal and social policies appear to ignore one of the most quoted and revered messages in the Qur'an: 'There can be no compulsion in matters of religion' (2:256). This central tenet affirms that each person is responsible for himself or herself. Authentic faith cannot be coerced through aggressive missionsary tactics or protected by prohibiting free inquiry or punishing anyone who deviates from the norm."

It's that last sentence that really grabbed me- certainly something we can apply to Christianity in a big way:

"Authentic faith cannot be coerced through aggressive missionsary tactics or protected by prohibiting free inquiry or punishing anyone who deviates from the norm."

It is precisely the missionary element of Christianity that I have to take issue with. I have no issue with others believing and acting as they will. I prefer that they grant me the same human right and free will and refrain from approaching others as if they have superior knowing as well as the only "right way" to live in this world. Earlier in the book Kimball also eloquently confirms this sentiment of mine by saying,

"Freedom of relgion is a good thing. So is freedom *from* the religion others may wish to impose on those who differ."

Amen to that, Kimball.

2004-01-31T19:29:00.001-08:00

MY VERY DIRTY DAY

So I had an interesting morning today. I had the Kirby vacuum company pestering me about coming over to clean/shampoo my carpet for free and give me a demo on their new, super powered vacuum. Okay, whatever, stuff for free is cool so I finally agreed after 4 phone calls and rescheduling the appointment three times. What was demo'd to me was the numerous ways this vacuum kicks major ass... and believe me, it definitely kicks ass... for the price of two thousand dollars. That's right. When he asked me if I was interested in this kick ass vacuum (after demonstrating how dirty my floor was with his special demo kit) and I said, "Sure, why not?" I did a double take... Not $19.99...? No? 1, 999? OH my god!

Okay, it's just inconceivable to me that people can and WILL spend two thousand dollars on a vacuum. People who know me will understand my animated disbelief at this. Having traveled and lived in places such as Africa and Central America, I am stunned at how 1) Americans spend money and 2) what they choose to spend it on. Sure, I've spent two thousand dollars before, in one lump sum. On things like a computer to do my music and paying off a student loan.. and I just can't fathom that much money on something like a... vacuum.. So that you can clean all day.....

Okay, so here's the funnier part. The sales rep- who was really a nice guy, by the way- shows me all this cool stuff, how much dirt the thing is picking up off the walls, the celing, the corners of my floor, under my fridge (wow.. you mean it gets DIRTY there?!) and so on and is going on about how I'm breathing all this stuff, blah blah blah and says, "Now, is that OKAY with you? That you're breathing in all this stuff?" And me, in my charming little way of being blunt says, "Well, honestly? Yeah. I mean, look, man.. I've lived in West Africa.. millions of other people live in places where their house is a DIRT floor... you can't tell me that this little bit of dirt is hurting me." It boggles the mind. Think about the thousands of years that human beings have been on this earth.. and that it's only in the last, what?, 60, 70 years that we've had vacuums? So why is dirt and dust suddenly so awful? I never had issues in West Africa or central America with dust, dirt, bugs hurting or violating me. So I just can't understand why this vaccuum is so damn important for me to have... for the cost of two thousand dollars.

Throughout his presenation he's showing me all the cool little gadgets for the Kirby.. things to vacuum the furniture, the walls, the ceiling, under things, above things, in between things, the mattress, the piano, how it turns into a shampoo cleaner, etc, etc.. and he keeps asking, "You'd definitely use this if you had it, right?" And I say, "uh, well I guess... sure, why not?" but increasingly, I'm thinking, "Holy shit! If I owned this vacuum, I'd spend all frickin' day cleaning! I think this vacuum could turn me into a neurotic clean freak! If that attachment is there, I must need to use it." There's another reason to not spend 2 grand on it! Vacuum the windows, the cupboards, the stereo, the sink, the radiator, the bookshelf.. hell! Why not just get a leaf blower?!

So later on the guy says, "So, what do you think? Want to go ahead and buy this right now? Would credit card, check or cash suit you better?" Again, I say, "Honestly? No.. I mean why would I spend TWO THOUSAND dollars on a vacuum of all things? That's a plane ticket.. two plane tickets!.. to Europe!" So blah blah blah, a very nice guy who unfortunately met one of the most unconventional Americans out there. I'm fine with my crappy Eureka $60 vacuum even if it spits out a dust mite here and there.

Anyway, I spent the rest of the day in awe.

2003-04-14T18:49:00.000-07:00

Some fun pictures from the Mazamas' Basic Climbing Education Program snow practice sessions near Mount Hood. I'm assisting with these classes as a climb instructor.

2003-04-14T18:47:00.000-07:00

This picture doesn't make much sense by itself.. we're attached to a rope team, ascending a slope, someone has fallen (pretended to fall by throwing himself down the slope) so we all immediately fall to the ground and plant in our ice axes, into the snow, to try and stop the fall.

2003-04-14T18:41:00.000-07:00

In motion: A head-first, backwards ice axe arrest down a snow slope, going fast. I plant the axe to my right and my legs will swing around counter-clockwise so I can complete the stop.

2003-04-14T18:26:00.000-07:00

Glissading..using the ice axe as a brake to my left. Even though it looks like I'm just sitting there, I'm actualy sliding down the hill.

2003-04-14T18:07:00.000-07:00

Hanging from the ceiling after prusking the rope (ascending the rope with knots called "prusik" knots.. when weighted they don't move and you can put all your weight on to them. When non-weighted they move easily up and down the rope):

2003-04-10T17:48:00.000-07:00

Went to hear Reese Erlich the other night- co-author of "Target Iraq- What the News Media Didn't Tell You."
I highly recommend the book as well as seeing him speak, if you get the chance. It wasn't extraordinarily mind-blowing but it was at least nice to hear an "authority" confirm my own beliefs, thoughts and perceptions about the mainstream media and the charade they're presenting.

2003-03-26T16:46:00.000-08:00

Not With the Mind

We cannot Think our way to Peace.
Peace cannot be waged
Until Every voice is heard.
Until every person who needs to speak,
can
who needs to be understood
is.

Until the stories of pain are heard
and understood,
peace will have no soil in which to sink its roots.
Until the Grief and agony and heartbreak are heard
and understood,
this peace will only know floods of desperation
Until the Rage and betrayal and disenfranchisement are heard
and understood
peace will have no shelter from hot, blowing winds
Until the Fear and worries and doubts are heard
and understood
peace will find nothing but compression and darkness

Peace is not waged with the Mind
Nor is it waged with Thought
or even with Hope

Peace is not waged by intent
nor by promises or strong words
nor by careful planning
Peace is not waged by waving flags
nor diligent prayers
nor generous funding

Peace breathes only the air of compassion
Peace is only resuscitated by Understanding
It is born
Of hearing Every voice
Of hearing Every story
Of Listening.

No matter its form
however ugly
however gruesome
however violent
however beautiful
Every action carries with it a message
Every message has a story
Every story has a teller

Not with the Mind do we wage Peace.
But with our Ears first
And then our Hearts
And then our Arms.

We cannot Think our way to Peace.
It is not the Mind that will save us
But those parts of us which are most vulnerable

2003-03-26T08:33:00.000-08:00

A good quote....

I read this quote today in the Portland Tribune and had to burst out with a cheer on the MAX (our light rail that I take to work every day).. so now it hangs above my desk at work (along w/a picture of ninja turtle police looking as ugly as can be):

"We are not in a war. We gave a war to Iraq, but we are not in a war. We are drinking caffe lattes at Starbucks and discussing the war in our SUVs on our cell phones. In Iraq, people are running for bunkers. But this is not a war for us. It's a mediafest."
-Jamie Tan
Southeast Portland

2003-03-23T22:31:00.000-08:00

Joy Over the Expression/release of Rage

So this is an issue that has come up between friends and those sharing blogs lately. To some, watching others take "joy" in the release and expression of rage is very, very worrisome to say the least.

Let's make some very, very important distinctions here:
1) Joy in response to someone or something being hurt, damaged or destroyed vs Joy in response to the release of the emotion itself
2) Unrest vs. Violence
3) Rage vs. Hate

For starters, yes, I feel excitement, relief and a feeling of rushing up release when I see rage come out; by that I mean people taking to the streets, pounding drums, yelling out chants, giving impassioned speeches. Why? Because at the very basic level, I believe that rage is not outside of Love. I don't believe that it is in opposition to love, that it negates love nor that it resists love. I believe that rage wants love. It wants light. It wants understanding.. Rage results from unmet needs.

I don't believe that expressing rage is immature, juvenile or dangerous. Quite the contrary. The expression of emotion is where we are at our most vulnerable and our most human. Resisting emotions doesn't make someone more "adult" or more "mature." But many people have an embedded judgement within them that the head is more wise than the emotions and that we should follow our heads. Thee is an embedded judgement that being emotional is being immature. I don't think there's anything I can do to counter the intensity of this judgement, so widely held by so many people in this society. I don't know if I can or even want to try and tackle it, but it's at least important to point it out and suggest that it be challenged.

Rage is one of the most frightening emotions for most people, next to terror. Rage, because of its destructive power can feel volatile and life-threatening. People are afraid to see the merit in rage because they think they might be condoning destruction and violence.
Rage is not synonymous with violence, destruction or hate. It is an emotion and the prior are actions. You can have emotion without the action and it is important to distinguish between the emotion and the action. I would say, to be plain here, "It is bad to be violent towards the self, towards anyone. It is not bad to be enraged."

I've used this analogy before and I'll use it again. Compression.. say, the compression of a pressure cooker. The heat is turned up, the compression builds and builds.. it has to go somewhere. It is a natural force for something which is compressed to need to release. When people are compressed.. or Oppressed.. they can sometimes burst. It can be a great relief full of realizations when they do... just like when you're holding tears back for so long and finally let yourself cry... and suddenly, ahhhhh, the compression is gone.. the pressure is gone.. and light can come in and help you sort it out.

I shared excitement watching people exercise their freedom of assembly, their freedom of dissent because I believe we have to get honest with ourselves. It feels like relief to me to hear someone say, "Yes.. I am angry! I'm enraged!!" There is so much judgement against strong emotion in this society. Much more than most societies that make more room for passion. We are mostly a society stuck in our heads. We tend to discount emotion. We would rather get the emotions to quiet down so we can think. This is a fundamental problem that denies the way we are built. It denies our humanity.

Once again, as I've said before, rage, to me, is our sense of knowing when to stick up for ourselves, knowing when we are in danger and the natural instincts built into our psyche that know when to say, Enough is enough. Or sometimes rage is where the self can no longer be without what it needs. The compression of holding back is too much.

Since this is all coming up in response to the Portland, Oregon protests, I will say that I myself participated in none of the vandalism. I shouted, though. I shouted and yelled and jumped up and down. I was "unruly" perhaps? I demonstrated impassioned emotion and I am proud of it. I give a shit. But I am a person who feels very, very deeply.

However, I don't applaud vandalism but I understand it and I even empathize with those that feel compelled to do it. I won't go into that now. For many it is hard to imagine being so pissed off that you would want to do that. I know what desperation feels like. But realize that there is a difference between vandalism and violence. Although, if you're looking to talk about violence at protests, what about the police beating and gassing protestors? Isn't that violence? Can someone be okay with police acting violently but not protestors? Is that contradictory? Things to think about.

The other distinction. Rage is not hate. Rage can turn into hate. That is, when it never is given full release. It ferments, it sours, it decays without the presence of understanding and compassion. It doesn't receive any merit or compassion, no light, so it gets darker and darker. Rage, when allowed to move and receive merit, validation and light has much to teach. One can find great compassion for oneself and one's feelings by allowing rage to move, without judging it, without hurting the self or anyone else and can find that on the other side of rage releasing, that has not been judged against, are great understandings, not to mention a pocket of pain that just wants so much to live, to receive love and be heard. I have compassion for rage. I celebrate when it can come out into the open, when people are allowed to feel it w/o feeling like they are in danger of being "bad" or "unloving."

There are large reasons why people choose to vandalize, to be unruly, to turn their rage into action against other people. That's complicated. That's a whole other discussion, partly addressed in my earlier response as to why some people believe that civil disobedience works.

Lastly, what is also so key here, is that it is the judgements we hold against our emotions, that make them feel so uncomfortable. If you judge against your grief, your rage, your fear or your joy, it will all feel negative and painful to you. If you trust that what is within you is ultimately loving, ultimately wants love, ultimately wants light, understanding, compassion and that your rage isn't a "bad" part of you but a message, the part of you sticking up for yourself, I think you can find healing through it. Remember, rage is not hate. It is not destruction. Emotion is energy. Intelligent and divine energy. Yes, we must be careful how we channel our emotions into action, and each case should be addressed individually.

2003-03-23T13:00:00.000-08:00

Why Protesting Works and other responses...

There was a comment online in reference to my essay about the Portland protests:

It’s a sad, sad thing when the cries of protest, civil disobedience and unrest are louder than the message of peace. The vandalism and rage that we experienced last night and the joy that much of the crowd took in the actions, belittled the work so many of us are doing in writing our congress people and speaking out against the administration. If they remember their intentions, their intentions are good. Their message is simply lost in the medium. And that is sad for us all.

There are two things that I want to respond to about these comments:

-The emotional stance being taken to represent the content
-The content

When one has a negative reaction to something but chooses to criticize it by saying, “Isn’t that sad?” it puts across an extremely patronizing, self-righteous stance 1) It dismisses the opposition but in a quiet way that doesn’t reveal too much emotion, doesn’t choose to pick apart the disagreement as if to non-verbally communicate that the person is “above” giving the opposing view the “time of day” 2) it invalidates, and disapproves of their actions and steps away from the situation without wondering why the “opposition” is doing what it’s doing 3) It puts across a feeling of “I’m being generous and compassionate to look down on them with pity”. It has the feeling of taking a superior stance, shaking one’s head in dismay, “Oh, what a pity… how sad.”

Personally, I would rather see “I am sad because…..” or “I’m angry because…” rather than an emotional vibe that seems to say it doesn’t have time to really elaborate, that it’s just a no-brainer, it’s simply just sad. It can be translated as, “Alas, what a pity that these poor, unenlightened people must resort to this, but I can’t blame them because they just don’t know any better….”

What I want to know is how can these protests make one sad? Nothing is lost here because the peace movement barely has anything going for it right now. Are protests going to void the letters that people are writing to Congress and senators? No. Are they getting in the way of public discussions? No. Are they making our politicians write us off? Not any more than any other peace action is.

But more importantly, what is being reacted to here? Is it a news report of the protests or the actual witnessing of the vibe, finding it “sad”? I was there… and even though I might disagree with whether or not vandalism is sad and ruins others efforts, I get frustrated by people reacting to the media’s representation of protests and skipping past the fact that they are reacting to second-hand information and then criticize the people about whom they are hearing second-hand information.

Yes, there was rage that night but not as the motto and certainly not in an explosive way.. the real rage I saw was the fact that people were out there to begin with, not that they felt the need to spray paint concrete. There was empowerment there, .. the basic feeling was a feeling of the people’s powers in numbers to be heard. It was celebration, it was pride, it was hope, it was confidence that we will be heard one way or another. It was a positive vibe with a few extraneous vandalism events.

Also, do people realize how easy it is to get arrested? Just because the news says that x number of people were arrested, does NOT equal a measurement of how unruly and violent and damaging the protests were. It’s more a measure of how much of a power trip the cops were on that night. All they have to do is look at you and decide that they don’t like the way you look and they can arrest you. Don’t listen to the numbers and judge those people. Very, very few of them, usually in numbers you can count on one hand, ever get charged with anything, ever really do anything illegal. And the news loves that stuff. They love to make everything seem really melodramatic and negatively so. They love to shed negative light on protestors. That’s why you hear more about the “bad” ones than the “peaceful” ones. They are hungry for a story. Why didn’t they focus their report the other 99.99% of the crowd that WAS peaceful, that WAS joyous, that WAS doing their thing legally?

What also confuses me is the stance that “cries of the protest, civil disobedience and unrest are louder than the message of peace.” That civil disobedience that I saw happening was and is the message for peace… a demand for peace. Not a “please, could you please stop killing innocent people.. thank you very much, sorry to take up your time!” But STOP NOW!! We are out there protesting because we are shouting the message of peace. I personally don’t think or believe that when we are in such a dire situation, in so much danger and there is so much to be lost, that we can afford to go about this politely. Politeness, I’m sorry to say, doesn’t work with this government as well as loud, insistent, persistent, visual demands. Our government isn’t listening to us. We want them to listen. So we are disruptive.

As much as we would like it to be so, let’s not pretend that our government is more responsible than they are. Let’s not go about having our voices heard in the way we think it should work just because that’s the nice way to do it. This is big for me. We think we should be able to be heard by all these totally peaceful means and so forth, but are we? Are we being heard? Sure, it would be nice if they could hear the message of peace through nice behavior. Is it more important for us to look good to ourselves or be heard? To me, it’s more important to be heard, than look good to my fellow citizens so that they can say, “oh isn’t that nice that Tamara is being so courteous?!”

I’m reacting to having seen so many complaints about the protests- how inconvenient they were, how pointless, how disruptive and the cynical part of me wants to say, “Uh, yeaaahhhh… DUH!”

The whole point of protests is to gain attention, to speak out in a visual way.. a way that can be seen. A way that makes news. A way that spreads. A way that gets under the skin of politicians and the people who influence those politicians. Remember the whole “seen but not heard” thing? It is important to write letters and do things behind the scenes too but that won’t be “seen” by anyone other than the person reading the letter. I think it’s even more important to do things that intentionally draw attention, that intentionally get under the skin of collective consciousness. Yes, we are trying to get on the nerves of that status quo. The fact is, if protests happen politely on the sidewalks with please and thank yous, unfortunately, they are a lot less effective. People go about their usual business. The news doesn’t care and people look out their windows at us and say, “oh isn’t that nice that they can express themselves.”

What’s the whole point of expressing yourself if you’re not going to be heard? If no one is listening? If it doesn’t rattle anything?

Yes, this is about unrest.

I will not be on of those people, sitting at home shaking my head about how bummed I am about this war. Even if that one protest, even if 10,000 protests don’t do it, we’re making the news aren’t we? Bush is hearing about it, isn’t he? It’s pressure. It may not be the one key thing that stops that maniac but it’s part of putting the pressure on. So if my little body added together with 35,000 other Portland bodies added with millions of other bodies across the world can slowly and steadily keep the pressure on Bush and his administration, then it is helping. And it’s not going to get in the way of letter writing, of holding public discussions or whatever it is that is meant by ‘working so hard for peace.”

Protests aren’t meant to be polite. They don’t have to break the law. They don’t even have to contain vandalism, but their point is, YES, to get on the nerves of people who insist on looking the other way. People who refuse to hear our voices. It gets people to feel something about it. Even if it pisses them off, fine. It gets them involved. It keeps them from being apathetic. One could say, “but who’s seeing it? It’s only getting on the nerves of fellow Portlanders.” On the surface, yes. Yes, it is going to inconvenience our citizens when we take over the road they are driving for a gawd awful 15 minutes.. maybe an hour? But stopping traffic makes waves. We’re trying to make waves. We’re trying to rock the boat in our community. In a perfect world, letter writing might do the trick.

For me, this comes down to the survival chakra. Call it survival instinct. When you have a government that will stop at nothing to get what it wants, kill innocent people when they have a choice not to, it causes a feeling of desperation. It causes rage, it causes “I won’t stand for this and you will hear it!” When people act out, it is always because their health and wellbeing is in danger. People act out to get attention. The more things are compressed, the more the survival instinct bursts out and explodes, just like a pressure cooker. Let me tell you, my survival instinct is kicking in. I write letters. I talk to friends about the war, I give money to these causes.. but I have to get my physical body into the streets too.

If someone isn’t listening to you (the government) and you want to get their attention, you mess with them where it hurts. That’s the philosophy of civil disobedience and even vandalism. “No more business as usual!” Our government isn’t listening to us but I sure as heck bet that their ears will perk up if they hear about more and more intense protests. I can’t help but cheer for unrest.

I’m very, very pissed off and scared about this war and not just what the war means but what it means for how our country is going to handle foreign relations from here out. While people are being bombed, while our government is mindlessly shredding Iraq to, supposedly, find one man, it’s totally obtuse and disgusting to me that our lives should go on untouched, business as usual. “Let’s all just nicely do what we can but get on with it.” By looking around, no one would ever even know that we are at war, should they be walking through the streets .. if people weren’t protesting in those very streets. We are so incredibly sheltered in this country. 9-11 was the first experience with what war feels like. That was ONE day of hell in America (and yes, it will haunt us forever). So imagine a lot more days like 9-11 and you have the situation in Iraq.

We have no idea what it is like to have a life constantly under threat, only to be bombed by the Americans again. So what right do we have to criticize our citizens that think that it’s worth getting arrested to make a point? Wouldn’t we want someone in another country to protest on our behalf if we were being slaughtered? Would we still say that protesting should be polite if it were our life on the line? “Oh, no, don’t inconvenience someone on account of my life…”

So if they won’t listen when we’re nice about it, “please don’t do this..” then we start to get louder. Bring it on, I say. Let’s get as loud as it takes.

2003-03-21T18:32:00.000-08:00

So here is the video I worked on for Nov. and Dec... for sale now on CD Baby!

Garden Flowers Video for sale!

2003-03-20T23:28:00.000-08:00

THE MARCH 20th PROTESTS FROM ONE PORTLANDER

Tonight is a night I will never forget. I went down to join the crowd at 3rd and Main at 4:45, not knowing what to expect, having heard rumors of some kind of permit but plans for civil disobedience. The turn-out was mind-blowing. I'm not clear on how many branches of marches there ended up being but, after scaling a few innocent light poles, the group I was in stretched as far as I could see. I heard rumors of 45,000 people and I wouldn’t be surprised at all if it were more. The spirit of the crowd was unbelievable, powered by the drum line, homemade bucket drums, cowbells, pots and pans, whistles, ringing bells, cheers, chants and handclapping. Periodically a huge wave of cheers would move though the crowd and often, I would look up to see people in apartments, dorms or stores ahove the streets cheering us on, waving their two fingers in peace. Most of them were as astounded as we were.. and their view must have been an amazing one.. especially when the streaker bicyclist worked though the crowd. Shop owners along our claimed route cheered us on as well. We cheered them back.

One of the most powerful moments of the night for me was when our march came around the corner of 3rd and Burnside and met with what I assume was a large part of the Critical Mass bike ride. Tears filled my eyes and I started jumping up and down screaming, “Yes! YES!” when I saw some 20+ (I’m no good at judging numbers.. was probably many more) cyclists raising their bikes over their heads, shaking them like one would shake a fist, at the stopped traffic.. as if to say, “Yes! We are here! We are taking the street with our bikes and our feet! You will not move until we want you to move!” All four lanes of traffic were blocked. Cheers spread through the crowd like a roar. It was the type of sensation that starts in your gut and spreads up through your torso into your throat.. like joyous reflux! I literally felt a rush go through me. After hanging out in that intersection for a while, I continued on with a large group to march back towards Main Street. When we arrived, rumors quickly spread that police were beating and gassing people on the Steel Bridge. A large majority of the crowd decided to go there to support the protestors and overwhelm the police. I was hesitant, not sure what was going on and how bad it was, and hadn’t dressed or prepared for being beaten and gassed but I thought, “How can they possibly arrest this many people?” By the time I got there, people were turning back. From asking around, it was a stand off and the protestors gave up on passing through the line of robocops for the time being. But that was just the beginning. That was the last bridge the cops would block from this march.

I heard several people comment, “They [the police] don’t want us to block the bridge so they line up all their cars and get into their Robocop riot gear and… block the bridge?!?!” to which I answered, “Yeah, that’s REALLY helping the cars get through, eh? Just like Bush logic, ain’t it?”

From there, we made our way and marched across the Burnside Bridge, collectively deciding to “take” the east side. Here’s where the power of numbers really hit home. I kept waiting for cop cars and motorbikes to come zooming around the corner.. for things to get scary, but it appears they just couldn’t get to us.. or keep up with us and the line of traffic congestion we left in our wake.. despite the choppers looming overhead, undoubtedly reporting our position and where it looked like we were headed. It appeared that after a while, the cops just gave up. I have no idea how many marchers were still with us at that time. A few thousand? Enough. Enough that it was too many to arrest and WE had the power. We CHOSE which streets we wanted to take. Several people had hand-held megaphone thingies and shouted out directions and chants. But it was us.. US leading the march, US deciding when and where to go. No plan. Spur of the moment. " Let’s go up this street!"

For a crowd that had no designated leader and chose its route spontaneously based on crowd consensus and whoever had megaphones, it was remarkably civil and successful. I have to say, the people I was marching with were some of the most courteous and respectful I have ever been around. And I know so many people have said how diverse these protests have been but let me say it again… I saw people from EVERY class, niche, race, religion and lifestyle.. from cross-dressers to elderly, from Native Americans to Germans. Of all the things that people might fight about, it’s amazing to me how many people have come together against this war… that I can share the streets with people that I might have nothing else in common with.. nothing.. and yet we all so passionately don’t want this war.

Perhaps our greatest victory of the evening was marching onto the on-ramp of I-84 and onto the highway itself, stopping traffic in BOTH directions for about 10 minutes.. until the Robocops could get their heads together, figure out how to get to us and run down the ramp after the group, looking like misplaced gangs of ninja turtles or those awful beetle like creatures from the Dark Crystal. I didn’t see a scuffle or any arrests from my vantage point and the protestors eventually left the lanes of traffic.. but let me tell you!!!!… POWER OF THE PEOPLE!!! We stopped traffic on a major highway…. And cries for I-5 were echoing through the crows. “Let’s take I-5!!”

The brave taking of I-84 scared quite a few people off, understandably. Nobody wanted to get hit that night and watching a handful of people standing across all lanes of what is normally a buzzing highway, while more marched down from the steep on-ramp was nerve-wracking to say the least. So I think we lost a little of our collective nerve after that. Nevertheless, we continued to march north and take the Broadway bridge back over to the West. Along the way, as we passed by a Shell (oil) station, protestors decided to kindly snatch the obnoxious, yellow Shell signs decorating the grassy lawns of the station. “Burn it! Burn it!” The crowd shouted. But they wouldn’t burn. ‘Put gasoline on it!,” the crowd responded. Not a good idea. So we had to make do with upside down Shell flags, and those worn as capes, to join our upside down and vandalized American flags. I have to admit I got a kick out of that. “Fuck Shell!” resounded. As well as Bush and the INS and a lot of other names we love to bash.

With a snicker, I watched one guy scale a lit up billboard for ClearChannel, coincidentally, and write, FUCK BUSH. I also watched people in black spray-painting “no war” graffiti on concrete building sides. We really did own those streets. It struck hard. “Whose streets?! OUR streets!!” was a popular chant. WE decided where we wanted to march and when and how long we would be there and what cars we would let by. Power of the people.

I watched one cyclist blocking an SUV and get into what looked like a minor scuffle. More protestors came to make peace and let the driver get through. Again, people were looking out for each other, trying as best they could to maintain the peace. Trying not to hurt anyone. Besides some mild property damage that a little sand-blasting would take care of, our almost four hour march was peaceful from what I experienced. We were inconvenient as hell to drivers, we shut down all public transport for a good while (I had watched MAX drivers pack up their stuff and leave and other MAX trains be led by a TriMet street referee of sorts, slowly walking along the tracks as if guiding the train by a leash..to god knows where) but what’s the big deal about waiting? I wonder if the police realized this and decided to just let us take our streets and stand by, hidden in the dark corners of the streets here and there, ready just in case. In case of what? I waved at the cops. They didn't wave back.

I really enjoyed running up and down through the crowd over the course of the 3 and a half hours, checking out pockets of cheers, hearing various drum beats and conversations. One of the funnier ones that made me half laugh was a 4 or 5 year old sitting on his dad’s shoulders, saying,’Dad, I want to see the police use their pepper spray!” He must have been hearing a lot about it and it sounded rather exciting. Sadly, police DID use their pepper spray on people… and from what I heard through the crowd, even on children.

Our disobedient march ended to join up with a crowd of people at 2nd and Burnside, who I hear that, as I write this, are being surrounded by cops in full riot gear and have already begun to be beaten. Why can’t they just let them sit there? They’re certainly not hurting anyone! Jesus, if traffic could figure out how to deal with 4 hours of protestors marching all over the streets and bridges of Portland wherever the hell they wanted, what ‘s a group of peace-sitters in one intersection of downtown going to be? But doesn’t this behavior just seem a little familiar? You can almost hear the cops thinking,
“I want to kick some ASS! Give me some ass to kick!!”

After tonight, after four hours of marching through the streets, my hope is renewed. Even if we can’t stop this war, this time, this week, I know now that it’s possible to stop something so huge like this in the power of numbers. When you’ve got butt-loads of people, even Robocops can lose. And when the cops lose power, it spreads upwards.

To all my friends who came out today to shout, march and have their voices heard, to pound upside down water jugs and wear bloody shirts and carry pictures of Iraqi women and children, I thank you. I wanted to shake every person’s hand that was there tonight. Power of the people. Power to the people.

Tamara

2003-03-19T22:16:00.000-08:00

So as of March 19th, 2003 this is no longer a Curt and Tamara blog, but just a Tamara blog. Just lil' ol' me. Curt dumped me for his own blog and I'm such a sport that I'm going to link to him here!

Curt's blog

2003-03-19T22:01:00.000-08:00

In this time of domestic and international crisis, don't forget to write and THANK the politicians, who are speaking out and voting the way you would like to see them do so. Thank yous are just as important as criticism. Let them know we are watching. Even when they do good. Like Gordon Smith. A republican who voted against drilling in Alaska. Way to go, Gordon! (no matter what your reasoning was, at least I have SOMEthing to feel hopeful about!) And Tom Daschle for not backing down on his criticism of Bush and thus, demonstrating that powerful white men really can, sometimes, have spines.

2003-03-19T21:10:00.000-08:00

So I get this forwarded email from someone that is a letter to George W. from a guy who claims he is going to stop Georgie porgie with Love. The author of the letter goes on about how this war crisis has caused him to wake up, care more, pay attention and for that, he is grateful and loving to George W. We will stop them with love. We will love this situation to its end. We will use love as our weapon.

To me, this letter reeks of denied rage. That's when rage is rejected, shoved down, compressed and judged against so intensely that it is lost to its owner. I'm not saying that feeling loving about something necessarily means that anger is being shoved out.. but in this situation, I'm having a hard time not seeing this letter as being "above" anger- more or less judging against anger as being a less "loving" approach. "I won't be among those who denounce you, Mr. Bush..."

The REASON why so many people are waking up over this war and caring, getting all upset and active about it is that our survival instinct is kicking in. We can FEEL that the situation is bad. Really bad. Survival instincts don't come out politely. They don't come out with "please" and "thank you"s. They come out with intensity. That is the point. It might be scary for those who are used to a feeling of control over oneself and one's emotions but now IS the time to listen to our anger, give it merit, and not pass it off as less than what this guy wrote and is feeling.

So I want to venture to say that rage and anger are NOT outside of love. Love knows when to stick up for itself. Love encompasses rage and anger just as it encompasses grief. Emotions in general are not outside of love. That also means that if you happen to be pissed off and irate over this whole Iraq scandal, it does NOT mean that you are unloving or even negative. You see what you see. And it CERTAINLY does not make you any less noble than a person who choses to be calm, measured and "peaceful. " There is a place for our rage and anger, friends. Of any time, this is the time to consider not judging against those emotions and know that they have much to teach if we can only learn to listen w/o fearing our own feelings.

2002-11-20T09:53:00.000-08:00

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY:

"Just because symptoms cease to exist does not necessarily mean that healing has taken place."

For example, just because someone is no longer agorophobic or whatever, does not mean that the emotoins are "healed." LOVE is the essential ingredient here. As far as I'm concerned you don't "love" parts of yourself *AWAY* from you! You love them into evolution, you embrace them.. . You EVOLVE them. Severing out a symptom is not healing. Symptoms are messages. There's a lot more I have to say about all this but not now...

2002-10-25T03:26:00.000-07:00

Our template has been out of whack for far too long. Trying to make some fixes right now...

2002-10-10T12:51:00.000-07:00

If you still want to think that the media is unbiased and "just reports the facts" well, read below.

2002-10-10T12:49:00.000-07:00

FAIR-L
Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting
Media analysis, critiques and activism

ACTION ALERT:
Connie Chung: Skeptical of Skepticism

October 10, 2002

On her October 7 broadcast, CNN's Connie Chung took a U.S. congressmember
to task for doubting George W. Bush.

After Rep. Mike Thompson (D.-Calif.) told Chung that there seemed to be no
evidence that Iraq posed an immediate danger to the people of the United
States or its allies, the anchor responded, "Well, let's listen to
something that President Bush said tonight, and you tell me if this
doesn't provide you with the evidence that you want."

She then aired a clip from the speech that Bush made in Cincinnati:

"Some al Qaeda leaders who fled Afghanistan went to Iraq. These include
one very senior al Qaeda leader who received medical treatment in Baghdad
this year and who has been associated with planning for chemical and
biological attacks.

"We've learned that Iraq has trained al Qaeda members in bomb-making, in
poisons and deadly gases. And we know that after September 11, Saddam
Hussein's regime gleefully celebrated the terrorist attacks on America."

After this soundbite, Chung continued: "Congressman, doesn't that tell you
that an invasion of Iraq is justified?"

Thompson began to respond: "Connie, we haven't seen any proof that any of
this has happened. I have sat through all the classified briefings on the
Armed Services...."

But this questioning of what Bush said appeared to be too much for Chung.
She interrupted Thompson's answer, saying, "You mean you don't believe
what President Bush just said? With all due respect....you know... I mean,
what..."

Faced with Chung's obvious alarm that someone might not take Bush's word
as definitive proof, Thompson tried to reassure her: "No, no, that's not
what I said.... I said that there has been nothing in the committee
hearing briefings that have substantiated this. If there is
substantiation, we need to see that in Congress, not hear it over the
television monitor."

Later in the broadcast, Chung returned to the question of whether Thompson
trusted Bush, suggesting that skepticism toward Bush was equivalent to an
endorsement of Saddam Hussein:

"Congressman Thompson, there are those who believe that you and your two
colleagues who went to Iraq came back with the basic position of President
Bush may be trying to tell you something that in his effort to get
approval for an invasion in Iraq, that you shouldn't believe. So it sounds
almost as if you're asking the American public, 'Believe Saddam Hussein,
don't believe President Bush.' "

Rather than insinuating that it's unpatrioFaith Hill - Exclusive Performances, Videos, & more
faith.yahoo.com

2002-10-10T10:39:00.000-07:00

Biotech Industry Spends Millions on Disinformation Campaign

The biotech industry recently announced plans to spend $6 million
dollars to defeat the Oregon Labeling Initiative. Oregon is the
first state in the country to put on the ballot a measure that
will require mandatory labeling of GE food. Monsanto and others
argue that labeling will bring increased food costs.
But experience tells us otherwise. Over 30 countries have
passed legislation requiring GE food labeling and have not
experienced increased food costs. Want to find out how you
can support the Oregon initiative? Check out these web sites.

2002-10-10T09:44:00.000-07:00

THIS IS TAKEN FROM THE GUARDIAN NEWSPAPER, MONDAY OCT. 7, 2002

Help us to stop the war

As a US Republican, I reject George Bush's illegal and unconstitutional plan to attack Iraq

Scott Ritter
Monday October 7, 2002
The Guardian

As a former US Marine Corps intelligence officer and as a registered member of the Republican party who voted for George Bush in the last presidential election, I have to admit to a certain trepidation and uncertainty when I was asked by Labour MPs to participate in the massive anti-war rally in London on September 28.

In my way of thinking, mass demonstrations, regardless of the righteousness of the cause, were the theatre of the political left, and not something with which I should be associated. I was proven wrong on all counts. The outpouring of democratic will that occurred on that day came not only from the left, but from across the breadth of mainstream British society. It sent a message to a Blair government that had grown increasingly isolated from public opinion: UK support for an American unilateral war on Iraq would not be tolerated. That message met a response a few days later from the Labour party at its annual conference in Blackpool. Democracy in action is a wonderful thing.

Across the Atlantic, in the United States, a debate is about to begin in the US Congress over the granting of sweeping war powers that would enable President Bush to wage war against Iraq, even if such action were unilateral and lacking in authority from the United Nations.

To many Americans, myself included, the granting of such powers represents a breach of constitutional responsibility on the part of Congress, which alone under the constitution of the United States is authorised to declare war. There is at least one US senator - Robert Byrd of West Virginia - who recognises this, and has indicated his willingness to launch a filibuster of the debate. Senator Byrd is famous for carrying a copy of the US constitution in his breast pocket, and pulling it out on the floor of the Senate to remind fellow senators what American democracy is founded on. One man fighting in defence of the basic foundation of American society. Where are the large-scale US demonstrations in support of this struggle? Where are the voices of outrage over what amounts to a frontal assault on the constitution of the United States? Democracy silenced is awful.

The constitution has always guided me in my actions as an American citizen. It establishes the US as a nation of laws, and sets high standards for the ideals we Americans strive to achieve as a nation. As an officer of Marines, I took an oath to defend the US constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. It is an oath I take very seriously and I am willing to give my life in defence of this document - something I demonstrated during my time in uniform, including service in Operation Desert Storm.

I am no pacifist, but I am opposed to President Bush's rush towards war with Iraq this time around. As signatories to the UN charter, Americans have agreed to abide by a body of international law that explicitly governs the conditions under which nations may go to war. All require authority of the security council, either through an invocation of article 51 (self defence), or a resolution passed under chapter seven of the charter (collective security).

President Bush's case for war simply has not been demonstrated to meet any of these criteria. The president repeatedly announced that Iraq has failed to comply with its obligation to disarm, and as such poses a threat to international peace and security. The president declared that Iraq must allow weapons inspectors to return to Iraq, without conditions, with unfettered access to all sites. Iraq's failure to allow inspectors to return to work since their withdrawal in December 1998 has prompted fear in many circles (recently demonstrated by the UK government's dossier on Iraqi weapons programs) that Iraq has taken advantage of the intervening time to reconstitute its weapons of mass destruction programs dismantled under UN supervision. With no inspectors in Iraq, it was impossible to know for certain what the regime of Saddam Hussein was up to; and, given Iraq's past record of deceit over these weapons, the US and others were justified in presuming ill intent.

But now Iraq has agreed to allow the inspectors to return, unconditionally, and to be held accountable to the rule of law as set forth in existing security council resolutions governing Iraq's disarmament. The opportunity finally exists to bring clarity to years of speculation about the potential threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, as well as an opportunity to resolve this ongoing crisis of international law peacefully.

B ut President Bush refuses to take "yes" for an answer. The Bush administration's actions lay bare the mythology that this war is being fought over any threat posed by Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. It has made it clear that its objective is the elimination of Saddam Hussein. And this is where I have a fundamental problem. The UN charter prohibits regime removal. The US constitution states that international agreements entered into by the United States carry the force of law. The US has signed the UN charter. Regime removal is not only a violation of international law, it is unconstitutional.

There is a way to deal with the need to change a regime deemed to be a risk to international peace and security, and that is through the UN. If President Bush truly wanted to seek regime removal in Baghdad, then he would push for an indictment of Saddam Hussein and his senior leadership in the international court for crimes against humanity, something that should not prove hard to do, given the record of the Butcher of Baghdad (and something other members of the UN would clearly support as an alternative to war). But seeking judgment through the international court requires a recognition by the US of the primacy of international law, something the Bush administration has been loath to do.

The fact of the matter is this crisis between Iraq and the US goes beyond even the issue of regime removal. It represents the first case study of the implementation of a new US national security strategy, published last month, which sets forth a doctrine of unilateralism that capitalises on American military and economic might to maintain the US as the sole superpower, to impose our will on the rest of the world, even through pre-emptive military action. This strategy is a rejection of multilateralism, a turning away from the concepts of international law.

This new Bush doctrine of American unilateralism reeks of imperial power, the very power against which Ameri cans fought a revolution more than 200 years ago. The streets of Washington DC are empty of demonstrators protesting at this frontal assault on American democracy. Will the streets of London be filled again with protesters against this assault on the rule of international law? I certainly hope so, because the people of Britain could lead by example, sending a clear signal to fellow practitioners of democracy in America that when it comes to determining what actions a government takes in the name of the people, the will of the people cannot, and will not, be ignored.

Scott Ritter was a UN weapons inspector in Iraq in 1991-98 and chief of the concealment investigations team. His interview with William Rivers Pitt forms the core of War on Iraq (Profile Books)

WSRitter@aol.com

2002-08-15T09:23:00.000-07:00

I'm passing this along.. it was forwarded to me:

Humans are Stupid??

1. Only in America.....can a pizza get to your house faster than an ambulance.

2. Only in America......are there handicap parking places in front of a skating rink.

3. Only in America......do drugstores make the sick walk all the way to the back of the store to get their prescriptions while healthy people can buy cigarettes at the front.

4. Only in America......do people order double cheeseburgers, large fries, and a diet coke.
5. Only in America....do banks leave both doors open and then chain the pens to the counters.
6. Only in America......do we leave cars worth thousands of dollars in the driveway and put our useless junk in the garage.
7. Only in America......do we use answering machines to screen calls and then have call waiting so! we won't miss a call from someone we didn't want to talk to in the first place.
8. Only in America......do we buy hot dogs in packages of ten and buns in packages of eight. (THIS ONE ALWAYS BUGGED ME!)
9. Only in America......do we use the word 'politics' to describe the process so well: 'Poli' in Latin meaning 'many' and 'tics' meaning
'bloodsucking creatures'.
10. Only in America......do they have drive-up ATM machines with Braille lettering.

EVER WONDER ~~~~

Why the sun lightens our hair, but darkens our skin?

Why women can't put on mascara with their mouth closed?

Why don't you ever see the headline "Psychic Wins Lottery"?

Why is "abbreviated" such a long word?

Why is it that doctors call what they do "practice"?

Why is it that to stop Windows 98, you ha! ve to click on "Start"?

Why is lemon juice made with artificial flavor, and dishwashing liquid is made with real lemons?

Why is the man who invests all your money called a broker?

Why isn't there mouse-flavored cat food?

When dog food is new and improved tasting, who tests it?

Why didn't Noah swat those two mosquitoes?

Why do they sterilize the needle for lethal injections?

You know that indestructible black box that is used on airplanes? Why don't they make the whole plane out of that stuff?

Why don't sheep shrink when it rains?

Why are they called apartments when they are all stuck together?

If con is the opposite of pro, is Congress the opposite of progress?

If flying is so safe, why do they call the airport the terminal?

In case you ! needed further proof that the human race is doomed through
stupidity, here are some actual label instructions on consumer goods.
On a Sears hairdryer: Do not use while sleeping. (and that's the only
timeI have to work on my hair.)

On a bag of Fritos: ..You could be a winner! No purchase necessary.
Details inside. (the shoplifter special?)

On a bar of Dial soap: "Directions: Use like regular soap." (and that would be how??...)

On some Swanson frozen dinners: "Serving suggestion: Defrost." (but, it's "just" a suggestion.)

On Tesco's Tiramisu dessert (printed on bottom): "Do not turn upside
down." (well...duh, a bit late, huh!)

On Marks & Spencer Bread Pudding: "Product will be
hot after heating." (...and you thought????..)

On packaging for a Rowenta iron: "Do not iron clothes on body." (but
wouldn't this save me more time?)

On Boot's Children Cough Medicine:"Do not drive a car or operate
machinery after taking this medication." (We could do a lot to reduce the rate
of construction accidents if we could just get those 5-year-olds with head-colds off those forklifts.)

On Nytol Sleep Aid: "Warning: May cause drowsiness."
(and... I'm taking this because???....)

On most brands of Christmas lights: "For indoor or outdoor use only."
(as opposed to...what?)

On a Japanese food processor: "Not to be used for the other use."
(now, somebody out there, help me on this. I'm a bit curious.)

On Sunsbury's peanuts: "Warning: contains nuts." (talk about a news
flash)

On an American Airlines packet of nuts: "Instructions: Open packet,
eat nuts." (Step 3: maybe, uh...fly Delta?)

On a child's superman costume: "Wearing of this garment does not
enable you to fly." ! (I don't blame the company. I blame the parents for this
one.)

On a Swedish chainsaw:"Do not attempt to stop chain with your hands
or genitals." (..was there a lot of this happening somewhere?)

Now that you've smiled at least once, it's your turn to spread the stupidity and send this to someone you want to bring a
smile to (maybe even a chuckle)...in other words send it to everyone. We all
need to smile every once in a while.

2002-07-31T09:11:00.000-07:00

I'd like to HIGHLY recommend that anyone interested in your privacy and the government's plans to invade that, seeing that the most recent disease of the nation is terror-itis go read this article.

2002-07-28T22:53:00.000-07:00

Wow. I thought I was being uniquely funny for coming up with one of the most ridiculous Idiot's Guides as "Idiot's Guide to Being A Christian." But today, at the giant Powell's City of Books, I saw, "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Catholicism." I laughed out loud, raising the eyes of the man sitting quietly by the display, reading, and who looked a wee bit disturbed, not sure if it was he I was staring and laughing at. Now, darnit, I got distracted by another book so I neglected to check out the table of contents but later, walking home, I pondered what those chapter titles might have looked like... hm....

1: The Puzzling No-No's of Birth Control and Sex: Either Populating the World With Catholics or Having No Fun At All
2. Why Women Should Stay Barefoot and Pregnant: The Importance of Controlling women and Glorifying Men
3. Abstinence of Priests: Why having fun is the Root of All Evil
4. Transubstantiation: Magic Tricks With No Explanations
5. Mass: The secrets behind all that kneeling
6. The Holy Mary: The Only Image in Which Women Are Acceptable
7. Confession: Why guilt works wonders and why priests like to hear your innermost secrets
8. Uniforms: Why Everybody is Supposed to Look the Same and Why men find them sexy
9. 101 Ways to Stump a Priest: From Overpopulation to Harboring Pedophiles
10: Why the big fancy cathedrals? Why the candles? Why the incense?: Setting the Sinless Mood
11. The Technology of Torture: The Iron Maiden and other Happy Facts In Catholic History
12: Supremacy of Catholicism: The Numerous Cultures and Peoples Eliminated For Their Own Good
13. Appendix: 2001 Most fun ways to Earn your way to Hell in a Handbasket!

Of course, that would just be volume one.

What I really wondered was who is this book for, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Catholicism? For those considering becoming Catholic and who just don't understand it but feel attracted to it for some odd reason? Or for those who, just looking at it from the outside, continue to scratch their heads at the hypocrisies and dangerously out-of-date dogma? But what seems so obtuse to me is the suggestion, in having that idiot's guide, that "understanding" it, having it make perfect, logical sense, makes you intelligent.

2002-07-24T22:18:00.000-07:00

Okay, I love lists.
I like to go into detail about things but I also just like lists... especially of unique things like the most ridiculous Idiot's Guides you could ever find (see two entries below).

So here's another one that has been brewing in my frisky little brain (okay, but it's not THAT little):

The all-time, most absurd, lame, and basically pointless inventions of Western society, particularly American society.

My favorite, which will be the first to be discussed right now, and which friends and family have surely enjoyed hearing me bitch about for years now is the Leaf Blower.

Now......what the hell??!?!

I just don't get it. It just blows the leaves from one side of the lawn to the other. One side of the street to the other. It doesn't REMOVE the leaves. It doesn't package them up for you to throw into a landfill! It doesn't even allow you to compost them! All it does is just BLOW THEM AROUND.

Now, how much do you think people are paying for these things? I shudder to think about it.

See, a SNOW blower, while you have to admit, is also a bit lazy and lame of us, at least makes it easier to walk, helps old men cross a sidewalk without falling, might keep you from straining your back even though so many Americans are dying from LACK of excercise.. at least a snow blower is somewhat helpful.

But a leaf blower? First, you only see gardeners and maintenance people using them. Not everyone has a leaf blower to make walkng across the sidewalk safe. So I just don't get it. AND it's the most obnoxious, horrid noise. Have you ever tried to walk past one of those things running? If you don't go deaf permanently, you'll at least have ringing in your ears as if you had the local Handbell choir in your head.

The leaf blower ranks at the top of my list for one of the most pointless, absurd and lame inventions of Western Man.. and in this case, I have no problem using the politically incorrect term "Man" because you can bet your undies that a woman would have just picked up a sensible broom and had it over with hours ago!

2002-07-24T15:09:00.000-07:00

Favorite all-time Republican screw up (but so many to choose from and so many more to come!):

Ronald Reagan and associates claim that ketchup is a vegetable so it's suitable for school lunches.

First of all, tomatoes are FRUIT!!!! So, logically that would mean that mushed up tomatoes are ALSO fruit.

But then hey! I once recall Curt asking me if strawberries were vegetables and HE's not republican. :-)

2002-07-23T22:37:00.000-07:00

Now in the same legendary trip to Barnes and Noble that inspired the top 11/12 list of the all-time best Idiot's Guides (see my witty account below) Curt and I, in one of our raucous moods, secretly enjoying the discomfort of fellow patrons as they couldn't help but overhear our politically Left remarks, stumbled upon something blog worthy that frightful summer evening.

Right near the section deemed something like "Inspirational" was a Hunk Calendar of New York Firefighters with the New York skyline in the background.

Yes, these half-naked, testosterone-poisoned men rippling with muscles, and apparently, sex appeal (though I was lost to it), were staring at us with devious grins. In a voice loud enough to catch the attention of a few other shoppers, Curt says, "Oh my God.. now THAT'S American! Isn't that SO American?! A hunk calendar of firefighters?! Taking the patriotism of the tragedy and crossing it with beefcake and commerce!"

I shook my head and adamantly agreed, "Yes, that's very messed up. Very messed up." "I'm going to blog that!" Curt shrieked. But I, being the female component of this blog, more directly affected and targeted by the overt sexual messages about heroes (usually men, haven't you noticed?) and the sex appeal of danger, decided it disturbed me so much that I beat him to the chase! :-)

2002-07-23T22:12:00.000-07:00

Where is idiocy more revered in society than those heaps and heaps of Idiot's Guides? I have to admit, it's a brilliant idea.. and rather funny when you think about it.. capitalizing on someone's glorified insecurity...??

Well, I would always smirk and chuckle when I saw titles along the lines of something like "Idiot's Guide to Cooking" (oh! doesn't it make you want to hear the testimonials?!) and Idiot's Guide to LaTeX (which, by the way, I found out later was NOT talking about the material condoms are made of, but is a type of computer language...phew!) but it wasn't until recently when I was, I'm ashamed to say, patronizing Barnes and Noble (curt dragged me along!) and saw one of the all-time best titles: The Idiot's Guide to Witchcraft.

Now that got me laughing SO loud that several people in that section (metaphysics, new age, I'm sorry to say) started peering out of the corner of their eyes. But my God! I mean talk about playing with fire... and literally!!!

That got me thinking about other titles that would seem equally, ridiculously dangerous... Idiot's Guide to Voodoo, Idiot's Guide to Fire Walking, Idiot's Guide to Becoming A Psychic (kinda defeats the purpose, eh?)... which really got my overactive imagination on a roll... for a top 11 or top 12 list- just because I like to be non-conformist AND I can think of more than 10. As far as I know, these don't actually exist.... yet!

11) Idiots's Guide to Logic and Reasoning
10) Idiot's Guide to Operating Heavy Machinery
9) Idiot's Guide to Mountaineering
8) Idiot's Guide to Masturbation
7) Idiot's Guide to Emergeny CPR
6) Idiot's Guide to Operating Hot Air Balloons
5) Idiot's Guide to Pharmaceuticals
4) Idiot's Guide to the Human Body
3) Idiot's Guide to International Travel in Muslim Countries
2) Idiot's Guide to Snake Handling and Fucking With Other Dangerous Reptiles

and... drum rolllll
!) Idiot's Guide to Being a Christian

And there you have it folks.. ponder these a while.. unless you need to pick up number 12:

Idiot's Guide to Using Your Imagination...

2002-07-23T01:47:00.000-07:00

One of the things that I often notice is how stupid televised debates are. Whether it's Hardball or The O'Reilly Factor or even Donahue, whenever you get people that have opposing viewpoints, they don't ever actually discuss their differences - they just lie and attack each other with illogical arguments that make no sense. Well, most of the time, anyway.

While I never took debate, I imagine that a lot of these techniques are taught in debate class - whether to recognize them in your opponent (which is good) or to actually use them against your opponent (argh!). A class I did take a long time ago, however, was Logic and Reasoning in my freshman year of college. We talked about all sorts of argument fallacies like ad hominem attacks (where you attack the person rather than their ideas), the straw man, the slippery slope, and one of my real pet peeves, the argument by analogy.

There just aren't many analogy-arguments that hold water. However, they are insanely popular. But when I was talking about this to Tamara, I couldn't think of an example. But today I saw Minority Report. Minor spoilers follow.

In the previews it is established that there is a PreCrime Division in Minority Report. They know a murder is about to occur, and they arrest the perpetrator before it happens. There's a critic and they have a discussion that goes something like this:

"You're arresting someone for a crime they didn't commit."

"But they were GOING to commit it."

"But it's a paradox, isn't it? You kept it from occuring, which means it didn't happen, which means the prediction was wrong."

So, one of the characters takes a fragile ball, and rolls it towards the character across a counter. As it rolls off the edge, the critic catches it.

"Why did you catch it?"

"Because it was going to hit the ground."

"But it didn't hit the ground. Do you see? The fact that you stopped it from hitting the ground doesn't change the fact that it was very definitely going to. And you know it was going to."

I watched that scene and it worked for me. It really did feel like a good analogy. Of course, I was distracted by the drama of the movie. But later on I realized it was a perfect example of an analogy fallacy.

ceterus paribus is a latin term that means "other things being equal." That's the requirement one has to meet to structure a logical argument by analogy. This argument with the fragile ball equated the ball's path with destiny - perhaps that is fine. But it also equated the fragile ball with a person. It forced us to accept that the ball had every element in common with a human. And it doesn't.

When I made that point to Tamara, she immediately interjected with what I was driving at - "choice". Assuming for the sake of argument that there is destiny and future paths - we do know that an object, a ball, has no ability to choose its path. But regardless of whether we believe a person's path is predetermined, we don't know it for certain. The person might be able to choose.

So the person is not the same as the ball. The analogy does not work, and the argument falls apart. It was a fallacy, a flawed argument.

I love those because they are like puzzles. They are also really hard to recognize sometimes. Keep an eye out for 'em. :)

2002-07-20T22:13:00.000-07:00

Welcome!

This blog will span everything from the poltiics of organized religion to the Idiot's Guide books that haven't been written yet but should be. Though we're not aiming to take a negative tone here we are interested in being as aware and honest as possible even when it means picking apart other viewpoints.

Stay tuned........

2002-07-20T21:55:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone - this was born out of a bunch of discussions that Tamara and I have had where we were absolutely convinced that we had just thought of something new and fresh - well, perhaps not new and fresh, but at least stuff that we thought was good to keep in mind! So we figured we'd start writing it down. Some of it will be about politics, some about society, and some just about the random crazy shit that happens in life. Here we go!