Heroes and Cowards

The true heroes in this country are most definitely not the pundits, politicians and members of the chattering classes. Newt Gingrich, mirroring many others on the right, seems to feel that liberty is a frill and free speech an unnecessary option. According to the Manchester Union Leader

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich yesterday said the country will be forced to reexamine freedom of speech to meet the threat of terrorism.

Gingrich, speaking at a Manchester awards banquet, said a "different set of rules" may be needed to reduce terrorists' ability to use the Internet and free speech to recruit and get out their message.

"We need to get ahead of the curve before we actually lose a city, which I think could happen in the next decade," said Gingrich, a Republican who helped engineer the GOP's takeover of Congress in 1994.

It's worth noting Gingrich talked about dismantling the First Amendment at a dinner celebrating free speech.


Dick Cheney and Ari Fliescher, among others, have made similar public pronouncements. And General Tommy Franks, in 2003, suggested our constitution might need to be scrapped if another attack occurred on American soil.

Why is it that these brave, brave men, most of whom have never served in the Armed Forces, are willing to send the sons and daughters of America (but not their own) into battle, but run scared at the least hint of danger to themselves?

They seem quite willing to sacrifice the freedoms that our forebears fought and died for. They worry only about their own security. Benjamin Franklin said

They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.

Enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, the founding document of our nation, is this:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

Nowhere is security mentioned. Captain Nathan Hale, the great American patriot, said

I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country

before he was hanged as a traitor by the British. And Patrick Henry, speaking to the House of Burgesses of Virginia, said

I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!

Our forebears were willing to sacrifice everything - their lives, their reputations, their fortunes - for the cause of liberty. Today's "leaders" seem willing to sacrifice all of our hard-won liberties for a chance at a bit of ephemeral security.

Is our nation and its democracy at more risk now than it was in WWII? During the Cold War? During the Civil War? And yet never were our freedoms threatened then as they are now.

On one website, Hotsoup, there was much discussion about this.

A veteran who goes by the username “independentvoter” said fear should not immobilize the nation or lead to the elimination of freedoms “that millions have died for. As for me, I am a Marine (72-76; once a Marine, always a Marine). I wasn’t afraid to die for my freedoms back then and I sure as hell am not afraid to die for them today.”

He's a real American hero.

More here.

Peace on Earth

Christ may be the Prince of Peace, but that didn't stop the Loma Linda Homeowners Association of Pasoga Springs, Colorado from trying to force a couple to remove their peace-symbol shaped Christmas wreath.


They were threatened with fines of $25 a day for displaying the wreath in front of their house.

In its original letter to the couple, Lisa Jensen and Bill Trimarco, the association said some neighbors had found the peace symbol politically “divisive.”

A board member later told a newspaper that he thought the familiar circle with angled lines was also, perhaps, a sign of the devil.

......Mr. Trimarco said he put up the wreath as a general symbol of peace on earth, not as a commentary on the Iraq war or another political statement.

The peace symbol first came to prominence in the late 1950s as the logo for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, a British antiwar group, according to the group’s Web site. It incorporates the semaphore flag images for the letters in the group’s name, a “D” atop an “N".












So, what has happened since?

The fines have been dropped, and the three-member board of the association has resigned, according to an e-mail message sent to residents on Monday.

Two board members have disconnected their telephones, apparently to escape the waves of callers asking what the board could have been thinking, residents said. The third board member, with a working phone, did not return a call for comment.

......In any case, there are now more peace symbols in Pagosa Springs, a town of 1,700 people 200 miles southwest of Denver, than probably ever in its history.

On Tuesday morning, 20 people marched through the center carrying peace signs and then stomped a giant peace sign in the snow perhaps 300 feet across on a soccer field, where it could be easily seen.

“There’s quite a few now in our subdivision in a show of support,” Mr. Trimarco said.

A former president of the Loma Linda community, where Mr. Trimarco lives, said Tuesday that he had stepped in to help form an interim homeowners association.

The former president, Farrell C. Trask, described himself in a telephone interview as a military veteran who would fight for anyone’s right to free speech, peace symbols included.

The response was overwhelming. According to Lisa Jensen, owner of the wreath, who also happens to be a past association president:

....she was overwhelmed with hundreds of calls of support and offers to help her pay the $1,000 fine that would be due if she kept the wreath up until after Christmas.

"We would like to thank everyone who has contacted us with moral support and offers of financial support. We are grateful to hundreds of complete strangers who felt so moved by this story they contacted us," she said.

"It seems whenever someone tries to say Peace on Earth' it is met with so much resistance," she said. "The incredible amount of support we have received over the last couple of days really is proof to us of how many people believe in peace and in our right to say it."

And the town of Pasoga Springs? They were quick to point out that the subdivision is outside of town boundaries, and they have no jurisdiction. But they responded concretely:

Town Manager Mark Garcia said Pagosa Springs was building its own peace wreath, too. Mr. Garcia said it would be finished by late Tuesday and installed on a bell tower in the center of town.

And it was.

Winter is Icummen In

.....and I am preparing for it. Today was a nice and balmy late November day, with temps in the low 5os. I Put my Christmas wreaths up, after adding in a bit of dusty miller and some sedum flowers. I still need to find some red berries, as the birds seem to have eaten all my vibrunum fruit. I suppose it serves me right for not having filled the feeder sooner.

Today I had a new visitor at my feeder, a sure sign of winter, my first junco.

Juncos are an unusual bird; unlike other seasonal visitors to Michigan, that come to spend the spring and summer and fly away to avoid our frigid winters, the juncos fly down (from Canada) to winter here. I suppose Michigan, with our cold and snow, still seems quite pleasant to them, when compared to northern Canada.

I've also had some winter plumage goldfinch (not gold, but with a spot of yellow under their beaks) and lots of black-capped chickadees at my thistle feeders, which I've hung right in front of my dining room window, by the table where I am typing. They are quite welcome year-round Michiganders.


These brilliant photos are by Paul Evans; you can see more of his work here.

Oh well, enough of a break. Time to get back to work. There is more roping to hang, pots to fill with evergreens and fake pointsettias, lights to sort, and a plastic illuminated snowman who is missing his nose.....

Note: the title refers to a poem by Ezra Pound

Winter is icumen in,
Lhude sing Goddamm,
Raineth drop and staineth slop,
And how the wind doth ramm!
Sing: Goddamm.
Skiddeth bus and sloppeth us,
An ague hath my ham.
Damm you; Sing: Goddamm.
Goddamm, Goddamm, 'tis why I am, Goddamm,
So 'gainst the winter's balm.
Sing goddamm, damm, sing goddamm,
Sing goddamm, sing goddamm, DAMM.

It is a parody of a Middle English poem about spring.

Happy Thanksgiving!

The Real Turkeys.....


I am thankful that the US has managed to survive 6 years of the WPE without launching a nuclear war.

And I am thankful that the democrats have retaken 2 houses of congress.

Only two years to go.......keep your fingers crossed.

The Beauty of Science

There were two articles in the on-line version of the New York Times about science. The first was an article about the program "Mythbusters" which, despite all the explosions, fires, and rotting pig carcasses, is actually the best science program on television. The Mythbusters take a common myth and test it to see if it is true, false, or plausible.

Their delight in discovery for its own sake is familiar to most scientists, who welcome any result because it either confirms or debunks a hypothesis. That sense of things can be corrupted when grants or licensing deals are on the line. But the Mythbusters get paid whether their experiments succeed or fail.

......They come up with a hypothesis and test it methodically. After research and experimentation, they might determine that they have “busted” a myth or confirmed it, or they might simply deem it “plausible” but not proved.

It is the kind of logical system of evidence-based conclusions that scientists understand but that others can sometimes find difficult to grasp. And so “Mythbusters” fans say the show has hit on a great way of teaching the process of scientific discovery.

David Wallace, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at M.I.T., praises the program for “getting people interested in engineering, technology and how things work.” I have often found, when talking to non-scientists, that they have little or no concept of how science (and medicine) work.

A distant cousin of mine was railing on about science one day, and complaining that medicine can't be trusted. "They tell you something is good for you, and then a few years later it turns out it's actually bad for you. Why should I trust them?" I spent a long time trying to explain the concepts of research and scientific technique, but he wasn't convinced. (He's an art teacher and a Republican.) Next time I'll just tell him to watch Mythbusters.

The second article concerned a forum held this month at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, CA, which was a dialogue between science and religion. Those speaking were all scinists, weighing in on the pros and cons of religion. On the pro side:

“There are six billion people in the world,” said Francisco J. Ayala, an evolutionary biologist at the University of California, Irvine, and a former Roman Catholic priest. “If we think that we are going to persuade them to live a rational life based on scientific knowledge, we are not only dreaming — it is like believing in the fairy godmother.”

“People need to find meaning and purpose in life,” he said. “I don’t think we want to take that away from them.”

On the con side:

Maybe the pivotal moment came when Steven Weinberg, a Nobel laureate in physics, warned that “the world needs to wake up from its long nightmare of religious belief,” or when a Nobelist in chemistry, Sir Harold Kroto, called for the John Templeton Foundation to give its next $1.5 million prize for “progress in spiritual discoveries” to an atheist — Richard Dawkins, the Oxford evolutionary biologist whose book “The God Delusion” is a national best-seller.

But, overall, it was about science – how it is tied inextricably to human progress, and how religion often impedes the expansion of human knowledge, scientific and otherwise.

In the end it was Dr. Tyson’s celebration of discovery that stole the show. Scientists may scoff at people who fall back on explanations involving an intelligent designer, he said, but history shows that “the most brilliant people who ever walked this earth were doing the same thing.” When Isaac Newton’s “Principia Mathematica” failed to account for the stability of the solar system — why the planets tugging at one another’s orbits have not collapsed into the Sun — Newton proposed that propping up the mathematical mobile was “an intelligent and powerful being.”

It was left to Pierre Simon Laplace, a century later, to take the next step. Hautily telling Napoleon that he had no need for the God hypothesis, Laplace extended Newton’s mathematics and opened the way to a purely physical theory.

“What concerns me now is that even if you’re as brilliant as Newton, you reach a point where you start basking in the majesty of God and then your discovery stops — it just stops,” Dr. Tyson said. “You’re no good anymore for advancing that frontier, waiting for somebody else to come behind you who doesn’t have God on the brain and who says: ‘That’s a really cool problem. I want to solve it.’ ”

“Science is a philosophy of discovery; intelligent design is a philosophy of ignorance,” he said. “Something fundamental is going on in people’s minds when they confront things they don’t understand.”

Exit Strategy?

The Dems won the House and Senate for two main reasons: corruption (Republican) and Iraq. So all the pollsters say. The US public wants us out of Iraq. So what is Bush's response?

He wants to send more troops, 20,000 more, to try and win this thing.

The man is not very bright. His solution to all domestic problems? More tax cuts for the rich. And for international problems? Send in the troops.

And he is unable (or unwilling) to learn from past mistakes, his or others'. He claims to have learned the lessons of Viet Nam; while visiting there, he spoke of the quagmire in Iraq:

The president said there was much to be learned from the divisive Vietnam War _ the longest conflict in U.S. history _ as his administration contemplates new strategies for the increasingly difficult war in Iraq, now in its fourth year. But his critics see parallels with Vietnam _ a determined insurgency and a death toll that has drained public support _ that spell danger for dragging out U.S. involvement in Iraq.

"It's just going to take a long period of time for the ideology that is hopeful _ and that is an ideology of freedom _ to overcome an ideology of hate," Bush said after having lunch at his lakeside hotel with Australian Prime Minister John Howard, one of America's strongest allies in Iraq, Vietnam and other conflicts.

"We'll succeed," Bush added, "unless we quit."

Is it stupidity, or simply an unwillingness to admit mistakes?

And how many more must die - American servicemen and Iraqi civilians - for his intransigence?

John Kerry was right. This is what happens when you have a poor student, someone who didn't feel studying history was worth the bother, in charge. You get us stuck in Iraq.

Happy Birthday, Vera!

Today is my cousin Vera's birthday. This is just to wish her a happy birthday!

Bird Feeders

The bird feeders weren't filled while I was away in Australia, so there weren't many birds hanging around my yard when I got home. And, on my days off, the weather has been cold and rainy, so I hadn't gotten around to filling them.

It was cold out today, and gray, but no precipitation, so I headed out and filled the feeders: four thistle feeders (great for finches and chickadees), two suet feeders (appreciated by woodpeckers) and four seed feeders (two for small birds, one for large birds and one, apparently, for squirrels). I was worried that, having been empty for so long, the birds might have forgotten about them. Not a problem - within seconds, even before I had finished my tasks, there were birds feeding: chickadees, nuthatches, downy woodpeckers, and a tufted titmouse.

There was life in my yard again.....

(Next bird task: putting in the birdbath heater. Really.)

Remembrance Day

November 11th originally celebrated the end of WWI, which ended on the 11th minute of the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. WWI was supposed to be the war to end all wars; after all the carnage that had occurred, and all the lives lost, no nation would ever go to war again. Or so it was thought.

It was called Armistice Day, and was a remembrance of the end of war, and of all the losses of war.

During the Cold War, in 1954, in the US, it became Veteran's Day. In the rest of the world, it is Remembrance Day. As Effect Measure notes:

Veterans Day does not honor fallen soldiers. That's Memorial Day. Veterans Day is about those who survive their service. Given how we treat them in this country, we should call it Forgetting Day. Once they have served their purpose our current government abandons them.

i.e. New Republican mantra: "Love the war, hate don't give a damn about the warrior."

98 years (and countless wars later) we're still fighting, and young men still die as old men send them to their deaths, for honor and for country. And war profiteer still profit. Some things never change.

Two poems (cribbed from the same site):

Untitled poem

General, your tank is a powerful vehicle.
It smashes down forests and crushes men.
But it has one defect:
It needs a driver.

General, your bomber is powerful.
It flies faster than a storm
and carries more than an elephant.
But it has one defect:
It needs a mechanic.

General, man is very useful.
He can fly and he can kill.
But he has one defect:
He can think.
-Bertolt Brecht



CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR (I SHALL DIE)

I shall die
but that is all
I shall do for Death

I hear him leading his horse out of the stall
I hear the clatter on the barn floor
He is in haste
he has business in Cuba
business in the Balkans
Many calls to make this morning
But I will not hold the bridle while he cinches the girth
And he may mount by himself
I will not give him a leg up

Though he flick my shoulders with his whip
I will not tell him which way the fox ran
And with his hoof on my breast
I will not tell him where the black boy hides in the swamp

I shall die
but that is all
that I shall do for Death
I am not on his payroll

I will not tell him the whereabouts of my enemies either
Though he promises me much
I will not map him the route to any man's door
Am I a spy in the land of the living
that I should deliver men to Death?
Brother, the password and the plans of our city are safe with me
Never through me shall you be overcome

I shall die
but that is all
I shall do for Death
-Edna St. Vincent Millay

Victory is Sweet!

Republicans Blame Election Losses On Democrats

From the Onion, America's Finest News Source:

WASHINGTON, DC—Republican officials are blaming tonight's GOP losses on Democrats, who they claim have engaged in a wide variety of "aggressive, premeditated, anti-Republican campaigns" over the past six-to-18 months. "We have evidence of a well-organized, well-funded series of operations designed specifically to undermine our message, depict our past performance in a negative light, and drive Republicans out of office," said Republican National Committee chairman Ken Mehlman, who accused an organization called the Democratic National Committee of spearheading the nationwide effort. "There are reports of television spots, print ads, even volunteers going door-to-door encouraging citizens to vote against us." Acknowledging that the "damage has already been done," Mehlman is seeking a promise from Democrats to never again engage in similar practices.

As always, their coverage is spot-on!

Election Day

I'm off to the polls to vote, and then will spend the day with the Waterford Dems, getting out the vote.

More later.

Voting has Consequences

Vote Today.

Vote Democratic.

Voting Democratic

This year I am going to do something that I've never done before - I am going to vote a straight Democratic ticket. This is not easy for me. I have always prided myself on my independence, my non-conformity. In my first presidential election, at the age of 18, I voted for Independent candidate Eugene McCarthy. I have even been known to pull the lever for the socialist workers party.

I've always believed that one should vote for the candidate, not the party. That we should carefully evaluate each potential office-holder, and choose the one best for the job.

I've voted for Democrats and Republicans in the past.

But no more.

Why? Because in voting for any Republican, I am enabling the Republican party. I am enabling Bush. And I don't want to enable them any more.

Today's Republicans are not the Republicans of old. They have turned their backs on Goldwater, on their old beliefs in fiscal responsibility and personal liberty. Republicans used to believe in the constitution; now they seem to find it an impediment in their Christian fundamentalist vision for America.

Why am I voting Democratic?

Shall I count the ways?

Abu Ghraib.
Guantanamo.
Terrorism (increased world-wide).
National security (diminished).
Unprecedented presidential powers
Unmatched incompetence.
Unparalleled corruption.
Unwarranted eavesdropping.
Katrina.
New Orleans (still in ruins).
Unemployment (still high).
Poverty (increasing).
Enron.
Halliburton.
Global warming (denial of).
Cheney's secret energy task force.
Record oil company profits
$3 gasoline (don't worry, it will go back up right after the election).
FEMA (destruction of).
The Supreme Court (politicization of).
Diebold.
Florida in 2000.
Ohio in 2004.
Terri Schiavo.
Stem cell research (banning of).
Golden parachutes.
Shrunken pensions.
Unavailable and expensive health care (40 million uninsured).
Habeas corpus (repeal of).
No weapons of mass destruction.
Sacrificed soldiers (3000).
Sacrificed Iraqi civilians (600,000).
Wasted billions.
Record spending.
Record deficits.
Cuts in veterans' programs.
Taliban resurgence.
Osama bin Laden (still free).
Expiration of the assault weapons ban.
North Korea
Iran.
Intelligent design.
Swift boat hit squads.
The Constitution (attacks upon).
Tom DeLay, Roy Blunt, Katherine Harris, John Doolittle, Jerry Lewis, Richard Pombo, Mark Foley, Dennis Hastert, David Safavian, Jack Abramoff, Ralph Reed, Karl Rove
An illegal and immoral war in Iraq.

So think, before you pull the lever - what do you want for America? More of the same? Or will you help me throw the bums out?

(Thanks to Molly Iivns, from whom I adapted the list.)

Vote!

Remember, it's not just another election--it's an intervention to save America!

Back in the USA

I'm back home, and adjusting to the time and weather changes. Brisbane, my last stop in Oz, was 14 hours ahead of Detroit, and it was getting to be a warm spring, with daytime temps in the 80s and higher.

On returning to Detroit, I was greeted by snow - not on the ground (yet), but a sky full of large, fluffy flakes.


I'm going to be updating my Luba Down Under site over the next few days. I had hoped to keep current while traveling, but "high speed internet" in Australia seems to be much, much slower than my DSL here at home. Uploading photos took forever, and my connection kept timing out. I finally just gave up.