Life's Terms

Mary Oliver

2009-02-22T15:36:00.001-08:00

Summer Day

Who made the world?

Who made the swan, and the black bear?

Who made the grasshopper?

This grasshopper, I mean--

the one who has flung herself out of the

grass,

the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,

who is moving her jaws back and forth

instead of up and down--

who is gazing around with her enormous

and complicated eyes.

Now she lifts her pale forearms and

thoroughly washes her face.

Now she snaps her wings open, and floats

away.

I don't know exactly what a prayer is.

I do know how to pay attention, how to fall

down

into the grass, how to kneel in the grass,

how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll

through the fields,

which is what I have been doing all day.

Tell me, what else should I have done?

Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?

Tell me, what is it you plan to do

With your one wild and precious life?

John Updike '62

2009-02-22T15:21:00.001-08:00

Earthworm

We pattern our Heaven

on bright butterflies,

but it must be that even

in earth Heaven lies.

The worm we uproot

in turning a spade

returns, careful brute,

to the peace he has made.

God blesses him; he

gives praise with his toil,

lends comfort to me,

and aerates the soil.

Yea Michigan

2008-10-02T20:46:00.001-07:00

Yea Michigan (my home state) !!!

McCain won't campaign there since they're hopelessly for Obama!

A medical racket?

2008-09-06T22:56:00.001-07:00

New info published in the Washington Post about detection of breast cancer revealed that when a woman has

a mamogram, read by a radiologist who says a biopsy is needed, IN ONLY 18% OF THE BIOPSYS DO THE LABS

FIND CANCER. That means , in 82% of biopsys ....no cancer, biopsy unneeded, mamogram misread. Wow!

Source: American Society of Clinical Oncology 2008 Breast Cancer Symposium in Washington DC , this week.

Remembering the Jewish Ghettos

2008-05-25T08:59:00.000-07:00

Ghetto -1." A section of a city, often run-down or overcrowded, inhabited chiefly by a minority group that is effectively

barred from living in other communities, as, because of racial prejudice or for economic or social reasons.2. A section

of a city in certain European countries in which Jews were formerly required to live."

How did the Nazi s manage to do this before they killed them.? No resistance to being forced to live in a special

place? They did it by using the Jews as managers and secret committee members so they would control their own

people. I had a friend once whose father was head of the ghetto in Berlin, before the Nazi s killed them all. She

was proud of the importance of her father....that he should be chosen. I thought that was crazy. Why would you serve

and work for the people in charge who were your enemy? Isn't that helping the enemy kill you?

This sort of thing still exists. Look around. Just as slavery still exists. Look around. Be aware. Be conscious.

Beethoven & Food

2008-05-13T20:34:00.001-07:00

Listening to KUSC, they talked about Beethoven's favorite food:

Macaroni & Cheese

Then potatoes and bread pudding.

Creativity

2008-05-08T20:08:00.001-07:00

Something I wrote in' '79 just resurfaced:

Creativity is a violence to the beliefs and order within a society; therefore, creative people often cluster in

Universities and become esoteric. There is a natural antipathy between creative people and society. To know this,

would help creative people.

By creative people, I mean, those who reach higher levels of integration and enlightment giving them sight that

most don't have.....into the universe and how we function and interrelate.

New evolutionary attainments = Higher levels of complexity.

Those who are, must be told and given assistance.

Obama

2008-04-24T13:58:00.000-07:00

Heard on Tom Hartman's show today: Nixon's daughter has donated the max amt to Obama's campaign! Smart lady.
I still don't understand why Obama's name was not on the ballot in Michigan. How is that possible.

Obama was a state senator for 12 years. -Illinois. . Obama was a law professor
at the U. of Chicago for 12 years.

Obama is a Christian and there is no way to say otherwise except by lying, outright.

Sufi poet Rumi

2008-04-04T15:28:00.000-07:00

"Out beyond ideas of wrong-doing and right-doing there is a field. I'll meet you there."

Lonliness

2008-04-04T15:27:00.001-07:00

For those of you who thought I was stuck in lonliness forever, I'm sure you'd like to know that it was only

temporary, while I had to remain in bed in excruciating pain, week after week, month after month. Now

I am relieved of the worst pain, getting good treatment, and am able to live an active life again...at least for

now.

2008-02-20T20:41:00.001-08:00

I must be getting well again. I overheard myself bitching today about all sorts of things..

Screwup

2008-02-17T12:35:00.001-08:00

Woman whose social security # got screwed up said,

"People don't realize how difficult it is to be dead when
you're not!!"

Cost of Living index

2008-01-22T14:42:00.001-08:00

Cost of food and the cost of oil are not included in the cost of living index.
According to Tom Hartman today
it used to be a real index of costs, but they decided to phony it up because they were afraid it would be too
expensive for things like social security and military paychecks. "They" being Greenspan and
his buddies in the Fed. Reserve and Treasury.

Meat and milk revisited

2008-01-21T20:48:00.001-08:00

In addition to the hormones in milk and meat, we now have clones of animals and milk

from cloned cows plus the hormones and antibiotics. The FDA has approved NO LABELS

of cloned meat or milk in spite of Congress and Public citizens angry outcry. We won't even

know what we are getting at the store. Best bet is to buy eveything labeled organic including

meat, milk , and vegies, if you care.

Hormones,Milk,Labeling,Corporate manipulation for Profit

2008-01-21T17:57:00.001-08:00

Drink milk? Today the milk cartons are labeled such as, ""no artificial growth hormones", "from cows not treated

with the growth hormone rBST", or " free from artificial growth hormones". I am so sick of hearing about the

hormones in everything esp. estrogen mimickers because the estrogen in our air, in our water, in our food

is screwing up our bodies. Now growth hormones added to milk.

Mansanto and the great agricultural giants do not want those labels so they are pushing the agricultural depts in

states across the country to ban the use of the labels on your milk. Depending on what state you live in, you

may not see the good labels that give us choice. Big fight going on ,and in Penn. they can still label their milk.

How about your state?

Imagine that. Laws against telling us about the food we buy. Guess the corporations are really sore about being

required to label the contents of our food. Now they want to ban labels. I can't wait til they put thru the law telling us

not just the country but the location where the food was grown.

A small forest of Birch trees

2008-01-16T15:54:00.001-08:00

Once I had a picture from Nature magazine that I gave away, as I like to share something special. Many many

times I wish that I had it back to share with others. Why such a big deal?

The beautiful two page picture of the Birch trees had a line across the bottom third of the picture and that 1/3 of

the page showed the root system....All the trees were part of one root system tho from the top of the earth the trees

appear separate and individual.

I think all humans are thus connected by the invisible.

Take care of your Intestines

2008-01-16T13:56:00.001-08:00

This party has lots of trouble in that dept. now. The disease I have called diverticulosis has

this week turned once more into diverticulitis...inflammation, and I am in excrutiating pain.

This disease can cause problems in other parts of the body, like the joints. So now the unhappy

gut causes joint pain and dysfunction, along with already existing arthritis and osteoporosis.

I think this bod is finished and its time to move on to the next life.

The lesson is : talk about and care for your intestines. Learn everything you can. The worst

of the current situation is the brain. As you know the gut and the brain are closely related.

With all the pain and dysfunction, my mind is slipping away. It feels like its going into paralysis.

I don't know if its the pain or the messengers in the gut that are shuting down the mind , but

it's a fact.

I have this wonderful book that says whatever makes me happy makes my gut happy so here

goes. I love to laugh. any suggestions?

Flower children

2008-01-14T19:31:00.000-08:00

The 60s in California were thousands and thousands of our generation pouring in. Haight-Asbury days; drugs like
LSD and pot were shared with love. We were anti authority, anti regidity and wanting a new world of peace and
love. Make love, not war was our sentiment. Almost all of us were looking for a new way to be. Every kind of guru
was emerging in all fields. Farms, communes, cults. People wanted to be together and there were plenty of
self-appointed male Gods to go around. These gurus found the desperate, vulnerable females and bound them
to the gurus. They were given work, tilling the soil, or playing con games or stealing or being sex toys. The guru
would take their money and limit their access to any money so they were not free to go anywhere and the brainwashing began, as well as the required work. The guru made the rules, acting as benevolent father and savior. Only he knew what was needed and so ruled, just like David Koresh. Almost all were associated with religion and
spirituality The Eastern religions became known and popular, so there was lots of singing , meditation, and drugs
and music and alcohol. Little did anyone know what was coming as the gurus became more god-like and dependent on the beautiful young men and women. Some cults became murderous, some became healing, some became political
activism. It even spread into professional groups...psychiatrists and psychologists with therapeutic communities.

All of them take away the individual identity, requiring each person to take on the group identity. You are taught that you were nothing before you came to the group and will be nothing if you leave.Then the male God
defines reality and makes the rules as to what should be done or not done. If you don't go along, you have to leave
or bear terrible abuse because the guru demands recognition of his all-knowing and all-ruling position. Do not
question or you may be dead, if not physically, then spiritually and personally because your identity has already been
eliminated. Nothing existed before the group. Funny how authoritarianism sneaks in the back door so slowly. The
boiled frog syndrome.

These cults are still around because people are needy and don't know what to do about it.

She thought she was safe from the drug culture, but was captured by the alcohol cult and then the psychology
cult. Once a person has enjoyed the group identity, growth usually stops because individual identity has stopped.
People who come out of a cult usually are pretty sensitive to those who want to take their voice away.
Ever noticed how often inflated egos speak for others. We are this and we do this. It's brain washing and incredibly
destructive to everyone involved. Some men, cult leaders make a pretense of supporting women's retreats while making sure they control what happens thru some women....Subtle manipulation
and control thru the women. Remember Charles Manson and his women.

The poor women. They think they're getting something while they give up their own voice and repeat the mantra..

2008-01-11T17:15:00.000-08:00

She was a beautiful young woman, lost and alone, vulnerable after her divorce in the 60s. Her family in the midwest

rejected her because she was, tsk tsk, a used woman no longer married as she should be, according to them.

So she went to California thinking that , at least in California people don't frown on being divorced. Alone in a strange

land without anyone to care, she found work, but she was lonely and desperate, as an old couple called her.

We know what happens to such women in the 60s. Somebody sees a opportunity and latches onto her. First

crushed by a man and then rejected by her family, she was easy prey.

Lonliness

2008-01-07T17:44:00.000-08:00

A terrible lonliness has payed a visit. I didn't sleep last nite and I'm scheduled for a cortisone shot

in my spine this week because of pain. I attended a gentle memorial service today that broke into my heart

with old grief and longing for God. What to do? I want to be with someone who loves me. It feels like

someone took a knife and cut open an old wound. Why now, God?l

Sick Families

2008-01-04T17:49:00.001-08:00

Amazing how many families don't know how sick they are. For example; how hard is it for a mother

and father with no responsibilities to their grown children, to facilitate the children being there for each other?

If one gets a graduate degree, the others would be informed and congratulations, if not gifts, would be sent.

And when there is nothing but shame and silence and lack of sharing, except to gossip

darkly and with condemnation and judgementalism....that's a very sick family.

Or a mother and father who can't stand the thought of their children leaving and creating their own life, so

they cling every day with phone calls and thoughts and emotions and make the children shamefully full of

guilt if they don't take care of mother and father first. They infantalize the children so they cannot become

adults and parents to another future generation. Then there are mothers and fathers who use their children

for labor because they don' t have the remotest idea of what nurture and education mean..

When you work with families, you see the destructiveness under the disguise of love. It makes me want to

up chuck when peope say things like , " our group is just like a family".

Huckabee and Norris

2008-01-04T17:19:00.001-08:00

Heard on c-span today: Chuck Norris on taxes. He said the middle class pays 80% of taxes.He said Huckabee's proposal is for Corporations to pay that 80% and the middle class none.

He also said that Arab nation leaders travel here by

jumbo jet, buy millions of dollars worth of merchandise, pack it into the jumbo jet and take it home AND never

pay taxes. They too should pay their share of taxes. He also said the IRS should be dumped .

If Huckabee does go very far, the corps will no doubt dump him.

Great Minds

2008-01-01T18:03:00.001-08:00

I just picked up this quote from John's blog. I think you'all would love it.(his blog) John Moore .

"Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people".

Eleanor Roosevelt

Change our minds

2008-01-01T16:26:00.001-08:00

Candace Pert's new book is called, Your Body is Your SubConscious Mind. A good ole psychotherapist

is still what we need to change that. Affirmations will work if you say them all day everyday for a year, but

I don't know anyone who has the time to do that and for me, that would drive me crazy besides the fact that

I don't think I could do it.

It surely explains diseases of the body that seem so unconnected to our minds.

Better not to think if our thinking gets us into disease, don't you think???

A problem with corporations

2008-01-01T16:19:00.001-08:00

How do we say yes to corporations when they don't pay their own way? They take our land , our water, our

natural resources, our air and give us back pollution that they make us pay for. They say that's all free stuff.

Anybody can use the roads air waves, etc, etc, but who pays for them? You and I and definitely not the corporations.

When they create and invest in something new, they usually give something....not nearly what they take. Think

about the infrastructure that never gets renewed or is renewed at such a low grade, tragedies occur and failure is

laid on someone else's shoulders. (railroad tracks and trains; nuclear power plants, etc.)

They make the profit, pocket the money and scream that you and I should pay(and do) to clean up after them.

That's why I refuse to invest in public corporations. They are robber barrons and have only one goal in the

world and that is money. In fact, if they display any other goal they are not acting in accordance with their

charter.

Old idea

2008-01-01T16:07:00.001-08:00

If you say yes to the universe, the universe will say yes back to you.

Just learned about the social security increase of 2.3. How do we say yes to that when the real inflation isn't

counted in the tabulation? For example, home fuel to stay warm and transportation fuel are not counted as

items to consider for cost of living. There are others too, that are excluded from the list. I heard Alan Greenspan

once talk about ,how the calculation changes could partly solve the problem of social security going broke. So

they did that and the increase this year won't cover the increase in gasoline price in my budget.

Anybody know where I can find the list of other items that are not included in the cost of living increase for

social security?

China

2007-12-24T20:37:00.000-08:00

China was incredibly advanced centuries ago and they have come back so fast in recent years. I just read that

the people in China with the highest I.Q. (25% of the pop.) are equal to the total number of people in North
America. They have as many brilliant residents as we have residents. Sure looks like they will swallow us up

soon, so not to worry about our expanding population from illegal, ignorant immigrants.

There are families

2007-12-24T17:08:00.000-08:00

There are families that teach the children how to be respectful and honest with each other

and teach the children how to be best friends to each other and help each other.

FCC Chairman

2007-12-15T14:33:00.000-08:00

Watching C-span...legislators questioning the FCC commissioners about their rush to allow the mega corps

to become mega mega. The public and the congressional reps all say, slow down, and get priorities straight.

The chair, Martin acts and talks like he is 'the aurthority' and the president of the us. He spoke to the

legislators as if they were his personal advisors and bluntly said he was going to do it 'his way' no matter

what anyone said. Isn't he accountable to anyone?

To Shorten Winter

2007-12-08T10:06:00.000-08:00

To shorten winter, borrow some money

due in the spring.

W.J. Vogel

Worth Repeating- Lionel Corbett

2007-11-22T10:21:00.000-08:00

"There are still people who have very powerful, spiritually important visions, but they don't talk

about them. Some people have these experiences in nature. They are the nature mystics; they

experience the devine in the natural world. [yours truly] Some people experience it in relationships.

Some people through creative work. [ music, art] Some people through the body. Some

people through our pathology and illlnesses. Religions have given you a few ways to experience it,

[the sacred] but in fact there are all kinds of ways to exerience it."

Thanksgiving Greetings

2007-11-21T23:08:00.001-08:00

Hope your Thanksgiving was about love and gratitude.

Answering questions

2007-11-16T21:53:00.000-08:00

When you love people, single or plural, you try to answer their questions to the best of your

ability. When you don't love, you withhold and disregard questions.

TaoTeh King LXXIII

2007-11-10T17:29:00.001-08:00

Nature itself has the patience to endure insult, yet always wins in the end.

It does not explain; nevertheless all understand.

It does not command; but all eventually obey.

It does not hurry; yet everything is accomplished.

Nature's web is so wisely woven- wide enough to catch the biggest, fine enough to catch the smallest--

that not a single thing escapes.

Anonymous Programs

2007-11-08T14:03:00.000-08:00

Anonymous Programs are misnamed these days. They have swung all the way to the opposite side

of anonymous. The members, lacking better things to do, discuss other members ad nausea. There is

more gossip and more judgementalism then there is in society at large. In a small community, the

psychiatrists and therapist, who know most of the members, also discuss and gossip about patients

on a daily basis. In essence,

this is a form of social control, but it was never intended to be that.

One of the ways of control, as in all good cults, is to condemn anyone who leaves.

That is to make people afraid to leave.It serves to keep the membership up. All cults use this

and shun people who leave the club or church group.I understand the Book of Revelations in the Bible

was written for exactly that reason. Members will tell you all the rational reasons,

except that the club or church could not meet the needs of that person. or that the club has gone

insane with their rules and regulations and nasty gossip. The members cannot concieve of their

being something better in the world then what they have. They are sad, sick folks.It's a woeful self-obsession

by the group as well as the individuals in it. . It's a belief that I'm ok, you're not. If you leave, you are less

then the people who stay. No freedom of thought involved. One must think and talk as dictated by the

good book and the priests or senior members or self-appointed leaders. But it works to keep people faithful. People

used to be able to get help and move on, but no more. Gossip has substituted for letting go of another habit. As if

that were the be-all and end- all of life. People with diseases form groups and run together because it gives them

an identity, when life fails them or they fail life. Their friendships are not real, but are totally dependent

on their membership. Leave the membership, away go the friends.

Nothing emerges in any friendship except the cult beliefs. Great thinkers and leaders do not come from

these cults because the members are obedient sheep.

Many escape and move on with their lives building wonderful relationships and creating wonderful things, but

they will always be spit upon by the membership who are too sick to create a life for themselves and

others full of blessings, creativity, love, and joy.

Tao Teh King

2007-11-07T22:53:00.001-08:00

If one remains silent and keeps to himself, he will not fail to fulfill his life;

But if he gives advice and meddles in others' affairs, he invites trouble.,

Gossip

2007-11-07T22:50:00.001-08:00

Folks who don't know how to talk directly to a person....you know, like an old fashioned I, Thou

conversation, find confort in talking about people. As Oprah puts it, " Gossip means we haven't

emboldened ourselves to talk directly to the people we take issue with.".

If someone asks you about someone else, give them their phone no and say, Call them yourself!

or, Ask them yourself.

Everytime you gossip about someone, you diminish yourself and all involved. I have never seen so

much gossip disguised as concern. If you are so concerned, why not contact that person directly?

If you ask people how they are in order to report to someone else, the real question is, "Why do

you ask?

The Business of Cancer

2007-10-26T04:33:00.001-07:00

The true story you'll find here

What's the point of name calling?

2007-10-26T04:14:00.001-07:00

Name calling, mud slinging, & labeling. What it says about you.

l. You prove to the world that you can look at a tree and say, That's a tree.
2. You diminish, demean & dismiss, proving how abusive you can be.
3. You reveal your incapacity to dialogue, teach, or be kind.

Buying from Communist China

2007-10-25T18:37:00.001-07:00

When we buy products made in China remember this (from Lou Dobbs today). Christmas Tree
Lights and artificial flowers are made with prison labor, and when we buy them we are
supporting Communist Labor Camps. We'need to start thinking more about who is making our products. I, for one, don't buy either.

Messages from Within

2007-10-25T13:03:00.000-07:00

Sometimes your body tells you to do one thing and your coach tells you to do another. Listening to inner messages

about your life, your body, your food culture, your vulnerabilities, your history can head off serious illness.

Pump up your metabolism! Is that really what your body needs? You may need more rest programmed

into your life. Our dear friend, Oprah, did everything for everyone...on stage every day, pushed her body til she

was thin and looked like a model. Her thyroid gland went wacko. First overactive, then underactive and now 20

or some pounds later with swollen face and body, she fights for her life.....still doing the shows, talking more

about death and illness than weddings and clothes, marriage and babies and parties. My take is she was listening

to all the coaches and doctors and physical therapists and psychologists and friends and experts rather then

her inner voice. Her soul will have it's way. A good book on that subject is, The Souls Code by James Hillman.

Not for wimps.

What kind of response?

2007-10-22T22:04:00.001-07:00

How you respond to another person is the next level of love.
A negative response is, of course, better then nothing but very low
level of love, and of course connected to hateful
actions. Indifference is truly the opposite of love. That's why we see
families full of fantasy and hate still sticking together.

Response is the First step of love

2007-10-22T21:07:00.001-07:00

When you refuse to respond to someone who sends you a wire, or makes a phone call to
you, that is proof of your lack of love for that person. Pehaps there was none to begin with, but
pretending to care and then not responding is the equivalent of saying, 'drop dead'. And when
you explore that negative sentiment, you will find your hostility, resentment, fear and everything that holds
you back from being a whole, loving human being. This is where you look when you wonder why you
didn't reach your dreams or goals or hopes.

Even a negative response is higher then no response at all.

Who stears your ship?

2007-10-18T22:22:00.000-07:00

Do you ever wonder how you arrive at your opinions? Who do you believe when they talk? Most Joes and Janes on the

street believe anything anyone tells them. Especially if it is juicy gossip that feeds your need to hurt someone because

you have been so hurt. Hurt people hurt people. And we have masses of folks in this category and increasing as fast

as the Republicans can do it. As they eliminate the middle class and increase slavery, there are more and more hurt

people who are unable to keep up and give the good stuff to their children. That pain then gets inflicted on others and

torture now becomes common. Our whole society once becoming beautiful, now becomes ugly.

Drug Business

2007-10-12T19:19:00.001-07:00

The FDA doesn't allow us to have drugs from Canada, but China is ok. The FDA estimated that 50% of the

ingredients of drugs sold in this USA are from China...unregulated. Makes you wonder what you're getting

in your drugs. What is in the pill comes uninspected from China (50%) and then the pharm houses here

put it together and sell it here. Remember all the BS in the legislature about their protecting the public

by not allowing us to buy Canadian drugs. This was reported on Lou Dobbs CNN News

a couple days ago. I don't think we should forget it anytime soon.

So if you have a deadly drug reaction like I have had recently, we can only guess at the cause.

Run in packs

2007-10-01T09:14:00.000-07:00

Individuals are targets of our police state. Remember this. After the airlines have removed all respect and
dignity to their customers, an angry,frightened and verbal lady from New York was handcuffed and locked alone
in a room at the airport in the great city of Phoenix, and died...was killed probably death by fear. After all, behind
anger is fear. Don't the police know that?

The police in all forms go after the person who is alone first. Wouldn't it be nice if they
could think ....'protect the person alone'.

Best to be part of a gang...could be a family gang or a church gang.
Police and police-like people see themselves as thought police,
behavior police, attitude police, word police. If they don't like something, they tell you either publicly or in the privacy of your home where they feel they have a right to come or
write you a threatening letter. With a little power, they like to threaten people. It's all very legal as
are the police who handcuffed the woman, tassered the student, kill the students, beat up any black man alone
and allow the illegal Mexicans to screen and yell in rage in our streets (in a crowd of course).You think they don't know there's safety in numbers?

The police are afraid of any irregularity. If you are angry and alone, they will lock you up, unless you cower around them.

Y'all let this happen. Who controls the police? Remember to cower, my friends.

NASdaq Stock Exchange

2007-09-21T19:07:00.001-07:00

Arabs are in the process of buying 20% of the NASDAQ Stock Exchange. Perhaps they will just

buy us out so we have no land to call our own, etc. I believe the saying is: lot, stock and barrel.?

Other countries now own a portion, if not all, of our municipal water operations, our roads, our businesses,

our ports, . We are such fools for a buck or a pitch that we will get something. I think it may be because

we do not teach the children to think, to explore, to be curious and aware.

Communist China

2007-09-21T18:58:00.001-07:00

In the news today, Mattell Toy Co. apologized to China for the recall of Mattell toys. The toys may

kill your kids, but we mustn't offend Communist China.

Farmers Not Allowed to Plant Seeds

2007-09-14T10:14:00.001-07:00

Farmers in Iraq are not allowed to plant their own seeds (reuse) on their farms since we moved in. They are forced to buy

licenses from corporations to receive new seed each year. They have traditional varieties for their area, but the

U.S. military in bed with American companies want them to use GMO seeds patented and sold by American companies.

How do they do that? By Operation Amber Waves. Order 81, issued in 2004 by Paul Bremer, the head of the

Coalition Provisional Authority.

Why do they hate us? Maybe Americans will wake up when U.S. military authorities come into U.S. homes with

human sperm and eggs and require couples to implant the humans to grow in your body. They probably will be

sperm and eggs from warriors.

Bush

2007-09-07T12:18:00.001-07:00

Just saw our Pres. on TV and I swear his nose is getting longer.

Considering buying new pillows?

2007-09-06T09:03:00.000-07:00

Flame retardants in furniture, pillows, etc may be very dangerous to our health. Folks here like to put-down

the Europeans, but get this......"New chemicals must be proved safe before they can be used in Europe. In good ole

USA, chemicals have to be proved unsafe before you can get them off the market."..New York Times. Here there is no problem marketing

and spreading chemicals anytime , anything, anywhere until somebody proves them unsafe. For example, flame retardants (PBDE s) in foam furniture padding, TV casings and plastics and foam may cause

breast problems...found in mother's milk and now there are big issues around increasing thyroid problems in people connected to chemicals in everything.

When are we Americans going to get smart about health?

Night 2

2007-09-04T19:22:00.000-07:00

But people did go out, and they did so despite the warnings of the Churches and city councils. Come dusk, bells were rung, horns were blown, and drums were beaten; city gates were shut, drawbridges raised, and stragglers forced to scurry home to light candles and tend the hearth. In medieval France, and throughout Europe, strict curfews were imposed. Around eight or nine in the evening, a bell sounded to indicate the Couvre-feu, or putting out of fires, from which the word 'curfew' derives.

To make the night even less hospitable, city officials saw to it that chains and logs blocked off major thoroughfares, and that crimes committed after curfew met with stiff penalties. When a woman of Siena was found guilty of assault in 1342, her punishment was halved because she had attacked a man, then doubled because she had hit him in his home, and then doubled again because the infraction had occurred at night. In some Swedish cities, a robbery committed after the curfew bell warranted the death penalty. In many European jurisdictions, killing a house breaker was legal if the crime occurred at night but not after sunrise.

...............................................A good night's sleep for people in pre-industrial society was, at best, a long shot. There may not have been car alarms, ambulance sirens, or pneumatic drills, but there were watchmen shouting, bells ringing, dogs howling, mice scampering, roofs leaking, timbers shrinking, and chamber pots smelling. Most people slept on straw pallets or rough mats, or perhaps shared a cot with two or three siblings, along with fleas, lice, and bugs. Chronic fatigue was the norm, and sleep was valued in ways that we probably can't imagine. What rouses us from our own dogmatic slumbers, however, is Ekirch's assertion that "until the close of the early modern era, Western Europeans on most evenings experienced two major intervals of sleep bridged by up to an hour or more of wakefulness." People, evidently, awoke after midnight and, instead of tossing and turning, they regularly got up to talk, study, pray, and do chores.

Night 1

2007-09-02T22:15:00.001-07:00

Excerpt from Arthur Krystal's book, At Days Close: Night in Times Past.

Today, those who live far from the tips of the earth, where it is continuous night half the year, rarely find themselves in the dark. Unless you're hacking your way through jungle or humping along in the desert, some form of artificial lighting, either a light bulb or an LEDis sure to be nearby. Electric light is so much a staple of modern life that we forget that there are people around whose parents relied on only two sources of light: the sun and fire. Thomas Edison's bright idea of 1879 notwithstanding, many homes, until the second or third decade of the 20th century, were lit by small flames burning in gas

lamps. In terms of radiant power, then, the Dark Ages lasted a lot longer than you may have thought.

How dark was it? Let's put it this way: an electric current coursing through a tunsten filament in a small glass vacumn produces a hundred times the light emitted by a candle or oil lamp. And, considering that no European cities deployed any kind of public lighting before 1650, the world atnight was no place to take a stroll. Moonless nights presented a darknesss so complete that anyone bold enough to step into Shakespeare's "vast sin-concealing chaos" was at risk of losing his footing, his purse, and his life. Carriages tumbled into ditches; houses were broken into or set on fire; and town squares

filled up with beggars, prostitutes, crooks, and the crooked. In many cities, gangs roamed the streets. In 1606, a gangbanger by the name of Caravaggio killed a rival in Rome and fled to Naples. In London, young rakes, with such high-sounding names as the Scowrers, the Mohocks, and the Hectors, staked out territory and busted heads. (It's the street gang, not the noble Trojan, to which we owe the verb "to hector.") As Ekirch sees it, the night was "a forbidding place plagued by pestilential vapors, diabolical spirits, nbatural calamity, and human depravity." No wonder that the Italian proverb admonished, "Who goes out at night looks for a beating."

to be continued. . . .

Bugging

2007-08-29T12:20:00.000-07:00

I can't decide which bugs me the most.: People who 'think they know it all' or,
People who want to make all the rules within the law. I have only for those who deliberately
disregard the laws, as I do for people who gossip.

On the subject of A.Gonzalez, whenever I can't remember how to spell his name, I look in the phonebook
where there are hundreds of them. It seems noteworthy that today, one can no longer find his name anywhere
in the news, or about his leaving , even when doing a Google Search. What I wanted to say about him and the
millions upon millions of illegal Mexicans, is their basic attitude that they should make up their own rules and
laws and disregard the laws of our country. Apparently his parents were illegal Mexicans* and I fear the attitude
of these illegal Mexicans (and his family) is that our rules and laws need not be followed and they can make up their own
laws.The Mexican gangs and mafia that are flooding over our border reflect that same basic attitude. A.
Gonzalez' disregard of the Geneva Convention and support of worldwide torture is one example that basically
destroys everything we Americans have created and stand for.

*When asked on a talk show if his parents were illegal immigrants, he said he didn't know.

Science or Dreams?

2007-08-28T09:36:00.000-07:00

Christiane Amapour( Sp.?) reported in her TV special that 53% of Americans believe in Creationism, wherein

no evolution exists. People were just popped into existence one day by the hand of God. THAT is why our

nation is in trouble. Those people will believe anything any politician tells them if it's dreamy enough.

Prozac

2007-08-28T09:22:00.001-07:00

I have not been able to build a relationship with a client or friend who

is on prozac. This might be the reason...the ultimate control of the masses.

Are you being drugged?

IMPRESSIONS

by Claire Rabe

She recused herself from aging by putting a condom on her brain, safe thinking

ensured by Prozac, feelings kept in check while her skeleton crumbled or fused

in microbytes, growing down as quickly as her granddaughter up. At night she

retired with her best friend--her bed; in the goose-down cave she had prozaic dreams.

She rejected the irretrievable, away with sadness, her morning cup of serotonin

guaranteed a comfort zone peopled by the zombie in the mirror of her medicine

cabinet.

The Mouse and The Donald

2007-08-24T11:07:00.001-07:00

by Yoni Brenner

Ambling through Central Park one day, a mouse happens upon Donald Trump,

trapped in a hunter's net. The mouse asks the Donald if he can be of any

assistance. "How could you help me?" scoffs the Donald. "I am Donald Trump and

you are just a lowly mouse."

Several years later, the Donald calls the mouse into his office. "Your division

underperformed again, Johnson," says the Donald. "Someone's gonna have to take

the fall." "But, Donald!" cries the mouse. "Don't you remember why you hired me?

How I nibbled through that net and saved you from the hunters?" The Donald thinks

for a moment, then replies, " I don't remember it that way."

Moral: Success is fleeting, so keep a paper trail.

ADD...Attention Deficit Disorder

2007-08-23T10:24:00.001-07:00

The word is finally out....it ain't no disease! They are normal, healthy kids
that prefer lots of physical activity. Back in the tribal days, they would be
the hunter-gatherers. It's in the genes.

First the teachers and doctors called it "hyperactive". Then the teachers, moms
and doctors found it so irritating, they turned it into a disease and drugged the
kids. Now the truth is out. Children live and learn in a variety of ways, just as they
have a variety of talents..

West Nile Virus

2007-08-23T10:14:00.001-07:00

It's in our county now, so try not to get mosquito bites. They are

usually active at dawn and sunset. Y'all know the routine. Keep

your skin covered...neck, arms, legs, etc. . . .

Two Warnings for our Seniors

2007-08-03T17:17:00.001-07:00

Today - 2 warnings for seniors.

Stay inside at dawn and dusk because of West Nile virus from mosquitos.

We have 3 counties (Kern is one) under alert because

of deaths.

Stay inside day & nite to prevent breathing ash filled air from the Zaca Fire.

Cabbage

2007-07-22T20:58:00.001-07:00

Cabbage is good for the mucus lining of the stomach,
and lowers blood pressure. Cheers for cabbage!

Then there are women. . . .

2007-07-06T22:29:00.000-07:00

who want to have a choice about what happens to their bodies and want that choice to be applied

to all women. In other words, these women want to choose what happens to other women's bodies

and not allow them to choose for themselves. These are run-the-whole-show women who are authoritarian

dictators who what total control and obedience- a serious kind of arrogant superiority. What's good

for them, they think, is good for the world.

Any Woman

2007-06-24T11:41:00.001-07:00

Any woman who thinks she should not have a choice about what happens to her body

should be confined to her husband's home without the right to vote or confined to a convent

where the priest will make all the decisions for her, and her only assignment is obedience

to the priest in charge. She should not be allowed to participate in any intelligent discussion, tho

she should be allowed paper and pencil to keep a diary.

Coming Topics

2007-05-27T11:03:00.001-07:00

Lowering the bar-Americans Failure-Boiled Frog Syndrome

One-size-fits-all Thinking and Recommending-if it works for me, it's good for you

Regardless of differences.

Live in the Now

2007-05-18T11:06:00.001-07:00

Living in the present is an excellent recommendation for people trapped by past experiences or people
who are so future oriented or goal directed that they miss the whole experience of Now...who never stop to take
a deep breath or smell a flower.

We have to consider what else lives in the Now. The id lives in the Now.
Instant gratification lives in the Now. Hunger and disease live in the Now. Death lives in
the Now. If you don't plant the seeds to grow in the future, there's no food unless you steal
it or have inherited wealth from some who did not live in the Now.. Sexual desire lives in the Now.
If there is no future, why not take what you want Now? Pain and Anger live in the Now. If there
is no future, why not beat up others who cause you pain?
Earthquakes, storms, hurricanes, floods,
fires, tsunamis, tornados, pollution of air and water and food live in the Now. If you want
any protection or shelter, someone has to put their head in the future and make a plan.
If you want health care for yourself and loved ones and you live in the Now,
and have no money, your only option is to steal it or beg it from others who do
not live in the Now.

Children have the luxury of living in the now. It's instinctive. Parents work and create to provide

for their family for today and the future. Priests have the luxury of living in the now, so long as

someone else takes care of them.

Who would delay gratification and go to school to be a doctor or lawyer or writer if there
are no needs tomorrow, to anticipate?

A lot of fundamentalists firmly believe that Armageddon is coming soon so there is no point
in being concerned or even thinking about global warming or peace. It's a kind of thinking that
says, rape the earth for Now because we'll all be gone soon. Some people call that
spiritual, but I call it instant gratification from thinking and living in the Now.

If we are on the moral high ground and live in the now, we must be willing to die...
starve to death or allow the sword to be thrust thru without fighting back, or allow
a disease to ravage our mind and body without help.

Virginia Tech Massacre

2007-05-16T13:17:00.001-07:00

Anyone remember the date? Or the number of dead and
injured?

The bullies are still having a hayday. The response of Americans
to the bullies around us is ziltch, as far as I can tell. And the bullies
create rage. If you can persuade the victims of bullies to kill themselves,
then they leave other people alone, but when they take down others
with them, we notice for a few days.

And I think our foreign policy has become Bully Policy.

The Disconnect

2007-04-21T00:15:00.001-07:00

Technological changes have made us feel that we are more connected because of

e-mail,internet, cell phones, TV etc. etc. What if that is an illusion? Suppose humans only

experience REAL connect ,in person with all senses operating whether they touch or not?

In truth, the sound of a voice over technology is not connecting to a human voice. It's only

a small bit of information that we have trained ourselves to think is the other person.

Serious Pain Relief thru Vision

2007-03-12T12:32:00.001-07:00

A story from Paul and Pat Churchland

The psychologist and neuroscientist V.S. Ramachandran turned up at U.C.S.D. as a junior faculty member around the

same time Pat and Paul arrived. Paul met him first, when Ramachandran went to one of his talks because he was

amused by the arrogance of its title- "How the Brain Works." Then Pat started observing the work in Ramachandran's lab.

She saw him perform a feat that seemed to her nearly as astonishing as curing the blind:

seating at a table, a patient suffering from pain in a rigid phantom arm, he held up a mirror in such a way that the

paitent's working arm appeared in the position of the missing one, and then instructed him to move it. As if by magic,

the patient felt the movement in his phantom limb, and his discomfort ceased. Pat spent more and more time at

Ramachandran's lab, and later on she collaborated with him on a paper title "A Critique of Pure Vision," which argued

that the function of vision was not to represent the world but to help a creature survive, and that it had evolved,

accordingly, as a partial and fractured system that served the more basic needs of the motor system.

From a profile in "The New Yorker", 'Two Heads' by L.MacFarquhar

Remembering who you are. . .

2007-03-03T16:10:00.000-08:00

When I have forgiven myself

and remembered who I am,

I will bless everyone and

everything I see.

A truth about Perception

2007-03-03T12:19:00.000-08:00

Perception can make whatever picture

the mind desires to see.

Remember this.

In this lies either Heaven or hell,

as you elect.

To Be Your True Self

2007-02-28T01:25:00.000-08:00

"You need not leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. You need

not even listen,simply wait. You need not even wait, just learn to become quiet, and

still, and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked. It has no

choice; it will roll in ecstasy at your feet."

Franz Kafka

'Dinner With Friends'

2007-02-11T10:57:00.000-08:00

I kept watching it because it was a 3 star movie so it really didn't grab

me as an interesting movie, but it turned out to be a beautiful study

in marriage and male-female relationships. I highly recommend it...

as good, if not better, then 'Someone to Love' .

Tapping your phone!!!

2007-02-04T23:23:00.000-08:00

From the Sheriff's Blotter: February 2007: Cable television installation tools, including a specialized

phone used to tap into phone lines, were stolen from a truck parked in town. the victim reported

the grand theft the next day after the theft. The work items are valued at more than $1,500.

It appears anyone, anytime may be listening to your land line calls. I wonder about cell phones.

Cure for Cancer...it appears

2007-01-18T19:19:00.000-08:00

http://calsun.canoe.ca/News/Alberta/2007/01/18/3399917-sun.html

Check out the news...above

A simple known drug, DCA, dichloroacetate will

probably not get trials because there is no profit

in it for pharmaceuticals. If there is no money in it,

there is no interest in healing and you can be sure

the Cancer Foundations, who pull in all the millions,

will have nothing to do with finding a simple cure

because then they would be out of business.

We already know that the chemical industry that

makes and adds carcinogens to our life, also makes

the treatment drugs that almost kill people. How can

they give up such profitable products?

Death Penalty for Corporations

2007-01-11T19:27:00.000-08:00

I think we will hear a lot about this in coming months. Since corps are chartered by the people

to do business, the people can take away their charter for wrongdoing.....if our legislators and

judges serve the people. Of course, it may be too late. That is, the corporations may already own

our government. So many of the people in power now, truly believe one should run the government

like a corporation. For those who know, know that corps are not democracies. They are basically

authoritarian....line down....do what you're told to do and shut up....make money any way you can

......break the law and pay your fees just so the big money keeps pouring in.

I believe that's why the corporate executives make so much money now. They know how bad they

are and destructive and take the lead.

Choosing Chosen. . .

2007-01-08T20:51:00.000-08:00

My morals have been chosen

Your morals have been chosen.

How did we choose our morals?

Did we not choose chosen morals?

Chosen by those who chose chosen morals?

Consider choosing not choosing chosen.

Harry Walker

Forgiveness

2007-01-07T18:31:00.000-08:00

When someone asks for your forgiveness, isn't it important to ask what they

want forgiveness for?

No Blame

2007-01-07T18:29:00.000-08:00

One of the things I love about the Book of Changes ( I Ching) is the reaffirmation
of No Blame after describing the events and how to best relate to them.

On that subject, Deepak Chopra said, " When you become defensive, blame others,
and do not accept and surrender to the moment, your life meets resistance. Any time
you encounter resistance, recognize that if you force the situation, the resistance will only
increase. You don't want to stand rigid like a tall oak that cracks and collapses in the storm.
Instead, you want to be flexible, like a reed that bends with the storm and survives.....

.......If you observe people around you, you'll see that they spend ninety-nine percent of their time
defending their points of view."

Keeping your mind large . .

2007-01-01T22:11:00.000-08:00

There are so many small minds that throw out nets to capture you into their level of thinking. They're all around us.....tearing at us to think small. Gossip will do that, jealous people, full of hate people, withholding controlling people, etc. etc.

We get caught in their nets when we are vulnerable. When we are strong we can give them a loving up-level showing

them a positive aspect or broader aspect.

Back drop . . .

2006-12-30T20:54:00.000-08:00

Watching and listening to the Lou Dobbs show on Thursday, Christine gave the White

House report from Texas. Behind her was an enlarged photo of a very broken down shack.

Cute shananigans, but why would CNN be doing those kind of impressions?

By the way, there's an article on Lou Dobbs in the New Yorker this month. I found it interesting.

Autism Alert

2006-12-24T00:02:00.000-08:00

Autism is increasing rapidly and increasingly.(now 1 in 166 births). An anti-social disease, yet humans have been high social animals. Exploring the causes, we find the-mother-who-can't-relate was

considered the primes cause 40-50 years ago. Other ideas.... because of autism heavy metals

cannot be eliminated as easily...bowel problems high in autism....that's where things are absorbed and eliminated.

Information superhighway, tv, radio waves, computers, microwave ovens, electromagnetic waves & spectrum have effects

some think are causal for autism. What of MRI? Industry & Technology.as cause....we don't see autism on farms.

My hunch still relates to relating. The more technological we become, the more distant and unconnected we are to

each other. High tech parents are more likely to produce autism....more autism in Silicone Valley.

Bogeymen

2006-12-23T23:06:00.000-08:00

Folks use the term for general scary things and when I was growing up, it was even used to redicule

little ones who are afraid of the unknown. A tape at the library about old sailing ships around the

world said the bogeymen were a group of pirates in a particular place in the area of Indonesia who

would board a ship in the still of nite and cut the throats of all the crew, without warning.They were

so quiet and seemed to come out of the nowhere that special care had to be taken in certain waters

to survive. Based in history....not fiction.

Keeping your head in the light

2006-12-23T17:56:00.000-08:00

Seems the challenge of life is to keep your own head in the light and
still look at the darkness (don't turn away and only look at the cheery side
of things). If you are really in the light, you will pierce the darkness with
your light and bring light to the dark.

Many religious groups teach people to only hang out with positive people.
I suppose they can only keep their positive attitude by being around others
who have a positive attitude. Perhaps their light is too dim or they don't
know how to restore it. It's sad, n'est ce pas? So unlike our great avatars.

We are all connected.

2006-12-23T17:04:00.000-08:00

Stuart Wilde writes , The Safety of Tenderness . It's a good time to
think about what he wrote.

UCLA data security breach

2006-12-16T23:37:00.000-08:00

Seems data on some 800,000 students has been taken. It includes vital statistics , social security,

etc, etc. They notified everybody, but think about it. With all the identity theft going on which

practically destroys peoples lives, there is no safety , no security. Credit card companies and

universities give it away. Then everybody moves on to the next news while lives are destroyed.

My bank of 20 years asked me all kinds of personal information the other day because of new

policies even tho the teller knew me for years, as if the customer is the security problem when

they are the problem.

When I moved and notified the credit card company 2 months in advance, they continued to

send blank checks to my old address 3 months later. When I complained, they had no shame

and no apology. Their attitude was it was perfectly justified because that's how long it takes

for them to change an address. BE FORWARNED.

A Culture of Sex Offenders?

2006-12-16T03:05:00.000-08:00

According to the TV fiction program, Numbers, there are 491,000 registered sex offenders in the U.S.
Those would be just the ones who have been caught, punished, and released.
They are so sneeky that I would say it probably represents about 50% or less of the total sex offenders.

Why bother to report such information? We should know what's going on around us. How
do we create so many sick people? Are we a doomed society that is morally bankrupt like
our Congress and Administration? Is it too much blind religion or too little religion?.

Scoop

2006-12-15T20:46:00.000-08:00

You can press escape all you like, but it won't

do anything if the keyboards not plugged in.

Pixy Misa @ Ambient Irony

Let Them Be Sick

2006-12-15T11:05:00.000-08:00

I am remembering Marie Antoinette's attitude of "Let them eat cake". She was so out of touch with reality,that her
only frame of reference for someone who had no bread, was to eat something else....eat cake instead.

George W. Bush will be remembered for his attitude reflected in "Let them be sick". I began wondering,
Who cares about clean air? You can't see it or feel it, so it doesn't exist. I think that would be the response of most people, because most people are that insensitive as adults. Especially if they are hungry.

I can imagine Bush saying," Who cares about clean air or clean water? Let them be sick! We've got that covered
with drugs and health insurance companies, ha, ha, ha!"

From the current New Yorker, I learn the Clean Air Act initiated under Nixon, was indeed a bright spot.
Those who care about such things are now having to go before the U.S.Supreme Court to get our nation
turned around from deliberately destroying its own people with pollution leading now to global warming.

How is Bush any different from Marie Antoinette?

War ON Terror

2006-12-10T18:29:00.000-08:00

What crazy doubletalk....War ON Terror ! War IS terror. It's like saying, War on War .

Noam Chomsky

2006-12-03T21:25:00.000-08:00

He now has a web-site, chomsky.info, this year.

He also has all kinds of new books and DVD out. I just viewed Power and Terror

and found incredible intellectual harmony listening to his reasoning. I think he believes

in the equality of nations.....that one standard for us and another for others just ain't the

way its supposed to be.

Confucious Says . . .

2006-12-03T18:06:00.000-08:00

Hold faithfulness and sincerity as first principles.

Have no friends not equal to yourself. When you

have faults, do not fear to abandon them.

Complicated Voting Machines

2006-12-03T11:05:00.000-08:00

Ken on Conscious Junkyard here has a post describing in detail (very well written) on his experience

voting on a Diebold machine. If you have time, its worth reading. I learned about the use of

thermal paper for receipt and realized Sears is doing that. When you have a receipt that you

can't read anymore (which I keep for household items) think of thermal paper.

Ken knows what he's doing. Imagine someone voting on Diebold who is not familiar with computers.

From Net of Fireflies

2006-12-03T10:32:00.000-08:00

The noble lord gets off his horse.

And who makes him dismount?

The cherry blossoms do.

Issa

Death Poems

2006-12-01T18:03:00.000-08:00

Ah, nightingale, with half your song expressed,

I leave for the next world---to hear the rest!

Anonymous

Not even for a moment

Do things stand still--

Witness color in the trees.

Seiju

Moving Forward

2006-12-01T11:23:00.000-08:00

THE pain is gone, so now the task is to rebuild muscles that have
atrophied in the last year. Getting the gradations right so as not to
overdo but also to max the effort is now the challenge.

My happiness is complete. The weather is perfect today with a
delightful coolness while the sun shines warmly. Hope you are
all enjoying the day where you are.

The Cullinan Diamond

2006-11-28T14:39:00.000-08:00

Do you know anything about the Cullinan Diamond that is in the Queen of England's crown?

They have such an interesting ceremony. Each year the Queen reads the intended programs and intentions for her people.

Today the Government gives her what she is to read. The whole parliament cannot meet without her/him. It's always held

in the House of Lords, which profoundly irritates the MPs in the House of Commons....having to go over to the House of

Lords for the reading. She, the Queen, always wears this crown, which I am sure is very heavy to have it on your head and

have to read which means having to tip your head a little. Bet there are some wonderful stories about her practicing the reading and walking so as not to lose it. Her husband , Phillip, very carefully holds out his hand to her held out hand, giving her some balance as she walks down the lane with a long train behind her. They make it look so easy.

What l love is the symbolism of cherishing the monarchy, but the instructions come from the government of the people.

....a good reminder every year about who makes the decisions and the demise of singular rule-making. Hot Stuff!

Alone....lonely

2006-11-26T23:56:00.000-08:00

Ram Dass used to talk about being alone as full of possibilities and not to be

confused with lonely. Lonely, he said, is a condition of clinging to a model of

how it ought to be. I suspect that fear spoils a peaceful opportunity which

leads into judging that all is not well. I find so many people never step out of

judging. Fear says judge and for some reason, that keeps the deeper fears

away.

Thanks

2006-11-19T20:34:00.000-08:00

Time to give thanks,
For more hours not in pain,
For friends who really care,
For a good nites sleep,
For God's protection,
For love and trust,
For a little more time with you.

Instant Write-0ff Voting

2006-11-18T11:06:00.000-08:00

For so many of us Americans , we vote for a democrat or republican because to vote for the person we want in that office, means our vote won't be counted. So we end up with the same bad choices all the time. The only remedy

is INSTANT RUNOFF VOTING . Lets get it into the system. That way we get to vote for 3. If the first fails it goes to the

next and if that one fails, it goes to the next. Then we could see some real change in our country and none of this

voting for the two party system that it was never intended to be because if that were true we would have only 2 persons

to choose from. I also think we should get rid of the electoral college which gives the power to the small states who have fewer peope.

Women in Congress

2006-11-12T23:12:00.000-08:00

The announcement that we will now have a record number of women in

Congress, 86 out of 535 , just reminds me of male domination in this country.