You stupid bastards, you blew it up!

(Hover over the location to see what I mean.)

My mother mails me these mass messages, clearly crafted to cement the bond between the "right wing" (AKA the "religious reich") and Christians... Naturally, I respond to them, and sometimes we debate it, sometimes she just regrets sending it to me (and, probably, teaching me to think for myself & speak up when something is wrong). Perhaps I should pause for a second of silent sympathy for my poor Mom.



Okay, anyway, this one is about how Dubya took the time to pray with a visitor to the White House. It says at the bottom not to add to it, but I'm not about to obey something like that (just won't alter the text, in blue); I'd rather start it off non-religious, hoping it may possibly prevent people's brains from shutting the logic centers down for the reading. That's how religious rule is rampant, despite dramatically drastic discrepancies in the things they say and do.



Re-reading it, I am struck (like a brick to the brain) by how freakishly fanatical the behavior and quotes seem, to the point of being nearly scared, sincerely, even with all I already knew. This is incredibly creepy to me.







Being able and willing to set aside a moment to be personable to individuals amongst one's people seems a good trait for a leader, but does not mean that they are a good leader. Unfortunately, most people do not see the bigger, whole picture, and take things like this as reasons to support someone. This kind of thing is why he got re-elected, it was seen as a Christian imperative, and the voting majority followed blindly and fervently.



This is indicative of the biggest problem facing our country, and possibly humanity (although, the climate change is pretty serious too, this era is within an Ice Age and we're in a warm spell that may be ending or increasing, depending whose interpretations of the data you go by) - people put religion above all else and allow it to blind them to very serious issues.



This policy of putting "ideology" above all else is part & parcel to making ideological war acceptable (let us not forget that he called Iraq "the decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century"). It is setting us up for a Civil Holy War, much like the Middle East has been locked in for thousands of years, only here too; probably a World War, to be fought on scales so extreme as to make our previous Civil War look like a picnic.



Being very religious & occasionally humane doesn't make up for the huge problems, like The "Patriot Acts";

the lies that have cost thousands of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars, intentional misinformation, twisting intelligence info to suit his own purposes, anybody else does something like that, it's called "lying" - remember that whole impeachment drive over the bit about "Well, I don't consider that sex..." - but how many died from that blowjob and the lie about it?;

the administrative corruption (why do you think so many of his people have resigned, and it keeps happening?) - it has come to light that he & Cheney were directly responsible for the leak that cost a CIA agent her career, could have been her life, because her husband was vocally opposed to their agenda;

The policy of commuting sentences so that the corrupt have no consequences for their actions (some have dubbed this "The Amnesty Administration" for that);

the economy - outsourcing could easily be quashed here as it has been in China, but that would require a different tax incentive program & tariffs, maybe even holding companies accountable for how they do business in other countries;

the torture policies;

and the environment... I have told you about Texas, haven't I? You could literally see the clouds of smog surrounding cities when we were there. His environmental policies, to make it cheaper for big businesses, are directly responsible for the "air quality days" when children can't be allowed outside on recess. The whole country is headed that way now, rapidly - why do you think asthma is so much more common than when I was a kid?.

Our border security is still a joke, and, I may have mentioned, I've tried to report things, like an Al Quaida Internet group, and the Dept of Homeland Security didn't even have its own e-mail address. How pathetic is THAT?

Can't forget to mention the permanency he's setting us up for in Iraq.



We have not diminished the terrorism or anti-American sentiments, quite the opposite, we've been fueling the hatred, allowing mercenaries to represent us until it became unavoidable public knowledge that they shoot first no matter what. Remember the downfall of Rome? One of the big parts of & reasons for it was the use of mercs instead of true Legionnaires, another was the prevalent use of lead in cookware - which is paralleled by the ineptitude of the FDA and the so-called drug war (the DEA should be going after doctors & pharmaceutical companies for the over-doping of children, but instead they focus on only illegal drugs - it's not the Illicit Drug Enforcement Agency, but the real money is in taking drug dealers' property, not protecting the people).



Most of that is exactly as I was saying years ago, and, no, I'll never forget being called a traitor for not blindly supporting our Commander In Chief, and trying to point these things out before they were so ensconced.



Now, he's wanting to go after Iran the same as Iraq, the same BS about WMDs, only this time it's nuclear, despite the UN investigators who have been searching inside of the country for literally years, inspecting the nuclear program and assuring the rest of the world that their plutonium would have to be cuddled or eaten to harm humans. Why? Because they're religiously opposed to Israel, who can do no wrong despite bombing refugee camps unprovoked.



But, he takes the time to pray with someone, so none of the rest matters, he's a "Good Guy"...



If his motives were really humanitarian in other regions, why has nothing even been said to/about Israel's aggressive actions, or Darfur (the UN actions were woefully inadequate, and we could press for more, but they have no oil and it doesn't affect the Holy Land), or the burning out of Buddhists monks & temples...?

I will give him kudos for one thing, though, telling the Pakistani President, essentially "Hey, man, just step down from the military instead of trying to keep both positions, you're facing civil war."



I'd applaud the compassion of this too, but, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one, and there are a lot of very serious, pressing issues that his time would be much better spent handling. What kinds of things were put off so that he could play minister?



Yet, it is forwarded as testimony to his goodness...





[Bill's Mom] wrote:



I think this story is a beautiful reminder that even one the busiest men in the world can take time to stop and pray with a person who really needed it at that moment.



Mr. Vincent's Story:



Story by: Bruce Vincent



For those of us who sometimes find ourselves having doubts about our President, here is an excellent piece -- worth every minute it takes to read it. This story is from Bruce Vincent of Libby, Montana who had gone to the White House with others to receive an award from the President.



He writes:

I've written the following narrative to chronicle the day of the award ceremony in DC. I'm still working on a press release but the White House press corps has yet to provide a photo to go with it. When the photo comes I'll ship it out. When you get done reading this you'll understand the dilemma I face in telling this story beyond my circle of close friends.



Stepping into the Oval Office, each of us was introduced to the President and Mrs. Bush. We shook hands and participated in small talk. When the President was told that we were from Libby, Montana, I reminded him that Marc Racicot is our native son and the President offered his warm thoughts about Governor Racicot.



I have to tell you, I was blown away by two things upon entering the office.

First, the Oval Office sense of 'place' is unreal. The President later shared a story of Russian President Putin entering the room prepared to tackle the President in a tough negotiation and upon entering, the atheist muttered his first words to the President and they were "Oh, my God."



I concurred. I could feel the history in my bones. Second, the man that inhabits the office engaged me with a firm handshake and a look that can only be described as penetrating. Warm, alive, fully engaged, disarmingly penetrating. I was admittedly concerned about meeting the man. I think all of us have an inner hope that the most powerful man in our country is worthy of the responsibility and authority that we bestow upon them through our vote.



I admit that part of me was afraid that I would be let down by the moment -- that the person and the place could not meet the lofty expectations of my fantasy world. This says nothing about my esteem for President Bush but just my practical realization that reality may not match my 'dream.'



Once inside the office, President Bush got right down to business and, standing in front of his desk, handed out the awards one at a time while posing for photos with the winners and Mrs. Bush. With the mission accomplished, the President and Mrs. Bush relaxed and initiated a lengthy, informal conversation about a number of things with our entire small group. He and the First Lady talked about such things as the rug in the office. It is traditionally designed by the First Lady to make a statement about the President, and Mrs. Bush chose a brilliant yellow sunburst pattern to reflect 'hope.' President Bush talked about the absolute need to believe that with hard work and faith in God there is every reason to start each day in the Oval Office with hope. He and the First Lady were asked about the impact of the Presidency on their marriage and, with an arm casually wrapped around Laura, he said that he thought the place may be hard on weak marriages but that it had the ability to make strong marriages even stronger and that he was blessed with a strong one.



After about 30 or 35 minutes, it was time to go. By then we were all relaxed and I felt as if I had just had an excellent visit with a friend. The President and First Lady made one more pass down the line of awardees, shaking hands and offering congratulations. When the President shook my hand I said, "Thank you Mr. President and God bless you and your family." He was already in motion to the next person in line, but he stopped abruptly turned fully back to me, gave me a piercing look, renewed the vigor of his handshake and said, "Thank you -- and God bless you and yours as well."



On our way out of the office we were to leave by the glass doors on the west side of the office. I was the last person in the exit line. As I shook his hand one final time, President Bush said, "I'll be sure to tell Marc hello and give him your regards."



I then did something that surprised even me. I said to him, "Mr. President, I know you are a busy man and your time is precious. I also know you to be a man of strong faith and I have a favor to ask of you."



As he shook my hand he looked me in the eye and said, "Just name it." I told him that my step-Mom was at that moment in a hospital in Kalispell, Montana, having a tumor removed from her skull and it would mean a great deal to me if he would consider adding her to his prayers that day. He grabbed me by the arm and took me back toward his desk as he said, "So that's it. I could tell that something is weighing heavy on your heart today. I could see it in your eyes. This explains it."



From the top drawer of his desk he retrieved a pen and a note card with his seal on it and asked, "How do you spell her name?" He then jotted a note to her while discussing the importance of family and the strength of prayer. When he handed me the card, he asked about the surgery and the prognosis. I told him we were hoping that it is not a recurrence of an earlier cancer and that, if it is, they can get it all with this surgery.



He said, "If it's okay with you, we'll take care of the prayer right now. Would you pray with me?" I told him yes and he turned to the staff that remained in the office and hand motioned the folks to step back or leave. He said, "Bruce and I would like some private time for a prayer."



As they left he turned back to me and took my hands in his. I was prepared to do a traditional prayer stance -- standing with each other with heads bowed. Instead, he reached for my head with his right hand and pulling gently forward, he placed my head on his shoulder. With his left arm on my mid-back, he pulled me to him in a prayerful embrace.



He started to pray softly. I started to cry. He continued his prayer for Loretta and for God's perfect will to be done. I cried some more. My body shook a bit as I cried and he just held tighter. He closed by asking God's blessing on Loretta and the family during the coming months. I stepped away from our embrace, wiped my eyes, swiped at the tears I'd left on his shoulder, and looked into the eyes of our president. I thanked him as best I could and told him that me and my family would continue praying for him and his.



As I write this account down and reflect upon what it means, I have to tell you that all I really know is that his simple act left me humbled and believing. I so hoped that the man I thought him to be was the man that he is. I know that our nation needs a man such as this in the Oval Office. George W. Bush is the real deal. I've read Internet stories about the President praying with troops in hospitals and other such uplifting accounts. Each time I read them I hoped them to be true and not an Internet perpetuated myth. This one, I know to be true. I was there. He is real. He has a pile of incredible stuff on his plate each day -- and yet he is tuned in so well to the here and now that he 'sensed' something heavy on my heart. He took time out of his life to care, to share, and to seek God's blessing for my family in a simple man-to-man, father-to-father, son-to-son, husband-to-husband, Christian-to-Christian prayerful embrace. He's not what I had hoped he would be. He is, in fact, so very, very much more.





NOTE: If you decide to forward this story... please do not add to it. Let Mr. Vincent's encounter stand as he wrote it.



No. This is SOO not right, on so many levels! How can people find it inspiring?

For those of you that aren't local, you may not be familiar with the missing person case in a neighboring suburb here. So, heres the website her family (I think) put up. http://www.findstacypeterson.com/ I'd post this there too, but don't want to register for yet another site just now. I did cross post it in MyFoxChicago blog, though.



Just a quick note on what has been bugging me this whole time. Well, that is, other than the fact that it seems pretty obvious that the police should have been much more involved a wife ago, even before her demise, but especially after. Oh, and that it appears that he met the most recent wife while she was a teenager, about three years before his previous bride died suspiciously.



He's mad at the media, again and still, but has he once used them to show his anger at his wife for not contacting anyone and stopping this mess?



If I were in his position, I'd be yelling at every camera I saw "HEY STACY! I know you're mad at me, but this is ridiculous! Come forward, already, and stop allowing our kids to be put through this!"



Why isn't he? The only logical theory I'm finding would be because he knows she's not off with some other guy, isn't able to see the news, and can't respond.

We all probably saw that Bush's Homeland Security Adviser, Fran Townsend, was among the latest to resign...



She also defended Bush's use of the term "Islamic fascists" and tried to explain it, inadvertently making my most common point about the wrongfulness of this war. Again, for the record, I am not opposed to all of it; we should be in Afghanistan, the government there wants, appreciates, and needs our help, and there are (or at least were) actually terrorist training camps there, unlike the unfounded allegations against Iraq.



"What the president was trying to capture was this idea of using violence to achieve ideological ends — and that's wrong," stated Townsend. "Regardless of what label you pin on it, it is this form of radical extremism that really wants to deny people freedom and impose a totalitarian vision of society on everyone, that we object to."



Add to that another quote, this one from Dubya, in an attempt to justify the Iraq war: "It is the decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century, and the calling of our generation."





Need anyone say anything more on this?



Maybe it isn't needed, but why not: remember those little things like the so-called "Patriot Acts" and programs of spying on American citizens? Aren't those denials of freedom? Isn't the whole prosecutor scandal all about imposing a totalitarian Christian vision of society on everyone through the interpretation of our laws?

We need to see a lot more press about this veto... and the bipartisan bull-bombs about upholding it. It made it through both Houses for good reasons, but the President thinks he knows better, of course.



Privatizing health care might be a good idea, but ONLY if families can afford literally a couple hundred dollars a week for insurance. What about the rest of us? What about those of our fellow countrymen(and women) who barely make that much and have other, more immediately pressing bills, those who worked at the many closed or closing places, and those whose jobs have been outsourced? More importantly, what about their children, who really can't do anything at all about it, no matter how coldly you look at it?



Who believes that we can afford tens to hundreds of billions for failing foreign programs that the majority of Americans are very much against, but not to prevent bigger medical bills or worse for the poor children of our own country?



Where is Bush's brain?

Sorry I've been so sorely neglecting LJ... Life's been lots of fun, but not really much to talk about. This place needs more positive posts, too, I'll have to do something about that.



This morning, I am compelled to comment on some of the incredible idiocy that is presented as "science" - this time, with one of the WORST misleading link lines, even for Yahoo, to an article from one of our least favorite sites on the web. When the Wife & I see headlines, then note that the source is livescience.com, we shudder, knowing that the writing will be biased/fluff, the conclusions unsupported or obvious/old news, and the evidence inadequate, and "average" people will eat it up as "Fact".



This morning, the link line was "Science shows luck doesn't exist".



The thing that gets me, is that's like saying "Pigs proven flightless, therefore, mammals can not fly."



It's a good thing to be skeptical about and not rely on luck, but but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist or one shouldn't harbor such hopes.



The article itself was really just fluff for the super-superstitious who have yet to recognize for themselves that all sevens has never won a lottery (I think, am pretty sure we'd all hear about it if it did anywhere at any time) and is no more likely to than any other combination or that "2007" and "7" are very different numbers. Of course it was the unluckiest number played when looked at from the right angle, more people played all sevens than any other combination, so thus more people lost on it. From the sound of it in the article, I think that the book mentioned in the middle section also may have been written a few times before, like by the likes of Norman Vincent Peale...





Granted, for the most part, people do make their own luck, and probabilities can be pushed. However, I'm sure everyone knows at least one person who seems reckless & always manages to come out of it on top, or at least without the worst, and another who is overly cautious and manages to have things fall on them, or can "never catch a break". If their odds are 1000 to 1 against something going wrong, they just happen to be that rare tenth of a percent. Not all of those people are pessimistic or clumsy, either, and some seem surprised again & again by the same "bad luck".



Sometimes, it is optimism. Sometimes, that confidence allows one to take risks that just happen to work out well for them. However, if the odds were the same for all, there would be more of those risks not going well, and for some people, it just doesn't work that way, it's not just that they don't dwell on it.



I have a step-cousin who went to the same high school as I did. As far as the world around us was concerned, he could do no wrong and I was automatically wrong in most of the same situations. He somehow managed to never get singled out or jumped, even seemed unaware that there WAS that "Malcolm X Week" BS. I was in the "Student Directed Learning" classes, and it made no difference, it seemed the more I tried to behave, the more shit I fell into (metaphorically). Some of that was appearance, being a short guy with long hair brought out the bully in many who needed that life lesson...



Some of it was being protected versus being protective. I didn't tolerate much in the way of injustice, while he just didn't see it (in his defense, he didn't have the same experiences to drawn on, and perhaps wasn't able to recognize some signs that something bad is happening). My mother expected me to protect my siblings and other, smaller children around, while his protected him and expected him to be her happy little boy. My parents' divorce added hardships on us, his increased the "only child" pampering from both parents. While mine tried to turn us against each other, his tried to buy him better than the other. He's still a spoiled shit, and I nearly knocked him out for how he acted when I introduced him to my Wife at a family party. Still, he apparently has yet to learn the lessons that life offers the rest of us so readily whenever we allow it opportunity, and as far as I know his only experiences with misfortune are second-hand.





"Luck" is also a broad and relative thing. In some ways, I am very lucky. I happened to be somewhere I almost never was (even when living in the area, which I hadn't for years at that point) when my Love happened to be somewhat suddenly single & driving home from work (and oddly socially bold enough to pull over & talk to me, which is way out-of-character), for example. We are so incredibly perfectly matched in so many ways, too... Coincidences are quite common in my life, sometimes the opportunities are not at all obvious from the outset, but later we're going "Oh, well, it was a good thing then that..." If they were seen at all, it was only instinctively, which leads into other interesting "unknowns" to explore.



Much of my luck I've made myself - I could have stayed in school or sacrificed ethics to remain the president of a company (which I was but left), I could have cared about monetary matters more in general, I could have been a victim, not fought as hard or not moved quickly enough, or fought at the wrong times (or panicked) instead of keeping my head...



However, there's no mistaking my luck with other people handling paperwork for me, especially regarding my cars or driver's license. This isn't the first time, and I'm still on court supervision over an issue summarized as:

I bought a car at a car-lot (Tessone Motors, it's not there anymore - couldn't get to the auction) and they didn't turn in the registration or transfer the plates. The insurance company (I forget which) couldn't insure the vehicle unregistered & so, it was just put aside. I got pulled over and arrested (and the car towed)... I don't recall now if I was also suspended for emissions on some car I didn't own anymore, but that happens periodically too, whether or not I get and send in the cards.



I thought I got all of that straightened out. Regardless of who was at fault, I was technically guilty as I was driving an unregistered car without active insurance.



A couple cars later, we were careful to be completely legal, had Gieco insurance because they didn't charge extra to send in the SR-22 to the State to prove we have insurance. I got pulled over again for a suspended license, apparently because the SR-22 was never sent in.



Gieco confirmed that they did, in fact, not send in said required paperwork, and I had to argue long & hard with a few of their managers before I got one who agreed that the least they could do was write a letter to the courts indicating that they didn't send the SR-22 when they were supposed to. Then, they never sent the letter, so a week later I got another one to make it her top priority, which she actually did. Still, I was technically guilty again, since I was supposed to wait until I received a letter from the State saying my license is un-suspended before driving again. Did you know that? Nobody told me that before I got pulled over, and I spent a good deal of time on the phone making sure everything was clear from everyone's angles - they only told me that it had to wait until they got the SR-22 and entered it into the system. I accept that "ignorance of the law is no excuse" but that's the kind of thing I'd have mentioned if I was working in their positions talking to someone who's asking so many of such questions...



I'm really bad with time in general, and miss or am late for all sorts of appearances, including court. That's more of me making my own bad luck, which led to this entry and then to this one, to where I am now.



Is that not bad luck, if only in how many people dropped the ball? Most people don't have such problems more than once, let alone in the same situation...



I wonder if there's any way I can get paid to prattle on about the obvious like that...