A few of my thoughts on the South Carolina primary, Bill and Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

It will come as no surprise for most here that I was and am outraged by the cowardice the Democratic leadership has shown since the Alito hearings.  I drew a line in the sand then, I said I wouldn't vote for another Democrat, especially one who lived and ruled from the ivory towers, especially candidates that live and breathe the machine of the Democratic Party.

It will also not surprise people, when push comes to shove, that if I vote the only candidate I could even begin to imagine voting for is John Edwards.  I still hope I will get to vote for him in the general election, I will vote for him on Super Tuesday.  

I long ago abandoned the notion of a life without storms, or a world without
dry and killing seasons.  Life is too complicated, too constantly changing, to be anything but what it is.  And I am, by nature, too mercurial to be anything but deeply wary of the grave unnaturalness involved in any attempt to exert too much control over the essentially uncontrollable forces.  There will always be propelling, disturbing elements, and they will be there until, as Lowell put it, the watch is taken from the wrist.  It is, at the end of the day, the individual moments of restlessness, of bleakness, of strong persuasions and maddened enthusiasms, that inform one’s life, change the nature and direction of one’s work, and give final meaning and color to one’s loves and friendships. Dr. Kay Redfield Jamison

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. There are so many faces whose stories aren't being told by words alone to give them the chance of a better life. For all those who live within the confines of poverty or racism or sexism or the bigotry of not being understood, these are the faces of your stories.

If we don't do something now when we have seen images that speak of a third world country, when we have seen bodies of the poor floating in feces filled waters, when we have seen houses marked with a big X which signifies a dead person inside, when we have heard of how so many poor people died horrendous deaths as the water rose up until they had no air left, no place to go, no life left in their bodies, if that isn't enough to make us pay attention and do something about the poor in this country then we will be a nation without a soul.  We will lose our pride, our honor, our dignity and our integrity.  We will be walking shells of people with nothing left but pure and simple greed in our hearts.  We will have lost our humanity.

It is also said that women make the decision to have abortions frivilously, that we believe in 'abortion on demand.'  There is a dangerous notion that we decide late in our pregnancies that we just simply don't want this 'kid' so we go shopping, we have lunch, and then we stop in at our local, friendly clinic and tell them to scrape and vaccum away, we've got a party to go to.

Depressed and traumatized on the one hand or party girls on the other.  Is it really that simple?  What happens to those who don't have a choice?

What we don't hear about is what forced motherhood does to too many women.  What we don't hear is how long it takes, how much courage it takes, how heartbreaking it is to find our way back from the terror and horror.

As I watched the Olympics last night I couldn't concentrate.  My eyes invariably went back, time and again, to the scars.

I remember so clearly what the doctor said to me when I woke up in the hospital.  He told me the scars would never go away, that when I looked at them they would remind me how close I had come to the end of my life.

He was wrong, when I look at the scars it never crosses my mind how close I had come to death.  When I look at the scars I'm reminded of the end of my childhood dreams.  I'm reminded of how many things ended in those days and months.  I'm reminded of the terror I felt, the horror of not being in charge, the outrage felt by others shaping my future.
 

We've been concentrating on the cloture vote, so many on the blogs worked hard to convince 41 senators it was the right thing to do, to dig down deep within themselves, to tap into their consciences and vote no on cloture. There has been a lot of disagreement on who let us down and who didn't. There have been clarion calls for unity, there have been pleas to not surrender, to not give up, to fight the good fight.  What there hasn't been is a willingness to admit and give respect to those of us who feel we are not anti-American or traitors to this party or cowards or idiots if we believe it is just as worthy, just as noble, just as courageous to fight for our lives, the lives we have known and gotten attached to.  

More below the fold

When we hear on the Sunday talk shows that half of the senators didn't know what `unitary executive power' was it's like a slap in the face.  When executive powers became as hot a button issues as abortion has been since Alito was nominated, I felt a rush of hope.  If the Democratic and Republican senators didn't have what it takes to protect a woman's right to choose surely they would care about the place Congress has in governing this great nation of ours.  

For those that think many of us are having a knee jerk reaction to the Alito hearings, for those of you who think we'll get over ourselves, for those of you who think we haven't thought this through, I'd like to offer evidence that that is simply not true.    

I've spent considerable time the past few days wondering about the fight we face and how it is different from battles and wars of the past.  It still has that uncompromising agony to it, it still has death and destruction, it still has mighty dissent, it still has a resolve by many to quiet the voice of the weapons being used on the battlefield and on the soil of our homeland.  

There is in every turn, in every heart, in every soul, in every spirit, in every person we choose to gather with during these troubling times a sense that we will not give up for to do so is to give up on humankind, to give up on our life as we know it, but mostly it is to give up on our country, the America we have always known, the greatest nation in the history of the world, the beacon of hope and promise for those around the globe as they have said that is freedom, that is liberty, that is justice, that is democracy.  We have in years past smiled proudly as we say, "yes that is so."

Or is it?

Below the fold, the rest of the story

Well lordy, lordy who doesn't support that, afterall the directions are so complicated.  Take one of the two little white pills after you've had unprotected sex (within 5 days) and take the second little white pill within 12 hours of taking the first little white pill.  Now really, they're saying someone who can't understand and follow these instructions should give birth because they're, what, so grown up and ready to have a baby?  

The rest of the story, after the fold
 

The rest of the story is below the flip

There is in every turn, in every heart, in every soul, in every spirit, in every person we choose to gather with during these troubling times a sense that we will not give up for to do so is to give up on humankind, to give up on our life as we know it, but mostly it is to give up on our country, the America we have always known, the greatest nation in the history of the world, the beacon of hope and promise for those around the globe as they have said that is freedom, that is liberty, that is justice, that is democracy.  We have in years past smiled proudly as we say, yes that is so.  

Or is it?  More below the fold.

It is a sad commentary that women are having the very same argument with other Democrats we have been having with the rightwingnuts for years.  It is beyond the pale that we are told an issue that is so personal needs to be framed and presented in a way that does not offend when we are offended over and over.  If this party wants our respect, it would behoove this party to start treating women with respect.  

More below the fold.

"It wasn't until a third plane slammed into the Pentagon that Rumsfeld jumped into action.  A few hours later, he wondered aloud to his staff whether the attack would allow the United States to strike at Saddam Hussein, not just Osama bin Laden."

The rest of the article exposes how our 'leaders' immediately began focusing on the wrong threat.  Why?  Because they had their eyes on a different prize -- China, Russia and outer space.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/09/05/INGQ58FN831.DTL

This is an ongoing story that needs to be headline news.  If you rate it on Yahoo it will remain a top story.  The Bush campaign has made Vietnam a top election year story so let's make them eat their words.

The AP states in the article, "For example, Air National Guard regulations at the time required commanders to write an investigative report for the Air Force when Bush missed his annual medical exam in 1972.  The regulations also required commanders to confirm in writing that Bush received counseling after missing five months of drills."  

Bush has stated, "I'm proud of my service."  And what is he proud of specifically? Could it be ... "It's sort of a code of honor that you didn't go DNF (duty not including flying)," said retired Air Force Col. Leonard Walls, who flew 181 combat missions over Vietnam.  "There was a lot of pride in keeping combat-ready status."  Bush and combat ready status?  Not a chance.

"A May 1973 yearly evaluation from Bush's Texas unit gives the future president no ratings and stated Bush had not been seen at the Texas base since April 1972.  In a directive from June 29, 1973, an Air Force personnel official pressed Bush's unit for information about his Alabama service.  This officer should have been reassigned in May 1972, wrote Master Sgt. Daniel P. Harkness, since he no longer is training in his AFSC or with his unit of assignment."

There's more that will curl your toes and make your blood boil ...

In Boston Clinton spoke eloquently calling Kerry, "a good man, a great senator, a visionary leader."

Bob Mulholland, a long-time operative of Bill Clinton's said, "whether he is on the campaign trail or waving from a hospital window" he will be active in this campaign to put the Democratic candidate in the White House.

Here's the link to read the news:

http://www.news-leader.com/today/0904-Clintonsil-171419.html

There's more for those who have doubted Kerry's campaign or his seeming lack of fire and rage.

The world is watching us to see what our ideal of justice truly is.  In The New Standard, http://newstandardnews.net/content/?action=show_item&itemid=911&printmode=true
Lisa Ashkenaz Croke and Brian Dominick report that there continues to be new evidence of ten US-run prisons in Iraq.  "The fact-finding mission uncovered dozens of cases of physical and psychological abuse, sexual humiliation, religious desecration and rape in the prisons in Iraq."

It seems we have misunderstood, jumped to too many conclusions, been misguided in our assessments.  We have, frankly been wrong. Indeed, Bush, Jr. has been far more humble than he's been given credit for.  He supposedly walks in the shoes of Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill and Ronald Reagan.  In know, I know, I was shocked to find out also.

Get ready, we're about to see our prez in a whole new light.  No matter what we think of Churchill or Reagan, I've never really thought of them as clueless or stupid.  Hmmm, this gives me a bushel of things to think about.  How have I erred so fully?

What, your lips need to be wetted?  Here's a small sample:

"Winston Churchill saw the dangers of Hitler when his opponents and much of the press characterised him as a war-mongering gadfly.  Ronald Reagan saw and described the Soviet Union as 'the evil empire'."  

"George W. Bush sees world terrorism for the evil that it is and he will remain consistent to the purpose of defeating it while working to make us ever safer at home."  This must have been before Junior stated today that, "we cannot win the war on terrorism."  Oh well, a slight flaw in the ... oops, I almost said plan, oh such folly.

But don't fear ... the babe, Rudy, also said ..."No White House since Abraham Lincoln's has placed as great an emphasis on faith as the current administration."  Phew, for a minute there I thought we were in trouble.  Silly me, I forgot God speaks through our prez.  

Here's the link to the entire article ... remember, misery loves company.

http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1018622004