Kollwitz, The Propeller

Having shown over the last seven months, since taking control of the legislative branch that they are at least equal to the Republicans when it comes to avarice, the Democrats set out this past weekend to demonstrate that, when it comes to cowardice, to blatant, unmitigated, ass covering politics they are every bit a match for Republicans.

Who impeaches the Congress? What in our Constitution protects the citizens of this country from a completely rogue government? When all three branches have abrogated their constitutional obligations, who will stand up for, who will represent the people of the United States?

Where must we search, to whom do we go for protection from the power of the wealthy corporate classes who are stealing our wealth, our livelihoods, and our future, who are spitting on our laws and our history as they sacrifice our Children and Grandchildren on the profane altar of their greed, in their eternal wars for profit and power?

Where is the opposition? Where do we go for redress of grievances when every institution of government is in the hands of the enemies of the people?

A crime of immense proportions that will now see more blowback. That is, unless people of conscience stand up to this terrorism on all sides, and soon.

Doctors Without Borders In Southern Lebanon

July 25, 2006

Christopher Stokes, MSF Director of Operations:

Relief materials needed in south Lebanon, but supplying is almost impossible

Listen to full report [mp3 - Running time 3:06]

Doctors Without Borders/ Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) Director of Operations, Christopher Stokes, describes over the phone from Beirut what he has seen traveling to the south of Lebanon and back.

The names of twenty five hundred young men and women have been erased from the chalkboard of life by the merchants of pain and death in our government.

They were erased from the list of the living by the hands of arrogant men wielding erasers soaked in the blood of tens of thousands of others who were maimed and wounded and tens of thousands of Iraqis whose deaths they will not dignify by counting or even mentioning.

It's a number, another irritating milestone that they hope falls on Friday so that the press flap will dissipate over the weekend.

When my dog, Missy, was alive, she had the reputation of "Stealth Woo" with all who knew her.  "Woo" is, of course, simply a play on the primary vocalization of the Malamute breed.  And Missy vocalized a lot.  She was very opinionated, with a innate drive to ensure that she was listened to and taken seriously.  She was also very clever, a bit sneaky when she wanted to be and she could move through the house like a ghost.

She loved it.  It was, for her, the ultimate game.

After she died, her absence was tangible.  It felt almost like an empty echo chamber, until her ashes were returned to us and set up on a small sanctuary that my wife had prepared in her honor.  Although the ashes were small consolation for the loss of her great fuzzy hearted presence, we nonetheless found comfort in the modified presence to which she'd been restored to our lives.  We reminisced about her humor, her games, her attitude and her appetite.  We didn't, therefore, think it was amusing when the bag containing her ashes vanished from the box which held them.

Today or yesterday is an anniversary of sorts, a day of commemoration, a day to reflect on what it is in man that dooms him to endless repetition of his mistakes.

Maybe it's just a day to spit on the sidewalk, hitch up your pants and say, "same shit, different day" and let man worry about himself.

Sixty nine years ago Hitler and Mussolini decided that propping up their soul mate Francisco Franco would offer them a great opportunity to test out all the new high tech military hardware they had amassed.