There seems to be a constant series of examples in history that reflect what we are living through this week: from Psistratus in Athens to Caesar in Rome to the Duke of Lancaster in 15th-century England to Napoleon to Lenin and Hitler and now to Karl Rove, a multitude of fellows have harnessed populist outrage to their own carriage in order to seize power.  That outrage, changing the metaphor, flows into the furious stream into which Boehner and McConnell and Palin launched their boats last night.

Two of the world's richest men and the Spanish government have pledged $150m (£101.7m) to battle disease and improve health in Central America and Mexico. Carlos Slim and Bill Gates are to fund a project jointly with Spain aimed at improving nutrition and maternal health and fighting dengue fever and malaria. The two men and Spain's Princess Cristina announced the project in the Mexican capital, Mexico City. The project also aims to reduce infant mortality and boost vaccination rates.

Fifty years ago today I was halfway through my sophomore year at WE Stebbins High, an almost completely segregated school in the almost completely segregated city of Dayton, Ohio, a town said at the time to be a southern city that happened to be north of the Mason Dixon line.

The school was "almost completely" segregated because it was located within a good Hail Mary pass of Wright Patterson AFB. I don't remember exactly the reasons but we were told that because the school received federal funds for students who were military dependents that it had to be integrated.

"Integration" was accomplished by the admission of two young Black kids, The boy was named Sam. I remember because we became friends for awhile until the transparent racist displeasure of my little Quaker Grandmother became thick enough to keep him from dropping by. She wasn't ready for a black president.

The girl's name is beyond my atrophied powers of recall. I can see their faces though; both were exceptionally attractive, beautiful in fact, bright, "A" students (National Honor Society), and the son and daughter of Air Force Officers. They weren't related, although they might have passed for brother and sister (to my eyes) and they knew each other from the Air Base (the Air Force at the time wasn't a lot more integrated than my high school).

Their presence among the lower and middle class adolescent white children of factory workers, shopkeepers and lower level bean counting managerial types caused no great stir. There were no serious problems (to my eyes) other than an occasional racist taunt, or snub. Civility towards them was rigorously enforced. The powers that be paddled freely and often back then and the sting of that paddle and its humiliation was seldom sought.

I tried to post this in the Code Blue section.  It disappeared.  I'm not sure why since I was not contacted about it.  I find that to be a bit disturbing.  It smacks of censorship.
These are desperate times which, as we all know, call for desperate measures.  I don't see or hear of anyone taking such measures.  This is my attempt to do so.
Please follow the link and sign the petition.  Forward the link to everyone you can.  If I can secure sufficient signatures I will hand deliver the petition to the United Nations.

On Friday, Clammyc offered us a smorgasbord of clammy goodness with his excellent diary, "This country has become an effing disgrace". In response, I attempted to bake up an addendum to his message "Don't Blame America: This country has NOT become an effing disgrace". My Diary essentially argued that the dismay associated with the US in recent years -- the hatred, the scorn, the frustration -- is more appropriately directed toward the scoundrels who have dismissed all that upon which this country was founded -- those who have pissed on the Constitution, f****d the founders, and sh*t on the people.

In essence, the hatred and disgust should be targeted squarely toward the neocon Bush Cabal, not the United States of America as it is meant to exist.

As support I went straight to the founding fathers, asserting that the neocon's agenda is so grossly anti-American, that they are left only with the option to destroy the principles upon which our country was founded in order to concoct a perceived sense of validity for their effed-up agenda:

More accurately, the powers that be have effing disgraced this country.

I totally agree with the message of this post over at DailyKos -- "This country has become an effing disgrace", but there is one thing that I'd like to make a tad more clear -- that this country Rocks!!!!

That's right! America ROCKS!!!

And the disgrace through wich we and the rest of the world are currently suffering are largely the result of a relatively miniscule power-band of effed-up neoconservatives who have wound their way to influence and power through decades of focused climbing -- politics, journalism, think tanks. The evidence is clear.

Yesterday Harold Pinter (the 2005 Nobel Prize winner for Literature) gave an incredibly eloquent speech. He wove the history of American foreign policy since WWII into a comprehensive and frightening tapestry. Already the MSM is calling it an 'anti-American' lecture. It is really the opposite. It is a compelling indictment of U. S. actions versus U. S. words. I believe that deep down most of us want to live up to the ideals this country was founded upon. His description of our actions versus our words will hopefully help us rip away the smoke and mirrors and start to become the country we thought we already were.

Can we please - please, please, please - start a substantive conversation on race in America?  There are ground rules though - no kicking, screaming, eye-gouging or biting allowed.  All participants have to agree not to put on silly hats or funky bandanas and march around with crosses or guns.  Think I'm being facetious?  OK - try having this discussion without the accompanying folderol.  Someone always has to start the button pushing - and immediately the ears close, the mouths open and for all intents and purposes we might as well be at a Jerry Springer taping.  

This morning it came across the airwaves once again - the same phrase I've heard dozens of times in the past few months.  And each time I heard it, it breezed through me, without registering as untrue or unusual or incorrect:

"A Free Nation is a Peaceful Nation".  A Free Nation is a Peaceful Nation.

It's generally an agreeable concept, to be sure.  But is it true?  If free nations are peaceful nations, then how does our President explain the actions of his own country?  After all, the United States of America, the patented Land of the Free, has spent most of the past century at war with someone or something.  The current target is something called terra or someone called evildoers, depending on the month, but history seems to indicate that if it wasn't this enemy, it would be some other.  A War on Saltwater or a War on Chicken farming or a War on War.  Whatever the case, the United States does not have a peaceful recent history.