(Cross posted from Docudharma)

"Modern man likes to pretend that his thinking is wide-awake. But this wide-awake thinking has led us into the mazes of a nightmare in which the torture chambers are endlessly repeated in the mirrors of reason."

Octavio Paz

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

My father was a soldier and a drill instructor who trained briefly with a Japanese jujitsu master during WWII in preparation for teaching hand-to-hand combat to Army GIs.  He taught my two brothers and me some basic techniques so that we might have an edge in dealing with schoolyard bullies – and the training stood me in good stead.  I used what he taught me on more than one occasion to inject a little homegrown justice into an unpleasant situation.  Those experiences left me with two lasting gifts, an antipathy for bullies and a love for the martial arts.

I began formal training in Judo at age eleven on the Army base at Ft. Benning, Georgia where I trained for a year.  I continued my training in Paris and for a brief time competed on the French National Judo Team as a brown belt (sankyu).  

‘Support the Troops.’  I have come to have mixed feelings about that phrase.  I have been both amused and appalled by the Democrats’ terror at being accused of not supporting the troops.  How did our politics become so simplistic and artificial?  How did it become all about appearances, and never mind the substance?  

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

(Cross posted from Docudharma)
 
I came of age in the time of Nixon and Vietnam.  I learned then that our government was not to be trusted, that they lie to us whenever it’s convenient and that there is nothing pure about their motives.  I also learned to suspect that elements of our government played an active role in the assassination of John Kennedy and possibly others.  I’m not saying they did, just that I’ve pondered that possibility for most of my life and not without reason.  I still have to wonder.  The possibility that our government is that fucking evil shouldn’t seem like such a stretch to anybody these days.

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

In looking back at the Bush debacle, one thing stands out.  It would never have happened, at least not so blatantly and egregiously, had there been a healthy opposition party in America.  Up until 2000 there was at least the illusion of the Democrats as a party in opposition to the Republicans, however ineffective.  And the Republicans, though always venal, have never been so nakedly predatory, never so in-your-face ‘I’m going to take your shit and you’re going to like it’, never so openly disdainful of the Constitution and the law.  Somewhere along the line, the notion of the Democrats as the voice of sanity counter-balancing Republican lunacy has become just so much political vaporware.  What happened?  

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

Must be a sign of the apocalypse.  The MSM catches up to Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes, a former senior official in the US Department of Commerce, who wrote The Three Trillion Dollar War.

Through my blogging I’ve become aquainted with quite a few interesting folks, among them is my good friend Elliot Anderson, Marine Veteran of Afghanistan and well-known Democratic activist from Nevada who also chairs the Nevada Democratic Veterans & Military Families Caucus.

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

Let’s Impeach the President for Lying
And misleading our country into war
Abusing all the power that we gave him
And shipping all our money out the door

Neil Young

On Monday of this week Rep. Dennis Kucinich introduced 35 articles of impeachment.  On Wednesday it finally was acknowledged by CNN.  In fact it was, for a time, the third most popular story right after Incest girl reunited with family and 'Idol' runner-up lands record deal.

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

This diary is a tribute to the power of the individual and is dedicated to two particular individuals who, as they say, require no introduction, kid oakland and Land of Enchantment.  I would never have had the pleasure of meeting my dear friend Land of Enchantment at YKOS last year had it not been for the scholarship program started by Kid Oakland.  This diary is in support of that program.

In this age of great and persistent evil it is easy to become overwhelmed by the never-ending cascade of horror and madness that the daily news has become.  How does one stand against the tide of violent hatred, willful ignorance and blind running greed when its onrush is so powerful, its influence so ubiquitous, its effects so devastating?  What in the world can one person do?

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

A hearty and sincere congratulations to Barack Obama and all of his supporters.  The only other thing I have to say about that is to ask you to please reach out to our brothers and sisters in the HRC camp, many of whom have been abused in this process.  We are all Democrats, we are all progressives, and we all have a lot of work to do in fixing our sadly and badly broken country.

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

With apologies to Gilbert Shelton who wrote The Day I Set My Chickens Free.

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

With all due respect to those who serve in the armed forces, we owe it to them to ask hard questions about the sacrifices demanded of them and their families.

It’s fine and good and perfectly appropriate for us to honor our dead, but if we allow ourselves to be whipped into a patriotic frenzy every time some yahoo waves a flag it can serve to legitimize the military enterprise – and that is the point I wish to make.  The military enterprise is not legitimate.

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

The one true and lasting gift that the hippies tried to give the world is precisely that which has been offered by every wise or holy man or woman to ever walk the earth – the gift of love.  Love as a conscious choice, love as an ethic, love as a way of life, love as the antidote to fear, hatred and violence – love as a way to walk lightly on the earth.

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

If we were wise and brave we would have taken down this President a long time ago.

Is an earnest desire for peace a foolish delusion?  George Bush thinks so...and who could know more about foolish delusions?

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

We have come to a place unimagined even by Orwell who got so much right.  

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

What follows is a bit of a recap of my two years here.  I’m going to drop in some of my favorite illustrations and collages from the past 2 years and they won’t necessarily relate to the text.  I beg your indulgence.

On April 30, 2006 I posted my first diary at DailyKos, The Curse of Big Money and The Pledge.  (Wasn’t a big hit.)

Faye is a loyal kossack and a progressive Democrat running for Congress down in Florida.  She’s being messed with by the Repubs down that way who refuse to give this fine woman a fair shake.  They’re playing their usual dirty tricks to keep Faye from running.

Faye can explain better than I, so let me share the email I received from her recently.