Roadmap to Peace Israel and Palistine need to call AAA for a new Map. Israel assassinated a Hamas member this week with rockets fired from two helicopters over Gaza. Three bystanders were injured. Israeli prime minister Sharon takes responsibility for ordering the killing. The Hamas member, Iyad al-Baeck, had been an accused killer himself. The U.S. State Department has denounced targeted killings and execution carried out without due process. "They undermine the efforts to achieve peace" according to spokesman Richard Boucher. Wow, no kidding. I don't believe anyone in the Israeli government will help support peace with Palistine. Sorry, please prove me wrong, I'd love to be wrong on this.
Nunya [9:14 AM]
Activists make demands of Ford Rainforest Action Network and Global Exchange sent a letter to Bill Ford, chairman of Ford Motor Company, expressing their disappointment with the poor fuel economy of Ford's vehicles.
Non profit groups may not understand the mission of a publicly held corporation. It's to keep the shareholders happy by earning a profit, legally, selling the customer products they want to buy. If the public wanted cars with better fuel economy, Ford would build them. They will start when the public stops buying cars that get low fuel economy. Every time the price of gas drops a quarter, people flock back to buy SUV's the size of tanks. It's the people, the consumers, who should be getting chastised by Rainforest Action Network. But I don't think the Network will like the reaction they get. Americans seem to drive by the slogan, "you can have my SUV when you pry the steering wheel from my cold dead hands" I did an informal survey in the barber shop a few weeks ago. I asked all there if they would like to drive a car that got 50% better mileage, if it was 33% smaller, with similar reductions in power, speed and acceleration. You should know what their answer was. And it was unanimous.
Nunya [9:06 AM]
According to an Associated Press report, India's prime minister said he would not accept Pakistan's offer for mutual nuclear disarmament. "We are seeking friendship with Pakistan, but we will be cautious," he said. "We do not want to use all our resources on buying arms and weapons, but we have to defend ourselves in case of a threat."
Too bad they are being "forced" to spend all their resources on weapons for a defense that will probably destroy themselves as well as all their neighbors.
Nunya [8:57 AM]
If you are an animal lover then this story will probably upset you. Cats and dogs being harvested for their fur might make your blood boil, but the animals are probably better off than these (human) animals in North Korea. Check out how NK is degenerating into concentration camp conditions.
Nunya [1:47 PM]
No, Really. I copied and pasted this right off an advertising banner:
Poetry Writing Workshops
Poets teach acclaimed online wrirting class "Best of Web"-Forbes www.WritingClasses.com
What's a wrirting class?
I thought I was a bad speller.
Nunya [1:35 PM]
Spheres of Influence If you never read "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" let me give you a condensed version. Spend 90% of your time working on things you can actually do something about. Makes sense when you read it but so many people waste their time banging their head against a wall. Easy example: The Weather.
Carp all you want, you can't make it rain, nor can you stop it from raining. You can put on a raincoat. Smart money goes with the mack. I read a lot of posts from authors who are deeply troubled about some serious problems. I feel their pain. The trouble is that the writer isn't always in a position to do anything constructive about it, unless living in anguish is constructive. I've been criticized for not doing anything "really constructive" about life's problems myself. My reply is "we're doing what we can". One tool I use is a list. I make up a list of things to do on a day off, a list too long to finish, because something always comes up, and I'm not able to do some of the things on the list. I just move on to the next thing. I've got a lifetime list too, but it's not written down. maybe it should be. What is on your list? Can you do it? Is there something you can do presently so that you may some day be able to attain your goal? Share with me.
Thanks.
Nunya [10:46 PM]
Revolution
by The Beatles
You say you want a revolution
Well you know
we all want to change the world
You tell me that it's evolution
Well you know
We all want to change the world
But when you talk about destruction
Don't you know you can count me out
Don't you know it's gonna be alright
Alright Alright
You say you got a real solution
Well you know
we'd all love to see the plan
You ask me for a contribution
Well you know
We're doing what we can
But when you want money for people with minds that hate
All I can tell you is brother you have to wait
Don't you know it's gonna be alright
Alright Alright
You say you'll change the constitution
Well you know
we all want to change your head
You tell me it's the institution
Well you know
You better free your mind instead
But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao
You ain't going to make it with anyone anyhow
Don't you know know it's gonna be alright
Alright Alright
Nunya [10:30 PM]
The Dems need to wake up. Because its time to move on. The president gave a political speech on an aircraft carrier. Well, he's a politician, he's up for re election, and he is the commander in chief of the whole armed forces. So you have a problem with someone doing his job at his place of business? The Dems are in the election too, and they have a job to do as well. So taking the president to task for this was not a surprise, but harping on it for a week is not good for them. Specifics of the gripe center on holding up the ship from returning to port, spending a lot of money, flying in a jet instead of a helicopter, and taking advantage of photo ops that will be used in the re election campaign.
If the Dems pointed these out and moved on it would be one thing. Like a body shot in a boxing match, no big deal but enough of them will add up. Quit trying to make it a knock out punch. What I feel the president was doing was not a case of hot dogging, but leadership. You show the men and women serving under you that you are willing to come out to them. You fly in a jet, because when you were their age, you were piloting jets like these yourself. It's like the foreman rolling up his sleeves and getting dirty in the trench to show his men that he got where he is by doing just what he asks them to do every day. The big deal is I don't think the Dems understand leadership. I'm not saying you shouldn't criticize the president. I am saying that you need to take him to task on real issues, not red herring issues.
By crying for more than a week about Bush being overly political, Democrats are starting to look like they are desperate for a political issue they can take advantage of themselves, or as a better writer once put it, "Me thinks thou dost protest too much"
Nunya [8:36 AM]
Salem Pax is back. After an agonizing absence, a new post appears at Where is Raed
Nunya [1:36 PM]
Ever wake up at 3AM and compose a poem in your head? Ever been able to remember it when you woke back up at 6? I would like to ask each person that visits and reads this to go to the comments section and suggest a title. Thanks.
Dave
Untitled
Of all the images of nine-eleven
that are burned into my mind,
none are as desperate as those
of the souls who chose to leap
from the doomed towers
to certain destruction on
the streets below them.
Their last few seconds
falling, an allegory of our
lives. And as they say on
many a trip, ‘getting there
is half the fun' ‘relax and
enjoy the journey'
For falling isn't fatal, although
no one has survived the sudden
stop at the end yet.
And aren't we all falling,
all of the time, into the
hands of a loving God?
Nunya [8:19 AM]
I'd like to share a poem By Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Ferlinghetti pre-dates the Beat generation as one of the Avant-Garde writers, but this poem is from a collection published in 1997 called "A Far Rockaway of the Heart" It is titled simply #9. The formatting is off because of the need to save space, but the poem and punctuation are his.
History is made of the lies of the victors but you would never dream it from the covers of the textbooks nor from the way the victors are portrayed as super-benevolent altruists and lovers of the poor and downtrodden who never had a chance to rise up and write their own dubious stories in the mystery we call history (a river blurred with tears or a running sea whose fish change color when cast upon the beach)
And the feelthy rich get filthier or richer or whatever because money really doesn't 'trickle down' but rises like anything hot
And they keep getting more medals for bad behavior and for agreeing that Yes Justice has been done and the stock market is open to everyone Long live usura and the jury system is the best ever for preserving the status quota
And in fact why not have historians who leave blanks in their writing to be filled in variously depending on who's in power and the computer makes changes easy
And anyway history isn't really history until it's rewritten or at least until it repeats itself
And a lot of genocides and massacres maybe never really happened so the record should be corrected like the Holocaust or the rape of Cuba and Nicaragua or Cambodia or Timor or you name it
Even though even God can't change a historical fact something that's actually happened like a rape or a kiss
But all those natives in all those Third and Fourth World ghettos really always wanted to be conquered by Cortez the prophesied fair-haired god or by Columbus the great white hope of Spain and/or Italy
and stolen continents weren't really stolen but were glorious Christian conquests that saved those heathen from themselves Onward Christian Soldiers
And on and on into the sunset go the histories about how God was always on our side anyway and who is more fit to write the story than the victors themselves who are the fittest having survived and arrived at the summit of humanity's blind history where the prizes are awarded to the fittest
And anyway everyone except Plato knows that Truth Beauty Goodness are all relative especially Truth as she is extolled in the history books Amen oh brother can you spare a dime?
Nunya [9:14 PM]
The not for Hollywood version. Pvt Jessica Lynch's rescue has more than one version, and the Toronto Star has a version that is supposed to have been told by the doctors and nurses who cared for Jessica at the hospital she was found at. You can read it at TheStar.Com. A thank you to Faramin for sharing this.
Nunya [2:16 PM]