It took so long to find him
In that God-forsaken wilderness
The mountains reaching upward to the sky
And friends who claimed they'd help us only
Stumbled on their own duplicity
The compound
Was fractured
In a daring display of
True bravado
Surprising
When it happened
He had since become incommunicado
He had us scared and running
For so many awful years
His ruthlessness was legend everyplace he'd been
Nobody knew quite how to do that
Which all knew had to be done immediately
The compound
Was fractured
In a daring display of
True bravado
Surprising
When it happened
He had since become incommunicado
. . . have you, when determining where to store a valuable, semi-valuable, helpful, pragmatic, useful . . .
. . . item, you finally - VOILA - arrive at just the absolute best place for that particular item?
A GOOD PLACE!
We all know them. We all have them. We have all placed these valuable, semi-valuable, helpful, pragmatic, useful items in A GOOD PLACE at one time or another. And it truly, without-a-shadow-of-a doubt as good a good place as a good place can be. But of course, when the time comes that you must find that item, you can't for the life of you remember where in the world you put it until you finally remember that you actually put it in. . .
A GOOD PLACE.
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(from NPR http://www.npr.org/2012/04/27/151456319/is-moderate-growth-good-for-the-economy)
'The U.S. economy hit the recession exit ramp nearly three years ago,
but it's been lost on the back roads somewhere near Recoveryville ever
since. Growth rates have been modest at best
compared with the 4-plus percent growth in the years well before the
U.S. began slouching toward its worst post-World War II recession. On
Friday, the government reported that the economy grew at a 2.2 percent
pace in the first quarter, down from the 3 percent rate at the end of
2011. The Federal Reserve this week said it expects growth to "remain
moderate over coming quarters and then to pick up gradually. "Common
sense says high growth rates are good and slower, more modest ones are
not so good. But is that always the case? After all, the "irrational
exuberance" of the early 2000s helped bring on the recession as people
borrowed and spent their way to prosperity. Economists
say growth will remain low and consumers will be cautious as long as
unemployment stays high. Last month, the jobless rate stood at 8.2
percent. We asked four economists for their
take on the growth rate and whether it has triggered any permanent
change in consumer behavior. They are Chris Christopher, a senior
principal economist at IHS Global Insight; William Dickens, an economist
at the Brookings Institution; Gary Hufbauer, a senior researcher at the
Peterson Institute for International Economics; and Ken Matheny, senior
economist at Macroeconomic Advisers. . ."
It's time we re-examine our expectations and our standards. Let us redefine 'growth' and calibrate our expectations to a more realistic and natural level. Paraphrasing Dylan Ratigan in "Greedy Bastards", short term greed is practiced by greedy bastards; the largest payback as quickly as possible. Long-term greed is what capitalism is all about. Provide a good or service of value and reap a profit over a number of years . . . yes YEARS; a concept quite foreign to U.S. business.
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there was any such thing as DNA when the constitution was written? U.S. or state!
Maryland's Attorney General has filed a motion asking the
state’s highest court to reconsider its ruling that it is
unconstitutional to collect DNA samples from those arrested for crimes
of violence. Also requested was a stay of its order until the Attorney General's office can appeal the ruling to the
U.S. Supreme Court. Supporters of the DNA law have urged
the Attorney General’s Office to appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court.
Federal courts, and
nearly every state court considering the issue of collecting DNA
samples from those arrested for crimes, have ruled the practice
constitutional. Collecting the DNA of an arrested person is similar
to fingerprinting suspects when they are arrested for crimes and then
running the prints through a database.
(thanks to Gazette.net)
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. . . sticks and stones? . . . don't think so . . .
Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein, two D.C. journalists for more than 40 years known for their carefully nonpartisan positions are saying that Congress is more dysfunctional than it has been since
the Civil War. They also name drop saying ". . . the Republican Party, has become an insurgent outlier —
ideologically extreme; contemptuous of the inherited social and economic
policy regime; scornful of compromise; unpersuaded by conventional
understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the
legitimacy of its political opposition," they write in their new book, It's Even Worse Than It Looks. . . "
They also say, ". . . the media and elsewhere sometimes do a disservice to the reality. . . It disarms the electorate in a democracy when
you really need an ideological outlier to be reined in by an active,
informed public. . . "
This one'll be a must-read for me.
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Susan Reimer, columnist of the Baltimore Sun wrote the other day about the Catholic church. She wrote about birth control pills being forbidden, opposition to any legal standing for gay people, even opposition to their own nuns' spending too much time on social justice issues and not
enough time pounding home the message about birth control and abortion.
And now, the case of Amanda Dougherty. Anna, a
student at a Catholic high school outside Philadelphia, had the dress,
the shoes, the ticket and the guy for her junior prom. Until the guy
backed out. She was determined to pin a smile on her face and go
anyway, to have fun with her friends. Healthy attitude right? Wrong! The school and the
archdiocese told her that she couldn't go without a date. "For
them to say that we're not good enough to go unless we have a guy
standing next to us, it's just kind of sickening," Amanda told a CBS
reporter. In a statement, Catholic school officials said there
were plenty of high school events a student could attend without a date,
"but we view the prom as a special social event where a date is
required to attend."
And
an Indiana teacher at a Catholic school found that her contract had not
been renewed after she asked for some time off to pursue a second in
vitro fertilization. When Emily Herx of Fort Wayne pointed out
that her supervisor not only knew of her first attempt but was praying
for its success, and that no embryos were destroyed or frozen, the
monsignor in the parish told her she was a "grave, immoral sinner"
anyway.
Why
is the Catholic Church increasing their stress of doctrine in a world
already full of religious extremists of all stripes? Why would it stifle it's own inner circle which serves the weak and defends their rights? Why would it wound the faithful at their most vulnerable moments? Why does it exclude, when it could embrace?
According to their own scripture, Jesus said, "I have come that you might have
life and have it abundantly." He also said: "By this shall men know
that you are my disciples; not that you pass the test of traditional
orthodoxy, but that you love; and in loving bear witness that you can
give of the life that you have received." Personally, I like that.
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