Shall we dance

Upon reading that Deborah Kerr has died, I felt the urge to post this video before turning in.



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Open Thread

Here's a new thread.

TGIF

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Colbert announces presidential pursuit

Okay, it's old news at this point, but I thought I'd front page it anyway...

Colbert announces presidential pursuit (Yahoo News)

OF COLBERT AND FAVORITE SONS AND DAUGHTERS... (article in The Nation)

Stephen Colbert announces presidential bid, but is it the truth or truthiness? (CNET)

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Has Burmas' Junta Gone too Far?

At the time of this writing, pro-democracy groups from Burma estimate the number of Buddhist monks killed by regime violence in the past two weeks to be as low as 200 and possibly many more. Those numbers make the regime's official estimates of a dozen or so monks killed absurdly low, and they highlight a serious error in strategy by the junta - one that is likely to be their final undoing.

Although the regime wants news of their ongoing and brutal repression to spread far and wide within the country (so as to terrorize its citizens out of continuing to protest), they are simultaneously attempting to cover up the extent of the repression against the monks themselves. By sequestering the monks away and focusing the most recent rounds of open violence on student leadership, the generals assume they are killing two birds with one stone - both quashing dissent (including amongst the monks themselves) and giving the appearance of stability rather than blatant cruelty. But they are failing on both counts.

The resistance continues, even amongst the monks, in a number of forms. Many monks have been engaged in a hunger strike for up to two weeks now. Others have been instrumental in protests of other types, including prayer vigils in honor of their fallen brethren. By violently striking out against that specific part of society - the revered, symbolic soul of Burma - the regime may have applied the final straw necessary to galvanize many who have thus far only stood on the sidelines. A common regime tactic in striking out against a nonviolent mass movement considered threatening to their power is to accuse the group of being "terrorists" or "enemies of the people." But in this case, the generals are in quite a dilemma because they know no one will believe that sort of fiction about peaceful, much-beloved monks. So, their answer is to hide away the monks and continue to terrorize the people.

However, yesterday's arrests (and reported torture) of three suspected movement leaders, including one of the alleged 8888 generation leaders, is evidence not of control by the regime, but a lack of it, especially because the movement has committed itself to the use of nonviolent methods in its resistance. ...

Read the full article

We very much hope this analysis is correct, and that the generals' days are numbered. However, the BBC's reporting is not optimistic.

Japan's balancing act on Burma
Defian Burma will not Change
Japan Adds to Pressure on Burma
UN Envoy Condemns Burma Arrests

Note:Look in the righthand sidebar on any of the above linked items for related stories, background, Q&A etc.

Light a virtual candle for the people of Burma

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Gizmo is for lovers

My wife, Jackie is in a lot of pain most of the time, so although I've been experimenting with Gizmo since about mid April, the time was never quite right for her to play the Butterfly Game with me until about two weeks ago, and again this past Thursday. Each session lasted about a half an hour because it's hard for her to stay in one position for longer than that.

In the first session, we started during the second half of 'our' favorite movie, "The Quiet Man." The second half hour, last week, we listened to selections from Rod Stewart's "Great American Song Book." I have to say that the results of those two sessions were astounding.

I have often talked about the moments when Lovers feel like two halves of the same person. Jackie and I have felt that way quite often over the years, but while playing Gizmo, we were taken to a whole new level. As the butterflies grew closer together, and finally touched, a tangible electrical field enveloped us. The intensity of this gentle electrical field grew as our hearts maintained and sustained identical frequencies, and was most intense at .6HZ, the frequency most associated with Oneness and Empathy.

Jackie knows almost nothing about computers, and even less about the theory behind how Gizmo works, but as we were surrounded by this electricity, tears of Love were streaming down our faces. We are looking forward to our next sessions, but Jackie has become busy taking care of the new kittens, and they have become a distraction for her. So it may be another week or so before we can try it again.

My instinct tells me that there is great potential for healing in that electrical field. In nearly 24 years together, I don't think we've ever experienced anything like it. Just imagine the difference between a flashlight and a laser and you'll begin to understand what happened.

We were totally amazed.

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Denise's Al Gore event report

From Renee: Denise posted this in the comments late Thursday night. On Friday morning, it occurred to me that it really should be frontpaged, but I was running late. I created this guest blogger thread, complete with comment link first thing Friday morning, but the day was so crazy I never got around to telling anyone I'd done that. But I had a lovely retreat when all was said and done. Without further ado, Denise's report...

I flew through the hotel with my business colleague in tow behind my conference manager, who was SO COOL to do this for me. Plug for the Westin St. Francis - great place for a real SF experience.

We're in the back of the house and opens up the curtain and seats me three rows behind Barbara, Bonnie and Jackson - as well as Barbara's family. I don't know who is who, but if she has a son, he was very nice. I had a chat with him in the elevator earlier but had no idea who he was at the time. I'm not sure if the grandbaby was his daughter. There were two other young women around who could have been her daughters.

So Barbara, in her very chic red suit, gets up on her literal soapbox (more like a veggie crate) to reach the mic. After her welcome talk, which was really very short, she introduced Bonnie and Jackson, as well as two other singers who were excellent. They harmonized really well on "World in Motion", the song I was listening to them rehearse earlier in the day. That was kind of fun, too. Bonnie spied me in the hallway, smiled and I asked her if they wanted privacy as the hallway was filling up. She said yes, so I shut the doors. Just can't leave the job behind...sigh.

The next song they did was "I'm a Patriot", composed by Steven van Zandt. You can see him performing it here.

Then Bonnnie did my most favorite song, the John Prine tune "Angel from Montgomery." I'm a huge Prine fan, and her version always makes me tear up. She dedicated it to the women around the world that are "still having a tough time of it." Darn she has pretty hair! I took a few pix on my cell phone. She was playing with the kids sitting around her as Barbara took the stage again to introduce Al.

He took the stage in a really smart charcoal suit, looking really, really good. My business colleague was freaking out. I was just enjoying the moment. I won't go into what he spoke about in detail, as we all know what he cares about most these days. And he told some stories about the so called scientists who write to him to basically tell him he's full of it. (My words, not his). He talked about Darfur and how we could have prevented it, and still could, if we had our priorities straight. He didn't mention Burma, but he only spoke about 10 minutes. Ice caps, healthcare, a few jabs at the Bushies, but not by any particular name. Class act all the way.

Barbara came back on stage and related the story about when Gore was in front of the Senate and the whole thing with Inhofe. It was sweet how she motioned with the mic as if it was the gavel when she said "elections have consequences." And then the guy I think was her son ran on stage and gave her a campaign pin (Boxer 2010) with those words on it. I was able to snag a couple for me and one of my friends. I'm wearing it now.
...
Oh yeah almost forgot....the whole room erupted in a long chant of Run Al Run. Boxer didn't try to stop it :)

One more story to share - sorry it's hard to remember it all in detail. He talked about the cities in Italy that have walls around them because they used to be at war, like Florence and Siena. And how absurd that seems to s now. Or how weird it is to think that, at one time, Germany invaded France - and he gave a nod to the Senior Citizens in the audience and thanked them for their perserverance during WWII. He took a moment then to give a shout out for our troops. Then he said that we can prevent another world disaster if we just band together and take the step to make things better - TOGETHER.

Coverage of the event from tonight's Chronicle

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Open Thread

Here's a new thread, since the old one has gotten pretty long.

Update: Something new I learned on retreat this weekend:

In Celtic and other folklore the otter is often characterised as a friendly and helpful creature, and is given the name 'water dog', alluding to these qualities. In the Irish story The Voyage of Maelduin, otters on the Island of Otter bring the sailors salmon to eat, and the Voyage of Brendan tells of how an otter performed this service for a hermit, even collecting firewood for him! St. Cuthbert is the patron saint of otters, and after standing waist-deep in the North Sea during his nightly prayer vigils, two otters would come and warm his feet with their breath and dry them with their fur.

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Gore, U.N. body win Nobel Peace Prize

Via Yahoo News:

Former Vice President Al Gore and the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize Friday for their efforts to spread awareness of man-made climate change and lay the foundations for counteracting it.

"I am deeply honored to receive the Nobel Peace Prize," Gore said. "We face a true planetary emergency. The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity."

More here.

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Hillary doesn't like being questioned

Found this via skippy...

in a rare departure from her tightly scripted remarks, the former first lady lashed out at an audience member steamed at her senate vote to declare iran's revolutionary guard a terrorist organization.

randall rolph, of nashua, iowa, compared the vote to the one clinton cast for the iraq war resolution, asking, "why should i support your candidacy . . . if it appears you haven't learned from your past mistakes?"

clinton hit back hard, saying, "the premise of the question is wrong, and i'll be happy to explain that to you."

then she suggested rolph was a plant, saying his question was based on something "somebody obviously sent you."

she soon backed down, telling him, "i apologize. it's just that i've been asked the very same question in three other places."

Well, Hills, it's an obvious question. Given that you feel that you can't admit your Iraq vote was a mistake, all we can hope for is some evidence that you've learned from that experience. And, yeah, we're going to find it a tad disheartening if you can't even give us that.

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Open Thread

I've added a few new shared items here.


Found the Harvest Moon pic via Stumbleupon.

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Bless all creatures here below

Daughter sang with the children's choir today, and, since this is the Sunday closest to the Feast of St. Francis, the hymns centered around that. The opening hymn was one I'd never heard before, and it was *adorable*.

Today we celebrate a feast,
A holiday for man and beast.
We think of every friend who speaks,
barks and purrs and roars and squeaks.
As we sing we keep in mind
beings of a different kind.

Bless all creatures here below,
Lord, from whom all blessings flow.

We think of squirrels in the park
at play from morning light 'til dark,
and birds that sing on leafy boughs
in green fields with the sheep and cows
Dear that in the forest leap,
whales that swim the ocean deep.

Bless all creatures here below,
Lord, from whom all blessings flow.

Together with our pets we meet
friends with whiskers, tails that greet.
Muzzles wet beside our cheek
show us love they cannot speak.
Hold them tight so they will know
where we are they too will go.

Bless all creatures here below,
Lord, from whom all blessings flow.

There were three more verses. The last line, though, is what made me well up:

When at last we come to you, let our creatures be there too

Our creatures have just got to be there. If they're not, how could it be heaven?

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Ads that suck

This afternoon I went out to run an errand, and the car's engine died on me. As I mentioned in the comments earlier, at least I was in town, and wouldn't have to wait too long for Demetrius to come rescue me. But I still had a good half hour of waiting by the side of the road, which was more than enough time to contemplate one of my un-favorite billboards, seeing as it was staring me right in the face.

The ad is for a radio station. It features a closeup of a busty young Caucasian female, wearing a t-shirt. I can't say "blonde" or "redhead" or whatever, because they don't show her face. She's not a person, after all, but an object. The billboard instructs the viewer to listen to The Blitz 99.7 and "Pray for rain".

Ohhh! I get it! I mean, it's a little subtle, but I *think* this is what they were going for...

Yaaaaay! Clap, clap, clap! If it rain, we see lady's nipples!

Also, crops not die.

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Open Thread

Just thought I'd put up a new thread before taking Daughter to choir practice.

Oh--in case anyone remembers that I had a picture of Daughter's cat Stevie in a Quaker-style hat with an empty talk balloon, and was wondering what words to put in the balloon. Here's what I ended up doing.

Updated shared items here.

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It's Kitten Time!

It's Friday night, time to relax with our friends at The Daily Kitten. Kittens are good for what ails you!

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My Evening with Al Gore and his Slide Show Presentation

by Linda*in*SFNM ~ 4th October 2007



As many of you know, last night was Rio Rancho's Al Gore Live Presentation with his slide show, "An Inconvenient Truth." Besides the important information about the Climate Crisis, our desire to show support for Mr. Gore to be our President was in full swing.

We arrived at the Santa Ana Star Center over an hour before the event was scheduled to start. Unfortunately the police said they were given orders no signs be on property. Given so many expected this to be "the place" to be, we had many other candidates, Presidential and Senate, present that were pushed to the sidelines as well. We stood on the sidewalk facing the entrance armed with buttons, fliers and displaying our banner. I don't know if Mr. Gore had a chance to see us, but the people sure did. It was great to hear-pretty much everyone wanting a Gore Presidency. Almost everyone we asked if they wanted a button was thrilled to put one on. Of course we weren't getting many walking by us, being we weren't in front of the door, so I sent Bruce with a bag of them to pass out in front of the entrance. He walked back within minutes that they were gone instantly 3 times.

The people were very excited about Gore for President. And the only one person who displayed skepticism that he would run and didn't want a button, came up to me after the presentation to say "I changed my mind, can I still have a button?" But people who were not even part of the "official Draft Gore" were still all on the same page and were doing their own individual part. It was so exciting. I had a couple with their daughter coming up with signs and petitions to join the Kyoto Treaty. And another couple inside painted R U N down their shirts. And yet another couple in front of us were too from Santa Fe and excited to hear there was a movement. And because the buttons we made have the website's address, www.algore.org on it, it is easy for them to officially get involved.

After arriving at our seats and realizing there was an opportunity to hit the folks up sitting in the front of the stage that Mr. Gore would be speaking on, I walked over to ask if anyone wanted buttons. If they weren't already wearing them (as we saw them on the chests everywhere we looked) more asked for them. Then the folks on the side that saw and heard I had buttons all started yelling out that they wanted some and I started getting "we need 5 over here." I had to excuse myself to return with them as I ran out. When I returned with more buttons, the people asked if they could shake my hand to thank me for my work, and one man yelled out "I love you."

Mr. Gore was absolutely incredible. He was so energetic, passionate, strong and funny. He opened up with some humor, before giving the facts. But he carefully alleviates the tension from the intense information he is sharing, with a slight break of humor every once in a while. The information and facts he shares, just rolls off effortlessly with intense passion being displayed when the news gets deep. The standing ovations he received when entering paled in comparison to when he finished his presentation. I don't think any of us wanted to sit down.

The information Mr. Gore shared in his presentation was updated with current information. So I must say how disturbing it was, after thinking I saw and heard the information before from the movie, to see and hear the latest news, including the fact that he highlighted information for our state. Most troubling was the fact that with everything happening, we are indeed running out of time. As he clearly stated, we are speeding up the warming at an alarming rate. We went from 100 years time to act, down to 50. Then after the long awaited study, it showed so much damage that we had as little as 34 years. Last month new information came out saying the rate is advancing so much with the melting of arctic ice, that we now had only 23 years before the tipping point. Well, after last weeks news that twice the size of England melted and then the size of Florida disappeared, Mr. Gore just received word the day prior that our tipping point may be as early as in 7 years. 7 years. I started to cry.

Mr. Gore said he believes we can solve this still, but we need to act with urgency and he is asking for citizenry activism. Get involved. Go online and find out what we can do to help. He also made clear that we must restore our democracy.

The evening ended when he was to take questions from the audience. At this point I figured if I got kicked out, it would have been worth it, so I took my banner, opened it up and dropped it hanging from our legs. I know it was seen, because Fran saw it sitting on the opposite side of the Center, and I noticed people in their seats pointing to the banner giving a "thumbs up." I can only hope a pause from Mr. Gore was him having a glimpse of it. Because, after all, it is time, Time for a COOL change with Mr. Gore.

The final questions of the evening were of a young girl and boy, ages 12 and 13. They both wanted to know if this would be solved, by whom and, "Do I and my children have a chance?" That pretty much said it all, what is on the mind of their generation. Then the little girl added "Good luck in winning the Nobel Peace Prize." Mr. Gore bowed his head with that and then responded that it is our responsibility to solve this for them and their children. And he hopes they will ask the question of how we managed to solve this. I do too.

Upon leaving from the very emotion filled presentation, I had the chance to find that little girl and give her a button. I hope that will help give some added hope that we will solve this crisis for her.

Thank you Al Gore.

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Saint Francis

Today is the Feast of St. Francis.

What have you done lately for the birds and the other creatures of the Earth?

Why Francis is the Patron of Ecology

- listener

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Howard Dean on Bush's SCHIP Veto

This morning, President Bush rejected health care for children. Now it's time for Democrats to reject President Bush.

If we can get 2/3 of Congress to stand up to President Bush, we can overturn his veto on the State Children's Health Insurance Program -- a program that provides health insurance for millions of kids.

We need your help to get those votes.

We've set up a simple tool that will allow you to write a letter and send it to your members of Congress instantly. Send your Senators and Representative a message telling them to stand up to George Bush:

http://www.democrats.org/FightForKids

George Bush made a cold political calculation this morning. He could have signed this bi-partisan bill into law, or he could have pandered to conservatives who didn't want to see the Children's Health Insurance Program get the funding it needs.

He decided to pander -- and millions of kids will suffer for it.

What makes this veto worse is that George Bush will spend billions of dollars in Iraq, some of it on contractors like Blackwater and Halliburton, while denying millions of children needed doctors' visits or medicine here at home.

On top of that, all of the Republican candidates for president support his veto.

Democrats are in the majority for a reason. Send a message to your Senators and Representative and let them know why that is:

http://www.democrats.org/FightForKids

This past week, Graeme Frost, a 12 year old from Baltimore, Maryland, delivered this week's Democratic Radio Address.

Graeme is a brave young man. Three years ago, his family was in a serious car accident. Graeme was in a coma for a week, suffered severe brain trauma, and had to re-learn how to eat and walk.

Graeme is alive today because of the State Children's Health Insurance Program. As he said last weekend:

"My parents work really hard and always make sure my sister and I have everything we need, but the hospital bills were huge. We got the help we needed because we had health insurance for us through the CHIP program.

"I don't know why President Bush wants to stop kids who really need help from getting CHIP. All I know is I have some really good doctors. They took great care of me when I was sick, and I'm glad I could see them because of the Children's Health Program."

Families like the Frosts need your help. You can hear Graeme talk about his experience and send a message to your Senators and Representative right here:

http://www.democrats.org/FightForKids

As a doctor, I've seen our country's health care crisis first-hand.

I've seen parents that have to wait for their kids to get dangerously sick before they could take them to a doctor. I've seen parents struggle over important medical care decisions because they didn't know how to pay for it. And I've seen parents left in poverty because they had no other choice.

But you don't have to be a doctor to understand the importance of health insurance for our nation's kids. Just ask any mother or father whose child has been sick, and they'll all tell you the same thing: that there's nothing more important to them than making sure their kids are healthy.

As governor of Vermont, 96% of the children in my state had health insurance. That's the sort of commitment our country needs -- and the sort of commitment President Bush doesn't have.

The American people elected a Democratic majority last fall to stand up to President Bush's misguided priorities. Remind your Senators and Representative just what the American people stand for.

http://www.democrats.org/FightForKids

Sincerely,
Gov. Howard Dean, M.D.

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Just Hanging Out Together, Thinking Green

- Photo by listener

Lucy: Make the scene with green.

Snoopy: Hang loose with chartreuse!

And, in the immortal words of Kermit The Frog: It's not easy being green.

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Open Thread

Talk amongst yourselves...

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Drowning in "sleep debt"

Originally posted at My Left Wing

Well, this is a timely subject for me to be covering with my introductory psychology students.

Each of us has a specific daily sleep requirement. The average sleep requirement for college students is well over eight hours, and the majority of students would fall within the range of this value plus or minus one hour. If this amount is not obtained, a sleep debt is created. All lost sleep accumulates progressively as a larger and larger sleep indebtedness. Furthermore, your sleep debt does not go away or spontaneously decrease. The only way to reduce your individual sleep debt is by obtaining extra sleep over and above your daily requirement.

So, here I am, up to my eyeballs in sleep debt. How am I supposed to get out of debt? By sleeping, one would presume. Except that I get into this ironic-sounding but very real state of "overtired" and I can't. But now, at least I have something new to worry about during those sleepless hours.

Like, if I can't get sleep on my own, and I have to pay off this sleep debt, what options do I have? Go to the sleep bank to take out a loan? Maybe my credit isn't good, and I'd be forced to go to a sleep loan shark. What do they do if you can't pay on time. Instead of breaking your legs, maybe they burn your mattress...

Sleep researcher William Dement--who wrote the article I excerpted above--has said that a large sleep debt "makes you stupid". At very least, as evidenced above, it is making my jokes stupid.

Jokes aside, though, this has been on my mind a lot lately. I think we hear these things about how much sleep we need, and how unhealthy it is to rack up a huge sleep debt, many of us are inclined to nod seriously, but then file that away with all the other "shoulds" that most of us ignore. And I wonder if there's something in the Western, "rugged individualist" mindset that tells us we're supposed to be able to "conquer the natural world", even when it comes to our own biological needs. I can't say exactly where, but I picked up an idea like that somewhere along the line. The idea that I should be able to "overcome" tiredness by sheer force of will. Or the idea that, if my schedule is packed and I can't fit everything in, sleep is an area where I can cut some corners.

I'm coming to realize that I can't, and that I need to listen to what my body is telling me.

Anyway, as I said in a comment that's attached to the My Left Wing essay, the upshot of all of this of all of this is that, when I take a realistic look at where I have to "cut corners", I realize that blogging is one area where I need to do that. Along with following political and news stories and getting outraged about them. Hopefully I can work some of that back into my life once I regain some "balance".

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