Here’s a definition of karma for those of you who are not familiar with the term.  In Hinduism and Buddhism it is the sum of a person’s actions in this and previous states of existence, viewed as deciding their fate in future existences.  Also referred to as destiny or fate, following as effect from cause.

I am wondering if this karmic draw will bring about the splitting of the Republican party which I’ve been sensing was coming for quite some time, and we will be finally left with three major parties instead of just two.

Bachmann doesn’t believe in compromise on her core principles, and will only hire someone to work for her if they share those principles which she’s pretty much defined as religious right.  This means that she doesn’t want to hear varied points of view, and that she’s scarily rigid.

She says she gets her directions from God also.  I’ve known some schizos who have told me the same thing – not that I’m accusing her of being such.  Her way of being in the world also reminds me of what I’ve read about Hitler’s mind set.  Well, whoopee ding: at least we can’t wonder if she’s a socialist – as if that could be the worst thing one could become.

I can’t imagine anyone that I know, who is a thinking grown up, voting for someone to preside over this country who believes that she is obligated to be subservient to her husband, and obey him even if she doesn’t want to; however, I’ve known women who still feel that way and odds are they will vote for her.  Yes, the Republican Party has gotten exactly what they deserve.  I just hope this country doesn’t follow suit.

If she does become the Republican candidate, perchance the following card would ease the angst of those caught in this theatre of the absurd: AK-034

And Rick Perry?  That’s just what the old looks like as it pretends to be new!

Our founding fathers set up our system of government so that our elected representatives would have to engage in compromise.   So far the Democrats are the only ones giving anything into this “compromise.”   It’s obvious that the Republicans want this government to totally collapse so that they can then blame it on President Obama and hopefully win the next elections.  There will be no winners in this dangerous game they are playing.

I do think and hope that it will reveal that the Republicans have let some vipers into their party.  It reminds me of a song I heard long ago, and I can’t remember who sang it,  abut a woman who invited a snake into her home, and then was shocked when it fatally bit her.  Well, Repubs: you invited the snake in for the votes!

Eric Cantor said yesterday that there were three choices: John Boehnerr’s plan; Cut, Cap & Balance or Default.  As I recall, these are all Republican proposals/choices.  This is compromise?  Here’s just a few definitions of compromise from Wikepedia.  Compromise is to make a deal where one person gives up part of his or her demand, and it is a concept of finding agreement through communication, through a mutual acceptance of terms – often involing variations from an original goal or desire.  Extremism is often considered as an antonym to compromise, which, depending on context, may be associated with concepts of balance, tolerance, etc.

I have yet to hear ANYTHING that the Republicans are willing to compromise.  Our government was set up the way it is to stop a dictatorship from creeping into our government, such as the one that is now being bowed to by both the Republicans and Democrats.

And here’s a chart from the New Republic to help clear up the LIE that President Obama has created the financial mess we are in.  Check it out!

The Bush Deficit

• Jonathan Cohn

• July 25, 2011 | 9:28 am
• More From this Author

Is Boehner’s Success Good News?

Tea Party Group: Boehner Must Go

Is There Any Good Reason To Support the Corporate Jet Loophole and Other Tax Breaks for the Wealthy?

Critics of President Obama never tire of blaming him for today’s high deficits. But if blame belongs with one president, it belongs with Obama’s predecessor, George W. Bush. The chart above, which the New York Times created based upon figures from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, illustrates this point very clearly. But it’s worth reviewing the history here, because while it’s familiar to most of us who follow politics it doesn’t seem to get a lot of attention in the political debate.

By the end of the 1990s, the federal budget was in surplus for the first time in decades. Partly that was a product of unusually strong economic growth, during the internet boom, which had swelled tax revenues. But partly that was a product of responsible budgeting, presided over by the most recent two presidents, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. In order to reduce deficits, lawmakers and those two presidents had agreed both to raise taxes and to reduce spending.

In the 2000 campaign, Clinton’s would-be successor, Al Gore, campaigned on a promise to, in effect, put those surpluses aside for a rainy day. Bush would have none of it. The government had too much money, he said; the responsible thing was to give it all back to the taxpayers. In office, he did just that, presiding over massive tax cuts that gave, by far, the largest benefits to the very wealthy. Bush promised that the tax cuts would act like a “fiscal straightjacket,” preventing government from growing. But then he, and his allies, launched two major wars and enacted a drug benefit for Medicare, all without paying for them.

Today’s fiscal gap is largely a product of those decisions, as the graph above shows. It has very little to do with anything Obama did while in office. In fact, the contrast between the two administrations could not be more striking. Obama’s primary undertaking has been comprehensive health care reform. But he insisted that it pay for itself, through a combination of spending cuts and tax increases.

Of course, tomorrow’s deficit problem is a bit different from today’s. Looking decades into the future, it’s the rising cost of health care that seem likely to wreck federal finances. But health care reform addresses that too, by putting in places the policies and institutions necessary to curb spending on medical care.

More Articles On: the New York Times, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush

And a little scary news from one of the Republican candidates for the presidency who has finally spoken out on the debt issue.  Michelle Bachmann says that she definitely wouldn’t raise the debt level to pay the bills we have ALREADY RACKED UP.  She would simply let the country drift into default and loose its credibility on the world stage – moreso than we already have.

This is no big surprise since she’s a tea- party favorite.  Also, think about this one: Bachmann’s husband demanded that she become a tax lawyer, and since she believes a woman is obligated to obedient to her husband, she did as she was told even though she didn’t want to be a tax lawyer.   Hmm.

I remember when John F. Kennedy ran for president and everyone was up in arms because they were afraid, since he was a Catholic, that he would have his policies dictated to him by the pope.  Well, it looks like, with Bachmann’s present feelings about her obligation to take orders from her husband, that if you elect her, you are really electing her husband.  Reminds me a bit of the connection between George W and Mr. Cheney?  Might want to give this some serious thought for sure.

In this day and age, how does any woman not stand on her own two feet and think for herself?  Leader of the free world?  Critic of President Obama as not leading?  Don’t think that the other Michelle that many of us have come to love and respect is pulling puppet strings behind her husband in the White House.  Here’s a card to send to your friends who will be having a nervous breakdown on August 3rd.  OT-049

The “freshmen” are telling the seniors what to do.  Have any one of you ever attended a  high school where this has  ever happened?  I say shame on you to those  in the Republican party, who instead of following their conscience, are allowing this to happen.

If you still don’t believe me that this party is being held captive by the far right freshmen, then ask yourself why Alex Castellanos, who was hired as a political strategist for the Republican Party, just said yesterday on CNN that Rush Limbaugh’s listeners are the Republican base.  ARE THE REPUBLICAN BASE!  John Boenher has even called Limbaugh to inform him of the Republican Party’s strategy in the talks he’s having with President Obama about the debt default.

And then there’s  Glenn Beck, one of their other heros, who has  invoked the name of Hitler 147 times, and Nazi 202 times while he was on Fox.   Beck also recently compared the camp that the youths were staying at in Norway, where the slaughter of dozens of innocent teens has just taken place, to Hitler’s youth camps, and yet Beck has formed his own 9/12 camps which he’s obviously forgotten exist. ????  What kind of mind would make such a comment after such a grave tragedy?

click here for Beck’s complete take on the Norway slaughter:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/norway/8660986/Norway-shooting-Glenn-Beck-compares-dead-teenagers-to-Hitler-youth.html

And then today, dear God,  I hear that the Republican Party showed a clip to the “freshmen” of the cops-and-robbers movie, The Town, to inspire them.  In the clip the robbers say before committing their robbery, “And people are going to get hurt, but we’re going to do it anyway.”  Inspiration from a bank- robber movie?  Reminds me of how the famous lawyer (some would say infamous )Jeff Feiger refers to the banks as the banksters.  Are these the kinds of minds you want dictating policy to our government?

What is happening before our eyes, if we really are trying to see through the veil of doublespeak, b.s. and outright lies is that the Republican Party of today simply wants President Obama to fail even if it costs the rest of us our livelihoods and country.

President Obama has compromised.  He’s given up on having the wealthy forfeit their tax loopholes for private jets, etc.  - and this really disappoints me deeply. The Republican Party has not only refused to compromise on anything, they continue to insist that the middle class give up even more than what’s been put on the table: Senator Harry Reid’s proposal is cutting far, far more in spending that Senator Boehner’s plan – and yet the Republican freshies have even rejected Bohner’s plan.

Do parents say OK to a three-year old throwing a tantrum for something that they know will harm them?  Hell no.  And so I ask why are the Republicans so terrified of the Tea Party and/or desperate to get rid of President Obama that they would allow the country to go into a default for the first time in its history?  If this happens, I do believe that the people who have eyes and hearts to see with will rise up, and a new party will come into existence.  It will be adios to the so-called conservative Republican party as we have known it to be in years gone by.

In the past, even if you disagreed with the opposing party, there still was an element of respect.  I fear that no longer exists – at least not for me.  In a Common Dreams’ communication  they quoted an old saying: if you’re not angry, you’re just not paying attention.   Pay attention America!  Don’t let the kids destroy the house!  What could happen to you will hopefully show you once and for all that the political is truly personal, and not to be left to fundamentalists to decide for the whole.

Not one of the candidates for president in the Republican Party has commented on whether or not they would raise the debt level (to pay for what’s already been spent by the way) as they are covering their political behinds on this one.  And they dare to say that President Obama isn’t leading?  Another reason for my present disrespect to kick up a notch or two – as if it’s not already going through the roof right now.

What’s presently happening in this country with the issue of raising the debt level is unprecedented in our history.  The debt level was raised 18 times under President Reagan, and 7 times under President George W. Bush.  There has NEVER been such an issue made over this with any other president, and I continue to  believe that it has a base in racism, and how deep it still runs in this country.

And, yes, if we don’t wake up really soon: people are going to get hurt!   People are already being hurt!  Anyone who’s not in the top 5% of the wealthy in this country who votes Republican again needs their heads examined for sure.  So let’s put our heads together and dream a new world, OT-025.

Fact: the banks were bailed out, but they won’t loan money to anyone who doesn’t already have money.  Fact: when a Republican says small business, they mean General Electric, etc.  Fact: tax cuts for the wealthy hasn’t helped with jobs whatsoever.  Fact: the Republicans  think compromise is simply the other side giving in to all of their unreasonable demands.

Fact: as much as I love President Obama, if he caves on this one to the greedy demands of the Republican Party, for the first time in my adult life, I might simply not vote in the next election.  Fact: President Obama stop worrying about the vote of the Independents, and keep the vote of your base.  The middle class has given way too much already, and the elderly and children should not be asked to live on the streets so oil companies can keep their private jets and 200-room mansions.

If you believe the b.s. that’s being put out there by the Republican Party to keep these tax loopholes, etc. then odds are you also believe that Casey Anthony is not guilty too.  So much for any common sense in this world.  I guess we just have to believe the words of Carl Jung: Bidden or not bidden: God is Present.  OT-058

After hearing this accusation, when I recently watched the movie, Inside Job, I couldn’t but help notice that the only two guys in this documentary who spoke against the American Financial System, even raised questions about its corrupt practices have ended up being taken down through sexual scandals.  Eliot Spitzer, the former New York Democratic governor, was caught having an affair with a prostitute, and now Kahn, who it would have been no big deal to have been caught with a prostitute (He’s French after all), is accused of raping a maid?  Hmm.  Were they set up?

We know Spitzer did have the affair – my husband always said that most men think with their penis, but this bizarre rape just feels a bit preposterous, and now serious credibility issues have come forward regarding the “victim” who has been shown to have lied numerous times in the past on serious issues, and not to have been totally truthful regarding the sequence of events in this case.  Hmm.  At least we need to wonder.  And then her attorney gives a press conference which sounds more like a page from a Harlequin novel.

Look, I am definitely for justice in this situation, but it really smells.  Watch the movie, Inside Job, and perhaps it will give you pause to wonder too.  Many have wondered, ever since the death of J.F.Kennedy, if it wasn’t because he was going to take on the banks.  I do think there’s a much bigger story beneath all of this (than just these sexual scandals) that reporters need to try and get to.  Anyone who talks against the Financial Lords in this world feel their wrath.  It simply is what it is.  I’m just sayin’!  Check out FA-003 to send to someone who needs the courage to man or woman-up!

Even as a Yellow Dog, and perhaps particularly because I am presently one, I couldn’t resist watching the crew I knew would be appearing in the first Republican debate, and here’s the crazy thing I really never expected to see: Michele Bachmann came out as the star for the Republican’s first foray into the next presidential campaign.  The reason that she was the star for me is that she was the only one (except for Ron Paul who’ll I’ll comment on later) who appeared to actually believe what they were saying.

While I don’t agree with her on literally ANYTHING, I can still respect someone who I feel is speaking their truth.  She’s no Sarah Palin, and I do believe she will be the V.P. candidate in the next election.  I also give her kudos for taking in 23 foster children.  This is a question that I ask the right-to-lifers: have you ever been involved in the foster care system in this country?  So far, except for Bachmann, the answer (if I even get one) has always been no.

We keep hearing from the Republicans that we need to take our government back – and I ask: don’t the wealthy own enough of it already?  Mitt Romney is a perfect example of going backwards and not forward.  It feels like he talks out of both sides of his mouth, and that he simply says what he thinks he needs to say to get elected; therefore, I can’t take anything he says to heart.

Romney, more than all of the rest included, has no clue what the middle class is presently going through. He’s so middle-class clueless that he wasn’t even aware of  how callous and thoughtless his remark about being “unemployed” was to the millions who are really struggling to support their families and loosing their homes, and by the way his “bump-in-the-road” campaign, ad that’s now being televised, is a line from President Obama’s speech that he’s taken totally out of context to the point where it’s really simply just a lie.

Romney also kept repeating how bad government is, and that makes me wonder just what does he thinks government is for.  It’s not our enemy, or at least shouldn’t be.  It’s supposed to be for the people, not just there to make money for those who already have an abundance of it.  Big business and deregulation is what got us into this mess, and that’s where he wants us to return to.  He wants to take back the freedom for those who are in a position of power and wealth to do whatever they want to do  to make more power – no matter who or what their actions harm.  Watch the movies: Too Big to Fail, and Inside Job, and then get properly scared about big business taking the government back.

When questioned on what he would do for the towns devastated from the recent tornadoes, i.e. Joplin and the help FEMA is giving, he pretty much felt that they just needed to take care of themselves.  Revert to the state on this?  I think that’s reminiscent of G.W.Bush’s attitude with Katrina.  The main difference between Democrats and Republicans is that Republicans feel government is there to help them become more wealthy, and Democrats feel that it’s there to serve the totality of the nation – at least that’s what I’ve surmised through observation these past few years, and why this Yellow Dog has begun to bark as loud as she can.

Now, regarding Ron Paul: while he appeared to be speaking his truth, it was hard to really figure out just what that truth really was (even Bill O’Reilley doesn’t understand him) as he tends to simply go into rants that go round and round and round.  Pretty scarey to think of him as president considering he will be in his eighties at the end of his first term.  I don’t sense that he’s a bad person, I just feel like perhaps he’s just running to have a final platform for his rants.

The rest of the candidates felt like they were just mouthing the party line and Obama bashing.  Rick Santorum made me yawn as he repeated right-wing platitudes; Tim Pawlenty is a wuss – he couldn’t even stick by his prior accusation of Obamney care that he directed toward Romney a few days prior; Herman Cain for me simply provided the comic relief; Newt Gingrich was just so full of himself that I had to fight back nausea whenever he spoke, and like he can understand the middle class with a million dollar line of credit at Tiffanys?

Actually, it didn’t even feel like a debate: it just felt like an Obama bash, and a Republican mutual admiration society display.  It felt like they all got together before they walked  out on the stage and said: let’s aim our arrows toward President Obama and not toward one another.  Go team!  If you heard it once, you heard it a dozen or more times that President Obama has failed, and hasn’t done ONE THING RIGHT. ????  Romney, trying to score points, at one point said that anyone on the panel would be a better president than President Obama had been.

How very small an inaccurate of him, and of all of them not to acknowledge ONE thing that President Obama had accomplish.  Duh!  He got Bin Laden!  He saved General Motors and Chrysler and millions of jobs as a result.  He kept us from another depression.  He helped to stop a complete collapse of our financial system.  His actions will probably get Gadhafi out of Libya.  He’s done Wall Street Reform, and introduced a health care bill that at least begins to solve that problem; repealed don’t ask, don’t tell, and all of this in the face of the party of NO.

President Obama isn’t perfect – how could he be with all of the resistance he’s had to deal with, but he’s doing the best that I believe anyone can do in the present system that we’ve been given due to the irresponsibility of the previous eight years of Republican rule.  By the way, Bachmann says she will repeal everything that President Obama has done.  Be properly scared!

After watching the Republican debate, the reality is that they are all simply courting or already a convert of the far right, except perhaps for Ron Paul, who I don’t believe is really a right-wing Republican at heart, but someone who simply needed a platform to speak from as by the time the next election comes around, he’s be going to be looking at 90.   Yes, be properly scared!  Go team Yellow Dog, and get the vote out!

Some words from my hero Walt Whitman FA – 005.

Last week  when  Anthony Weiner resigned from his position in congress, we were witnessing yet one more politician being brought back to the reality that his actions do have consequences.  He did it, of course, in front of the cameras  - and this seemed perfectly natural to me (why anyone was even wondering about this I’ll never know) as isn’t that what got him into this in the first place?  I’ve always believed it was more about being in front of the camera and elevating the ego than it ever was about sex.  Exhibitionism or narcissism?  Maybe both? Whatever.

While he has no law degree or business experience,  he’s certainly got a penchant for that camera and acting, so perhaps Hollywood is the next avenue he should pursue?  As a rather famous book’s title states: do what you love and the money will follow.  But then again, the reality of public figures who become too enamored with their own image(s) is that after the brief fall,  odds are (unless society changes quickly) they’ll get a higher paying job and end up a talk show host or the next candidate for mayor or governor or moving back into  another seat in congress.

I’m sure Weiner will be popping up (pun intended?) somewhere down the road in a few years to once again try to grab another of Andy Warhol’s 15 minutes of  fame, and I do say all of this with great compassion as we are once again witnessing what one’s shadow-side can do to someone if they don’t deal with it especially before landing in a public position.

Weiner appears to be stunned at his peers reactions and also many of his constituents.  This surprises me almost as as much as his original actions did, but then again in this world where everything becomes instant news, nothing really surprises me any more.  I think President Clinton readied many of us for the future shocks we are now experiencing, but I still cannot but help to ask myself: did Weiner really not understand what the consequences of  his actions would be?  Did he not believe that he would eventually get caught tweeting his private parts to whomever, and from the congressional gym no less?  Did he fantasize that he was a budding Tom Cruise starring in Risky Business?  Did he not believe there would be serious consequences to such actions?  Has he never been made to be responsible for his actions in the past?  Or perhaps he’s just been so good at b.s.ing his way out of the realities he creates that when the consequences appeared in his sphere of thought, he just shrugged and said:  fuhgedaboudit !   Party!  Party!  What pile of delusion and hubris was he buried under?  Whatever.  He’s paying the piper now!   And those roosting chickens have probably been sitting on his shoulder for quite some time trying to get him back to reality before the bottom fell of the coop fell out….of course to no avail.

I know people who have come to believe that all politicians are crooks, and therefore no longer even vote believing they are all the same anyway.  I’ve also heard many  women asking: what’s going on with all of these men?  Both positions assume that what’s happening with the male scandals of the last ten years is indicative of all men, and that because one politician proves untrustworthy, they all must be.  Both conclusions are based on faulty,  generalized faulty  thinking .

Years ago when I taught essay writing at a Community College, and the students had to do an argument essay, I emphasized BIG TIME that  classifying something as true all of the time and for all of one sex, age, or race just because they witnessed one or a few doing it was not a valid position to take when lodging a legitimate argument.  They really had a hard time getting out of that easy judging space, as most humans do.

If a number of a group do something, you could say perhaps that there is a tendency toward, or a penchant for, but not jump to a conclusion that all men, women, nationalities etc. will do what a few did because they are also part of that sex, etc.  Anyway, I refuse to throw all politicians and all men under the bus because of what’s been happening in the last ten years.  By the way, we all know that it’s been happening for a very long time, but just hasn’t been reported in the media.  As quoted in the last blog: 17 scandals, 6 Democrats, 8 Republicans, and 3 Independents.  I therefore hope that men will not assume that any woman who goes into politics will end up being a Sarah Palin.

The reality is that it is presently a pretty human tendency to jump to a conclusion about groups that are  considered to be “other” than we are just from the actions of the few we have  known and/or have observed – heard about through hearsay.   We tend to judge all blacks, asians, caucasians, Native Americans, Mexicans, women, men, wealthy, poor, by a  few personal encounters, or by what we’ve witnessed in the news.  And the really quirky reality is that when we see someone of our age,  race, sex or nationality doing something unacceptable, we don’t tend to negatively judge the collective group that we are part of, i.e. a white person doesn’t jump to the conclusion that all white people commit the murders or rapes that “like” others have done.  They see them as individuals – not as a collective.  This we v.s. them just seems to all too often be the present reality, and it smacks at our tribal beginnings -something we so need to grow out of.

And another “reality” that baffles me is how members of congress are calling President Obama on the carpet for breaking the law in regard to his actions in Libya.  Have any of these congresspersons (other than Kucinich) accused President George Bush of breaking the law when he lied and took us to war?  I’ve said in the past that President Obama will be damned if he does and damned if he doesn’t by the Republicans from now till the next election, so their opposition here is no surprise, but the members of his own party who are doing this  need their heads examined.

I leave you with a few more reality checks.  The first of which is how the economy has gotten where it is today.  Former Labor Secretary, Professor Reich has posted the following on his blog and also on YouTube.  It’s the Truth About the Economy is a two minute diagram that he draws with a sharpie on a board.  Really terrific, and I couldn’t agree more.  I first saw this on the CNN show, In the Arena.  Check it out.  Really puts it all in perspective for sure.  You know how they keep saying: it’s the economy stupid.  Well, after watching this YouTube short, you’ll hopefully be thinking: it’s the middle-class stupid!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTzMqm2TwgE

The second reality is the new warning labels on cigarette packages today that shows the reality of what smoking will do to you and those you love.  It’s the most graphic reality check so far showing dead bodies, etc.  My favorite one is the diseased picture of the lungs. I’ve had so many people in my family die from this addiction that I am totally for this graphic approach.  Perhaps I would view it as just a personal choice if I didn’t see so many unconscious people STILL puffing away around their children.  My chain-smoking parents all but killed me as a child with their smoking addiction!  Without penicillin, I wouldn’t be here.  My parents, at least didn’t know what they were doing, but parents today simply choose to ignore the facts.  As Maya Angelou says: when you know better, you do better. Check it out.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/20/cigarette-warnings-labels-photos-fda_n_880885.html#s295469

The third harsh back- to- reality is for women and their struggle for equality in the work force.  This week the supreme court’s vote to deny the class-action suit from the women of Walmart who were discriminated against for jobs and pay was only opposed by the 3 women on the court and one man.  The decision has devastating effects for women who are discriminated on in the future as they will now have to take on a big conglomerate by themselves – which is financially impossible; however, LADIES, WE ARE NOT POWERLESS!  Women do most of the shopping, correct?  So don’t shop at Walmart.  I know I’ll never darken their door!  Here’s where the collective is a powerful thing: show them with your purchasing power how you feel about this B.S. pro-Big -Business decision.  Check the details of this reality at the following:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110620/us_nm/us_walmart_lawsuit

And then check out AR – 051 on my site for a card you could send to encourage a friend.

Weinergate, as it progresses, feels much bigger (maybe a pun intended here?) than just another sex scandal – it’s starting to feel like a symbol for the unusual? and hurtful ways some  wealthy and powerful men are attempting to relieve the stress that comes along with power and wealth.  I’m no shrink or psychologist, I’m just a sayin’  musin’ as to how  Weiner’s weiner seems to have become a symbol that’s particularly telling that as a man grows in wealth and power, perhaps his brains can’t help but descend into his penis?  And Lord, luv a duck: Weiner even had to photograph it and send it into cyber space to be sure it was really there and workin’.

The reason I would never vote for Weiner  if he were my candidate for senator, congressperson, president,  mayor, candidate for the school board etc. has nothing to do with his testosterone level whatsoever: it has to do with an obvious lack of judgement, lack of being trust-worthy, fear of his un-resolved shadow issues that might pop up again in another way,  and his penchant for extreme risk-taking.

I am also perplexed, not at those who are still on the fence about Weiner, but by those who are fiercely (angrily?) campaigning for him to remain and fight for them.  But, everyone has a right to their opinion in this crazy political world we find ourselves in, and I think the public’s response is a subject for a whole other blog.

I also wouldn’t vote for Edwards or the Sperminator, not because of their sexual appetites, but because of the hurt they caused their families through their lies and deceptions, and while I’m appalled at the pain they caused to  their wives and family, I’m far more frightened and shocked by Weiner’s actions.  They shout: catch me if you can!  Instead of a cover-up, it feels like a plea to be stopped.  Not a person I would want making decisions for the country.  It feels totally adolescent!

So many men, once they have reached a certain level of power and wealth, are shown to begin to have multiple affairs. It’s as if they think that they now have earned the right to a younger woman’s sexual attention, or to the homosexual affair they have repressed for years.  Perhaps  the territory automatically throws open the doors that were closed inside of them in childhood?  Perhaps the territory should automatically come with a permit to have a harem?  Many in the middle east do.

Maybe wealthy and powerful men evolve beyond the societal rules that have been laid down for the common folk –  monogamy in particular?  Europeans have laughed at us for years at our puritan sexual ways.  They simply accept that affairs go along with the ascent into political power.  Again, I’m just sayin’!  And I must add that my heart goes out to their wives, children and parents.  Perhaps they would have been hurt far less if the reality had been put on the table from the get-go?  Just sayin’.

CNN listed 17 men who had affairs on their wives – with other women and/or men – and 5 were Democrats and 8 were Republican – a few were Independents.  Now, it’s 6 to 8 and the race to the top continues; however, I don’t think bad and/or distorted behavior has anything to do with what political party you happen to be in, but it does seem to be connected to a penis that’s not sure just where it belongs.

In a strange way I can understand why Weiner’s weiner ended up on the internet as it’s the powerful engine that is now connecting us all in more ways than one.  Just sayin’ – the internet often feels like an out-of- control virus that’s growing exponentially in our lives – the power symbol Weiner’s weiner was looking for?  Reminds me of the movie, Looking for Mr. Goodbar?  And once something is out there: it’s really out there like forevermore: think Palin’s emails, and Kwame’s messages to his sweetie.  That’s why I try as best as I can not to put false info out into cyber-space, and when it’s just an opinion to say so.  All of the above is just my opinion.

The next two elections are very close and so the lies will proliferate into a vicious storm, and we all have to check what’s sent out as “truth”  before we click the forward button. We need to distinguish between opinion and fact, and acknowledge the beast that the internet has become, and remember that just because it comes in an email, doesn’t mean that it’s true.

An old  friend keeps sending me right-wing emails that I tell her to check out on www.snopes.com before hitting the forward key as 99% of them are simply lies that are made up by the nutty right; however, I guess she’s just too lazy to check them before passing them along because I got  one more this morning in my in box, and my reply wasn’t as nice as it’s been in the past.

Sending out negative emails that malign another person, organization or political party reminds me of the way people pass along rumors (we used to call that gossip) without ever checking out the truth or falsehood in them.  The really scarey thing with these emails, however,  is that the email that is sent to you that isn’t true, once it is passed on,  is literally then passed along and quadruples into thousands of lies in cyber space.  Talk about a gossip chain!  More people, perhaps than not, believe that if it’s on the internet and/or in an email from a friend, then it must be the truth.  Opinion belongs to everyone.  Discussion is always good, but to pass untruth along as fact is destructive and irresponsible.  So, please check it out!

And, hmmm, tonight on that other powerful medium, the tube, The Bachelorette and The Stanley Cup Finals are both competing for your attention with the First Republican Presidential Candidate Debate taking place on CNN.  I wonder which one you’ll choose?  I’m up for the debate, even thought I’m pretty much a Yellow Dog Democrat at this point, I plan to watch as I want to check out the guy whose the founder of Godfather’s pizza, how Mitt will weasel around the health-care issue, and the confidence that will be postured by the inventor of the newest word in our vocabulary: newtony.  Thinking it’ll be a real hoot!  By the way, a Yellow Dog Democrat is one who if a Republican and a Yellow Dog were asking for your vote, you’d vote for the yellow dog.

My wish for you today is a small verse of mine inside one of my cards AR-009.

Within us all a cave of wonder:
white flowers of desire.
Within us all the hope of others,
our love the waking fire.

These videos  took my breath away – fed my soul, and so I pass it along to you, and hope you will pass it along to those you care about also.  The virtual choir is conducted by Eric Whitacre, and you can find many other videos of his out on YouTube also.

Only click on once, and before you listen to this virtual choir from all over the world, perhaps you should take a deep breath and employ this wonderful advice from Ram Dass: The quieter you become, the more you can hear.
http://www.wimp.com/choirvoices/

These two links below are the full versions of the music videos that you are introduced to in the first video.

SLEEP:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WhWDCw3Mng

LUX AURUMQUE (LIGHT AND GOLD):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7o7BrlbaDs

We are all energy beings, as Carolyn Myss explains so well, and our song is our lives: each song is as important as another.  May these wonderful videos encourage you to do the best you can with what you have and wherever you are at this particular moment.  The best you can do is to simply, as Eckhart Tolle and Ram Dass have said so very well and extensively: Be Here Now.   I love also a quote of Gregg Orr’s: Turn me into song: sing me awake.  And, of course, there’s always dear Walt Whitman’s entire Song of Myself.

The following poem of mine was previously published in Poetry East, and is in my chapbook, The Fear of Cameras, which contains poetry and photography.  It’s a song for the birth of my first grandchild – I now have eight. Lucky me.

TO A SMALL LIGHT

- for Matthew

Child within my child moving,
shadow-formed from the Dantean dark,
begin the center’s light.

Seed, in a light forest beginning,
song seducing the singing lark,
fly the center’s night.

Child, within my child winging,
spark formed from the wild heart,
illumine the center’s night.

Light, in a sonorous cave becoming,
yet never begun: Blessed Dark,
your song, the center’s light.

- Therese Becker
Poetry East

Here’s a card with an Albert Schweitzer quote on it: There are two means of refuge from the misery of life – music and cats. And of course, the face of a cat lost in whatever reveries cats get lost in, who has eyes as beautiful and deep as an endless ocean AK-034.

THE STORY begins with the rescuers finding this little guy they named Ralphie.  Someone had already taken him under their wing, but they weren’t equipped to adopt.

Ralphie, scared and starved, joined the rescuers.

I wouldn’t think anything could live through this…but we were wrong.

This little lady also survived that wreckage.

And then they are no longer alone!

Add two more beagles found after that…the more, the merrier!

Oh boy, a new traveler to add to the mix…

(Note: the cat coming over the seat needing shelter…)  Now just how is this going to work?  And remember they are all strange to one another.

Looks like it’s workin’ out just fine.  Animals tend to be wiser than so many of us humans.

Wow!  The things we learn from our animal friends.  If only all of mankind could learn such valuable lessons as this.  Lessons of instant friendship. of peace and harmony by way of respect for one another no matter one’s creed, color, age or gender.

I have donated to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to animals, as I felt that they were the ones that would be the most over-looked in the tragic destruction that’s taken place in the south.  Here’s the link in case you are so inclined to help our four-legged brothers and sisters too.  http://www.aspca.org/

Here’s a thank you card to send to friends with two of my furry four-leggeds who have passed on to another dimension of being AK-013.

And a passage from Song of Myself  by my beloved Walt Whitman.

I think I could turn and live with animals,
They are so placid and self-contained;
I stand and look at them long and long.
They do not sweat and whine about their condition;
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins;
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God;
Not one is dissatisfied
Not one is demented with the mania of owning things;
Not one kneels to another, not to his kind
that ived thousands of years ago;
Not one is respectable or industrious over the whole earth.