September 2007 archive

Wasn’t feeling very inspired yesterday when I wrote my weekly piece here at Docudharma.  And it showed.

andgarden made a comment that wasn’t very tactful perhaps, but was deadly accurate:

I mostly agree, but

I hope it will be something new and different, that we’ll all find a way to change the paradigm of how we speak to each other as Americans.  I hope we’ll talk about social justice, the deep primal human needs that percolate through our sophisticated and civilized minds and find their finest expression in laws, laws that apply to everyone equally.

seems just a tad bombastic. I’m just here to pass the time. And, you know, maybe force the establishment to see the error of their ways–if that’s possible.

And that is true.  I was being more than a tad bombastic.  It’s hard sometimes to get down to the real feelings on this.  The very term “social justice” is a ponderous and bombastic couple of words.

So I’m gonna try again, leaving out the bombast, I hope, and reaching more for the nitty gritty.

Here are some are some things moving westward…

so, what do you like to do???

chit chat about anything…

WaPo has a deceptive title on Bill Richardson’s Op Ed piece. They call it “Why We Should Leave Iraq Now.” It should be called “Watch Richardson Try TO Exploit ‘Differences’ on 2009 Iraq Policy and NOT Talk About Leaving Iraq Now.” Read the first three grafs of the piece:

Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards have suggested that there is little difference among us on Iraq. This is not true: I am the only leading Democratic candidate committed to getting all our troops out and doing so quickly.

In the most recent debate, I asked the other candidates how many troops they would leave in Iraq and for what purposes. I got no answers. The American people need answers. If we elect a president who thinks that troops should stay in Iraq for years, they will stay for years — a tragic mistake.

Clinton, Obama and Edwards reflect the inside-the-Beltway thinking that a complete withdrawal of all American forces somehow would be “irresponsible.” On the contrary, the facts suggest that a rapid, complete withdrawal — not a drawn-out, Vietnam-like process — would be the most responsible and effective course of action.

The fact that there is a Congressional debate in Congress NOW on Iraq does not enter Richardson’s thinking in the least. I do not know about you, but I truly detest what Richardson is doing here, selfishly trying to make political hay for himself at the expense of the real issue NOW – the Congressional debate on Iraq. Richardson is my least favorite candidate right now.

(reposted from Daily Kos)
Being learning disabled sucks.  But it doesn’t completely suck.  It’s not like I’m a Republican or something.

Being LD defines me, but it doesn’t completely define me.  I’m LD.  I’m also a liberal, a Jew, an atheist.  A man, a husband, a father.  An American.  A New Yorker.  Most of all, like all of you, a human.  Humans are complex.

So, below the fold, I talk about what it’s like to be me, what it’s like to be LD, and, most specifically, what it’s like to be LD me.  I don’t talk much about my politics, my religion, my ideas, and so on.  But don’t get the idea that LD is the most important thing in my life – it isn’t.  It’s just the most important thing in this diary.

And don’t get the idea that every LD person feels the way I do about being LD.  They don’t.  Some feel the way I do; some are angrier.  Some are less angry.  And LDs differ a lot.  I’ve got nonverbal learning disability, and even we NLDers vary.  A lot.  We say

  When you’ve seen one person with NLD, you’ve seen one person with NLD

enough preamble!  Follow me below the fold

Good morning all… for this PONY PARTY… I thought that, in the event any of you do have a life in the REAL world, it might be fun to point towards some events going on on the EAST COAST.

For today’s noon PONY PARTY, I’ll hit a few midwest and left coast goings on…

So… what do you do on your Saturday mornings????

This wrinkle in time, I cant give it no credit
I thought about my space and I really got me down
(got me down)

(excerpted lyrics from Headache – Frank Black)

Madeleine L’Engle would have loved the fact that she died at 88, I think. 88 is an abundant number, and the prime factors are 2x2x2x11.

L’Engle’s Newberry Award-winning A Wrinkle in Time was published in 1962, and this is the 44th year anniversary of her most acclaimed book. 44 is an octahedral number, the factors of which are 2x2x11.