Author's posts
Feb 03 2008
Shut Your Eyes – Love is the Only Way
This is just my second video and I’m having to work around the fact that I don’t know what I’m doing…which can be an obstacle, so the following is rough and a bit long but I hope you’ll find it interesting enough to watch. And thank you very much if you do.
Jan 26 2008
Dispatches From the Land of Lying Bastards
Jan 20 2008
A Gentle Reminder
This will probably step on a lot of toes around here but believe me, that is not my intent. I just want to point out, to remind you as it were, that much of the passion being expended on the Presidential campaign is wasted emotion. I want to tell you that the horse race, in which so many of you have invested so much, is really a rat race after all. For all their happy crap none of the establishment candidates will serve our interests.
Jan 12 2008
I Am Sick to Death of War and Madness
My generation thought Vietnam was an aberration, but it wasn’t, it was the game plan. Lie your way into a nasty little war and let other people’s children do the killing and dying while the fat cats at the top of the capitalist pile rake in the dough. It’s all for the benefit of those so bloated with greed that they just don’t care that their profits come soaked in the blood of innocents and patriots.
Jan 12 2008
I Am Sick to Death of War and Madness
My generation thought Vietnam was an aberration, but it wasn’t, it was the game plan. Lie your way into a nasty little war and let other people’s children do the killing and dying while the fat cats at the top of the capitalist pile rake in the dough. It’s all for the benefit of those so bloated with greed that they just don’t care that their profits come soaked in the blood of innocents and patriots.
Dec 30 2007
This is me just foolin’ around. (Updated)
I’ve acquired some new tools and I am struggling to come up to speed with them. I’ve only begun the learning process but here’s the first video project I’ve been able to complete. It has issues so please forgive its shortcomings. Bigger and better things are coming (I hope). Any pointers from the pros are most welcome.
Update: I smoothed out some of the transitions. Thanks for the feedback.
Dec 24 2007
Some call me Jesus
NOTE: Reading Kid Oakland’s beautiful diary yesterday (which is still on the rec list at dkos as I write this) made me think of this diary originally posted September 3rd, 2006. Given the timeliness I hope you will forgive the repost. ~ OPOL
Some call me Jesus…
Others call me Yeshua, others the Son of Man. By any name I am who I am.
Lately it has come to my attention that I have been swiftboated by a gang of lowly sinners who march under the banner of the Christian Right. They have obfuscated my teachings and associated my name with the terrible sins of war profiteering, torture, and the dropping of bombs on innocents and children. And those are just the beginnings of their transgressions. With your permission, I would like to take this opportunity to set a few things straight.
DISCLAIMER: Please forgive my hubris. No offense is intended to anyone’s religion, or lack thereof – just a little creative channeling of the Blessed Redeemer on a Sunday morning (actually, just a few things I’ve been wanting to get off my chest re: the ‘Religious Right’). Any heresy or error included herein is my own. I don’t really speak for the Creator – or his family. Oh, and apologies to pastordan for veering recklessly into his territory. ~ OPOL 🙂
(more below the fold…)
Dec 15 2007
Okay, Now I Get It
Like so many others, I have been bothered, bewitched and bewildered by the behavior of the Democratic ‘leadership’ over the past few years. At first the excuse that they were being steamrolled by the majority Republicans provided them some cover, but it gradually became evident that something more sinister was at play.
Dec 01 2007
It’s Even Worse Than We Thought
When I first started blogging at dailykos nearly two years ago, I took a lot of grief (and I mean a lot of grief) for some of my assertions (not that there weren’t plenty of others making them), such as:
The US has fallen to a fascist coup.
The American military/political establishment has long been guilty of the most heinous crimes imaginable.
The war in Iraq was always about oil and empire and was planned far in advance of 9/11/2001.
The elections of 2000 and 2004 were stolen.
The so-called ‘War on Terrorism’ is bogus.
Failure to impeach will ensure the end of our democracy.
The Democrats have sold us out.
Bush and his cronies and everyone who supports them or enables them are all war criminals and traitors.
We are never leaving Iraq.
We are NOT a democracy.
We are not free.
I don’t make these assertions so often or so vigorously anymore – I don’t have to. They are made daily by virtually everyone in the blogosphere. My ‘wild-eyed’ hysteria is now common knowledge. Reality has sunk in. In fact, it’s far worse than even I imagined.
Nov 29 2007
My Dinner With clammyc
I’ve long been a fan of noted blogger clammyc. He is a tireless and eloquent patriot blogging for the cause. He is also a pioneer in the field of blog radio and a soon-to-be new father. After following his writing for a year or more I finally met him face to face at YKOS in Chi-town this past August. In the course of our conversations there he mentioned that he had a trip to Atlanta coming up in the fall. I told him to get in touch if he had any free time.
Nov 22 2007
Giving Thanks for Progressive Activists
Nov 18 2007
The Secret History of My Foolish Heart
I asked for a horse the Christmas I was four and was not fooled by the black and white wooden facsimile on springy-thingies I got instead. That was my first brush with heartbreak. I did not know to consider the children who got squat, and to be grateful.
My next heartbreak was when one of my older brothers told me there was no Santa, this the night before Christmas when I was six.
We lived in Laos when I was eight and I made a deal with my dad to pay for half the price of a horse if I saved up the other half. Fifty bucks was the going rate for riding horses in Laos, took me nearly a year to save the twenty-five. Found a horse and paid for it, we were supposed to pick it up in a week once it was saddle broken. That was a Sunday. The Sunday I was to take possession I awoke to the sound of machine-gun fire and the rumble of tanks running up and down the road in front of our house. There had been a coup. The fighting would rage for another year. I was not long for Laos and I never saw my horse again.