My husband's son-in-law - I guess he's mine too now, a son-in-law-in-law - but I prefer to refer to him as simply "a friend", writes a weekly column in our local newspaper. On occasion, when short of a theme he'll include a collection of ideas from what he calls his "sticky-notes". I don't use those little yellow sticky bits of paper myself, but use Wordpad to save stuff which I think might one day come in useful, or which attracts my eye for whatever reason. As I'm short of a theme I'm going off into sticky note mode myself today. (There are plenty of themes on which I could easily vent my ire, but in deference to my own blood pressure and that of any passing readers, I shall desist). I've teased out a few items saved among my Wordpad-based "sticky-notes". Some have been sitting there for months, some for years, and have lost links to source, for which I apologise; some are more recent.
From The American President script by Aaron Sorkin
America isn't easy. America is advanced citizenship. You gotta want it bad, 'cause it's gonna put up a fight. It's gonna say "You want free speech? Let's see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil, who's standing center stage and advocating at the top of his lungs that which you would spend a lifetime opposing at the top of yours.
A comment on the concept of "generation" with which I wholeheartedly agreed:
The whole concept of "generation", in anything other than the strictest biological sense, is an intellectual fraud. There are no such things as "generations". There are only cohorts of humans who have passed through the world at a certain time and perhaps experienced certain phenomena in common. All of this talk of "Greatest Generation", "Boomers", "GenX", etc., is an exercise in the use of sweeping generalizations to obscure the myriad individual biographies of humans. Yeah, let's ignore the complexity of human society and human history! Yeah, let's arbitrarily lump people together in ill-defined groups based solely on their birth year! Trying to determine a person's characteristics based on when they were born isn't social science--it's numerology. I've had people argue to me that the use of such terms as Gen X, Millennial, and so on are convenient ways of discussing people. That's exactly what's wrong with them. Talking about other humans should be hard. It should require effort, should require clear-headed thought. Any worthwhile, complex subject does. --- Yosef52
Nine years ago, Martin Luther King III spoke at a commemoration of his father’s birth and said:
When will the war end? We all have to be concerned about terrorism, but you will never end terrorism by terrorizing others.
Draft of a post published in June 2008, titled "Lightworker?"
(Splutter!!)
The link within that post to a relevant article may be defunct - here's a current one: Is Obama an enlightened being? / Spiritual wise ones say: This sure ain't no ordinary politician. You buying it? By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist.
Still spluttering..... lightworker could, more accurately be read as sleightworker from a 2013 perspective (as in sleight of hand and tongue). These ideas on our now second-term President fit, prequel-wise, into issues discussed in a recent post Obama x 3.
Still spluttering..... lightworker could, more accurately be read as sleightworker from a 2013 perspective (as in sleight of hand and tongue). These ideas on our now second-term President fit, prequel-wise, into issues discussed in a recent post Obama x 3.From Judith Parker Harris's "The United States of Anger" (2009):
1) How many times have you had to swallow a difference of opinion only to feel it knot up in the pit of your stomach?
2) Have you ever had intense pain in your neck and shoulders just before or right after an argument?
3) Do you recall holding in frustration, anger, and resentment all day only to find yourself losing it later on with a family member or close friend? Stress causes 54% of Americans to fight with people close to them.
There isn't much that unites us these days except that a lot of us are really angry. We've got liberal vs. conservative, choice vs. life, young vs. old, rich vs. poor, male s. female, My God vs. your God. Why so angry? Maybe it is because everyone's feeling out of control about everything. Try substituting consciousness for control. Listen to what is coming out of your mouth and then decide who's running this show?
Bertrand Russell, British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, and social critic.:
Advocates of capitalism are very apt to appeal to the sacred principles of liberty, which are embodied in one maxim:
The fortunate must not be restrained in the exercise of tyranny over the unfortunate.
Line of dialogue I particularly admired, from last week's episode of Mad Men: Left-winger Abe to his advertising executive girlfriend, Peggy:
Abe: Your activities are offensive to my every waking moment. I’m sorry. But you’ll always be the enemy.
From Good Omens by Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman
In the Beginning
It was a nice day.
