Another reason why marijuana should be legalized

“‘We’re not winning the battle,’ Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard told lawmakers.  ‘The violence that we see in Mexico is fueled 65 to 70 percent by the trade in one drug: marijuana.'” (CNN)

The Arizona Attorney General has made it clear: marijuana legalization would cut violence in Mexico by 65 to 70 percent – violence that is creeping north into the US.  At what point will our elected officials see that the biggest threat marijuana poses is the violence that accompanies prohibition?

What if food prices spiked like gas did a few months ago?

Monsanto’s trying to make it happen: advertise aggressively, collect the money and to hell with the people.

If the House Republicans don’t believe President Bush anymore…

… when can I expect to see the Republican House members introduce a bill for an immediate and total pullout from Iraq?

Leave Georgia, pretty please, Czar Putin

My grandfather, the late Andrzhei Antonovich Dzialtvo, fled Lithuania with his family around 1902, when he was about four years of age.  It was during one of Russia’s periodic invasions of countries around it, which Russia has engaged in as a regular hobby long before Europe even noticed the Americas existed.

It’s also long-known that asking the Czar – whatever he goes by, Czar, General Secretary,  President, or Prime Minister – to stop invading gives the guy a good belly laugh.

So this is what I’ve suggested by phone to my Congressional Representative, the Hon. Christopher H. Smith (R4-NJ), and one of my Senators, the Hon. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), in a call made to each of their offices:

• The President of the United States of America should immediately recall his ambassador from Moscow and reduce relations to a chargé d’affaires level;
• The State Department of the United States of America should issue a warning to all American citizens in Russia to promptly leave Russia;
• The President of the United States of America should, by Executive Order, immediately declare a suspension of all trade with the Russian Republic.

That will get Vladimir Putin’s attention.  Calling for meetings and asking politely has not worked for dealings with Russia in over a millennium, and it obviously is not going to work now.

When I called Rep. Smith’s office, I was told that the Congress couldn’t do anything because Speaker Pelosi has declared a recess; I pointed out that the Representative was quite good at holding press conferences and could issue a public statement calling for these measures from the executive branch of the US government.  Senator Lautenberg’s office was a little more encouraging, and the staffer had a good laugh when I told him about Rep. Smith’s staffer trying to blame Speaker Pelosi for a possible inability for Rep. Smith to say anything publicly.

This is going to make it an interesting Olympic season, too…

The entirety of “The Defense of Fort M’Henry”

Defence of Fort M’Henry: the forgotten verses…

From “The Defence of Fort M’Henry”:

“On the shore dimly seen thro’ the mists of the deep,
Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected, now shines on the stream…”

“And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has wash’d out their foul footsteps’ pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave…”

Remembrances of a slandered Goddess

I remember.

I remember rocking the cradle;
The cradle of humanity’s civilization.

For thousands of Earth’s journeys around its Sun
I was Queen and I was Goddess.

I was heard of in the lands beyond
I was worshipped as Goddess but not taken as Queen
I did not require such.

I had my people in the cradle
My people that I was Queen for
That was enough for any Queen
And as for a Goddess: I accepted other worship
And behaved towards them as a true and faithful Goddess.

Then the murders came.
I remember.
I remember a being who chose Godhead
I remember a being who hid Kingship
Behind his worshipers.

I remember a being who, like me, had his people
I remember a being who, unlike me, rejected all but his people
I remember a being who never reached the lands in my Queenship
I remember a being who told his Priests to kill all but his people
I remember a being who brought slaughter to My worshipers and others
I remember a being who would not be stopped; a Mountain Godhead
I remember a being, a warGod, through and through
I remember a being who has slandered me from that time forward
I remember a being who hid behind his worshipers
I remember taking revenge for his people’s killing of my people
I remember not resisting until it was too late
Even now in the Time of Reawakening
I am feared as a killer instead of worshipped as Protectress
He is worshipped as Guardian of Peace instead of condemned as warmonger

He has his people still
He has allowed others to join his people
Provided they are as warlike as those they join
They say their wars are to protect peace
Even now a mongrel nation attacks my ancient Lands
Their leader a worshiper of the warmonger
But here and there, a thought, a prayer, calls me to Reawakening
I know not what power I have left
My worshipers are few and scattered
Evil curses still rain upon me from his worshipers
They believe that my retribution for his attacks
Retribution not was, but rather my war
They believe I am and was the attacker
They believe I will still attack
Even in the thousands of years past where no such has occurred
No such could occur
I remember I am not attacker I am defender

I remember
I remember a time of peace
I remember a time of Queenship
I remember a time when I and mine were Blessed
I do not know if I remember a Future Time which mirrors Past Time
Does anyone remember?

Quote Updates 5/18

Horatio, Lord Nelson:

“I am acting not only without the orders of my commander-in-chief, but, in some measure, contrary to him…I am doing what is right and proper for the service of our king and country. Political courage, in an officer abroad, is as highly necessary as military courage.”

http://infomotions.com/etexts/gutenberg/dirs/9/4/947/947.htm

Gregory Norbert:

“When the time of our particular sunset comes our thing, our accomplishment won’t really matter a great deal. But the clarity and care with which we have loved others will speak with vitality of the great gift of life we have been for each other.”

Stan Rogers:

“…For we couldn’t leave her there, you see, to crumble into scale./She’d saved our lives so many times, living through the gale/And the laughing, drunken rats who left her to a sorry grave/They won’t be laughing in another day…/ “And you, to whom adversity has dealt the final blow/With smiling bastards lying to you everywhere you go/Turn to, and put out all your strength of arm and heart and brain/And like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again “Rise again, rise again – though your heart it be broken/And life about to end/No matter what you’ve lost, be it a home, a love, a friend./ Like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again….”

http://www.stanrogers.net/

Kunal Ghosh:

“That communism is a crypto-religion in line with Judaism and Christianity (both are Abrahamic faiths of West Asian origin) has been alluded to by many great thinkers…Abrahamic religions, whenever they conquer a territory, convert the inhabitants and try to suppress their ancestral culture. Ancestral history becomes a prohibited subject. In Afghanistan and Pakistan pre-Islamic Hindu-Buddhist history is not permitted in schools. China is doing the same in Tibet.”

http://www.mainstreamweekly.net/auteur39.html

debauchette:

“I, and other women like me, object to the assertion that sex work is inherently degrading and that no woman pursues this work or experience by choice. Women do make these choices, and I’m among them. And I have no regrets. My perspective on Sawyer was just that – I was a woman who made a choice. “This isn’t to say that degrading and dehumanizing sex work doesn’t exist, because it most certainly does. But it does a disservice to everyone when we fail to recognize the differences, the differences in power, autonomy, and freedom.”

http://debauchette.wordpress.com/

Updating links pages and social sites

I finally added some actual descriptions (mainly copied from other sites I already put descriptions on) to my Tribe and Facebook profiles.

I also updated my humor link page and my cruelty, pain, and death link page. (The cruelty, pain, and death link page is not recommended for those who are easily offended, or for those who think ‘my body, my choice’ only pertains to abortion…)

Recent additions to my favorite quotes page

Mark Di Ionno:

“Want to know why there’s no peace in the world? Spend a morning outside family court.”

http://www.nj.com

 

Tom Clancy (Executive Orders):

“We all know that the government does take more than it gives back. They’ve just learned to hide it. The federal budget deficit means that every time you borrow money, it costs more than it should – why? Because the government borrows so much money that it drives up interest rates. And so every house payment, every car payment, every credit card bill is also a tax. And maybe they give you a break on interest payments. Isn’t that nice? Your government gives you a tax break on money you ought not to have to pay in the first place, and then it tells you that you get back more than you pay out. Does anybody out there really believe that? Does anybody really believe it when people say that the United States can’t afford – not to spend more money than it has? Are those the words of Adam Smith or Lucy Ricardo?”

 

Joan Kovatch, Jr.:

“How do you avoid conditioned air, toxic gases, and the stress of being boxed? Get outside whenever you can. Park a bit farther away in the parking lot and enjoy the walk, even in the rain. You know you’re not going to die wet and soggy and frostbitten, you’ve got the resources to get home and change as soon as you want to. Enjoy the wet, the cold, hot, whatever. Walk around a park, get some exercise, enjoy your neighborhood.”

http://joanjr.blogspot.com/

 

John Sinclair:

“They don’t want people to know – or if they know they don’t want it acknowledged – that men have cocks in their pants, that women have tits and cunts under their clothes, that people can say and do whatever they want as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else, that their guns and orders and phony laws and honkie power are all bullshit, that there’s no way any common words can ‘shock’ and ‘corrupt’ kids who are really hip to the whole deal and who are instead shocked and hurt by the insane disregard for human freedoms that the police and other authorities practice as a matter of course.”

http://johnsinclair.us/10for2/

 

Barney Rosset:

“If the Americans, Dutch, British, and French persist in this attempt to rule other peoples in the world, which they have no right to do, then we are headed in a straight line for the third world war, because these people won’t stand for it. If it had not been for Gandhi in India, I feel sure the Indians would have killed countless thousands of English, but his leadership in nonviolence has saved a lot of lives. In return, the British put him in prison.”

http://evergreenreviewblog.blogspot.com/

 

Timothy Levitch:

“If it weren’t for the slight Dutch imperialism that went down on these streets, it is possible that Cookie Monster would have been chasing down biscuits his whole life.”

http://www.speedisms.com/

 

Isaac Asimov:

“Jokes of the proper kind, properly told, can do more to enlighten questions of politics, philosophy, and literature than any number of dull arguments.”

 

Rabbi Joseph Gelberman:

“Once there was a great rabbi who for many years had pondered a question, “Where is God?” He asked a friend who was also a rabbi to help him. His friend’s answer was simple, “Wherever and whenever he is invited—that’s where God is.”

 

xesce:

“The difficult task is to explain that depression does not necessarily indicate an inability to accurately assess one’s life and one’s potential to achieve a satisfactory quality of life. Also, that a person has a right to decide that the treatment options available are not right – or realistic – for them personally. “It is incredibly depressing if the only way you can prove that it’s that bad is if you kill yourself – if no one believes you suffer until you actually manage to kill yourself. “To address the idea that suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem: things did not get better for me after high school. I am now 41 years old.”

http://xesce.net/qualityofdeath.html

 

Merri Lisa Johnson:

“Free love doesn’t always follow from a lack of self respect; there is something sex-hating in such an equation.”

http://preview.tinyurl.com/3yx38o

Click here for my favorite quotations page.