CNN.com – Study

I’ve been saying it for a long time: Bush is using fear to control public opinion and sway the voters. It’s not working on me.

As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such twilight that we all must be most aware of change in the air – however slight – lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness.

-William O. Douglas, judge (1898-1980)

I’ve just been watching Bill Clinton give his address to the delegates at the Democratic Convention.  What a great speaker.  I’m a democrat and always have been.  I’ve always thought that — despite his peccadilloes — Clinton was a fine leader.  And notwithstanding the fact that I agreed with everything he said, watching Clinton made me hearken back to a time when presidents were men accustomed to public speaking, men of eloquence and vision.  I can look at someone like Clinton and think, there is a man who is smarter than me, able to make great decisions and bear the burden of high office.  So I felt when Clinton was in office, so I did when Carter was in office.  So I did even when George H.W. Bush was in office.  The problem now is that George W. Bush is not smarter than me, and not so much in office as in power.  He has all the eloquence of a rusty barnyard gate, all the presence of leadership of a rooster on the peak of the barn.   

God help us.  God Bless America. 

Oh, Teresa, how rude. This can’t help the campaign. Let’s try to show some respect for our essential 4th estate.

Link

We had a earthquake this morning. It was a 4.3, centered about 5 miles ESE of here, at 5:55am. It was in the hills right behind the little town of La Conchita, which suffered a major, home-destroying mudslide several years back.

It woke me up. I thought, “aw shit,” which I quess means something like, “Gee I hope this isn’t a big earthquake somewhere distant, doing much damage, causing pain, grief and untold suffering.” Then I went back to sleep.

It was a nice little ride, if you’re into that sort of thing.

“I am wary of a lot of things, such as … time clocks, newspapers, mortgages, sermons, miracle fabrics, deodorants … pageants, progress, and manifest destiny.”

So I’m sitting here at the end of a long summer day, looking at all the cute and subtly intuitive buttons on the Word toolbars, and wondering what I should write about. My mind is a small orchestra, tuning up as a troop of clowns on bicycles crashes through a crowded Chinatown restaurant. So many recent immigrants are being scalded by flying pots of steaming egg drop soup. And as the last team of paramedics clears the scene, a soggy, scrotish fortune cookie ponders the folly of too much concern for fleeting love.

It can’t be helped. Call it the pratfalls of unremitting sobriety.

It was a quiet day. J detailed his car, as the dogs moved from place to place throughout the house, looking for a cool, soft place to doze. I worried about my nerves, which have been on high voltage lately.

Sometimes, when it’s like that, I get alone and make a stupid face. It’s a relaxation technique, taught to me by a psychotherapist a few years back. You breathe slowly in and out, and with each exhale, allow the face to fall more slack, like the uncomprehending features of an idiot. Let the jaw hang loose like laundry on the line. When the face is totally limp – which takes me 20 or 30 slow, deep breaths – work on down the body from the ears to the toes.

It just doesn’t matter. Whatever’s making you crazy, spend your day dreaming about getting drunk into a warm darkness, or eating to the point of paralysis, it doesn’t matter. Not in 40 years or 50, not to the lawnmower, weed whacker, reaper … sssshh. Shantih.

I was neither

This prayer is one that means a lot to me.

My buddy Pete raises the issue of the top 10 things to do/see before you die.  He asks his readers how many of the 10 they’ve seen.  I’ll offer a different list — things I’ve already seen myself.  These are in no particular order and just off the top of my head.  Some of them have passed into memory, and cannot be seen again.

1.  The Pieta, in St. Peters, Rome.

2.  The tomb of Napoleon.

3.  Poets’ Corner, Westminster Abbey.

4.  Giant Redwoods, northwestern coast of California.

5.  Red salmon and Rainbow trout in a cold creek, eastern sierras.

6.  Even a bad football game, if watched with my Dad and either of my grandpas.

7.  Bald eagle taking a dump while taking flight, Mt. Lassen.

8.  Mir-streaming icon of the Mother of God, Santa Barbara and Los Angeles.

9.  My family, any time they happen to be smiling. 

10.  Thanksgiving dinner, and something to be thankful for. 

And a bonus item:

11.  My parents, with my nephew, and their joy.

After a long walk I come down to the shore.

A cottonwood tree lies stretched out in the grass.

This tree knocked down by lightning —

and a hollow the owls made open now to the rain.

Disasters are all right, if they teach

men and women

to turn their hollow places up.

The tree lies stretched out

where it fell in the grass.

It is so mysterious, waters below, waters above,

so little of it we can ever know!

–Robert Bly

Thanks to my buds at OCofftopic.

Go watch Saddam doin’ a little of the ol’ Roshambo. Pretty funny stuff, dude.

Rock, Paper, Saddam!

Thanks to Sarah.