Monday, September 29, 2008

Greed Is Good?

Little Boots’ New American Way: social welfare for the rich by giving $700 billion to Wall Street so that they can turn around and lend it back to us.

I had to giggle when I heard Republicans blaming Nancy Pelosi's scathing speech near the close of the debate — which attacked Bush's economic policies and a "right-wing ideology of anything goes, no supervision, no discipline, no regulation" of financial markets — for the vote's failure.

Thank you, Nancy Pelosi, for calling things as you see them. You (the Democrats & a few brave Republicans) made me proud today when you stood and refused to be bullied into signing on to this joke of a plan and insisting on more detail and oversight.

Socialism is not Patriotic: Don’t bail them out, Jail Them!

Friday, September 19, 2008

Dow Jones Industrial Average - Then & Now

January 20th, 2001 = 10,588
September 17th, 2008 = 10,605

Bush says: "We must act now to protect our nation's economic health."

This is the same loser who's been telling us over and over for years that the economy is "strong."

Three months left in his miserable presidency and all of a sudden we need to "act now to protect our economic health."

Way to go Little Boots!

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Happy Birthday To My Best Friend Karen!

We met in the middle of 6th grade. I was blonde and Anglo, she was olive and Mexican-American. What she saw in me that first day I’ll never know but she held out her hand in friendship to a very shy 11 year old that had been to three different schools that year.

I always thought Karen was lucky. She had a nice house full of older sisters who could do the most AMAZING things with their hair. And they had BOYFRIENDS! Her parents, especially her Dad, loved her to pieces (I can close my eyes right now and feel the love in that house).

Karen taught me to toast corn tortillas over an open flame on the gas stove in the kitchen. I’d sometimes sleep over and we’d sleep in middle of the same double bed, giggling, about boys, until we both fell asleep.

On weekends, we’d ride the city bus “K & C’s Excellent Adventures” to downtown San Jose to window shop at Woolworth’s, Macy’s, Hale’s & Hart’s, completely fearless about being MILES from home (no cell phones then). We’d go to movies in old theaters that had velvet curtains and ushers with flashlights. We’d play with Barbie’s at my house, devour my Mom’s homemade bread the second a loaf came out of the oven, and went (indoor) roller skating every Friday & Saturday night. We’d drink “suicides” almost until we were sick. Anyone else know what a “suicide” is?

And Karen had DOGS, a big white poodle named Cognac who had a litter of puppies with their black poodle Fluffy. It was one of the best days of my life when I was given first pick from the litter who I named “Mademoiselle Michelle Cognac La Fluff Reyes Parsons” (Mimi for short).

In High School we were on the Yearbook Staff together, in charge of Clubs. Karen was a beauty (looked EXACTLY like Marlow Thomas aka “That Girl!”) and became a song girl; I joined the Spirit Club and painted the banners the football team ran through at the beginning of every game. She was “front of the house,” I was “behind the scenes.”

Karen married right out of High School and after the birth of her first child, we lost touch. Last October, her husband found me on the Classmates.com website and we have been trying to catch up on the last 30-something years ever since.

I hope you have a very Happy Birthday Karen and I am so glad we found each other again.

Friday, September 12, 2008

The Bush Doctrine ("Caribou Barbie" Edition)

The Bush Doctrine is based on delusions of grandeur about America's ability to dominate the world and endorses the use of unilateral preemptive force & persuasion rather than honest multi-lateral cooperation.

Just remember these four words: “Preemption, rather than reaction.”

In order to justify the invasion of Afghanistan, Bush came up with the policy that the United States has the right to treat countries that harbor or give aid to terrorist groups as terrorists themselves. Later, in order to justify the invasion of Iraq, he added that the United States should depose foreign regimes that represented a supposed threat to the security of the United States, even if that threat was not immediate.
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Obama was right about one thing, even if you put lipstick on a pig, it’s still a pig.

Thursday, September 11, 2008

7 Years Later: Rememberng 9/11

Life-altering changes. I guess if you live long enough, it probably happens more than once. For me it was the assassinations of JFK, RFK, MLK, Jr., and the Challenger explosion. I will always remember where I was and what I was doing when I heard about or witnessed these events.

The terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 were different.

While I didn’t have any family or friends die that day, I did have a friend, a Nurse, working in Manhattan who lived through the whole nightmare. At the University, we were deeply saddened when we learned that Alumni Jason Dahl, a 1980 Graduate in Aeronautical Engineering, was the Pilot and Captain of the crew of Flight 93, the plane that crashed in a field just outside Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

The overwhelming majority of casualties were ordinary people like you and me, including nationals from over 90 different countries. Let’s never forget that excluding the 19 hijackers, 2,974 people died in the attacks. Another 24 are missing and presumed dead.

Now, seven years have come and gone. In those years we moved on, we put 9/11 aside with all our other memories. Very briefly, we came together as a nation to help and comfort each other when we were all just human beings on common ground.

I hope on this tragic 7th Anniversary, we remember what is still good about our country and the innocent men, women and children who lost their lives. Let’s also remember the Heroes who responded to the emergency and the people who continue to sacrifice every day to help stop conflict around the world.

Friday, September 05, 2008

McCain's Speech

Yes, I watched the speech, I watched the whole stinking RNC this week as a matter of fact. With a barf bag at the ready of course. Only used it once when the "Cindy Show" was aired. Even 3 glasses of wine did not help to dim the pain of watching THAT. Does the woman get it that spending over 300K on an outfit for that night alone is...is...that vein in my neck is proturding so I better stop.

Unemployment is at a all time high in 5 years at 6.1. Did McShame say how he going to move this Country foward? Did he talk about: creating new jobs, improving economic fundamentals, shifting the tax burden from the lower pay classes back to the upper pay classes?

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What the critics said:

Former Bush Speechwriter: "Pretty Disappointing"

National Review: "Flat, Forced"

David Gergen: "Mostly A Rerun Of A Lot Of Old Republican Ideas"

New Republic: "No Overarching Themes"

CNN'S Jeffrey Toobin: "Worst Speech By Nominee Since Jimmy Carter In 1980"

NY Times Blog: "Some Delegates Fell Asleep" (I think I heard the snoring...)

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TOM BROKAW: But the fact is, governor, that you have had eight years of a bush administration and a lot of Republicans in Congress for the last eight years, so why wouldn't the american people say, look they had their shot we're going to change?

TOM RIDGE: Because John Bush - because John McCain is very much his own man...

No Tom, you were right the first time.

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Oh, and I know this is trivial, except when it applies to Obama, but where was McCain's flag pin?