Historic MLK

April 30, 1967
Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered a sermon entitled, "Why I Am Opposed to the War in Vietnam" at Riverside Church in New York City.
“ The time has come for America to hear the truth about this tragic war. In international conflicts, the truth is hard to come by because most nations are deceived about themselves. Rationalizations and the incessant search for scapegoats are the psychological cataracts that blind us to our sins. But the day has passed for superficial patriotism.”

Thanks for the Memories

This is my Mom's Baby picture. She is 83 years old now. We scanned the picture & brought her an 8.5 x 11 copy. she asked-- Is this ME? She recognized her baby picture-- they also told her there was someone behind her holding her up. I used to think she had her one hand in a kind of a *power to the people* pose. She was hanging on. She still IS hanging on, and she has hung in there, through a lot of rough stuff, for much of her life.

I have to say how much I respect & admire her fortitude. She endured some heavy stuff in her life, including taking care of her Father & Mother, raising two kids as a single parent, essentially. Mom regrets having postponed joy, or having missed the boat to do more fun things or the good stuff, in life. She did not retire until she was 76, and retirement was a downhill spiral of medical woes.

Looking back, she said "Heaven better be good", lamenting out loud that she had helped others all her life, and wondering when her break would come. It was just honest, open thoughts that her good karma seemed to have not arrived. She has every right to think that way.

On the flip side the "event" she had last year- a stroke, did not yield a deblitating paralysis, but caused her Doctor to revoke her license to drive, and medically order that she no longer live alone. It kind of goes into the *when life gives you lemons, make lemonade* philosophy. Mom never wanted to go into a facility, but she needs 24/7 care, and they had a particularly harsh winter with double the average amount of snow & ice. Mom was able to stay at the facility, and get her labwork, dental , counseling, church & live entertainment done, without ever setting foot out in the snowy winter.

I am so glad I went to visit her every chance I had, in between the house project. In the last 4 days I was there, Mom had contracted Noro Virus, and the Unit was quarintined. I could not visit her from Tuesday on. Our happy memory would be the days we spent together, and the previous Sunday, we put her in a wheelchair & took her out to the onsite Gazebo on a nice sunny day. We enjoyed a few hours visit, Mom, my Sister & I.

The Nature of Mom is such that on Easter, for a large family meal gathering, she could barely walk & struggled on the stairs @ my Sister's place-- she repeatedly asked my Sister if she wanted help in the kitchen! Her true spirit-the core desire to be helpful lives on, even past the point when her physical body is declining. What a sweetheart.

Twists & Turns

I had asked Mom if she would like me to give a few things to friends, as we cleared the house. She said yes, that was OK. So we donated 90% of the stuff to the Salvation Army, and gave a few things to different friends of hers.
The next week, Mom said she wanted the little faux tiffany table lamp. That was one of the few items I had given to her close friend, Mary. We took Mom & Mary out to brunch & gave the Mary the lamp later, after we had Mom settled back in her room.
The next day, Mom brought it up again- only this time with a more heated tone. "You have no right to give that away". Uh-Oh. Mom was serious & seriously pissed. I could tell from the look and the tone, Mom was going to hang on to this topic. I did not want this on my head.
Thankfully, I had not put that on the Salvation Army Truck for donation!

I wound up calling my Mom's friend, and explaining the situation.
Mary is a gem & said, no problem-- she can have the lamp back-- she was glad Mom was cognizant enough to be feisty about it, and ultimately, if it will make her happy, we want her to be happy . Whew!
I apologized profusely, and she said she would deliver it on Saturday to Mom & visit her.

The next day, I said to Mom- Mary is going to bring you the table lamp.

Mom asked: What lamp?


Farewell Old House~

I don't know if I will see the interior of my childhood house ever again. Not only did we go through all it's contents- the old metallic Christmas tree circa the 60's. My sisters Disc-GO-case, packed full of the records known as 45's that had single tunes on each side. I went through them to reminisce- Louie Louie, Come Together, She Loves You, Come on down to my Boat Baby, Hair, Let the Sunshine/Aquarious, Sky Rider. We wrote our names on our records, but apparently shared the case.
A lovely powder blue plastic that Maureen artfully put mod flower power flower stickers on. Downright Groovy.

Because I live a far distance, anything I would be keeping, would have to be something I would be willing to pay to ship. But I am a sentimental girl who craved heirloom things. Stuff Grandma gave Mom & now passing into my generation. The silverware set, the depression era wine goblets. Do I NEED more forks or glasses? No, not really-- but this stuff is special, and I want momentos- things I can pass on to my kids.
So let's just say it cost a small fortune to ship those things- even at the ground rate (least expensive), but I want that link & connection. These items are NOT going to sit & collect dust either. Life is for living & I am not going to save things for another day that may never come. I do have a new perspective about living life now & don;t postpone joy. Cheers- or Nasdrovia (Russian for to your good health??)

Example of how things went...

The car. Mom's car sat for a year in the garage. We were to get it, so I could have transportation when my sister returned to work the 2nd week I was there. The battery was dead, and the back tire very low. My Sister had it towed, and a new battery installed, oil changed & tire addressed. Good to go. Not exactly.
the City Sticker had expired. So my sister got that updated. The State license tag expired april 1st, but in order to get the tag, the car had to be emissions tested first! Done & done. All that probably cost upwards of $400 bucks- but it is now up & running & legal. The plan is to sell the car. A 1997 vehicle that has 29,000 miles on it!
The car had to be running in order to sell it. But this is a sampling of how what seemed like simple projects turned into multi layered complex issues. We also discovered, visitor day permits were required for vehicles, or you get a $50 dollar ticket. A lot of things with the house, lamp, car etc... were like this- hoops and hurdles we'd not considered kept popping up... and somehow we cleared them all.

So time marches forward, and life is full of unknowns.
The day we were driving home from Mom's house, after Salvation Army packed the bulk of everything out, on the radio in the car they were playing a Bob Hope tune-- Thanks for the Memories.

War is a Racket

Who is Smedley Darlington Butler, and what can we learn from him?


A Major General in the U.S. Marine Corps and, at the time of his death, the most decorated Marine in U.S. history.
During his 34 years of Marine Corps service, Butler was awarded numerous medals for heroism including the Marine Corps Brevet Medal (the highest Marine medal at its time for officers), and subsequently the Medal of Honor twice. Notably, he is one of only 19 people to be twice awarded the Medal of Honor, and one of only three to be awarded a Marine Corps Brevet Medal and a Medal of Honor, and the only person to be awarded a Marine Corps Brevet Medal and a Medal of Honor for two different actions.
In addition to his military career, Smedley Butler was noted for his outspoken anti-interventionist views, and his book, "War is a Racket". His book was one of the first works describing the workings of the military-industrial complex and after retiring from service, he became a popular speaker at meetings organized by veterans, pacifists and church groups in the 1930s.
In 1934, he informed the United States Congress that a group of wealthy industrialists had plotted a military coup to overthrow the government of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Butler was educated at the West Chester Friends Graded High School and later at The Haverford School, a secondary school for sons of upper-class Quaker families near Philadelphia, but he dropped out to join the Marines, 38 days before his 17th birthday.

Butler served in Guantanamo Bay, twice wounded in the Boxer Rebellion, Honduras, Nicaragua, Vera Cruz Mexico, Haiti, and World War I. After he left the service, he looked back with honesty and wrote a few books- one titled "War is a Racket"

Butler was known for his outspoken lectures against war profiteering and what he viewed as nascent fascism in the United States. During the 1930s, he gave many such speeches to pacifist groups. Between 1935 and 1937, he served as a spokesman for the American League Against War and Fascism .
In his 1935 book, War Is a Racket, Butler presented an exposé andcondemnation of the profit motive behind warfare.

"I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents."

Here are some excerpts from his WAR IS A RACKET book:

WAR is a racket. It always has been.

It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.

A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small "inside" group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.

In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.

How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat-infested dug-out? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle?

Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few -- the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill.

And what is this bill?

This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations.

It would have been far cheaper (not to say safer) for the average American who pays the bills to stay out of foreign entanglements. For a very few this racket, like bootlegging and other underworld rackets, brings fancy profits, but the cost of operations is always transferred to the people -- who do not profit.

The normal profits of a business concern in the United States are six, eight, ten, and sometimes twelve percent. But war-time profits -- ah! that is another matter -- twenty, sixty, one hundred, three hundred, and even eighteen hundred per cent -- the sky is the limit. All that traffic will bear. Uncle Sam has the money. Let's get it.

Of course, it isn't put that crudely in war time. It is dressed into speeches about patriotism, love of country, and "we must all put our shoulders to the wheel," but the profits jump and leap and skyrocket -- and are safely pocketed.

But the soldier pays the biggest part of the bill.

If you don't believe this, visit the American cemeteries on the battlefields abroad. Or visit any of the veteran's hospitals in the United States. On a tour of the country, in the midst of which I am at the time of this writing, I have visited eighteen government hospitals for veterans. In them are a total of about 50,000 destroyed men -- men who were the pick of the nation eighteen years ago. The very able chief surgeon at the government hospital; at Milwaukee, where there are 3,800 of the living dead, told me that mortality among veterans is three times as great as among those who stayed at home.

So by developing the Napoleonic system -- the medal business -- the government learned it could get soldiers for less money, because the boys liked to be decorated. Until the Civil War there were no medals. Then the Congressional Medal of Honor was handed out. It made enlistments easier. After the Civil War no new medals were issued until the Spanish-American War.

In the World War, we used propaganda to make the boys accept conscription. They were made to feel ashamed if they didn't join the army.

So vicious was this war propaganda that even God was brought into it. With few exceptions our clergymen joined in the clamor to kill, kill, kill. To kill the Germans. God is on our side . . . it is His will that the Germans be killed.

The only way to smash this racket is to conscript capital and industry and labor before the nations manhood can be conscripted. One month before the Government can conscript the young men of the nation -- it must conscript capital and industry and labor. Let the officers and the directors and the high-powered executives of our armament factories and our munitions makers and our shipbuilders and our airplane builders and the manufacturers of all the other things that provide profit in war time as well as the bankers and the speculators, be conscripted -- to get $30 a month, the same wage as the lads in the trenches get.

Let the workers in these plants get the same wages -- all the workers, all presidents, all executives, all directors, all managers, all bankers -- yes, and all generals and all admirals and all officers and all politicians and all government office holders -- everyone in the nation be restricted to a total monthly income not to exceed that paid to the soldier in the trenches!

Let all these kings and tycoons and masters of business and all those workers in industry and all our senators and governors and majors pay half of their monthly $30 wage to their families and pay war risk insurance and buy Liberty Bonds.

Why shouldn't they?

They aren't running any risk of being killed or of having their bodies mangled or their minds shattered. They aren't sleeping in muddy trenches. They aren't hungry. The soldiers are!

Another step necessary in this fight to smash the war racket is the limited plebiscite to determine whether a war should be declared. A plebiscite not of all the voters but merely of those who would be called upon to do the fighting and dying. There wouldn't be very much sense in having a 76-year-old president of a munitions factory or the flat-footed head of an international banking firm or the cross-eyed manager of a uniform manufacturing plant -- all of whom see visions of tremendous profits in the event of war -- voting on whether the nation should go to war or not. They never would be called upon to shoulder arms -- to sleep in a trench and to be shot. Only those who would be called upon to risk their lives for their country should have the privilege of voting to determine whether the nation should go to war.

A third step in this business of smashing the war racket is to make certain that our military forces are truly forces for defense only.

To summarize: Three steps must be taken to smash the war racket.

We must take the profit out of war.

We must permit the youth of the land who would bear arms to decide whether or not there should be war.

We must limit our military forces to home defense purposes.

Had secrecy been outlawed as far as war negotiations were concerned, and had the press been invited to be present at that conference, or had radio been available to broadcast the proceedings, America never would have entered the World War. But this conference, like all war discussions, was shrouded in utmost secrecy. When our boys were sent off to war they were told it was a "war to make the world safe for democracy" and a "war to end all wars."

Well, eighteen years after, the world has less of democracy than it had then. Besides, what business is it of ours whether Russia or Germany or England or France or Italy or Austria live under democracies or monarchies? Whether they are Fascists or Communists? Our problem is to preserve our own democracy.

But victory or defeat will be determined by the skill and ingenuity of our scientists.

If we put them to work making poison gas and more and more fiendish mechanical and explosive instruments of destruction, they will have no time for the constructive job of building greater prosperity for all peoples. By putting them to this useful job, we can all make more money out of peace than we can out of war -- even the munitions makers.

So...I say,

TO HELL WITH WAR!

>>>>>>Wow! I heart Smedley Butler! It is interesting to hear these words & solutions coming from the early 1900's era.
I love the idea that the profiteers, including the government, must take the same pay as soldiers. Can you imagine Halliburton, Boeing & Dick Cheney taking drastic pay cuts for the war effort? I'm pretty sure the whole thing would end right then & there.

Although this guy's name sounds like something out of a cartoon- right there with Dudley Doright (Canadian Mountie), Snidley Whiplash, or Yosemite Sam, he was a military insider who saw the military industrial complex for what it is.... and offered solutions.
Too bad he is not alive & running for president in 2008. We'd be out of Iraq & Afghanistan faster than you could say the word *racket*.

Molly Ivins Revisited

This is a reprint of a piece Molly Ivins wrote.

I will not support Hillary Clinton for president
January 20, 2006

AUSTIN, Texas --- I'd like to make it clear to the people who run the Democratic Party that I will not support Hillary Clinton for president.

Enough. Enough triangulation, calculation and equivocation. Enough clever straddling, enough not offending anyone This is not a Dick Morris election. Sen. Clinton is apparently incapable of taking a clear stand on the war in Iraq, and that alone is enough to disqualify her. Her failure to speak out on Terri Schiavo, not to mention that gross pandering on flag-burning, are just contemptible little dodges.

The recent death of Gene McCarthy reminded me of a lesson I spent a long, long time unlearning, so now I have to re-learn it. It's about political courage and heroes, and when a country is desperate for leadership. There are times when regular politics will not do, and this is one of those times. There are times a country is so tired of bull that only the truth can provide relief.

If no one in conventional-wisdom politics has the courage to speak up and say what needs to be said, then you go out and find some obscure junior senator from Minnesota with the guts to do it. In 1968, Gene McCarthy was the little boy who said out loud, "Look, the emperor isn't wearing any clothes." Bobby Kennedy -- rough, tough Bobby Kennedy -- didn't do it. Just this quiet man trained by Benedictines who liked to quote poetry.

What kind of courage does it take, for mercy's sake? The majority of the American people (55 percent) think the war in Iraq is a mistake and that we should get out. The majority (65 percent) of the American people want single-payer health care and are willing to pay more taxes to get it. The majority (86 percent) of the American people favor raising the minimum wage. The majority of the American people (60 percent) favor repealing Bush's tax cuts, or at least those that go only to the rich. The majority (66 percent) wants to reduce the deficit not by cutting domestic spending, but by reducing Pentagon spending or raising taxes.

The majority (77 percent) thinks we should do "whatever it takes" to protect the environment. The majority (87 percent) thinks big oil companies are gouging consumers and would support a windfall profits tax. That is the center, you fools. WHO ARE YOU AFRAID OF?

I listen to people like Rahm Emanuel superciliously explaining elementary politics to us clueless naifs outside the Beltway ("First, you have to win elections"). Can't you even read the damn polls?

Here's a prize example by someone named Barry Casselman, who writes, "There is an invisible civil war in the Democratic Party, and it is between those who are attempting to satisfy the defeatist and pacifist left base of the party and those who are attempting to prepare the party for successful elections in 2006 and 2008."

This supposedly pits Howard Dean, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, emboldened by "a string of bad news from the Middle East ... into calling for premature retreat from Iraq," versus those pragmatic folk like Steny Hoyer, Rahm Emanuel, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and Joe Lieberman.


Oh come on, people -- get a grip on the concept of leadership. Look at this war -- from the lies that led us into it, to the lies they continue to dump on us daily.

You sit there in Washington so frightened of the big, bad Republican machine you have no idea what people are thinking. I'm telling you right now, Tom DeLay is going to lose in his district. If Democrats in Washington haven't got enough sense to OWN the issue of political reform, I give up on them entirely.

Do it all, go long, go for public campaign financing for Congress. I'm serious as a stroke about this -- that is the only reform that will work, and you know it, as well as everyone else who's ever studied this. Do all the goo-goo stuff everybody has made fun of all these years: embrace redistricting reform, electoral reform, House rules changes, the whole package. Put up, or shut up. Own this issue, or let Jack Abramoff politics continue to run your town.

Bush, Cheney and Co. will continue to play the patriotic bully card just as long as you let them. I've said it before: War brings out the patriotic bullies. In World War I, they went around kicking dachshunds on the grounds that dachshunds were "German dogs." They did not, however, go around kicking German shepherds. The MINUTE someone impugns your patriotism for opposing this war, turn on them like a snarling dog and explain what loving your country really means. That, or you could just piss on them elegantly, as Rep. John Murtha did. Or eviscerate them with wit (look up Mark Twain on the war in the Philippines). Or point out the latest in the endless "string of bad news."

Do not sit there cowering and pretending the only way to win is as Republican-lite. If the Washington-based party can't get up and fight, we'll find someone who can.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Molly nailed it, bless her soul. Hillary has been a spineless republican-lite politician all along. She still refuses to say her vote to go to war in Iraq was wrong. Her campaign has turned negative, and we see the mean streak side of Hillary. Even the most recent March 4 primary election "wins" are really close. No glaring wins there, just barely squeaking out a win. As far as I am concerned Hillary is old school. Entrenched, Insider, left of center. Just the kind of lackluster shit we've seen & have come to hate. We've had a democratic majority in congress for 2 years. Did the war end? Has there been a troop reduction? Have executive branch criminals been prosecuted? What difference has it made?

Happy Prezzzident's Day

Ladies & Gentlemen, I did not make this stuff up. Quotes from the current President of the United States of America.

A dictatorship would be a heck of a lot easier, there's no question about it.
George W. Bush

America must not ignore the threat gathering against us. Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof, the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.
George W. Bush

Free nations are peaceful nations. Free nations don't attack each other. Free nations don't develop weapons of mass destruction.
George W. Bush



I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we're really talking about peace.
George W. Bush

Leadership to me means duty, honor, country. It means character, and it means listening from time to time.
George W. Bush

The legislature's job is to write law. It's the executive branch's job to interpret law.
George W. Bush

You can fool some of the people all the time, and those are the ones you want to concentrate on.
George W. Bush

You teach a child to read, and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test.
George W. Bush

"And there is distrust in Washington. I am surprised, frankly, at the amount of distrust that exists in this town. And I'm sorry it's the case, and I'll work hard to try to elevate it." --George W. Bush, interview on National Public Radio, Jan. 29, 2007

"I'm the master of low expectations." —aboard Air Force One, June 4, 2003

To my Valentine.....

LOVE IS ALL YOU NEED. BECAUSE LOVE MAKES LIFE WORTH LIVING. LOVE IS CARING. LOVE IS TRUSTING. LOVE IS A HIGHER CALLING. LOVE IS RESPECTFUL. LOVE GOES THE EXTRA MILE. LOVE IS ACCEPTING. LOVE IS KIND. LOVE BREAKS THROUGH BARRIERS. LOVE IS COMPASSIONATE. LOVE IS THE BEST. LOVE IS PEACE. LOVE TRANSCENDS ALL ADVERSITY. LOVE IS PATIENT. LOVE IS UNDERSTANDING. LOVE BENDS THE RULES, AND DOES THE RIGHT THING. LOVE MANIFESTS IN MANY WAYS. I LOVE YOU! xoxoxoxoxoxo

Rain~ I don't mind

Beatles: Rain

After a little sampling of snow & ice last week, our Pacific NW Rains have returned. I have a new appreciation for the rain~ you don't have to scrape it off the windshield, shovel it, or slip & slide on it. Rain~ I don't mind.

Bush fields the tough questions

A little Q & A sampling from the Decider:

Gioia, from California writes:
Mr. President, A silly question, but who picks your attire for all the important events you attend? Love your ties

George W. Bush
Dear Gioia, I pick my own suits and my own ties. Thank you for the compliment about the ties, and thank you for your question.

>>>>>>>>Riveting!


Dan, from Bethpage, NY writes:
Mr. President,I applaud your trip to the Middle East and yearn for peace as much as you do. In order to understand the people of the Middle East can you tell us what similarities you have noticed between the people of the United States and the People of the Middle East Countries?

George W. Bush

Dear Dan, perhaps the greatest similarity between peoples in the United States and the Middle East is the desire for people to live in peace. I like to remind our fellow citizens that a Muslim mom wants the same thing that an American mom wants -- that is for her child to grow up in a hopeful, peaceful world. That desire for security and peace provides the basis for our strategy with the nations in the Middle East to defeat extremists and terrorists who use murder as a weapon to achieve their political objectives. Thank you for your question.

>>>>>>>>> That would explain Shock & Awe & 5 years of occupation & the death toll.


Max, from Freeport, ME writes:
Dear President Bush, I would like to know why the government doesnt invest in research to try to create some kind of big battery that would replace the use of oil. That battery would pollute significantly less and would get rid of our dependency to Middle Eastern oil. In such a case, energy costs wouldn't vary subsequently to geopolitical issues. Moreover, we wouldnt have to constantly ask for the OPEC to lower its prices. It would also have a very positive effect on our economy.

Thank you for taking time to read this message and may God bless America

George W. Bush
Dear Max, our government is spending money on battery technologies that would enable automobiles to drive the first 20 to 40 miles using electricity. This, coupled with ethanol, is the main thrust of our initiative to become less dependent on oil. I appreciate you for sending in your question.

>>>>>>>> This is scheduled for, when-- the 12th of NEVER?


Patrick, from California writes:
Mr. President, During your tour of the ruins of Capernaum, on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, could you describe any thoughts of personal reflection.

thank you for your service to our country.

George W. Bush
Dear Patrick, our trip to the Sea of Galilee was magnificent. I had the opportunity at the Church of the Beatitudes, which sits at a high point, to gaze out on the Sea of Galilee. As I reflected on the view, at that moment I was reminded of the…New Testament story of the calm in the rough seas, which then reminded me of the power of prayer to bring calm in a person's life. Thank you for your question.

>>>>>>>>>> I'll sleep better tonight George. I bet the heavy Military ship traffic cruising around Iran are calming too.


LeRoy, from Beirut, Lebanon writes:
Dear Mr. President, Lebanon seems conspicuously absent from your itinerary this week. Doubtless, security concerns had something to do with this, but what can you say to assure us that Lebanon is still on the American agenda? What will friendlier U.S. ties with the Gulf, especially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, mean for Lebanon? Both the US and France seem eager to broker a variety of business deals with the Gulf states apparently there is even a French plan to build a nuclear power plant for these oil-rich states but, when will Lebanon see any substantial foreign direct investment from its western allies?

Best regards, LeRoy

George W. Bush
Let me assure you I am committed to democracy in Lebanon. Syria, however, continues to try to subvert the outcome of the Lebanese political process from the outside. We support the Siniora government and the efforts of the March 14th group to come together to elect a President, pursuant to their constitution. I did not want to distract from the delicate political process that is now moving forward, and therefore on my trip I spent time with the leaders of the Middle East, strategizing on how best to help the Lebanese solve their problem of Syrian involvement and secure their own democracy.

As for the U.S. doing business in the Gulf states, I support open and fair trade and investment. I also understand why the Gulf states would want to develop civilian nuclear power, it is a much more cost effective way to desalinate the water. After all, water is a precious commodity for these countries. Thanks for your question.

>>>>>>>>>>> You heard it here first folks-- It's all about the DRINKING WATER.

Ironically, the Official White House web site has a regular column called "Setting the Record Straight". It begs the question-- are the records crooked to begin with?

Welcome 2008

Green waters and verdant mountains
are the places to walk in meditation;
by the streams or under the trees
are places to clear the mind.
Observe impermanence,
never forget it;
this urges on the will to seek enlightenment.

- Keizan Jokin (1264-1325)

Ball of Confusion

As this year winds down, we will be hearing *Year in Review* recaps of the highlights (or is that low lights?) of what transpired in 2007. I'll make mine short by throwing a photo montage done to the song *Ball of Confusion*, by the Temptations. 2007 was a rough year for me, personally, my Mom had a stroke, a close relative passed on, our dog had to be put down, and a few hospital forays for me, one very serious. So in retrospect, I am happy to kiss this year goodbye.... and welcome 2008. Each new year holds new hope, and I hope for you the very best health & to be centered & on a good path, whatever that may be. I plan on working on making things less confused in 2008!