" When Laura Bush spoke up last week about the human rights atrocities in Burma, two women, both Armenian Christians, were gunned down in Baghdad by contractors underwritten by American taxpayers. On this matter, the White House has been silent. The gunmen who mowed down the two Christian women worked for a Dubai-based company managed by Australians, registered in Singapore and enlisted as a subcontractor by an American contractor headquartered in North Carolina. This is a plot out of "Syriana" by way of "Chinatown." There will be no trial. We will never find out what happened". From an Editorial in the NY Times
"We must also examine our own responsibility for the hideous acts committed in our name in a war where we have now fought longer than we did in the one that put Verschärfte Vernehmung on the map. Note: Verschärfte Vernehmung, or enhanced or intensified interrogation, was the exact term innovated by the Gestapo to describe what became known as the ‘third degree." From an Editorial in the NY Times
"Republicans are trying to figure out what to do about Larry Craig, the loony senator from Idaho who got caught in a public toilet behaving as if he thought the promised land was just one stall away".-Don't remember where I got this.
From the Democrats, heavily armed with thermometers, barometers and windmills to test the wind, comes the usual timidity. They behave as if their hearts would stop if they actually took a tough stand -Don't remember where I got this
Now for something a little more digestible. These are from the mind of Stephen Colbert
“The sooner we accept the basic differences between men and women, the sooner we can stop arguing about it and start having sex.”
"...candidates test the waters with a book first. Just look at Barack Obama, John Edwards or O. J. Simpson"
Now you know why Sunday with a newspaper is such a pleasure for me. Not only can I get angry but then someone like Colbert makes me laugh. Like getting ice cream after having your tonsils removed. (That was the "tradition" that I grew up with anyway) I have got to be careful. Those little parenthetical side comments may appear to come from some old curmudgeon....wait! I think I am. "Thems the breaks."
And now for something completely different (exit Monty Python). I was doing some thinking about beauty last night and these came to mind. Watching a Discovery Channel thing on the Albatross (did I hear Python come on stage again?) and how much it amazed me of the grace that that bird can achieve when sailing through the air.
How blue the sky can be when you are open to it. So blue sometimes you turn away embarrassed, feeling that it was something that mortal are not allowed to see.
How bleak is the desert yet has its own unique aesthetic.
Writing this, listening to some "Jass" (the original spelling) and in a groove that said to me how wonderfully mathematical and emotional a big jazz band can be when going full tilt and then turn and do a number that is as light as air. How does the mind create such wonders.
Any way enough crap for now. See you next time
DennyG
