BAD NEWS

Time to take the plants in. Fall is about used up. I encountered this strange mushroom growing in one of the pots. A menacing looking little devil. It’s a bright lime color, like pistachio pudding, but without the pasticcios. Lime jello wouldn’t work to describe it, you can’t see through it. And I doubt it would giggle. While not very big, it looks like it would glow in the dark. Like it belongs in the dark. The stem burrows down into the soil, some of its flesh peeling off and falling next to it, reminding me of a creepy looking Halloween scene where faces are peeling off, probably zombies. The white stem gleams clear and bright enough to see yourself in, about 3 inches high, getting thicker towards the bottom, with a ring about a quarter of an inch down from the top. The top reminds me of a Chinese hat, I have no idea why, maybe an old cartoon. The stem appears to go deep into the pot, almost through the bottom, but not quite. It’s terracotta, clay red with a black band around the top. It is not going to get out of that pot, thank God. If you were to ingest that thing, it’s hard to tell what you might see. A mushroom I once ingested made me see music and I could smell color. This thing makes it look like you would regret the stupidity involved in trying to find God in a mushroom. This thing looks like bad news.

CAN'T STAND THE PAIN

Have you ever walked down a road where you can't stand the pain? How do I get to be the person I would like to be? What is it in me that keeps holding me back? Do I have to spend every minute worrying about the world? Can't it get along without my attention? Every day I try to be a better person. Am I as devoted to that as I am to my golf? My community needs me to help. How? How about next week? My neighbor is sick. What can I do? I'm a 67 year old man. Is there no rest? When the road gets painful, am I willing to keep stepping forward? Or will it burn holes in my shoes?

BUMPER STICKER OF THE WEEK

GOD HATES FLAGS

'We're Staying': Obama Adds Endless Afghan War to Legacy

'We're Staying': Obama Adds Endless Afghan War to Legacy



SO MUCH FOR GETTING OUR TROOPS OUT. ANOTHER STUNNING DISAPPOINTMENT. SCORE 17 FOR THE MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX, ZERO FOR THE PEOPLE.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“I'm sorry, but I don't want to be an emperor. That's not my business. I don't want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible; Jew, Gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other's happiness, not by each other's misery. We don't want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone, and the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men's souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical; our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery, we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost. The airplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men; cries out for universal brotherhood; for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women, and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me, I say, do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed, the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish. Soldiers! Don't give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you, enslave you; who regiment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel! Who drill you, diet you, treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don't give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines, you are not cattle, you are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don't hate! Only the unloved hate; the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers! Don't fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the seventeenth chapter of St. Luke, it is written that the kingdom of God is within man, not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people, have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy, let us use that power. Let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfill that promise. They never will! Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to fulfill that promise. Let us fight to free the world! To do away with national barriers! To do away with greed, with hate and intolerance! Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men's happiness. Soldiers, in the name of democracy, let us all unite!”
Charles Chaplin

Jim Hightower | Grassroots Democracy-Building in Iowa

Jim Hightower | Grassroots Democracy-Building in Iowa

Proving Competitive with Clinton Machine, Sanders Goes Big with Small Donations

Proving Competitive with Clinton Machine, Sanders Goes Big with Small Donations



IT'S ALL ABOUT MONEY.

THE KILLER IN ME IS THE KILLER IN YOU

Violence is a part of all of us. We all carry a dark side. When we are engaged in war, it is all of us that are responsible, not just the chosen few. With each death, humanity becomes less than what it could have been. When we take an eye for an eye, we move away from the common good, toward the common bad. And before long, we accept the common bad as okay, or something we can settle for. This is the law of diminishing humanity. We all take part in it. We are all responsible for it. We sit back and watch.