Response to the Canonization of Pope John Paul II

I remember how shocked everyone was when Sinead OConnor sang this on Saturday Night Live in the 70s. I was there watching the TV. Ms. OConnor was reviled.

Fight the real enemy. It was appropriate then and is even more appropriate now. I am a Catholic baptized and confirmed.

'How can you post this and call yourself a Catholic' you may ask. It is complicated.

"Over the pope as the expression of the binding claim of ecclesiastical authority there still stands one's own conscience, which must be obeyed before all else, if necessary even against the requirement of ecclesiastical authority. Conscience confronts [the individual] with a supreme and ultimate tribunal, and one which in the last resort is beyond the claim of external social groups, even of the official church."  (Pope Benedict XVI [then Archbishop Joseph Ratzinger], "Commentary on the Documents of Vatican II", ed. Vorgrimler, 1968, on Gaudium et spes, part 1, chapter 1.)

Ghetto Garden Fabulous

My New Fig among the Daffodils

My house is a tiny HUD row house I bought as a veritable shell a decade ago. I have had to dedicate any money I had to serious repairs like putting in a heating system and erecting a front door.

I love to garden. However, my garden gets the least investment in terms of capital available. Nevertheless, I have turned it from hard packed clay with a scraggly lawn I had to mow to its present state.

I scavenged antique bricks from an old house and we made a walk. Who wants a lawn to mow? Not me. I use fallen tree branches to make garden beds. I use chunks of cement. I scavenge fallen leaves that others bag up and throw away. I compost to make soil and keep weeds down. In that way, I have raised the level of my garden 6 inches of fertile composted soil all over. Took some time.

I write a lot about garden design here. Even so, I did not realize quite what I was doing, until my Daughter suggested I get some nicer paving stones on a trip to the garden store. I recoiled. And I was not sure why. I mean, I just spent $50.00 on new fig trees.

And then the light dawned. I like the scavenging. Saves money so I can indulge in fig trees. It is a challenge. I just did not know it was a design theme. I scavenged every single one of those Iris and in another few weeks they will be glorious. I have the Herbs in and my Blueberries are doing fine.

My garden theme is Ghetto Fabulous. Example is the old ladder. It is a bean tower. I think it will be beautiful. We shall see. God bless my Daughter. Eventually she will whip me into shape. One way or another. Kind of like my garden.

Letter from Finland to America

Jore Puusa 
I am a Fin living in Finland, Europe. ( BTW Europe is on the other side of Atlantic ocean for those who had no free education)

We have free education and free healthcare. Of course we pay lots of taxes- me about 21% and richer people even 50%. But, this way everybody can stay healthy and study whatever he/she likes and has talent. Most of fins learn english, swedish, germany or french in schools, I hear that even American English is a problem at certain areas in US???.

We are a small country of five million and we do not try to learn how to live to other nations. So here I´m only telling to US citizens what real freedom sounds.

On the opposite of US we have real freedom of speech cause most of us can read or write ---as I`ve heard 14% millions of US citizens cannot read. Our people do not beg or sleep in the streets. If one gets sick he/she goes to local health station and sees a doctor. If You go only once or twice a year You pay 40 USD for those two first... all the rest is free. I does not depend on disease, if You have cancer it is as cheap as a broken leg or a flu. So why can we pay for it and mighty US cannot??

Maybe cause we are not to the right so much and we really care for other people.
Or for some other reason. Maybe You could care about Your citizens if You did not throw away Your money in useless wars. maybe.

I am a photojournalist, I´we been twice to USA. In 1984 La Olympics and in Lake Placid olympics. No other problems but the racism everywhere and crime all over seemed a bit sad. When I read angry and almost facist comments in this thread I understood that You just cannot make it better, so sad.

But its Your choice. Good luck.
Jore Puusa
Helsinki
Finland

Fred Phelps is dead and all I got is these nasty pictures. - UPDATE

UPDATE: You can find more photoshop artistry at http://www.freakingnews.com/ You will be amazed and delighted by the work there.

KARMA'S CALLING

Click Me!

Satanists Announce Plans To Turn Fred Phelps Gay In The Afterlife

FRED PHELPS JUST DIED - FUCK THAT GUY  By Gavin Haynes

THERE IS NO MORE UNCOMFORTABLY BIZARRE SENTENCE AVAILABLE ON FRED PHELPS THAN THIS FROM JON MICHAEL BELL’S ADDICTED TO HATE
You can read the full text of Bell's Addicted to Hate at the link.

“Mark remembers the family coming back once to find Pastor Phelps jogging around the dining room table, beating the sobbing [Nate] with a broom handle; while doing so, he was alternately spitting on the frightened child and chuckling the same sinister laugh so disturbing to those who've seen him on television.”

Open Carry MoFos or Not in My State

"Use a picture. It's worth a thousand words." - Arthur Brisbane 

The guy in the white coat is C.J. Grisham of Open Carry Texas and the other guys are his Posse. Aren't they special?  How confident do you feel that they can and will meet the challenges of Wayne LaPierre's brave new world?

“We, the American people, clearly see the daunting forces we will undoubtedly face: terrorists, crime, drug gangs, the possibility of Euro-style debt riots, civil unrest or natural disaster.” - Wayne LaPierre, National Rifle Association

"Most Texans are surprised to learn that the people they see openly carrying in our streets and our public spaces are not required to have had a background check or to have received any firearms safety training whatsoever," said Hillary Rand. 

Activists have congregated in malls, store parking lots, restaurants and city parks in Dallas, Fort Worth, Austin, Houston and San Antonio in an effort to "normalize" the open carry of firearms. Last year in Arlington, nearly 40 open carry activists protested four Moms Demand Action volunteers by standing in the parking lot with long guns. - http://www.burntorangereport.com/diary/15065/texas-moms-demand-action-chapter-gives-testimony-on-open-carry-laws

When I googled "open carry Texas," I also found this lovely young lady with a BLOG. I looked at the picture of the posse above and I looked at her and I thought to myself "Self, maybe you misunderstand Texas culture. Could this be a mating ritual like Christian Mingle?" 

Then I found this photograph with the label "gun-girl.' My mind is officially blown. And I grew up in New Jersey. These are the women Texas legislators are trying to take reproductive rights from? 

Texas, like New Jersey, has lately become one long messy greasy salty popcorn worthy event. I am starting to love Texas. 

Note: For those who are not familiar with American slang, the meaning of 'mofo' can be found HERE. 

I'm from Texas, and one of the reasons I like Texas is because there's no one in control.

Willie Nelson

Get Your Stoning Right Here! - UPDATE

Shreveport Louisiana asked to stone some gays by transexual woman.

What is really ironic is the guy who proposed the bill in question appears to wear glasses because he has a defect in his eyes. And I wonder if he has prostate issues? According to the Levites, Ron Webb has no right to preach or even approach the Altar of God. Does he have both his testicles. Maybe he will let us check?

Leviticus 21 states:

17 “Speak unto Aaron, saying, ‘Whosoever he be of thy seed in their generations who hath any blemish, let him not approach to offer the bread of his God.
18 For whatsoever man he be that hath a blemish, he shall not approach: a blind man, or a lame, or he that hath a flat nose, or any thing superfluous,
19 or a man who is brokenfooted, or brokenhanded,
20 or crookbacked, or a dwarf, or who hath a blemish in his eye, or hath scurvy, or scabbed, or hath his stones broken.

I wonder if Ron Webb has ever read the book he is thumping. Man is an embarrassment to Christians. Blasphemy is a sin, if you are into the sin type of coercion. Personally, I like Pope Frankie's approach. The thing to keep in mind when dealing with religious authoritarians is - they have very high standards - for YOU.

If you read my blog, it is no secret I despise religious authoritarians. I hope this action becomes a standard way of dealing with religious zealots. In your face!

Call these folks out on their bullshit. Make them live up to all of the "rules," not just the ones that suit their personal prejudices. They cannot live up to their own rhetoric.  Biblical morality will get you arrested.

PHOTOS: LGBT Activists Demand Stoning at Antigay Harlem Church

Well, they'll stone you when you walk all alone
They'll stone you when you are walking home
They'll stone you and then say you are brave
They'll stone you when you are set down in your grave
But I would not feel so all alone
Everybody must get stoned. 

- Bob Dylan, Poet

Another uppity queer woman. Is this a new trend? I approve.

 

NUT FIGHT! NUT FIGHT! Get the popcorn.

UPDATE:

WASHINGTON – The Board of Directors of the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), the nation’s oldest and largest pro-life organization, today voted to seat the Georgia Life Alliance as its official NRLC affiliate for the state of Georgia, replacing Georgia Right to Life in that capacity.

According to WHO, unsafe abortion is one of the three leading causes of maternal mortality, along with hemorrhage and sepsis from childbirth.1 

America ranks 50th in maternal mortality worldwide. 

What are the "prolife" fighting over? They are fighting over compelling me to birth a rapist's child by force of law or not. Or birth my Daddy's child or not. Because they care. Oh how they care.

They are also fighting about who the National Right to Life folks will support for election in the Georgia Senate race. It is Karen Handel vs. Paul Broun. I already gave Karen Handel an Asshat Award.

The Fight about Abortion for Rape and Incest:

Georgia Right to Life:

“If all aren’t protected, none are protected … Rape and incest is a horrible scenario and we have the utmost sympathy for anyone in those circumstances, but we can’t condone murder in those circumstances,” Suzanne Ward of Georgia Right to Life told Fox 5 Atlanta.

versus 

Georgia Life Alliance:

 "No one is asking them to condone it (abortion for rape and incest). But what conservatives have asked is that we at least move the ball forward where we can on this issue. Georgia Right to Life has refused to do so. And now they are going on record with their position — better all die than work to save as many as we can. This is horrific. This is Westboro Baptist Church insanity. Georgia needs a new pro-life group — one that actually wants to save as many lives as possible." - Erick Erickson of Red State Blog.

I think it would be useful here to define rape. Words have meaning. Commandeer or make unconsensual use of my body and you have committed rape. Violence is defined by the act of rape itself, not by the intention of the rapist.

The term rape originates in the Latin rapere, from raptus, "to snatch, to grab, to carry off". The term has come to mean, since approximately the 14th century, "to seize and take away by force." In Roman law in the carrying off of a woman by force, with or without intercourse, constituted "raptus." In Medieval English law the same term could refer to either kidnapping or rape in the modern sense of "sexual violation." The original meaning of "carry off by force" is still found in some phrases, such as "rape and pillage" or in titles, such as the story of the Rape of the Sabine Women or the poem The Rape of the Lock, which is about the theft of a lock of hair. The term is most often defined in criminal law. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape

Meanwhile, the citizens of Georgia have been denied health care under the ACA MedicAid expansion by the same Republicans who want to force them to give birth no matter what. 15% of sexual assault and rape victims are under age 12. You think that might be pertinent?

• Girls ages 16-19 are 4 times more likely than the general population to be victims of rape, attempted rape, or sexual assault.

Georgia women are not at all happy. Women vote. Eyes on Georgia because it is going to be a hoot.

Conscientious Objection, Nuns, and President Obama

UPDATE: The battle for women's reproductive health has been joined by America's Nuns. Nuns supported the ACA, and now they have come out in support of the contraception mandate. 

It is the Nuns against the Bishops and Hobby Lobby. My money is on the Nuns. Sign a petition in support of the Nuns HERE.

What is nonviolent civil or religious disobedience? Gandhi's definition is the clearest in my opinion:

"I have also called it love-force or soul-force. . .  I discovered in the earliest stages that pursuit of truth did not admit of violence being inflicted on one’s opponent but that he must be weaned from error by patience and compassion. For what appears to be truth to the one may appear to be error to the other. And patience means self-suffering. So the doctrine came to mean vindication of truth, not by infliction of suffering on the opponent, but on oneself." - Mohandas Gandhi.

Let us examine the definition of violence:

Violence is defined by the World Health Organization as the intentional use of physical force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself, another person, or against a group or community, that either results in or has a high likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, maldevelopment or deprivation. This definition associates intentionality with the committing of the act itself, irrespective of the outcome it produces.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V...

A Conscientious Objector takes on the burden of the Objection. That is the nature of nonviolent conscientious objection, religious or otherwise. Transferring the burden of one's own conscientious objection onto the Other is not conscientious objection. It is assault.

The Roman Catholic Church and the Religious Right are engaging in the War on Women as allies. They sent in some Nuns to the battle along with the requisite Corpos. Some other Nuns have filed a brief supporting the Affordable Care Act. 

This religious war on women is not new. It is very old. And now the Nuns are in a civil(?) war up to their necks. Do most America's Nuns support the ACA? Evidently, they do.

As further proof that conservative efforts to paint President Obama as the enemy of religion are a red herring, nearly two dozen leading Catholic nuns filed a brief in the Supreme Court last week supporting the president’s signature legislative accomplishment. As they explain in their brief:

Amici curiae represent the leadership of Catholic women’s religious orders from across the United States. Amici and the orders they serve have a long history of public service in healthcare in America dating back to the 1700s. These services include founding hospitals and free clinics and providing free healthcare to the underprivileged and uninsured. The work by Amici gives them a unique perspective on the unmet healthcare needs of the poor, as well as on the positive impact that will result from the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“ACA” or the “Act”). . . .

Amici believe that a civilized society must ensure the provision of basic healthcare to its citizens regardless of their ability to pay for it. They further believe it is a moral imperative that all levels of government institute programs that ensure the poor receive such care. They believe Medicaid expansion under the Act is critical to the communities they serve. 
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/02/23/431147/catholic-nuns-file-brief-supporting-affordable-care-act/