Today's Quote

All I know for sure is that I am alive now.  I have been made who I am by the gifts to me of many people.  I believe that the word God stands for those gifts that lift me beyond my limits, allow me to escape my survival-driven existence and invite me into a deeper experience of being human.  As I give my life away, I experience life being expanded. As I share love, I find my ability to love is increased.  When I have the courage to be myself, I find my participation in being itself enhanced.  That is where I have glimpses of the divine and intimations of immortality. 

~John Shelby Spong

Quote of the Day

On the Santorbum "suspending his campaign"


I'm actually glad that Mr. Santorum was in the race and that he managed to get as far as he did. I never thought for a moment that he would get the Republican nomination, much less win the election, but seeing how far he got tells us that just because we elect a center-left president every now and then, we should never forget that there remains a seething and bitter bloc who despise other people based on superstition and ignorance. And they vote.

Mustang Bobby.

I read somewhere else that (p)Rick vowed to fight on - to take us back to the 1400's  -  Go for it,  I'll contribute to a ticket to send you there. Perhaps they would let you be Pope.

Quote for today

Maurene Dowd in the New York Times says:  "The Republicans, with their crazed Reagan fixation, are a last-gasp party, living posthumously, fighting battles on sex, race, immigration and public education long ago won by the other side."

Read the entire article Ghastly Outdated Party here.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Honoring Dr. King requires action, and not just any kind of action, but action aimed at producing a new way of living.

It is one thing, after all, to build houses for homeless people, but quite another to demand an end to housing shortages in a nation as wealthy as this one. It is one thing to feed the hungry, but quite another to demand that food security be guaranteed as a matter of public policy and not just hoped for as the result of private charity. It is one thing, in short, to honor the safe Martin Luther King Jr., and another to honor the man in his entirety.

 Tim Wise

Quote of the Day

I've come to believe in Tim Tebow, but not for what he does on a football field, which is still three parts Dr. Jekyll and two parts Mr. Hyde.

No, I've come to believe in Tim Tebow for what he does off a football field, which is represent the best parts of us, the parts I want to be and so rarely am.  

Rick Reilly

I had a critical post about Tim Tebow up earlier because I really don't like people who make a big show of praying in public.  I got a comment on it which directed me to this article and I watched a spot on TV about him and I have (somewhat) changed my opinion. So in fairness I have taken that post down and request that you read this article and perhaps cut him some slack as I will now do.

  

War on Christmas

From The Christian Left
‎(From a post shared by member Brian Meadows, a note to people who think there's a "war on Christmas":) "If you want to keep Christ in Christmas, worry about things more important than the signs and decorations at JC Penney. You think Christmas should be about Christ? Then take up your cross and follow Jesus – not into department stores, but into the prisons, the hospitals, among the poor and the outcast. You get angry when someone doesn't say 'Christmas?' Try getting angry over Christ's children dying of malnutrition or AIDS. Try getting angry over the fact that the Christmas chocolate you love so much was kept cheap on the back of the working poor. Try getting angry over the fact that Christians are keeping people out of churches with their closed minds and closed doors. You want to keep Christ in Christmas? Try putting Christ in your life first."

I can't believe he said that!

Cain: "We need a leader, not a reader."


h/t TPM

Letter from George Washington - Quote of the day.

George Washington wrote a letter to the Jewish Congregation in Newport, Rhode Island in 1790. Read the CNN Story here.

It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for, happily, the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support. 

 ...

May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants—while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid.     

George Washington

Emphasis mine.

Quote for today

Albert Camus:

But what then is capital punishment but the most premeditated of murders, to which no criminal's deed, however calculated it may be, can be compared? For there to be equivalence, the death penalty would have to punish a criminal who had warned his victim of the date at which he would inflict a horrible death on him and who, from that moment onward, had confined him at his mercy for months. Such a monster is not encountered in private life.

Quote of the Day

"I was an Eisenhower Republican when I started out at 21, because he promised to get us out of the Korean War, And over the years, I realized there was a Republican philosophy that I liked,... And then they lost it. And libertarians had more of it. Because what I really believe is, let’s spend a little more time leaving everybody alone."    Clint Eastwood

Quote of the Day

Sometimes i feel alone. Some days are long and tough. But when i look out into the world, I am struck by the impossible beauty of it all. Those billions of magnificent accidents that led us to where we are today,that led us to paper planes and nautilus shells the tiny, crooked smiles of children. When i think about all the small perfections of the world, I have faith that my time will come. I have faith that some day a warm light will flood over me and I will find peace.
-Chaseism Motto


The above is a Motto on the Facebook page of the son of one of my former students.  When I read it I was struck with the depth of thought that I found in it. This young man is still in school but he shows an appreciation for our world and its intricacies that many of our politicians and so called leaders don't even begin to have. And oh yeah, he is a normal kid who loves football and girls and his mother.  Now he tells me that he didn't write it but found it in a little kid's book.  I guess that I have to give him credit for honesty and for appreciating something that someone else wrote. Thanks Chase for sharing,  Now go back and cite your source....


You know, I really love Facebook. It has reconnected me with former students and friends and keeps me in touch with happenings in my friends and families lives. Sometimes I hear things on there sooner than I do in person. It is a real bright spot in my life and I especially love looking at all the pictures.

Christianity's Biggest Mistake

I am more and more convinced as of late that our biggest mistake as Christians is that we have put so much weight on eternity that we miss the life in front of us.   We are so heavenly minded, as the saying goes, that we are no earthly good.    

From Christianity's Biggest Mistake by Chad 

Quote of the Day

Maureen  Dowd on President Obama:


It’s not enough to understand how everybody in the room thinks. You have to decide which ones in the room are right, and stand with them. A leader is not a mediator or an umpire or a convener or a facilitator.


Read the entire article here  Why Is He Bi (Sigh)

On last night's debate

Can't tell em apart

A year from now it might be interesting to see who made it through the primaries, but right now it's like watching pre-season baseball in February when the old-timers, the rookies, and the no-chance walk-ons are all trying for a spot in the line-up, and none of the games count.

Mustang Bobby

Quote of the Day

"An IBM spokesman said that while Watson had failed in his mission, there was probably not a great wealth of information in the emails to begin with: “Out of a total of 24,199 emails, 24,195 of them were out-of-office autoreplies.”

For her part, Gov. Palin seemed unfazed by the news, using a stop on her bus tour to blast Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY): "In Paul Revere's day, he had to ride from door to door to show people his penis.""

Andy Borowitz from the Borowitz Report.

Get the Borowitz Report delivered to your inbox for free here.

Quote of the Day

It appears that Sarah Palin's desired meeting with Mrs. Thatcher will not take place.  One of her (Mrs. Thatcher's) allies reportedly said.

"Lady Thatcher will not be seeing Sarah Palin. That would be belittling for Margaret. Sarah Palin is nuts."

Quote of the Day

Here's the thing; stupid people can't help themselves. Stupid people don't know that they're stupid, because if they did know they were stupid, they wouldn't be stupid in the first place.

 Sarah Palin's problem isn't stupidity; it's willful ignorance. She's probably got an average IQ, but she has the intellectual curiosity of an adolescent diva: nothing matters if it isn't about her. That's not leadership; it's egomania.

Mustang Bobby on Sarah Palin

Pretty much nails it!

Tea Party Thought

From Hullabaloo:

When I looked over all of these and thought about how they all seem to revolve around the idea that the States are primary and the nation as a whole is just a loose framework meaning almost nothing, I realized that these people {Tea party} are the real America haters. They literally loathe the fundamental concept of the United States of America as a nation, preferring to think of themselves as Mississippians or Minnesotans than Americans. Do you think they know that?

Come on Governor Branstad, you are holding kids hostage.

Quote of the day:  From here

“It’s time for Iowans to get involved in terms of what’s happening in state government,” Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal (D-Council Bluffs) said. “We started this session talking about education and job creation in this state. We’ve been at it for over 120 days, and we’re not making much progress with the people in this building. So it’s time for the people outside this building to call Gov. (Terry) Branstad and tell him starvation budgets for economic development and for education in this state are unacceptable to Iowans

Every single year that I taught school that the Republicthugs were in power we had to fight to get money for Education.  I don't think that they like kids.  Come on Governor, Kids should be the first priority of a democracy, not the last.


Constituents may call the Governor’s office at (515) 281-5211.

Quote of the Day - From Americablog

Arianna: If "America can do whatever we set our mind to," how come our leaders won't set their minds on jobs?

by John Aravosis (DC)

Arianna Huffington:

"We do big things," President Obama said during his State of the Union speech in January. And, in fact, we do. Sometimes. Finding and dispatching Osama bin Laden certainly qualifies. "We are once again reminded," the president said after announcing the terrorist's death, "that America can do whatever we set our mind to." But if that's true, why are our leaders so accepting of a stagnant economy? If they really focused on the havoc it is wreaking on the lives of tens of millions of Americans, they would, in the memorable words of Richard Clarke, be running around with their hair on fire. But they're not. Instead, we're being asked to accept years of underemployment, low growth and draconian cuts to America's social safety nets as the "new normal."