DamNation

Iran Shouts, "Death to Dictatorship!"

2009-06-20T16:37:00.002-07:00

Yahoo News reported today on the protests going on in Iran over the fraudulent election of June 12 in an article titled, "Defiant Tehran protesters battle police," by Ali Akbar Dareini and Brian Murphy of the Associated Press Writers.

Does that cover my legal obligations to quote this article?

"Thousands of protesters defied Iran's highest authority Saturday..." What does this mean for the Middle East, what does it mean to Americans? I'm going to try to explain what I think this means.

The news today is filled with negativity and hype. The Associated Press does a really good job when it comes to reporting the news and only the news. They do not speculated and rarely opinionate. However, like all news agencies, the fall victim to the negative side of the news. And why not, it brings in the high ratings and thus the high revenue of advertising.

But that's a side note to the more pressing news that Iran is in the beginning stages of reform and before it is over, I am sure we (meaning the U.S.A.) will be involved.

"President Barrack Obama [warned Iran] to halt "all violent and unjust actions against its own people." He said the United States, "stands by all who seek to exercise," the universal rights to assembly and free speech."

Interesting quote, yes? Is our peace loving, talk first president really prepared to back those words? Would he really lead the U.S. into helping one side of someone else's civil war? And people were afraid of President Bush II.

Wait, did I say civil war? Yes. I believe this faux election in Iran could lead to more than civil unrest and become an all out war, a war we would no doubt be asked to participate in since... well, it's our fault. Before I get to why it's our fault let me feed you one more quote.

Mehrdad Khonsari, a consultant to the London-based Center for Arab and Iranian Studies said, "... history has taught us that people in these situations lose their initial sense of fear and become emboldened by brutality."

So if history teaches us that, does it not also teach such emboldenment leads to revolution? It did for the British Colonies of America some 230 some odd years ago. Creating a nation which valued Truth, Justice and Liberty for all.

Liberty for all? Is that why we are in Iraq and Afghanistan? or was that just my motive for joining the army?

Maybe it's a universal want. Aprox. 3,000 protesters marched against the faux election some chanting, "Death to dictatorship," "Death to the dictator," and my fave, "Death to Khamenei!" - a "once unthinkable challenge to the authority of the successor of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the father of the Islamic Revolution."

So why is all this the fault of the U.S.? Because of the Domino Effect. Here's how I see it. The U.S. liberates Afghanistan - The U.S. liberates Iraq - Syria releases it's control of Lebanon - Israelbegins talking about a two state solution - Iran's youth gets a taste of freedom and wants more - Ahmadinejad cheats in the June 12 election - Iranians demand a fair election.

Will there be a revolution or at least a major reform in Iran? Why wouldn't there be. History has also taught that a repressed people who feel emboldened will stand against further oppression. So what does the Iranian gov. do?

Block "Web sites such as BBC Fasi, Facebook, Twitter and several pro-Mousavi sites used by Iranians to tell the world about protests and violence. Text messaging has not been working in Iran since last week and cell phone service in Tehran is frequently down."

But an emboldened people will find a way, Sami Al Faraj, president of the Kuwait Center for Strategic Studies said of the opposition networks, "They can resort to whispering... they can do it the old fashioned way."

I mentioned something about all the negative news didn't I? Well here is a positive thought, one I never saw coming but now I can see it: Peace in the Middle East in my life time!

Freedom/Liberty is contagious. Once a people taste of its fruit the want more and more. Don't believe me? Look at the history of the United States we started with only giving true freedom to land owners and now even illegal immigrants are getting treated better than many of our fore fathers.

Give us Liberty for All or give us death! Let Freedom ring, eh?

Ozymandias is Alive

2009-03-15T07:47:00.002-07:00

Ozymandias is real but his name isn't Adrian Veidt it's Shai Agassi and he's gonna save the world. In a time when a graphic novel has sparked all kinds of conversations about age old problems a real life counter part to Watchmen's superhero Ozymandias has appeared with a bold new plan to save mankind.

Shai Agassi started a company called Better Place, plans to replace all our gas powered vehicles with electric cars and to build a world wide infrastructure to support these vehicles. Just like in the graphic novel Watchmen Agassi has invented power stations to be placed all over our city's and towns to charge these vehicles. In the graphic novel Veidt invents a charging station that looks much like a fire hydrant you plug your car into when it's parked. Will this change how the world runs? Will it stop wars over oil? How prolific is Watchmen and it's writer Alan Moore?

As the character Rorschach would say, "This needs further investigating."

for info on Better Place goto: Better Place

Alan Moore won't watch Watchmen...

2009-02-28T21:57:00.003-08:00

Looking like the face on the Shroud of Turin but much older, Alan Moore is the epitome of Goth Punk. You might guess he is a poet or a writer, so should you be amazed to find out he is the writer of comics greatest, most thought provoking stories?

The works of Moore tend to be wordy, as the art form of comic books and graphic novels often use the "less is more" approach, letting the art fill in the gaps; he gives "more than less" in every story he writes. The words cascade across almost every frame of art, combine the two and it is as if you are living the story not merely reading it.

Some call Moore the greatest graphic novelist of all time, even prophetic in his story telling. His acclaim comes from his many amazing stories but none so much as Watchmen. The graphic novel given credit for changing thew ay comic books are viewed, was written in the late 80's (originally published by DC as 12 monthly issues between 1986-87) is about to be put up on the ole' silver screen, much to the writer's dismay.

When asked by Wizard: The Magazine of Comic, Entertainment and Pop Culture (pg 54 Wizard#209) if he would ever see the film adaptation of his great work, he replied, "...that's never going to happen... I'm never going to see the fucking thing."

Moore has an unfavorable attitude toward Hollywood. If you have had the displeasure of sitting through the film adaptation of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen you just might understand why he feels the way he does. However, other books of his which have seen the lime-light of Hollywood: V for Vendetta, a faithful translation of graphic art to moving picture or From Hell which benefitted much from the performance of actor Johnny Depp, you begin to question where Moore gets his attitude.

In a recent interview with journalist Geoff Boucher of the L.A. Times, Moore explains his opinion, "I find film in its modern form to be quite bullying. It spoon-feeds us, which has the effect of watering down our collective cultural imagination. It is as if we are freshly hatched birds looking up with our mouths open waiting for Hollywood to feed us more regurgitated worms. The 'Watchmen' film sounds like more regurgitated worms. I for on am sick of worms. Can't we get something else?"

So why would I call one of my "hero's" of the written word a big baby?

I think an artist should be thrilled at the idea so many have been moved by his work they want more. With a film adaptation, as faithful as a film can be to an original work, so many more might have the opportunity to be affected by it, the artist should be thrilled!

Is it not a bit shocking how Moore can dislike film so much that he would take his name off the movie he inspired? Dave Gibbons, the artist behind the graphic novel, Watchmen, is a talent to be recognized but people didn't buy the book for his art the way the might for any book published by Image Comics. No, they bought the book because of Moore's prose. They bought it and shared it because of the story Moore created. They love the story and they will go see the movie because they want Moore.

I say:

Dear Mr. Moore

Get off your high horse, go see the film, enjoy the spoils of your work, you deserve it. Did you hear Frank Millar cry like a little bitch about 300? No, you didn't did you? Why? Because Zack Snyder stayed faithful to the book and made a much larger audience aware of his work just as he is doing with Watchmen.

... big baby!

But I guess when you are an intelligent, talented yet, eccentric writer you can get away with being a complete dick!

The Department of Ethnic Diversity

2008-06-29T22:08:00.002-07:00

Mr. Andrew Hacker has worked for the Department of Ethnic Diversity for fifteen years and since its creation, shortly after the end of the Minority/Majority Civil War (M&M War), the D.E.D. has had an overwhelming success rate in deterring conflict between races. The department made very few mistakes and never one as bad as this. Today was one of those days that Mr. Hacker hated. Today a mistake had to be rectified. Mr. Hacker looked at the file on his desk and shook his head unable to comprehend how this could have been over looked for so long.

Birth Number #539-1998-02-29

Given Name: Benjamin Woodworth

Scheduled Race: American African

Birth Race: Non-Hispanic Caucasian

This was not going to be a good day.

Mr. Hacker, dressed in his finest tight blue suit, stepped out of his office, the file in his brief case next to his MacBook and walkout to his TSV (Time Shared Vehicle). He pressed his thumb to the pad on the door and the vehicle unlocked. He set his brief case aside and pushed the command key on the TSVs’ console. The quiet hum of the electric hybrid engine began and the TSV asked in its robotic voice, “Destination please?”

“Yes, the home of Benjamin Woodworth, number five-three-nine,” Mr. Hacker replied. The TSV worked itself out onto the road and finding the shortest distance between the office and Mr. Woodworth’s home Mr. Hacker arrived all to quickly.

Ben was dictating his next best seller, “How a Civil War Saved America,” to his iMac his Automated Security System popped a video box onto his screen showing a man dressed in a tight blue suit walking up to his door. Ben commanded his iMac to save and power down, took a sip of coffee and left his home office to answer the door just as the bell rang. He opened the door and greeted the with his usual Cruisesque smile, “Howdy. What may I do for you?”

Mr. Hacker smiled back and replied, “Hello, Mr. Woodworth. I’m Mr. Hacker from the D.E.D. Uh… the Department of Ethnic Diversity?”

“Yes, of course. I’m writing a chapter on your department for my next book,” Ben said. Lifting his right brow, the way he did whenever he had misgivings about something he continued, “What does the D.E.D. want with me?”

******

After about an hour of explaining and many attempts to calm Ben down Mr. Hacker had finally gotten to the part that calmed every red blooded American down: money.

“The D.E.D. is well aware of the inconvience going through a Transracial operation causes that is why we are prepared to offer reparations,” Mr. Hacker explained as Mr. Woodworth robot assistant Asimo refreshed his drink.

“What kind of reparations,” Ben asked?

“Name your price,” Mr. Hacker boldly stated.

“Name my price? Are you kidding?”

“No. The D.E.D. has nearly in exhaustable funds in matters of peace such as this. So, name your price.”

“Okay. One million dollars a year for the rest of my life.”

Now, Mr. Hackers eyebrow raised, “As I’ve explained our audit of your life predicts you will live another fifty years…”

“As a black man,” Ben interrupted, “ Yes, I understand that. I also understand that even with your guarantee that I will live another fifty years, as a black man, I am more than likely to die of some terrible disease. I’ve done research on this. According to the [U.S.] Department of Health & Human Services website, black males are more susceptible to “…heart diseases, stroke, cancer, asthma, influenza and pneumonia, diabetes, HIV/AIDS.” There will even be an increase in chance that I will die of a homicide canceling out your guarantee!

So yes, I will be asking for one million a year for the rest of my life.”

“Alright. I’ll take that down. However, I’m going to leave you some littiture I want you to read and there are some questions I’d like you to answer before we finish the paper work. I’ll come back in two weeks time…”

Works Cited

"Data/Statistics: African American Profiles." The Office of Minority Health. 2005. U.S. Department of Health & Services. 13 Apr 2007 .

Davis, Jr., MD, FACS, Kenneth. "African American Health." Net Wellness. 17 June 2002. University of Cincinnati. 13 Apr 2007 .

Haunting, the Eye of Hurricanes

2007-04-02T00:01:00.000-07:00

The eye of a hurricane will pull you in, the words will shock you, and the meaning will entice you. This is perhaps what the advertiser of the film want. The film is An Inconvenient Truth and what I’m looking at is one of the posters used to bring people into the theater. As a whole the poster is almost threatening. The ominous hurricane eye, filling the top two-thirds of the poster, over takes the hazy blue-grey, evening sky, with a terrifying swirl of white smoke. The smoke is supplied by two of three, tall chimneystacks, centered in the middle of the ad, pulling the eye from the hurricane down. Not all the way down, to the left (the posters’ stage right) is the copy stating, “By far the most terrifying film you will ever see.”
Terror upon terror, your eyes will still follow the smoke stacks down to the main body of the factory they support. Behind the factory you can discern the fading dusk. The eye continues down into a black fade until the bottom fourth of the poster is a black matte designated for the title of the film. An Inconvenient Truth stretches across the blackness in bold lower case lettering larger than any other group of words; they are printed without any more space between the letters than had they been one word. The only way to tell them apart is the fact that the middle word, “inconvenient” is in an eye catching orange-red color. Below the title is the subtitle, slightly smaller yet just as tricky as the words above it. This time the lettering is in all uppercase, still all white yet once again red is used to draw your eye. The subtitle reads, “A Global Warning,” with “warning” slightly crooked and all in red looks as though it had been stamped there with a sure hand leaving the stamps rectangle shape around the words.
Less interesting and common on all American movie posters are the film credits placed at the bottom center in white lettering so they may be seen by curious parties but make no more statement about the film then the "who made it," question only geeks like myself ask.
When I look at the smoke coming from the building on the bottom left I find that the two plumes of smoke present in the middle of the poster is repeated here. This time, it seems, the eye is lifted up in almost a heavenly way back into the haze to be abruptly stopped to read the copy, either for the first time or for a second time. “By far the most terrifying...” Haunting, the way this poster was designed. The “two plume” devise is used again on the bottom right of the page, though only for the purpose of symmetry.
I am left with so many questions I’d like the to ask the advertisers: why is the third and most prominent smoke stack empty; why is it not filling the air with hurricane smoke; why the lower case letters; why the upper case letters?

Why did this poster have so powerful of an impact on me?
When I was a boy, the trip to my grandmothers’ house was always long and boring for a kid in a time predating Gameboy’s and portable DVD players. It would be a trip of car games like finding the alphabet on license plates and Slug Bug. Then of course there was always the inventible punching of the younger brother and the pestering of the older one. My brothers and I would drive my parents crazy. Then about fifteen or twenty minutes away from her house we would see the large chimneys that rising into the sky as if they were built for a giant’s fireplace. We called them “cloud makers.” We knew that as soon as we saw the cloud makers we were almost there. But these great chimneys didn’t make the clouds, as we found out when we hit the fourth grade, they were the smoke stacks for the local factory burning up wood chips to power whatever machines they used behind those sheet metal walls.
To see the cloud makers of my child hood used to strike terror into others, hit me in a way I am still contemplating, then to include the hurricane... Let take you back to when I was in stationed in Iraq, when Hurricane Katrina and her sister Rita hit the Gulf of Mexico and devastated New Orleans and so many towns and cities of our great country. I remember sitting in the cafeteria on our base, barely eating as the reports came in on the big screen TV we had in there. The Fox News reporters telling us of the massive devastation wrought by Katrina and then, so soon afterwards, Rita... Maybe it was the all too familiar image that hit me the most.
“Warning! Danger! Destruction! Disaster!” The poster shouts at us, urging you to see this film and learn what it is that we must avert, avoid. Images of disasters flood my mind and my thoughts are filled with previous knowledge of the consequences we already face from a changing earth. The sands of African dessert pulled off the continent by powerful winds, sweeping them across the Atlantic to settle in the Gulf of Mexico, thousands of miles away. The coral started dying at alarming rates affecting every form of life in the sea. What other horrible things have been happening? Most importantly, is there anything we can do to stop it? Can this destruction be averted? And finally, will this movie tell us?
I found out the answers to my questions when I became an audience member sitting in the theater. I couldn’t believe what was going on. The world is in danger. The advertisers did their job well and I learned something that will challenge me for the rest of my life. I left my seat in that dark theater not only believing the copy on that inspiring poster but today I’ve added my own take on it and tell whom ever will listen: This is the most important film you will ever see!

http://www.climatecrisis.net/downloads/images/poster.jpg

Observing Those Observing

2007-03-31T00:01:00.000-07:00

It is late as I pull into the Cineplex parking lot. I do a slow drive by passing the movie posters with the show times posted below them. I missed the seven-thirty show by almost two hours but I can still catch the late show at nine-twenty. I drive around back and park near the theater exit, like always. I look around quickly to memorize my spot and briskly walk to the ticket counter.
I’m not to late. I ask for my ticket and hand over my card. I look at the attractive young woman as she prints out my receipt and ticket. My mind wonders and I think about how nice it would be to be young again and then laugh at myself over the silly thought of a 29 year old wanting to be young again. She hands me the receipt to sign and then my ticket. Our fingers touch for a half second, hers are soft, mine are rough, I think again about being younger.
I enter the main lobby still thinking about my own youth when my eye catches the flickering light of the arcade. There a group of teenagers are playing a pistol game. It looks like one of them is telling the others that the movie is about to start, as he is shoving his watch in their faces. I turn to look at the concession lines and decide that they are short enough for that I may buy popcorn and something to drink and still enter the theater in time to see the previews of coming attractions. In front of me, a couple orders a large tub of popcorn, two sodas and then adds Red Vines and Junior Mints, their total nears thirty dollars. They don’t seem to mind; they flirt with each other as the progressive woman shells out the cash. I’m next. The same girl that sold me my tickets has swapped places with a co-worker and is now taking my order. I ask for a medium coke and small popcorn. The young woman goes through the regular suggestive selling routine and asks if I want to up size my snacks for a buck more. I look at my watch, the show has started by now and I kindly decline. I pay for my snacks with cash this time to speed things up.
I hand my ticket to the kid ripping tickets. The teenagers behind me, joking and play fighting, hand their tickets over to get the official rip as I walk down the maroon carpeted hall to the door of my theater. I glance at the screen before I look for a seat. I relax a bit when I see that commercials are still playing so I haven’t missed the trailers. I continue looking for a place to sit and find one in the middle that is still empty but then I remember the excuse I gave my wife for “wasting money” at the theater and choose a seat that allows me to see the audience as well as the movie.
I watch as other latecomers trickle in. Some stop in the walkway looking for that perfect seat. Some are like the teenagers that followed me in go straight for the front row, or like the young couple that was in front of me at the concessions, go straight for the privacy of the find in the back for. Then the guy who had his buddies save him a seat comes in and when his friends spot him one of them shout, “Over here!”
If you had been raised with theater etiquette you would not believe you were in a room of people about to see a show. There are people laughing and joking and having a good ole’ time. The previews come on and the audience’s whispers’ float all over the room as they discuss which movies they want to see. Then a sound arises from the speakers, it intensifies to a louder and louder hum. This movie is presented in THX Surround Sound. The audience is quiet and tensely waits for the movie to begin.
The initial credits are placed in front of a backdrop of a slow pan over skyscrapers of a modern city. Geeks like me comment on cast and crewmembers we have read about or seen the other works they’ve done as their names appear. An abrupt and commanding, “Shhh,” is heard, someone is annoyed. A laugh and chuckle follow but is quickly silenced when a gunshot is heard from the speakers. The action has finally started and the audience takes note, finally buttoning up. They begin to really watch. All that is heard of them now is the sucking on straws and the crunching and munching of candy and popcorn.
Of course not everyone is watching intently. The young couple, in the dark, corner shadows, are giving more attention to each other than the film and the teenagers are still at it in the front, presently, tossing popcorn at one another. This all brings to mind the question of why people come to the theater at all when they can spend a 10th of what they pay here on a rental. Why come to the theater to for faux privacy like the couple or to play like the teens?
Why do Americans pay so much money for this experience? I don’t think I can answer that question with out looking into myself. But of course my answer may only fit me. I have a love for the theater that comes from childhood experiences. It is the first place I saw a man fly, the first place I saw a galactic space opera, where my favorite television cartoons were blown up to larger than life size in action packed movies. It was the family time I experienced. The popcorn and candy and soda my parents would buy for me. When the lights would go down and our dreams became reality. You could laugh along with everyone else and cry with everyone else or scream as the whole audience screamed. To peak through your mothers fingers as she blocked your eyes from the parts that were too scary. I guess for me the dark theater is a place where one can forget the outside world and be surrounded by people who enjoy the same stories as you do.
Maybe it is as simple as that, to escape without having to leave our community, to be a part of a community and separate from it at the same time. What ever the reason I do know that I will always love the theater more than renting and watching at home and I am sure that America will go on doing the same for times to come.

What Dreams May Come: Examining A Career in Broadcast Journalism

2007-03-20T00:01:00.000-07:00

I was a clown. There were five of us crammed into a toy box on the corner of the stage with only enough room to maneuver out of it when we heard our cue. The lid closed left us saturated in darkness. I was to be the first out. My ears strained to hear the toy prince say the line that would deliver us from this sardine can. Three clowns were cracking jokes and behaving rather unprofessionally for actors in a stage show. I turned and “shh’d” them, shouting in a whisper, “this may not matter to you but, you’re not gonna ruin it for me. I going to be an actor!”
That was a long time ago, when children dream big and before the world crashes down on their shoulders. I was thirteen years old when I auditioned for The Oregon Coast Children’s Theater (O.C.C.T.)and was bitten by the acting bug. Ever since I have dreamed of being an entertainer, a story teller. With journals full of short stories and notebooks devoted to novels, I am constantly building stories in my head. At one time I thought I would be satisfied with simply acting stories out. Yet, I continued dreaming up more. I concluded that I could be a director/writer and that would satisfy me. My stories became greater, more epic. I spoke to my mentor, the Director of O.C.C.T., he told me of the many stories that he wants to tell but knows he will die before he tells them all and, I panicked. What if end up like him, a great guy living his dream but one who remains a starving artist. I grew up poor, and I have no intention of living poor my whole life just so I could be an artist. So, I gave my dreams the status of “hobby” and went to work for high pay and extreme boredom. I was being practical and told myself that through my “hobby” I was still living my dream.
I wasn’t living my dream and I learned that when I was on the set of a spur of the moment no script/no budget short. I was the happiest I had been, while working, and it was very apparent that I could not be satisfied with a job just because the pay was good. I needed this, I needed to tell the stories. I had to do this for a living.
First, I needed a wake up call.
Years had passed and I had joined the Idaho Army National Guard and my perspective on life changed. Those things you think are so important at the time seem so trivial when you see people blow themselves up because they let someone brainwash them into believing it was the right thing to do. I had grown less concerned with the silly stories I had been writing for years and began investigating things a little closer to home.
Working with the Kurdish people gave me inspiration. I began studying their history, culture and myths. I even picked up enough of their language to communicate... a bit. I was inspired to tell their stories. To tell the world who these country less people are. I left Iraq with plans to return someday to make a series of documentaries, when I was ready...
I completed my tour of duty in Iraq. My wife and I bought a home and moved in. One day as I was sifting through a box of old journals and papers I came across a script I had written years ago. I thumbed it over and was surprised that it still made me laugh. I sat there and began to read it from beginning to end. I grew more and more flustered. How could I have spent so much time on this script just to throw it in a box? Why did I not produce this? I became angry at my own weakness of not completing what I start. I took it to my wife and asked her. She reminded me about my passion for storytelling and my talent for telling stories. However, she did could not answer my question.
I spent much of my time in the next year pondering on this. Obsessing over it. I had told my Iraqi friends that I would be back someday, to the ones that understood more english than I kurdish, I promised I would tell their stories. I wouldn’t let them down. I began doing research on film schools and online schools. When those didn’t pan out, cost and need wise, I began looking at schools in the area and finally settled on UI. That wasn’t enough because, if I was going to quit a high paying job, with benefits, to follow a dream I had to prove to myself and my wife that I could actually earn a comfortable living.
I returned to research mode. What I found was motivating. The Moscow/Lewiston area offers a variety of jobs and even local internships in both TV and Radio. Fisher Communications, INC. being the most prominent offers an internship for broadcast journalism at KLEW in Lewiston. They brag on their web site of internships that often lead to careers spanning their vast media empire from Coos Bay, OR to Great Falls, MT. And should I get an internship it will open the doors of their 10 television and 26 radio stations.
To really do what I want to do, the documentaries and such, I would use said internship to develop my skills at producing. It is my plan to become a producer. I got this in my head when I read a book by Buck Houghton called What a Producer Does. He defines his title as, “[a producer] has an idea and pursues it... [he is] an inspirer of creativity... “ (Houghton viii-ix) as do I have an idea and am so inspired to pursue it. I left my comfortable wages and my comfortable life style for pen and paper; books and all night cram sessions and the life of a twenty-nine year old college student.
My plan is to work hard in school and work, as often as time allows, on projects that will build my resume. Before college ends I will have produced at least one 30-minute documentary on a global issue and develop a production plan for my kurdish docu-series. I will use these to promote my ability to get things done and to apply for internships. In my junior and senior years of college I will work for college credit with an internship at KLEW or other local station to gain experience in “on the floor” producing and learn the journalistic style of telling stories. I will take that experience out into the world and use it to sell my self to television stations and land myself a the starter job I will need until I can then sell my ideas and move into independent production, producing documentaries on topics that mean something to me. which I hope to parlay into producing independent film and later a television series.
I do understand that this will not be easy, but nothing worth doing is ever easy and there are a lot of “what ifs” in there however, what would the world be like if Spielberg never snuck onto the Paramount lot; what if Fox laughed at George Lucas; what if Christopher Reeves passed on Superman?
My wife tells me, I am not intimidated by my huge dreams and that I will make my dreams come true if I remain true to the passion that has always burned inside me. The passion that fueled my decision to serve my country in Iraq; the passion that forced my hand to turn in my resignation at work; the passion that has me working for a degree I thought I’d never get to earn; the passion that has my wife believing that a man can fly. And so I will be true to my dream and keep my promise to the Kurds. I know that I can make a living doing what I love and that is my goal.

Bibliography

Houghton, Buck. What a Producer Does: The Art of Moviemaking (Not the Business). First. Beverly Hills, CA: Silman James Press, 1991.

"Inside KLEW." KLEWTV.com 3. 29 Mar 2007. Fisher Communications. 29 Mar 2007 .

"Internship Program." Fisher Communications, Inc.. 2007. Fisher Communications, Inc.. 29 Mar 2007 .

“Mammas’ Boy..?”

2007-02-28T00:01:00.000-08:00

Relationships are complicated; none are so complicated as the one between mother and son. From the frosty winter day I was born on, I was a mammas’ boy. Everything I did, I did it to please her. She was my life, always looking out for me and I, in turn, was always looking out for her. Life was easier back when my mom would look at me with her beautiful blue eyes and gently whisper, “everything is going to be alright.”
Mother’s don’t tell you all the lies they tell just to comfort you. When I learned of my parents divorce my mind went back several years to a comforting promise my mother had told me when I was upset by an argument her and my father had… How things change, the promises that are broken with time, along with hearts and innocence. How did a little comforting lie cannon ball into such a strained relationship with my mother as we have today?
It started with the broken promise but, my mother eased this when she told me I was her favorite. Of course, I knew this already, as I have always been favored. Which may be why my brothers didn’t like me that much when we were young. I’ve often wondered about this and about why I was the favorite. What about me set me apart from my siblings? Was it my calm demeanor and never getting into or causing trouble? Or maybe it was that I had a creative side much like her, after all I did look like her and maybe she liked me a little more because she saw herself in me. I’ll never really be sure but, what I do know is that after the divorce she came to rely on me more, to the point that she had me playing dad to my baby sister.
I spent the next six years taking care of my family and raising my sister while my mother worked two jobs just to pay the rent and feed her four children. I did the dishes, changed the diapers, cleaned up after everyone and even cooked dinner for the family and saved left overs for mom. I continue to do what ever I could to please her… but the broken promise kept eating at me everytime she would tell another comforting lie…
I grew up, fed up with the lies and mis-truths and moved out as soon as it was economicly feasable. I became independent of her or, so I told myself, as I walked to her house one day when she called me for help. I may not have lived at her house but, I did spend a lot of time there. I thought I was being the noble son, always there for his mother however, I was merely enabling her to trap me as man of the house, always at her beck & call.
Then one day I met a brilliant young woman who would rock my world in more ways than one. My future wife immediately saw in me a man capable of anything his heart desired and made it her personal mission to see to it that those desire would grown to fruitation. She challenged me like no one ever had. She taught me that I could be independent and I could get the high paying job I always wanted and I would make my dreams come true. I fell in love, hard, but when I brought her home to mother, my mom (I later found out) feigned happiness for me. All she saw was her son was being taken away from her forever and she was not going to stand for that.
I was married and had finally moved onto a path that led to some where other than my mammas’ door step. I moved to the nieghboring city and aquired the highest paying low level job in the valley, coveted by everyone I knew. I was learning what independence really meant. I had begun an identity other than, my mothers’ son.
Yet, still at mothers’ beck & call.
It was after my wife had taken time off of college when we were married. A few years later she had come to the conviction that it was time to finish her education and as bold as ever she pursed it, only pausing long enough to ask me if I was ok with moving away from my family. I hadn’t always been supportive during her time at college so I really wanted to make it up to her. I had never been away from home but, when I saw the look on her face when I told her it wouldn’t be a problem… my mind was made up. We sat down and made a plan. We were to leave on January 1st. All I had to do was tell my mother I was moving nine hours away.
Easier said than done. That September, shortly after we had made this momentous decision my mothers’ little sister died. How could I tell her, her baby was leaving town for good? So I waited. I had thought two months would be enough. It was coming close to the dead line and I wanted her to have time to deal with it before I left so I could help her with what would be to her a huge transiction. I was not prepared for her reaction at all. She compared me moving from Albany, OR to Moscow, ID, only a nine hour drive away, to her sister leaving her by dying…
What was I supposed to do? I was improving my life. Don’t most parents rejoice in their childrens success? The worst of it, she still holds it against my wife and I.
So, how unfortunate was it, after only three months since our arrival that my wiifes’ National Guard Unit was called for duty in Iraq? As much as this scared me, it also excited me. I finally had a strong enough reason to join the army, something I’ve wanted to do since I was a kid but, was strongly discouraged from doing. So, I would sign on the doted line and join the wife and family over seas but, first I wanted my mothers blessing. When she came up for a visit the weekend before I planned to move forward and I told her. I spent the next few hours talking to her through the bathroom door she had locked herself behind crying like a baby. She expressed her thought that I was going to die and how she would have to kill herself if that happened…
“The bible says, “Honor thy parents.” I looked at her and told her what I felt in my heart. “I can not follow this commandment if I let my growth as a human being be stunted by fear. If I donot take the opportunities life presents by the fullest then what will become of me? I want to have children and tell them that I did some good in this world. That I helped give freedom to the middle east. I want to be a part of this great change the great good that can come from this conflict. If I do that, am I not honoring you?”
She told me she would rather me be alive and so I told her a comforting lie, “I promise, I’m not going to die.”

“If I knew then what I know now…”

2007-01-31T00:01:00.000-08:00

Regret can be a terrible burden. One doesn’t always know that they will grow to regret an action when they are taking it. I have three failures, together they make up one, large regret. I had failed the seventh, eighth and twelfth grades. It is not easy to admit failures let alone the regret of these failures.
My mother had regret too. She regretted marring my father. This became apparent one day when my dad told her he was quitting his job again for a better one and we would have to move again for the seventeenth time. That is when the screaming and yelling started and the throwing of fruit. This event has been labeled the “Peach War” because when the smoke cleared, my siblings and I found decimated peach parts all over the kitchen. But wouldn’t you know it, my mother stayed with married to my father for four more years for the kids, she said.
The new town my father moved us to was the very rural two street coastal town of Nehalem, OR: population 126. I went to school there from fifth grade to the end of ninth. It was near the end of seventh grade when my mother had had enough of my father and kicked him out of the house. Later, she had my father tell my siblings and me that they were getting a divorce. When I heard that word I could only thing of one thing, a promise made to me long ago by my mother. She had found me drenched in my own tears after my parents had a huge fight when I was still very young. I told her as best a crying child can that I was afraid they were going to get a divorce. To ease my pain she bent down and embraced me and looked into my eyes and said, “I promise, your dad and I will never get a divorce.”
Suffice it to say when I was told that my parents where divorcing it hit me hard, very hard. To say I was devastated still wouldn’t explain how I felt. My world collapsed on me and they only way I survived was by building a shell around my self and creating a world of my own in my head. My imagination ran wild and paid little attention to anything other than my comic books and my own short stories. My school grades began to suffer and by the end of the year I had achieved one of the strangest report cards in history: three A’s and three F’s. I stopped caring about the subjects I didn’t really enjoy and focused only on those that involved art, writing and crafts.
When my mother saw this, she knew right away I would fail seventh grade if she did not intervene. Intervene she did; she went to the principle and convinced him I only failed those courses because I was depressed about my parents’ divorce and that holding me back would only hurt me. And so I was moved to the eighth grade through no effort of my own. If only my regrets ended there.
The strained relationship between my parents increased when my mother, in a classic divorcee move, refused to let my father see us if he didn’t pay up, like he was renting us or something. This strain affected all of my siblings and I asked to see my mother’s “shrink” needing someone outside of the family to talk to. I wish that had helped but by the end of eighth grade talking to someone didn’t raise my grades and my report card looked the same as the last year. My mother, ever the heroine, stepped in to save the day once again and the next year I started high school feeling very lucky I had such an understanding mother.
That’s about where my luck ended. My mother began having economic problems that left us homeless for a week right after school had ended for the year. However, she cleverly disguised this by taking us camping until she could arrange a place for us to stay. For the next seven months she moved us from her friends’ house to an apartment and finally back to her hometown of Albany, OR where we stayed. I was in the middle of the tenth grade and had failed every single class so far but something happened in Albany, kids liked me there. They found my dark and mysterious posture attractive and I became very popular in my clique, the drama geeks. My grade point average rose and I made it all the way to the last month of twelfth grade without any problems, or so I thought. I came to discover that my habit of choosing an equivalent elective to cover my required course had left me shy of graduating by one credit. Come graduation I found myself in the stands rather than walking across the stage with my peers…
I was eighteen now, and master of my own destiny. My mother could no longer protect me from my mistakes. So I walked away from school and never looked back. I joined the work force moving from one job to another, just like my father, always looking for the better deal. Then I married a woman who showed me my own worth and I tried for a job I thought I was to dumb to get. Working at Hewlet & Packard gave me a great pay check and a huge boost in self esteem. It was because of her that I finally broke down and admitted I dropped out of high school and then earned my GED which let me join the Army National Guard, in turn led to a life changing experience in Iraq.
When you are faced with death on a daily bases it really makes you think about your life. I looked back on the last ten years and I did not like what I saw. So little accomplishment on my part in such a large space of time but, I had learned that if I had the courage to live under fire then I could face my greatest fear and return to school. Here I am. I am completing my education and moving forward in my life for the first time. I am finally making up for my failures. I am going to reach for the stars and refuse to pull back until I have changed them and in the process alleviate a great regret.

Is Anybody Out There

2006-09-01T06:00:00.000-07:00

Over the past nine months I have been going through a lot and am nearly convinced I have the Post-Tramatic-Syndrome thing. Ive been in and out of very deep depresion, my marriage is on the rocks, I can't keep money in my bank account becuase every time I see money in there I feel like I have to spend it for there may not be a tomorrow. How can my year in Iraq have affected me this much. I enjoyed my time with the Kurdish people and learned a lot from the Muslims about this war and there culture. So why do I have symptoms of PTS? Is it because of the dead and wounded bodies I saw? Do I really miss my M-16? How come I still flinch when I hear anything that sounds like a shot being fired or a bomb popping? My second favorite holiday (the 4th) made me very uncomfortable. I don't get it. Do you?

Welcome Back ConDamNers

2005-08-09T09:45:00.000-07:00

It has been a while, war has kept me away from my blogpinion but I’m back now and more pissed than ever at the ungrateful attitude of the world, and oh, I hate the French. That reminds me of a joke, “What’s worse than a French man from Paris?” Give up? “A French man from Toronto!” Ha, ha, ha! Oh I kill myself! Ok I don’t really hate the French I just thank Parisians stink. It seems they think they know everything and they are so superior to Americans cause they got… champagne? They keep forgetting that we bled on their soil to save them from a mad dictator only to have them slap it in our face 60 some years later when they decided to appease and court another sic dictator / genocidal mad man. Buying oil from that bastard when he was slaughtering the Kurds and the marsh Arabs.
How can a man, woman, or child in the U.S. read about his crimes and not have their stomach churn to near vomiting. I can’t! I cannot even write about it without getting sic. How can the French or anybody not believe this war is just? This man is pure EVIL! Terrorist have no love in their harts how could you when you blow up children and turn them into pools of blood just to kill one or two Americans?

Well, I’m back. I’m not leaving until I convince everyone that Bush is not the enemy. Ignorance is, lack of knowledge or too much of the wrong knowledge. I write from my emotions, so I may come off angry, I may use swear words to get my point across when I can’t cipher any other way to say how I feel. When I look at things I see the pain words and actions commit. I am hoping that my words and those of others like me might move others to take ACTION to stop the pain.
Bitching about Bush will not change anything if you all haven’t figured that out by now then you really are stupid. If you want change then start in your own community. Instead of making an ass of yourself by protesting in front of your city all or court houses or anywhere else you deem to get you opinion out try investing that time in your local soup kitchen or library literacy program or adopt a homeless kid or help a welfare family find work and learn better money skills, etc. These are only a very small set of examples of things you could be doing to help. But no you are going to choose to buy some white board and markers and draw nasty sarcastic slogans on it mocking your president and the men and women of the services just for your own self-gratification… isn’t that what the terrorist do? The blow themselves up to force their views on you just for self-gratification (40 virgins in heaven)?

Something to think about...

P.S. I have a few new post below this. Just a few things I've been working on since I got here and finally published. Let me know your opinions, especially if you disagree. I like to hear more from the pro-genocide half.

It's All Americas' Fault

2005-08-08T22:46:00.000-07:00

I was flipping through the magazine U.S. News & World Report for July 25, 2005, you know the one with the Harry Potter fans on the cover to sell this weeks issue, well on pg. 11 I found the second disturbing image of the week (the first being a PETAkillsAnimals.com ad). It is a pic of relatives crying over the casket of a boy who died in a terrorist suicide bombing. In a very brief article blocked in with the pic the writer tells of how Iraqi children have all learned the phrase, “Mister, Mister. Gimme, gimme!” As a soldier over here in Iraqi I can attest to the honesty of this and of how it is one of the few things that give us GI’s joy (as the author says). The article goes on to state that the bad guys have now ruined this for the children and the GI’s. A suicide bomber used this opportunity of soldier lack of vigilance to blow up enough Americans to get him his 40 virgins. Well this prick only succeeded in killing 18 innocent kids, 8 adult Iraqi citizens and 1 American.
*Before I go on my rant I would like to thank the author of this pic/article for their kind heart. Julian E. Barnes seems to actually care about what goes on here. So thank you.

Now my picking bone: though I applaud this note on pg. 11 I’m betting that there will be those who will use it as evidence that we should not have come to Iraqi or that we need to get the hell out of there. There will even be those who will say this is all Americas fault. That had that GI not been handing out candy* he and those Iraqi’s would still be alive. Well, I can’t argue with this last statement but, this is not our fault, I won’t point my finger at any one religious group, Sunni or some other violent Muslim faction but I will say that anyone who thinks this is our fault is just stupid or ignoring the real problems over here.
I really should read the book The Arab Mind before stating my opinion but like most bloggers I’m using my right to voice my semi-educated view of things. The people over here do not think like us. For one they believe you can go to heaven with great reward by killing people of a certain group or people that associate with that group such as candy eager children. They think it is all right to force their beliefs on you by the point of a sword or in this case the burst of a bomb…
What really gets me is all those loud mouthed idiots back home that think we are doing nothing good here and are only making things worse and the idiots here who were grateful that we came and removed Saddam and his demons but now are ungrateful cause we are sticking around until the violence stops or comes under control of an Iraqi run government. If you don’t believe me just read Time Magazines’ recent interview with a terrorist to see how stupid and ungrateful these people are or just how uneducated they are and how detrimental the lack of education can be on a group of people with bombs. To make a point we are doing a great deal more good than bad over here. We are building schools, sewer systems that Iraq is in serious need of, we are showing them what charity means (to give without expecting to receive) we are showing them how to do things for them selves, and many other things.
What so many people don’t think about is that the Iraqi people have been oppressed by a sic, demented psychopath for the last 30 years. A generation has past under the bloody hand of Saddam. I may best illustrate this by a story one LN (Local National: the army term for Iraqi) told me: One day a mortar was shot onto one of Saddams army bases. It came from the Kurdish side of town. The army was sent into that part of town to round up suspects. They were lined up and asked who shot the mortar. If they said that they did not know, they were shot on the spot. If they said anything but a name they were shot. They were forced to give up one of their own to spare the others.

Violence is a way of life over here. We are doing everything we can to change that to give the Kurds and Arabs and others here a real chance at life. They are astonished when we tell them that you can walk down any street in America and never have to worry about getting blown up or shot (well we don’t tell them about big towns like L.A. where that isn’t exactly true, it is too hard to translate). Just think about it we have it really good.

I really want Americans, especially citizens of our great country to stop hating themselves, remember that we are the good guys.

Where No Man Has Gone Before

2005-08-08T22:45:00.000-07:00

A few years ago Hollywood made two films about asteroids on a collision course with Earth: Armageddon and Deep Impact. Only one of these films was good enough for NASA to name their latest miracle machine after. Last month NASAs’ Deep Impact landed on a moving comet. A moving comet! Oh the miracle of mans brain to come up with the technology and math required to land on an object that is moving as fast as a comet. It leaves me breathless. (Don’t worry Christians I’m not forgetting God’s part in this). I am just amazed, astounded. As a lover of Sci-Fi this achievement is just one step in getting us to Mars and beyond.

I’m sure you are asking why this is important. What brought man out of the jungle into the wilderness? What possessed men to cross the Atlantic? Why do we climb mountains and cross the artic's? Why did we fly to the moon? Why did we build space stations? Is it simply for economic reasons? I can’t believe that, not knowing myself so well and others. Mankind was built with an indomitable curiosity, a curiosity that led him to the stars and will lead us beyond, it created methods to build fire and sculpt the wheel and more.
Then why where we given curiosity, you may ask? Survival. Without is man would have stayed in one place and been subject to damage that place might suffer from weather changes and food supply changes. What if a great flood had covered mans habitat and destroyed it? He would be gone and we would never know Mozart, Einstein, Lincoln or Picasso. And what of now? What if an asteroid or comet hit the earth we would be gone like the dinosaurs. If people think Hitler was a tragedy then surely all of us dying would be horrific.
All of this and more is why I got the most exhilarating feeling when I heard the news that we had successfully landed on a comet. Very soon, and I believe in our lifetime, we will no longer have to be fear mankind being erased from history. We will take the first steps on another planet. And later on the moons of our solar system and after that our great, great grandchildren will see a sun rise while walking the beach on a far off system. How beautiful that image is. I think of all the good that is in man and like the father of Star Trek I see great things in mans future but instead of a vision of wonderful prose or fictionist television I see it as reality. I see it as the great good in man to create wonderful things and places. If you share this dream support NASA by writing your senators and telling them why you think a mission to Mars is important and then sit back and watch the impossible dreams of so many writers become reality.

Responsibility

2005-08-08T22:33:00.000-07:00

“With great power, comes great responsibility.”
- Stan Lee

America the beautiful in all its’ glory and generosity how often we forget this rule of morality that a comic book scribe must remind us of our purpose as the greatest country to ever grace the pages of history. We will give our money, and we will give some time to help out and we will thank our ancestors for giving their lives for our freedom and all in the same sentence we will tell every other nation to go fuck them selves. It’s not our problem it’s yours. Where would America be if France did not support us during our revolution? Where would Japan be if we never bombed the shit out of them? Do you really believe France would still exist as anything more than a German State if we never answered the call to help? This is one of the cool things about our nation; we answer the call for freedom, for liberation. We will bring down the wicked and bring justice to all, 'cause that is what the good guys do when they are given great power; they use it responsibly.

We have the power to overturn corrupt governments and create new free democracies. We have done it twice this century already. What is wrong with killing killers and liberating the oppressed? Tell me, I’d like to know. I read that the “liberals” oppose this war. I’d like to ask, “On what grounds do you oppose it?” Would you really come over here and tell a Kurd to his face that he was better off with Saddam in charge? Tell a Kurd that America has no place here! Tell him his American brothers don’t give a damn if he lives or dies! 'Cause that’s what (those of you who oppose this war) are saying. Are you so cold hearted that you can write a check for 9/11 victims families but cannot say lets go spank the naughty children? Or give to the victims of the tsunami and then read about Saddams' Hate crimes and still say we have no right to be here? Maybe we don’t have a right to be here but we do have the responsibility to be here. To clean up our mess and the mess these people have made for themselves because we have the power to do so and it would be morally wrong to sit on our fat lazy asses and watch as the world unfolds into chaos. Cause that chaos will one day be on our door step just like 9/11 but 10 times worse and instead of your son dying it will be your mother and father and daughter and granddaughter. Have you no guts? Did your ancestors die for nothing? Does the Declaration of Independence mean zero to you? The trend in our nation to lean toward apathy must stop. All this tolerance and lack of caring about others is sickening. Americans seem to believe that opening our checkbook is going to solve all the problems or talking about it will fix everything. I have a question for you baby boomers and gen-xers: When you did something bad like lying or hitting your sister or back talking your parents what worked better to stop you from doing it again: a good swat, or a calm talking to? I would bet my life savings most of you said the swat. 90% of you I’d say. Now Gen Y has no idea what I’m talking about. Most of them have had the gentle talking to then gone out and did it again but this time it was drugs and sex and killing classmates cause they made fun of your hair or nose or zits. What ever happened to responsibility for your own actions? That is what I am talking about. America must take responsibility and we have the power to do so, so our president is trying (and succeeding) to rectify past mistakes, it is a shame he has only 8 years to fix 4 decades of mishaps. We can only pray that Condeleezza runs for president and wins so she can finish the job right instead of putting another do nothing gentle talking deamoncrat in the office again.

You heartless bastards just sicken me! You make me dread coming home. If living in Iraq has taught me anything it is this: America Rocks! We have it so good. You whiny bitches just have no idea how bad it is here. These people have hope now. Despite what the media tells you, there goes by not one single day that an Iraqi doesn’t come up to and tell me how thankful he/she is that their American brothers are here and have rid the nation of the evil known as Saddam, not one day passes without a cheerful thank you. Not one. Think about that when your liberal college professor starts spouting out lies of the war, when he begins preaching treasonous lies about our great president, in the guise of intellect. He hasn’t done his research. He has relied on the media and others to do his thinking for him and if you follow him…. Oh forget it I’m just talking to automatons in the first place. Just go to your fucking rallies and protest the war and sleep well tonight because you’ll all find out how stupid and wrong you where when the terrorist is banging down your door to kill your sons and rape your daughters just like he did here before we kicked his ass. And we national guards men will save you despite what you’ve said about us.

CGActor VS. Humans

2004-12-11T16:11:00.000-08:00

This isn't really political and I may discredit myself by this article but, I have a bone to pick and so I must pick.

Tom Hanks, you got to love this guy. A great actor and an even better human being. So, why, you say, am I picking on him. I'll tell you: The Polar Express. A fun family film but not a very good film. Several reasons: The animation, though plesent looking, does not move with the flair we love in the Shrek movies. The facial expressions are lacking and the emotional mood is missing. Second, Mr. Hanks plays three roles, the boy, the conductor (who looks like him) and jolly ole' St. Nick. Now this might be fine for Eddy Murphy in a live action flick with the help of make-up wiz Rick Baker but Tom just doen't cut it. Now I'm not saying it is his fault I blame the technology. They used a computer to capturer his face and his movements a simular tech to what was used for Golum in LOTR. The diference is in LOTR it was needed to make Gollum work as he works in the books, here it was not needed and hurt the film as a result. I strongly believe that this film would have been a great had they used real actors on a "green screen" set like they do for the new Star Wars films but more like what they did for Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. Had they done that, the emotional content would have been felt and Tom would have delivered a power performance as the conductor or what ever role he would have played. The key word being "role".

I never like adults playing kids, the only time it worked in a film was Grease and that is simply because John Travalta in a convincing child even today he just has that loveable spirit. And no, I'm not forgetting about Big but, that was live action and Mr. Hanks was aloud the full power of his face which delivered the childness in all of us.

To sum this up, Hollywood is trying to find cheaper actors and it is abusing a new technology to do it and in the mean time making good movies instead of great movies.

Tolerance!

2004-11-17T06:12:00.000-08:00

Who says we need more tolerance? We tolerate crime in our streets, we tolerate our children abuse of drugs, we tolerate pre-marital sex, we tolerate violent crimes when we put a user of marijuana in prison for 6 years and a rapeist in prison for 3. What are we telling the world? We tolerate the fast food industry, even though most of us know it is bad and possibly responsible for America's obesity problem. The French recently made a film called; The Triplets of Belleville. In this film the triplets come to America to find it full of fat people, really really fat people. Is this what the world thinks of us? And why not, go to the mall or better yet go to that haven of American commerance Wall-Mart and look around; FAT people are everywhere! Have we become so tolerant of our life style that we have forgotten about our own health?
And crime: in 2002 Oregon was struggling with their budget, not enough money for schools nor enough for prison. The great Oregon legislators came up with a brilliant plan to solve this. In the voters pamphlet for that year I read something that still shocks me today. They called it a temporay income tax increase. The Oregon legislators thought (wrongly) that the people of the state would vote for this tax to save their schools even though they had wasted all the moneys we had already given them. However, just as a side bar to help ensure the voters voted "Yes" they added a threat: should this temporay tax not be passed the drastic cuts that would have to be made would force them (the OR gov.) to release 1400 prisoners that they could no longer afford to imprison. Naturally the already highly taxed citizens wouldn't hear of another tax hike, temporary or not. So when it came time to vote the measure failed as did our trust in the government when they came through on thier threat to release the prisoners they promised. The kicker here is the criminals they put back on the streets not the harmless but stupid pot heads, but hardened, violent criminals including rapest and child molesters.
It gets better, and more horrorfing, the people of my home state tolerated this.

This isn't just a problem in the good ole' United States, the UN has this problem too, but it is much worse. Bosnia, Iraq, Kuwait, Sudan, and countless other countries ruled or subject to ruthless men begged for the help of the UN a form of government set up to stop anything like Hitler from happening again yet they sit on their seats of power in the and do nothing about these baddies. This may be the worst form of tolerance I've seen yet. Here is this great united power, they could put a stop to all this tyranny, they could balance the world and find an end to poverty and war just by working together. But no, they would rather bicker amongst another and play power games, "Mine is bigger than yours."
Do you remember history? A man comes to mind a lesson learned from Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and his plan of "appeasement". When he signed the Munich Pact he promised Germany that England would stay out of its affairs if they would not invade Britain. I remember what happens when you trust the bad guy will keep his word. Britain was left open and exposed and the great isle fell defenseless before the onslaught of the German war machine that was the Nazi's.
LISTEN to the history of our for fathers and be tolerant no more. For what greater crime can there be than the tolerance in our world today? Can we not learn from the mistakes of the past and take control this virus that is sweeping the globe? If not, then we surely are doomed as where the Romans when they began to be tolerant.

Don't Cry For Arafat

2004-11-10T18:41:00.000-08:00

So why is the media once again praising a sic degenerate? Yasser Arafat's rule of Terror is finally coming to an end in a very natural way yet all I hear in the media is, "When will he come out of his coma." Hang on Arafat. Do people not realize that this man damn near invented terrorism in the modern age? It was under his rule that his people started blowing themselves up in the name of Allah, (Allah doesn't like this by the way!) He could be pinned as being responsible for the lack of peace in Isreal. Never willing to goto peace talks but to lead us into false hope before one of his minions blows themselves up along with a school bus full of children. I'm tired of hearing about his ailing condition... just shut up and pull the plug on this evil S.O.B. and be done with it. One less spawn of hell to worry about. Think about it.
America influenced Isreal to give the palistinians thier own state, something they've been dying for and killing for for the last 40+ years and this "great" leader of thier's couldn't keep his people in line for more than a day after this announcement before they went and blew up some more innocent people. When that jerk die's I'll be dancing in the streets like "they" did when our twin towers fell. I'll count it as a great victory for Good when this evil man dies. I can only hope the media will say something about the crimes he was never charged for here on earth that he will certainly be charged for in the afterlife...

The End Justifies The Means

2004-11-07T23:37:00.000-08:00

So let me get this strait, you really hate President Bush. Am I hearing you right America? So why did he win both the popular vote and the electrorial vote? I bet even you haters' secretly voted for him but dont' know why you did it. Well, I'll tell you why. He gets the job done. He is willing to do what ever it takes to keep us safe. He put his foot down when other presidents (the ninties pervert) refused to take action when that son of a ... Saddam was shooting at us despite his surrender, when Usama Bin dumbass was plotting against us ... America voted for the President to have a second term because they know down in thier hearts that we need the man. He has kept us from further attacks and his plans (which he tells us about unlike Mr. I have a plan but you need to goto my website to read it and if you don't have internet then screw you) keep us safe. Children even know this. If you don't read USA Today then you didn't read the cute little article about how Weekly Readers sponsers a vote for children to decide the presidential race and they voted in President Bush. Interestingly enough I've been told that Weekly Reader has been doing this vote for every Presidential election for several decades and it turns out the kids always vote for the canidate that ends up winning. Interesting, no?
When asked why they voted for Bush they said it was because he keeps them safe from terrorist. Something to think about I think.

Back to Saddam and the evil war for oil. It is quite simple Saddam was a very sick and twisted individual. He killed anyone who posed a threat to his power, attempted genocide, and as CNN reports he barried these people in the same manner as another sico, mass graves.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/10/13/iraq.graves/index.html

I don't know the Presidents motives for going to war with Iraq. Maybe he lied but maybe he was fed false info, or maybe he wanted to get that bastard but didnot think the UN would listen to him unless he had a good reason to invade. So they brought up the WMD thing. The point I'd like to make before I expand on a few of these things is this. We (the United States) stopped a killer. We toppled and EVIL goverment and are now bringing peace to the middle east. What ever the reason the President had to invade Iraq, the ends justifies the means.

A remark on the UN: The United Nations was set up to stop another World War from happening. They where set up to stop evil dictators like Saddam. When the Gulf War ended Saddam surrendered but, all through Clintons admisitration the dictator shot bullets, missles and other small arms at both US and UN forces on his borders not to mention all the difficulties he made during weapons inspection. The shooting at us alone is enough for us to invade in the rules of war. But the UN just like britains prime minister (the guy before Churchhill) during WWII placated Saddam and let him get away with mass murder. We had to go in there because no one else would. The UN and Clinton where too scared or lazy....

Interesting point about WMD: Did you know that Saddam signed orders to use WMD on invading American forces? Saddam himself thought he had them! Something to think about the next time you call the President a liar!

Now the whole Peace in the Middle East I brought up. I know what you are thinking how can a war bring peace? (again see WWI and II America brought Peace to Europe through war) If Iraq becomes a true democracy and being the richest country in natural resources as it is the through that power base (that we now have strong ties to) democracy has a true chance at bringing peace to a people who have suffered through wars for the last 2000 + years. Think about it with the three most opposing forces (Saddam, Usama, Arafat) gone can the middle east stay messed up? The people are learning about freedom and liking it. Once they have it will they let it go? Would you ever give up your freedoms? The answer in no.
I finish with the title of this blog; The End Justifies The Means!!!

Home Sweet Home

2004-10-21T18:50:00.000-07:00

I love this country of ours. America home of the brave. We are free to think, speak, and act however we like, so long as we are not hurting others. But let us look back at the 9/11 tradegy. I was walking into my Bishops office to finish up my wedding plans for the 15th. When my soon to be bride and I met him, the first thing he tells us is that a plane crashed into the Twin towers. A couple hours later we get home and I turn on the tv, the first image I see is the towers collapsing... all I can think about is all those Brave rescue men and woman being crushed by the unimaganble weight of the building as it falls on them while they're in the middle of helping people to safety. Later we will hear how thousands lost thier lives that day.
Fast forward to the present and all the news talks about is how Bush lied about this or that and how rebublicans are ruining the nation... I love america and I am a fan of President Bush and he is doing a damn good job. So I ask you this what would Gore have done in the wake of 9/11 would he have prevented the numorous attacks that were thwarted because of the presidents quick action to fight back? What would wishy-washy Kerry have done? What have either of these men done to Help america? The answer that I got from my research is: NOTHING! These two men, these two democrats have only done what was nessicary to advance thier own carreers. They have acted selfishly and in thier own interst.

Now Bush on the other hand has always done what he thought would be good for the whole USA.

Now if you disagree with me you may want to read what more educated people have to say and check out www.ornery.org

But this is just my opion. What's yours?