Doctor Grandma

I must say, applause applause to the UN for countries coming together to end the reign of Ghadafi, before he goes “house to house” to “hunt down” his own people as he promised. I hope for the release of these people from the threat of annihilation, before it happens.

and I must say, it seems to me that our President did not go in there like a cowboy, and he garnered the support of the countries of the world before helping to end the reign of this madman. Either that or some of the countries came together with or without the United States, but in any case it is not just one nation now, but a force of some nations coming together to end one oppressive ruler.

The reason it is significant that 18 people were shot in a mass murder in AZ, at a friendly, political event where a democratic Congresswoman was meeting her constituents, is that AZ has become the hotbed of political hate speech, hateful spewing along with irresponsible suggestions of violence toward other politicians. AZ has been in the news for bigoted practices lately, and SOME people there spewing hateful comments to the world, and calling it their right to free speech. And yes, I’ll mention Sarah Palin’s incredibly unwise posted page where she included “target bullseyes” such as those you see through the telescope lens of a gun, directed at fellow politicians, one of them being the Congresswoman who got hit. She is now lying in a hospital struggling to survive and recover, with half her skull temporarily removed.

The sheriff, in his comments last night on tv, stated, “Hateful words may be free speech,  but it is not without consequences.” He also stated America needs to do some soul searching and develop civility. His words came from his heart, and I applaud him.

The 22-yr-old who did the shooting, it seems obvious, was mentally deranged and disturbed. The question is, does the hateful spewing BRING THIS OUT in mentally deranged people? Does it accentuate EITHER / OR and US vs. THEM mentality, and possibly ENCOURAGE lunatics to act on these hateful thoughts & feelings in the worst way possible?

I think people are responsible for the words they spew, and shame on anyone who spews hate speech to get elected. Shame on them.

This child was mentally askew. Had to be, in order to start spraying bullets, one of which killed an innocent 9-yr old girl who was there to meet her Congressional representative because she was an honor roll student. Of course, no one can be blamed for what he took their words and did with them. But the VERY INTERESTING side point is the number of people who, because of this incident, are now voicing THEIR disgust and disapproval of hateful speech by political candidates. WHETHER OR NOT this person did this act BECAUSE OF being influenced by their words, which is always an impossible thing to prove and rather pointless, people are VOICING their disgust over this hate-mongering.

People want tolerance, appreciation for our differences, respectful discourse, intelligent discussion of issues, civility toward one another, and (if you can imagine) actual LOVE of humanity for the sake of our being a creation of God. I believe people want that. Now’s the time to voice those beliefs and not be silent.

I don’t know what to say about these past elections. It is depressing to me, really. Honestly I think that capitalism is about done. The greed that is manifested, the viciousness, the hate-mongering, it is about at its limit. We will either move into fascism, or change to be a better, more fair-minded society that is not hell-bent on putting the blame on the wrong set of people. We will put limits on wealth and take care of those in poverty, OR the system of capitalism is about done. “As ye have done to the least of my brethren, ye have done unto Me.” hmm

What always amazes me is the way that corporate America, those at the top of the business world who make MILLIONS more than most of society could ever dream of,  remain anonymous and hidden from view. It’s not President Obama, people, who is taking all your money and jobs!! Don’t you see how those at the top of business are laughing at your pitiful accusations? They don’t care who you blame– it can be the illegal Mexican families in this country, who are here out of desparation and are working harder than any of us– you can blame them if you want. You can blame the government that just came to power a whole 2 years ago. They don’t care who you blame, as long as it’s not THEM, those who are claiming bankruptcy and calling on the Federal govt. to “bail them out,” with accompanying threat of America’s economy falling apart if they lose their … let’s say… posterior… while still paying each other millions (millions) in bonuses and then spending their bail our money on BUYING UP other small businesses — not on helping people to stay in their HOMES (oh no). They’re not losing their homes, and they’re not losing any sleep over it. They’re in control as they always have been and laughing at the rest of us struggling to survive.

Unemployment rates are running around 10 percent right now across the country. Some places are less, some are more. Some are at nearly 25 %. That’s 1 in 4 not having a job in some communities. Are we going to fix this by not letting our elected government provide a more equitable society?? I don’t think so. Let’s open up the free market & see who survives. It ain’t gonna be you, Joe plumber, trying to start your own little business. Those miners are going to re-enter those mines in very unsafe and hazardous conditions, and next time a bunch of them will die– like they did in, was it West Virginia a few years ago? They died. They didn’t make it to CNN filming them being pulled up out of the hole they were in and companies offering them presents. They died. The little guys are dying. The wage gap is ever wider in America, and GROWING. That means those at the top, who remain very much the same people over long periods of time, gain MORE of the total wealth and income pool, while those at the bottom earn less and less, or control a very small percentage of the total income and wealth pool.

Who is MAKING MONEY, making a profit over hiring those illegal workers, some 12 million of them, across our country? Why are they here, really. Who is making money off them? It’s not THEM. THEY work long hours, and don’t complain when they are treated unfairly, because they fear being sent back home. At least here, they are working, earning some wage, and they hope for their next generation to have a better life. They’re not earning a profit, they’re stuck in dead end jobs and can’t complain about working conditions. It’s not really their immediate BOSSES although they certainly profit from their low wage laborers. It’s the owners. Those at the top holding stocks in their company, making the true profits on these workers. Are they even going to suffer if there’s some kind of ‘crack down’ on businesses employing them? NO. Ever heard of the unemployed “reserve army” out there waiting to pick up jobs lost by others? That’s a term from Marx. Karl Marx. No, I am not a communist. With miserable unemployemnt rates, it only HELPS those at the top because there is a literal reserve army of workers ready to pick up where others leave off. Always available. Happy to work and not interested in building coalitions or any such thing, for workers. Hooray for their stocks gaining more & more profit.

And now we have for-profit PRISONS, run by private companies. What does this mean? The state or federal govt. actually pays a company so much PER PERSON, to manage them in their prison system. The ethical problem is, these companies now have a vested interest in keeping those prisons FULL at all times. So much for thinking about society in general and trying to PREVENT crime in the first place. They’re in business to keep it going, now.

anyway, I’m tired, really. I have to turn away from politics because this is how it makes me feel. People are suffering. My students are too young to have any life experience to tell them these things are for real and threatening their own plans and goals. So they want to believe if we just keep power out of the hands of the government, everything will be okay. So now we have tea partier idiots calling for an end to social security, Medicare, and other such federally-funded, federally run programs. Great!! Let’s do away with the state and federal highway systems as well! Perhaps we can go back to local police taking care of their own communities and do away with the federal database system that means they can actually SHARE and benefit from each others’ information. In that case, all a criminal has to do is cross a state line & he’s in the clear. Cool. It is so ridiculous, I can’t even tolerate listening to them on tv. The scary thing is that so many people are rallying behind them! I don’t get that at all.

I am not for either party. There are things that would place me in either party. But I am for a more just society and I think the way to go is to further unite our states to share information and laws, all that stuff. We are a NATION after all, are we not? Didn’t we resolve this issue when we were only 13 states? Aren’t we proud to be a NATION, united, with one government? Where is all this going?

This morning I give a lecture on Hurricane Katrina. It all happened 5 years ago. I relate it to Stratification, inequality, class difference mixed with race, in America. The students like the subject, it is interesting for them. They are shocked when I get to the part about babies dying for lack of water in the Superdome.

It is a horrifying story. I get angry and sad every time I review it. Overwhelmed at the suffering. Remembering tv shots of people with arms outstretched, standing on their rooftops with signs, “HELP US!” And every face was brown. I remember someone saying, “If those were little teenage white cheerleaders, they wouldn’t have been left there. They wouldn’t have been taken to some deserted highway intersection and left there with no water, food, or protection.”

It is a story of tragedy, of a nation full of itself, floundering in a bureaucracy that did not function at the time most needed by its own people. No one expected Katrina to be this bad. It was a bad girl, coming across Florida as a Categotry 1 and hitting New Orleans as a Category 5. The people who never evacuated were the poorest of the poor. No car, no money, no place else to go = No evacuation.

I cannot imagine being holed up in the Superdome, not being ALLOWED to leave, and my baby dying for lack of water. Can you, really? in America? Can you imagine watching your own mother die for lack of medicine and medical care, and leaving her  body covered with a rag, to rot for days? No assistance? This is America?

I do not want this story to die out, as those 1800+ people did 5 years ago. We need to be reminded. My students need to hear it. So it never happens again. It is horrifying.

The Director of FEMA resigned. So did the Supt. of the New Orleans Police Dept. after law suits.

Federal marshalls positioned themselves on top of a bridge and started shooting (black) people trying to walk out of the flooding, over to the safer side, the richer, white areas. This HAPPENED, it is documented, and people testified they did it in court. I know academics who were with them and wrote about it later. The fear of hordes of uneducated  black folk streaming into their rich areas was too much. They brought out their guns. People were picked off their rooftops and left on deserted parts of highways with no water or food. What exactly were they supposed to do?

Was there looting? YES. And violence. It was chaos, but it was also unnecessary. That’s the really sad part. The American Federal Corps of Engineers was found responsible for the levee breaches, which then poured Lake Pontchatrain into the lower 9th ward. But they did not have to suffer or pay out a dime, due to protection clauses put in place years before, at the time of another hurricane.

Citizens came with their own boats, volunteering to rescue people themselves, and were turned away. They didn’t have the proper credentials, or clearance. This was bureaucracy at its worst.

Katrina survivors were scattered all over the country. Most of them never returned to New Orleans. Ray Nagin, who screamed over the news for those in Washington to “get off their asses and do something” is no longer mayor.

The city today is back to life, a fun place to visit, full of music and people. Academics take their conferences to New Orleans and have a great time in the French quarter. But in the lower 9th ward, houses are still boarded up. Churches do their best to serve the folks living there. It has not been rebuilt.

This could have been America at its BEST. We have a big heart. People tried to help. There is a lot of love in America, and most people don’t carry around the prejudices we used to. We realize people are people. The interesting thing is, when a tragedy happens, bureaucracy takes over. We expect the government to take care of the situation. And in this case, at this time in our history, it did not. It failed us. Citizen groups eventually organized themselves as relief agencies and many people put in hours and hours administering to the people, taking them water, food and supplies. Because FEMA never came.

Hurricane Earl is building as I write this, in the Caribbean. I wonder, what will prevent this from happening again? What will be the next tragedy?

First of all, it is not “at” Ground Zero. It is something like 2 — 2  1/2 miles away from Ground Zero, on private property. So where shall we legislate is far enough away? 5 miles? 10? nowhere in NYC? what? and who decides?

I am for it. I think it is perfectly fine to have a house dedicated to the worship of God, from one of the major religions of the world that has been around since about 600 A.D., near ground zero. It would be really nice if we also built a church, a synagoge and maybe a Hindu and Buddhist temple on the same  block! It would be a place of prayer for all peoples, to offer supplication to the One Creator for this to never happen again, to say prayers for peace and an end to senseless killing by radical extremists insane with misplaced anger. Of course, the only thing being built is a mosque.

The Islamic world condemns the horrific tragedy that occurred at Ground Zero. There is a radical and growing, violent element within their own ranks, and I think they cannot be ignored and must be continually fought so that they do not bring more destruction. But this radical faction is not building a mosque near ground zero.

Islam is a worldwide religion, one that brought us algebra, beautiful architecture, a very strict and drug-free way of life, prayer 5X a day, giving to the poor as a matter of worship, and many other things. These are the basic teachings. It united many warring tribes and united them into a strong and disciplined nation of peoples, in its day. The nation with the most Muslims within its borders is INDONESIA. Ask the average American and they would probably say a nation in the Middle East. And by the way, Jesus was from the Middle East. The Sermon on the Mount was given in the Middle East. It is an area of the world rich with history and religion(s).

Islam does not promote terrorism. Their radical extremist minority factions DO.

I really think what it comes down to is that most middle-class and lower-class Americans do not have the slightest understanding of what Islam is, and do not know personally any one Muslim. If they did, they would not be going insane because of a mosque, a house of worship, being built at ground zero on private property.

Freedom of religion has always been a tricky thing in America. George Washington wrote to the “Sons of Israel” and welcomed Jews into colonial life, but we all know we have more church denominations than you can count and churches are also very racially divided. Religion hasn’t exactly been the example of unity and bringing people together in this land of diversity.

What an opportunity here to show our true belief in FREEDOM of religion, to show our tolerance for law-abiding and peaceful people in this nation of different cultures, races and peoples. We say this country was founded on Christianity, but the Christianity of our Founding Fathers was a radical type of Christianity most Americans could not relate to today.

People always want to quote their principles when it is most convenient, and legislate their own morality at times when it gets a little uncomfortable. Educated politicians are on television comparing Muslims to Nazis. PLEASE! GO BACK TO SCHOOL, read another book or two, learn something. It’s like condemning all Europeans because of the Holocaust. These terrorist groups are just that, and they are not the Muslim world. Let’s show our tolerance and brotherhood in action. Who are we as a nation? And who do we want to be? What lessons of tolerance are we to teach our children?