darfur

the latest Kristof on Darfur.


Darfur will be an ongoing thing for me this summer. It's important to me to raise awareness.

darfur

It's become blatently clear to me that the United States along with the rest of the "Western" world will fail the Darfur region of Sudan, just like it failed the Congo and just like it failed Rwanda.

This makes me sad. And mad.

Nicolas Kristof, a columist I sometimes don't really care for at the NY Times has been bringing the horror of Darfur home to the mainstream press. It's been an excellent series. Sadly, it looks like he is more or less alone. Other than some Congressional Resolutions that never really went anywhere and a few bloggers here or there attempting to make people realize just how awful things are. The United Nations wants to push the blame away to someplace else and ignore the genocide. (let's not parse words. From what I've read that's pretty much what it is.)

One site I found is The Passion of the Present. It looks to be a fairly lone voice. However it has a ton of links where you can donate, push for action, and so on.

This is probably one of those issues you should probably call your Congressional leadership over---as exasperating as that can be.


World Vision is also collecting money to help feed Sudan. Drop them some pennies.


Lastly, the Human Rights Watch report on the genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan. Read and be horrified.

I would have suspected something like this out of Mississippi or Alabama, or even my own state, but Virginia has managed to make my jaw drop ten thousand feet.

You already know how I feel about this, so I won't go into a long tirade. I see clear 14th Amendment violations here actually because it severs all legal contracts such as power of attorney and so on that same-sex couples may have.

Amazing.

general updates

I'm still here. I'm still watching the events of the world. Ten days until the 'turnover.' We'll see how that turns out.

At anyrate, I'm preparing to graduate (the countdown has been added to the bottom of this page.) I've been sending out a few queries here and there. Right now it looks like I will be relocating from Amish Country---even though I really do like it here. It's time to see new things even though in spring and summer, this area truly is paradise. Indeed, there's a town named just that only 3 miles away.

There's a 50% chance that I'll move to D.C., with friends, and a 50% chance I'll move to Harrisburg, PA, depending on who hires me first. I'm putting graduate school off for a year and a half---my brain hurts and the last two semesters have taxed my sanity. I haven't even begun to put my thesis on paper. That's a task for August I think.

So yeah that's what I've been up to lately. No real vacation or hiatus. I didn't have much to say about the torture crisis other than the usual "we-are-civilized-and-we-are-a-better-country-than-this" outrage that is quite justified. In reality, torture seems to be apart of the human condition--a fear of the Other. Same goes for genocide. These things are wrong and evil yet we still do them. And we still ignore them, in the case of Darfur Province in Sudan. Noone should be saying never again.

Perhaps I'll get a job where I can fight both evils at the same time. That'd be grand.

Happy Juneteenth!


(I'm not Texan, which is where it started, but it's an important day nonetheless.)

russia

I'm probably being a little bit paranoid. Indeed, I've been slightly unhinged as of late. It just seems odd to me that Russia would supply the Bush Administration with Iraq intelligence that said Saddam was going to attack the United States.




This is rather amusing actually, in a very sad and dangerous way. Two of our former(current?) enemies have manipulated us into a war that in the end will cost us dearly, financially and socially and psychologically. Those being, Russia and Iran.


There's a game being played here. Or a fool.

gmail

I have a small number of Gmail invites to give away if anyone wants one.

My thesis covers fascist and fundamentalist movements in the US and UK and how they relate to the study of geography (identity, various other theories). However I've done a lot of research into many other areas around the world. Russia was feared to head that way by some analysts back in the early 1990s. So I'm not surprised to read that the fears may not be far off.

I know I said I was staying away from politics but oh my god, read this Billmon post and be amazed and awed and frankly a little scared.


And then...

Note that fully half of the American population thinks exactly like that.

Reagan

I really can't say much about Reagan. By default, I'm probably supposed to dislike him.

However, I was but a wee zygote when he first took office and 6 going on 7 when he left. Or would that be 7 going on 8? So, in retrospect, I really don't remember much politically from this period. I remember Jesse Jackson running for President in 1988 because I went to a rally in Center City Philadelphia with my mom. Other than that the only memories I have of his presidency are watching the Oliver North trials on TV with my cousins down in Miami one very hot summer and the stock market crash of October 19, 1987. Mom had just come back from San Francisco that morning and I got to go down to the trading floor in Philadelphia with her. I didn't have to go to school, although I was a weird child who liked going to school. (and the week prior I got a stomach virus on my birthday and puked everywhere, including on my favorite teddy bear. It was not pleasant. My dad didn't like it one bit either. That's a tangent though.) Anyway, my few memories of former President Reagan are rather negative, not counting what I learned much later through research of my own.

I suppose I'm writing this because I'm simply amazed at some people I know who are quite personally sad over his passing. How can they be? They have absolutely no memories of his 8 years in office. In fact some weren't even born until his second term. Perhaps he had a greater effect on people then I'm giving him credit for.

The point is, since I really don't have any real memories of him directly since I was busy being a kid (although I was a very odd child), just stuff that his policies caused (Ollie North and the stock market crash of '87), I'm rather ambivelant about the whole thing. I neither like him nor dislike him. And frankly, I find the hero worship a little bit creepy. Almost. . .Stalinistic.

Whether he was great or not is not for me to say. And to be honest, he probably didn't remember any of it. I currently have a grandparent in the stages of Altzhimers. So for that, while I'm required by default to dislike the man for setting loose this right-wing spend and borrow monster upon us all, I do have a bit of sympathy for the family. Not knowing who or where you are, or who your family is, when its your time to go is such an undignified end for anyone.

And that's all I'm really going to say about this.

Oh man....Walter...Damn.


That is some excellent writing. I think everyone needs to get to reading it.

Well folks, the Philly Sports Curse remains in full effect.

Reagan's dead....

No TV for a month for me.


They're practically sobbing on Fox News. Shouldn't they be happy? He suffered for so long and was ill for so long.

It's wrong to want to beat the living tar out of a bigot, right? I dealt with one in a bar the other night. I didn't hit him. He just hated Indians and Hindus. But I seriously wanted to smash his skull in.

But that'd just give them what they want, right? So I ignored his drunken rantings and left.

Love your enemies....or ignore them. That's what I say.

Here's a bizarre and eerie little site I found in my travels on the net. If I weren't such a cynical skeptic I'd be heading for the hills.

Because the net is full of scammers, here's a site that has a hefty dose of skepticism.


I'd give it a look over. It's interesting. Either someone is very, very creative or someone actually traveled back in time from 2036 to tell us it'll all pretty much be over in a few years. It makes a good sci-fi story I think, and I do like sci-fi.

Schaedenfreude is bad. I shouldn't participate in it. Remember, karma can come right back at you...it can be a real bitch like that. . . and that's all I'm saying about that.


Related. Also related. This is related too.

Now I need to go to bed. Too many days of working graveyard and/or third shift can make you a little bit loony.

job search begins

One of the things I'm doing on my hiatus while I "get it together" is lining up a job for when I graduate in December. Eventually I am going to graduate school but I don't want to have any downtime after I graduate. (Namely, I don't want to have to move back home like nearly every college student I know has to do.)

I think public service is what I should be doing. That's where I've been looking. I heard rumors that getting hired in government is frustrating. Any truth to that?

Anyway wish me luck. I think I should start writing again soon.

This blog will probably take a direction that is less politically oriented. The only thing I plan on writing on politically wise is my fundamentalism project. I promised that I would contribute and I will honor that promise. I'll probably begin writing on my job search and things like that since in less than 6 months i'll officially be on my own. I hope people stick around to see how I turn out.


PS: Donate to those people on the left!


and Ben, don't forget about Ben in his State House campaign!