no man's land

"When I am in the city I long for the country, when I am in the country I long for the city."

"The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides with the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who in the name of charity and good will shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon those with great vengeance and with furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know that my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee." Jules Winnfield

MsD tells a Christmas story

I remember when I was little my favorite part of Christmas was when it was time to decorate the tree; I would always do the Christmas village. The village consisted of 8 to 12 miniature houses and buildings made of cardboard. They came from Germany and where finally made. I would set them up under the tree or on a table near the tree and light them up from behind with Christmas tree lights. Arranging them on a bed of fluffy cotton that looked like snow, I added a plastic Santa, in his slay pulled by reindeer. I spent most of the Christmas week arranging and rearranging the scene. Sometimes I would combine the little village with the Nativity scene. The scale was off but it looked cool to see a little village around a gigantic baby Jesus. As I got older I would add model airplanes, cars and model monsters like Frankenstein and the Wolfman. At times I took one of the buildings to the backyard and blow it up with a leftover firecracker or cover it with model glue and set it on fire. By the time I was eleven there were only 6 or 7 of the miniature German buildings, and the little baby Jesus had been replaced 2 or three times due to sacrifice by fire on the seat of a “Weird-ohs” hot rod model. 

So many are talented and beautiful so few drift into an arena where they are appreciated.

"The Great Dictator" (1940) Apropos for our times

"I'm sorry, but I don't want to be an emperor. That's not my business. I don't want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible; Jew, Gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other's happiness, not by each other's misery. We don't want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone, and the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men's souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical; our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery, we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost. The airplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men; cries out for universal brotherhood; for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women, and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me, I say, do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed, the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish. Soldiers! Don't give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you, enslave you; who regiment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel! Who drill you, diet you, treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don't give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines, you are not cattle, you are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don't hate! Only the unloved hate; the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers! Don't fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the seventeenth chapter of St. Luke, it is written that the kingdom of God is within man, not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people, have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy, let us use that power. Let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfill that promise. They never will! Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to fulfill that promise. Let us fight to free the world! To do away with national barriers! To do away with greed, with hate and intolerance! Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men's happiness. Soldiers, in the name of democracy, let us all unite! Hannah, can you hear me? Wherever you are, look up Hannah! The clouds are lifting! The sun is breaking through! We are coming out of the darkness into the light! We are coming into a new world; a kindlier world, where men will rise above their hate, their greed, and brutality. Look up, Hannah! The soul of man has been given wings and at last he is beginning to fly. He is flying into the rainbow! Into the light of hope, into the future! The glorious future, that belongs to you, to me and to all of us. Look up, Hannah. Look up!"
The Great Dictator (1940)

"John 14:6
Jesus said unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man comes unto the Father, but by me. (King James Bible)

A true Christian should not entertain the idea that any other faith has access to God or is a means to God. Only Christianity can offer salvation. Individuals with any other faith are dammed. If the bible and the New Testament are the word of God and Jesus Christ (and it is), there is no other choice but to accept this. If you are a Christian and do not accept the Bible as truth and fact you are a heretic.
I am troubled that there are so many people who call themselves “Christian” and have no idea what it means to be one. They run around all open minded to all sorts of cult like faiths all friendly and lovey-duvey like… thinken we are all going to meet up in heaven and have a party with the Big Guy. NOT. They are all dammed to hell and so are you for your heresy. You heretics are the worst of all because you are not true Christians just pretenders and misleading the true believers. Jesus has set up a special place for you where the fire is hotter and the room service is really really bad.

”

—	Dr Robert Jeffress

I better get cracking

I guess I better start working on this blog, not that anyone is going to read it! I get much more attention on my tumblr blog than on here, and I have only been there a few months.

It is far better to go wrong in freedom that to go right in chains
Thomas H. Huxley

The path to the left

The Left Hand Path, feeling of incongruity, a flipping out of the norm a moving out into the realm of danger, following the way of your own bliss. A realm for which there are no rules, and you do not know where you are going. Here you will live a life of danger creativity perhaps not a respected life but certainly an interesting one. Joseph Campbell

“God is a metaphor for a mystery that absolutely transcends all human categories of thought, even the categories of being and nonbeing.” Joseph Campbell.

A definition of the Bible

A 400 year old English translation from a group of trangentially related ancient Middle Eastern text transcribed from Greek Hebrew and Aramaic oral histories.

Fighting the good fight

“The only kinds of fights worth fighting are those you are going to lose, because somebody has to fight them and lose and lose and lose until someday, somebody who believes as you do wins. In order for somebody to win an important, major fight 100 years hence, a lot of other people have got to be willing - for the sheer fun and joy of it - to go right ahead and fight, knowing you're going to lose. You mustn't feel like a martyr. You've got to enjoy it.” I F Stone

Chinese Six Happiness Wishes:

Wealth, longevity, good health, virtue, and a peaceful old age and death. And the Sixth Happiness ... that you must find for yourself, each person decides in his own heart what the sixth happiness is.

Sedition Act

The Barr Code WikiLeaks may spawn new sedition act

6:00 am December 27, 2010, by Bob Barr

The infamous Sedition Act, which criminalized speech critical of the federal government and which was passed by the Federalists during another of America’s undeclared wars (that time, against France), lasted only three years, from 1798 to 1801. However, if the congressional critics of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange have their way, a new and revised version of the Sedition Act may be in the offing.
Thomas Jefferson, who became our third president in 1801, was not only a vocal critic of the Sedition Act, but pardoned those who had been punished pursuant to its terms. Jefferson was, of course, right in his view of this law (which expired before its constitutionality could be determined by the Supreme Court). His wisdom is well-needed today to quell the blood thirst of those clamoring for Assange’s head because of WikiLeaks’ release of cables and e-mails critical of and embarrassing to, the government.
The primary vehicle these modern-day Federalists are looking to employ in order to criminalize the publication of information critical of government policies and actions is the venerable, but little-used 1917 Espionage Act.
Many legal scholars, not prone to the pressures of public sentiment (which polls suggest strongly supports prosecuting Assange), correctly argue there simply is no proper basis for a case against the WikiLeaks founder under the Espionage Act, federal conspiracy laws, or other statutes. In recent testimony before the House Judiciary Committee, several constitutional scholars eloquently presented the case for not prosecuting Assange; based on a fair reading of the First Amendment to the Constitution, current law, and sound policy.
One of those who testified, the Hudson Institute’s Gabriel Schoenfeld, also noted in an interview with Politico that the government was “not going to be able to threaten or touch Julian Assange,” pointing out that there were clear conflicts with the First Amendment in steps the Justice Department appeared to be taking in an effort to construct a case against him.
While some legal scholars, such as former Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Wainstein, encourage the government to prosecute Assange (based largely on a theory that his actions and motives are not those of a traditional journalist), the clear weight of constitutional law and policy argues to the contrary.
A Congressional Research Service report, “Criminal Prohibitions on the Publication of Classified Defense Information,” published earlier this month, notes that the relevant provisions in the Espionage Act most frequently cited as a way for the Justice Department to build a case against Assange, have almost exclusively been used to prosecute the individual(s) making the information available without authorization. In this case, that culprit allegedly is Army Private Bradley Manning; who almost certainly deserves prosecution.
Reading the Espionage Act the way Assange’s critics would have us do, would open a Pandora’s Box of virtually unlimited reach. As Benjamin Wittes, a legal analyst from the Brookings Institution, explained on his blog, such interpretation would reach even “casual discussions of such disclosures by persons not authorized to receive them to other persons not authorized to receive them – in other words, all tweets sending around those countless news stories, all blogging on them, and all dinner party conversations about their contents.” There wouldn’t be enough jails to hold us all.
Yet such ridiculously broad expansion of federal law, simply to pillory a person who clearly delights in embarrassing the government, would seem to be what some in Washington, including Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-CT) and Rep. Peter King (R-NY), just might have in mind. And, unfortunately, there are many in the executive branch who appear to be moving in just such direction; actively constructing what may becomes a conspiracy case against Assange.
We can only hope Jefferson’s wisdom and understanding will speak from across the ages to shine the bright light of constitutional truth on such dark plans.

-by Bob Barr, The Barr Code

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Mr. Cat

Mister Cat has been in my life ever since I care to remember. I imagine it was forever. I do not know how or when he came to me it was some time in the nineteen nineties, the years I began my decent into obliteration. He snuck into my life as a stray kitten when I was living in some dumpy apartment complex in Sacramento California, and he became a permanent part of my life.
Today Mr. Cat died. I do not know the circumstances of his death, I found him later in the day in the back yard.
What I feel most is regret. I did not pay attention to him as much as I should have, or that I could have done better in loving him, giving him attention, petting him more and on and on with all the things I could have done more of for him.
And I feel how much I will miss him, his presence in my life. No more will he wake me at four am to add some food to his empty bowl. No more will he meow at the top of his lungs to get me to pet his head. no more will he scratch his cat tree or snuggle on my bed with me as I softly stroked his back.
Some say love is only a human emotion. I was homeless for a time, living in my car with Mr. Cat and my dog Coco. Parked near some strange Laundromat in hopes of getting some sleep Mr. Cat went off into the bushes to do his business. The police telling me to move on, I called for Mr. Cat but he did not return. I drove around the block a few times but on Cat. I drove off in frustration, that dam cat can fend for himself, a half hour later I drove back and there he was on the sidewalk where an hour ago I had parked to rest. I opened the door he meowed and jumped in. Numerous events similar to this happened throughout the month and a half I was living in my car.