If you already read Who’s in Control Here!? read it again!!
06/03/2011 09:57 a.m.
I did a major update to Who’s in Control Here!? If you thought it was crazy before, yer gonna get a double dose of sarcasm in it now. jj
I am currently Giddy
I am listening to Bob Dylan - All I Really Wanna Do

49,000
05/25/2011 07:33 p.m.
I don't think it's a lot, relatively speaking, but I just noticed the total poem reads in my library hit 49,000 today since coming back to Pathetic in Sept of 2005. Trap-Eas-y-To-Fall-In-Two was the one that did it, which is funny to me as it is in my junk poems folder that rarely gets any reads.
I am not sure how many total reads I had my first time around, but I doubt it was that many. I know some members have a lot more than I do, which I attribute to doing a great deal more commenting than I do. I know in the past that getting POTD used to give a poem a read every time someone signed in to Pathetic because it was viewd on the main page. I'm pretty sure that is no longer the case.
It really means nothing, but I felt like noting it and it will be interesting to see how long it takes to hit 50,000. If I could get that many people to buy my book, I wouldn't be worrying about paying the rent next week. Figuring that I have over 200 poems in my library and I am closing in on publishing Passion and Pain, dividing them in half and then by 100 makes for about 250 copies of Seeds and Weeds. That works out to about $625 I would have gotten paid for book sales. That would cover my rent and some food for June. Unfortunately, cyber dollars are as meaningful as the total number of reads in my library. By the way, it costs $500 minimum to get a POD publisher to make a book available, and that's if you catch a sale price. Otherwise $600 without any extras. So even if you sell 250 copies of your book, you just break even. It is unlikely I will break even when I do finally get Passion & Pain published. Kinda makes me wish I hadn't noticed the 49,000 reads in the first place.
JJ
I am currently Indifferent
I am listening to MSNBC

bin Laden's death
05/03/2011 06:35 p.m.
I do not rejoyce in bin Laden's death. I would have preferred he were captured and brought back to stand trial. I would rather he spent the rest of his life alone in a prison cell.
I believe he was responsible for the 9/11 attacks. I have not heard that he may not have been and it would have been better if a trial could have proven it. He was not willing to be taken alive. The only reason to attack a hungry bear is to allow someone you love to get away.


I am currently Content
I am listening to silence

Hatred of the President and me
04/28/2011 11:40 a.m.
I don't think that people are racists because they don't support President Obama. It is about the attacks on his status as an American, on his exceptional educational record, his ability to get an education being BLAMED on affirmative action and numerous other attacks that he has had to put up with that no other President ever has had to. I realize that Republicans don't watch MSNBC, they watch FOX and think they are getting news. You are being lied to. Sure there is bias on MSNBC, but it's nothing like what happens on FOX every single day, all day long. Heck, even MSNBC has Republican shows on during the day. It's hard for me to watch them, as they are almost as biased as FOX, but the one thing they do is have opposing viewpoints and don't cut off every guest that has something to say that doesn't line up with their point of view.

Donald Trump has never intended to run for President. He served a republican purpose, to make as much noise and make as many people question President Obama's legitimacy as an American and therefore as President. He doesn't want to give up his tv show to actually have to do some work. And he has nothing to offer the nation as President. Business leaders do not make good Presidents. They are not for the people, they are about making money. The Nation is not about making money, the Nation is of the PEOPLE, by the PEOPLE and for the PEOPLE. The government, no matter how big or small, is there to protect the PEOPLE. Sometimes the people need protection from the government. Interestingly enough, from my perspective, every time the people have needed protection from the government, it has been a Republican in charge. Of course Republicans don't see it from my point of view, but that's why we elect our leaders and the pendulum swings back and forth and spends the least amount of time at the extremes.

When people say they have a problem with President Obama's policies, what you fail to realize is that those are NOT his policies, they are my policies and those of his supporters. That's why we voted for him, because the things he wants to accomplish are the things progressives want accomplished. Don't blame him for my vote and don't hate him because I elected him, along with a whole lotta other progressives. He speaks for me and I want my president to protect my rights and implement policies that help people. No one has a reason to hate President Obama. Not that there is ever a good reason to hate anyone, but if you have to hate someone, hate me. Of course there are allot more me's in this country and if you hate me now, just wait till after the next election...

I am currently Upbeat
I am listening to the rain pouring down outside

Trumping racism
04/27/2011 10:04 p.m.
I am one of the Americans that did not need to see President Obama's birth certificate. I didn't need to see George Bush's, 1 or 2, I didn't need to see Bill Clinton's or Ronald Regan's, so there would be no reason for me, or any other American to need to see a Presidents birth certificate, unless of course you're racists and can't stand the idea of a black man being President of the United States of America. There was a time in America that people wouldn't admit that black people were even human, so it's not surprising that hatred continues to insist that a black man can't be a legitimate President in America.

I have written poetry and said on many occasions that Pride is a seed of prejudice. 4 times today Donald Trump exclaimed how proud he was for getting President Obama to release the long form of his birth certificate. As if the shorter form that Hawaii provides for legal purposes wasn't official enough to prove the President was born in the USA. Yes, pride is one of the seven deadly sins, according to the Holy Bible, for a reason. So Trump's grandiose claims for acting like a carnival barker don't surprise me at all. Oh, I know he didn't say that, but President Obama's analogy is certainly apropos.

And even after the official document was released, Trump and other birther/Tea Party/Republicans, imply that it's a fake document. Trump wouldn't even look at it when a reporter attempted to hand a copy of it to him. He refused to look at it again when the reporter asked him to look at it.

President Obama had to get an exception from the State of Hawaii to get the official copy of his own birth certificate. When I moved to California, I needed my birth certificate to get a Californian drivers license even though I had a NY State drivers license and the original Hospital birth certificate with my footprints and county seal stamped on it. I apparently lost the official copy when moving. I was not able to get a copy by myself. I had to get my parents to go to the county clerks office and declare that I was their son and that I was born where and when I said I was. And what's funny is that I had it when I got my NY State license. Now it seems to me that having needed to show it to get my NY license and presenting my authentic license in CA, I would have been able to get it without any problem. So knowing what I had to do to get a copy of mine, I have absolutely no doubt at all that President Obama's birth certificate is real. Only someone with an ulterior motive would claim to not believe his birth certificate is authentic.

I wonder what Donald Trump fears. Perhaps the truth. Fear being one of the 3 Seeds of Hatred and knowing beyond the shadow of a doubt that he is a racist, and that greed controls his life, fear can't be missing from the mix.

JJ

I am currently Refreshed
I am listening to Donald Trump acting Proud

love is like....
04/17/2011 11:08 a.m.
All I really know about love is that it's a lot like jumping off a waterfall, you stray a little off to the side and you will hit the rocks and break something, you go to deep and you might drowned and if you get out of the river, you have to climb back up a rocky cliff to start all over again. Even after all that, it is indeed worth it.
So here I go again....

JJ

this is from a comment I made in the forums the other day. I decided to save it here because it's how I feel, starting all over again after climbing up the rocks to the top of the cliff. and it feels good....
I am currently Happy
I am listening to Sille Veb by Pete Ham

isn't it funny how....
04/12/2011 07:28 a.m.
we take things for granted that we cherish more deeply than we even realize? Sometimes you can go seemingly forever without a taste on your tongue that everytime you have tasted it, you thought, OMG this is incredible! And you wonder how you ever lived without that flavor, and you wonder if you can go on without it even for one day, one hour, one minute, one second.... I hunger for the taste of you, for the sound of your voice, for the site of what has never been exposed to my eyes, but what I have seen in my dreams over and over again. I thirst for the flavor, just a taste, to satisfy my tongue, my heart and whatever other part of me that can savor your essence. I want you
I am currently Stimulated
I am listening to WYWH

State of the Union
04/05/2011 11:25 p.m.
It is, to say the least, disheartening to see what is happening in America. Hatred has been on the rise at a phenominal rate and for all the outright prejudice and discrimination that's been going on, the pure disdain for the poor is so dispicable that I can barely find words to describe it. As someone who feels that nothing is worse for a nation, I believe this nation is heading down a path to civil war. So many things lead me to believe it is inevitable. The war against workers rights might not seem like such a big deal to some, but consider what Martin Luther King Jr was doing to night before he was assassinated. It was important enough for him to go and speak out for sanitation workers and important enough for someone to kill him over. We also have Republicans in the House of Reps trying to wipe out the programs that help our lower and middle class survive. Make no mistake, I believe this is all part of an organized effort to kill off millions of Americans through starvation and inability to get health care. Take away thir jobs, the ability to earn a living wage, to see a doctor when sick or to prevent future illnesses, it all adds up to killing off the poor and holding down the middle class. And the filthy stinking rich get richer all the while. Dispicable is putting it lightly, uncontionable sounds too nice. It makes me wish I wasn't against war, that I thought it ok to kill my enemies because when the war starts, I don't think I have the lack of heart to take another human life. It makes me think the Republicans will win the war because I know so many other Democrats who feel the same as I do. America is supposed to protect its citizens from this sort of thing, but somehow these tea party repubs have managed to convince enough people to go for the throat and murder America.
I am currently Angry
I am listening to A bell tolling for....

Having fun in the forums again....
05/25/2010 04:14 a.m.
The Pen is Mightier than the Pencil!

OK, I know this isn't going to go over well with some of you, it's really just a personal preference of mine since my days in Catholic school.

There's nothing like a Catholic Nun to teach you how to hate practically anything. For this episode of Mightier than the sword, let me impart my recollections from those long lost days of torture and childhood.

When I was just a little bitty boy my nuns used to smash me in the finger using those old lead filled pencil bombs.

Ok, enough Cotton Fields, getting cracked in the knuckles from time to time is not why I dislike writing with pencils. Actually, I just hated having to sharpen them before class and hoping I still had some graphite left to write with before class ended. The nuns wouldn't let us sharpen them during class, too noisy. So we all lined up at the start of class and sawed away with those old time sharpeners that you had to play games with to get a good point on the pencil without breaking it off. You could go through nearly an entire pencil in one day depending on the quality of your number 2.

But even that wasn't enough to make me hate pencils, no.... I don't recall my first time, it was so loong ago, but at some point back in the 70's, I touched it, rolled it around in my fingers and let it pour out onto the paper with it's well lubricated tip. Yes, it was ecstasy, my very first time writing with a Pilot Pen. Oh not just any Pilot Pen, but an extra fine tip Pilot Pen. Yes, yes, YES! I can still feel the smoothness of it's ink as it came out of the tiny prickly point. I was not prepared for what was to happen to me that day and so many days after that. I knew I could never go back. My pencils were never again to break their points in those cast iron behemoths attached to the counter top of the classroom window sills. Never again were those graphite bleeding sticks going to make the heel of my hand turn shades of grey by the end of the day. From that POINT on, I was going to be faithful to my new lover, to only use Pilot for as long as we both shall live. And soon I discovered that office supply stores existed where one could buy Pilots in bulk, yes, many, many pens, all in a box.
But even as I thought I had died and gone to Heaven, there was something even more incredible that awaited my discovery. Pilot made them in GREEN and PURPLE and RED and BLUE!!!! OMG in Heaven! COLORS, so many COLORS. I was never so unprepared as the day I discovered COLORS. I bought box fulls, Saved my lunch money, my ice cream sandwich money, my garlic stick money, yes, you heard me right, my Leonzo's Pizza Garlic Stick money was sacrificed for a rainbow of Pilot Pen Extra Fin Point color pens by the boxful.

And if not for these amazing instruments of artistically creative writing tools, I might never have written my first poem.
So there I was, alone in my room, afraid my mother would walk in my room and catch me rolling one around in my fingertips, making to pour my passions out onto the page. Fortunately, she never discovered my little secret.

But then a terrible thing happened one day. I was standing outside the Ramada Inn in Saratoga Springs, NY, waiting for the members of the WHO to arrive after the concert they had performed in Glens Falls. I learned from a friend who was a stage crew member, and the son of the local concert promoter, that the band would be staying there. So there I stood, waiting in great anticipation for my heroes to step out of their Limousines and grasp in their hands my favorite, most loved tool of all my writing Pilot Pens. Each member arrived in a separate Limo. First was John Entwistle, as I bowed humbly in his presence, holding out my finest Pilot Pen for him to use while signing a handwritten copy of my book of poems. It was a sweet moment as he took it in his hand and scrolled his signature across the page. I watched in pure happiness as his name appeared beneath the extra fine point of my pen, YES, MY PEN!

He kindly handed my pen and book back to me with a smile on his face. It was a beautiful moment for me, but was to soon be outdone when Roger Daultry got out of the next Limo. Just as John had done before him, Roger took the mighty pen in his fingers and signed his name in my hand written book of poems. It was indeed a sweet moment that lingered until the final Limo arrived. Within it's doors, behind windows too dark to see beyond their reflective surface was a man of such greatness I nearly peed my pants. The man who wrote TOMMY and so may masterpieces of rock-n-Roll. OMG the anticipation!

I prepared my pen, taking off the cap and placing it on the back of the pen so his majesty would not be bothered with such a mundane task. I opened my book to the place I wanted him to sign and as he stepped out of the car, I asked him, "Mr. Townsend, may I please have your autograph?" He looked at me for a brief moment and I feared he was going to say no. But alas, he reached out, took my Extra Fine tipped Pilot Pen into his majestic fingers, looked at the pen, as if to acknowledge my fine taste in pens and began to write his name into my book of hand written poems, when it happened. OMG, no dear lawd, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!, The extra fine tipped Pilot Pen ran out of ink half way through his signature. My heart stopped, yes, it really STOPPED! I thought I was dead for a moment. Only my panic infused my blood with enough adrenalin to restart my heart and allow me to think as swiftly as my mind was able. I reached out without a millisecond of delay, grabbed the pen from his hand as he looked at me with a startled expression. I wildly shook the pen and made a quick line on a piece of paper in my hand to be sure it would once again bleed on the page of my hand written book of poems, and YES, thank the lawd, it worked once again. I reached out, put the pen back in Pete's magnificent fingers, but gently, and as he looked at me, still expressing the look of surprise, but slightly laughing, and continued on with his forever lasting signature. A moment in time I will never forget.

It's interesting to note, you can still see the impression on the page where his signature ran out of ink just below his finished name.

Afterwards, I had time to reflect on the happenings of the event. I began to look at that pen with disappointment. It nearly let me down at the most important time of it's life. In fact, I no longer saw it as alive. It was just another pen among hundreds of Pilot Pens I had. When I got home, I put it in my drawer with a dozen others just like it. It got mixed in and I couldn't tell it apart from any other. I don't know what ever happened to that pen. I might still have it, as I had a pen box with several of my old pens I kept after they ran out of ink. Or it might have been thrown away by my mother, who was always throwing out my stuff when I wasn't looking.

It was after that when I started using a typewriter and later a computer to write my poetry. It is extremely rare when I put a pen to paper and even more rare when I use a pencil. But I have so many fond memories of those extra fine point Pilot Pens that it brings a smile to my face when I see someone else writing with one, or pass the stationary section of a store and look up to see them still hanging there, being sold to this day, those extra fine point Pilot pens, ahhh yessss, the memories are oh so sweet....

I am currently Excited
I am listening to TOMMY

Here we go again, I am just too smart for my own good, HA!
05/23/2010 03:32 p.m.
There are several issues I have with the Texas textbook misinformation debacle. I did some research to get more facts than just generalizations, but this is not comprehensive.

Before getting into the specifics, one must consider why I care about what Texas does. Not counting that it is an American state and I care because I care about Americans in general, Texas has tremendous influence in what the rest of the nations schools do because of its size and buying power. When text book publishers make books, they look to make as many books the same as they can. If you have ever tried to get a book of your poetry published, as I have, you learn alot about costs and how much you can make from large numbers of books being made all at once, as opposed to having to publish numerous smaller runs of books. So Texas orders thousands of books and the publishers want to reuse the mold and save money. Over 40 other states will likely use the same books Texas uses, so a large percentage of the American population is going to grow up on lies and half-truths over at least the next ten years.

Textbooks are not novels, books of poetry or purveyors of opinion, they are educational tools expected to tell the truth, no matter the topic. There should never be a thought about censorship of text books so long as they relay the facts of the subjects at hand. I can write whatever I want in Seeds And Weeds, but I, as a former Teacher's Aide, would never insert my opinions into the text books I used to teach my students.

What they have done in Texas is akin to educational blasphemy.
1: Students must "describe how McCarthyism, the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), the arms race, and the space race increased Cold War tensions and how the later release of the Venona Papers confirmed suspicions of communist infiltration in U.S. government." Adding the Venona Papers is an attempt to vindicate Senator Joseph McCarthy's Communist witch hunts.
But somehow, they leave out any positive effects, instead emphasizing "increased tensions".

2: Students are required to "identify actions of government and the private sector such as the Great Society, affirmative action, and Title IX to create economic opportunities for citizens and analyze the unintended consequences of each" relating to economic effects of World War II and the Cold War.
This fails to consider the reason for these programs, while insinuating that they have only had negative results. But the fact is, these programs were critical in achieving an equal society.

3: They attempt to deny the causes and effects of Global Warming and Climate Change. They claim the United Nation's funding for international humanitarian relief and environmental initiatives sre threats to individual freedom and US sovereignty.

4: They make students consider the political views of Confederate President Jefferson Davis on equal terms with President Abraham Lincoln.

5: Requiring that students downplay the contributions of the civil rights movement and “describe the role of individuals such as governors George Wallace, Orval Faubus, and Lester Maddox and groups, including the Congressional bloc of southern Democrats, that sought to maintain the status quo.”

6: Pushing Southern Conservative values requiring students to explain the roles of Newt Gingrich, “Phyllis Schlafly, the Contract With America, the Heritage Foundation, the Moral Majority, and the National Rifle Association.” Also to add more about religious figures like John Calvin.

7: Students are told to describe how country music is an important cultural movement, but not hip hop. Why not? How about the Rock-n-Roll I so dearly love?

8: Students must discuss the solvency of "long-term entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare."

One thing that was fortunately rejected was for President Barack Obama to be included in the curriculum using his middle name Hussein, while other Presidents were listed with an initial or not at all. Hmmm, wonder why they would do that? Another thing that was thankfully rejected was to refer to the slave trade as the "Atlantic triangular trade".

Also they downplay the role of Thomas Jefferson in American history because he advocated the separation of church and state, and require that students learn about "the unintended consequences" of affirmative action and Title IX, which bans gender discrimination in education programs and activities.


When will it end? Future students will be completely unprepared for college curriculums that are not based on these falsehoods.
Last year, the same board changed the science curriculum downplaying the teaching of evolution, cell formation and the Big Bang theory.

It is appropriate to offer alternative viewpoints, but it is an entirely different thing to claim the alternatives are the accepted truth.

So this all goes to the heart of this thread, if truth is subjective, what do we have left that is real? Can anyone say, "I think therefore I am" with any certainty that the thoughts they believe are their own really are? I debated a group that claimed we do not have fee thought, that we are creations of God and merely play the puppets of his thoughts, that our thoughts, as much as we feel they are our own, are merely his. So the famous quote is perhaps more accurately stated, "I think, therefore I am not". If we allow the State of Texas to be the thought police by writing whatever faux-facts they want to include in the textbooks of America, we no longer have the ability to make our own choices based on what we know, because what we know turns out to be something less than knowledge. Textbooks must not be Bibles and Bibles must not be textbooks. Textbooks must be facts, Bibles must not be facts. Bibles must be beliefs so that God, or whatever deities are worshiped within, can truly be entities of faith. In Christianity, God and Christ, above all, want our faith. I suspect it is the same in all religions, as it comes down to believe or things will go badly for you.

This is why we must have a separation of church and state, so that the pathway to faith, no matter what religion any individual American chooses to follow, is open to their exploration and fulfillment of their destiny.
I am a white male, if not for my feelings, I'd be happy. I could have spent my entire life enjoying the benefits of being among the powerful. But in my heart, I know it's wrong. Doesn't matter if I'm right or wrong, if it's the truth or not, I know on some basic human level that it is wrong. I don't want to be a part of it, I don't want to be a part of any majority, be it moral, male, white or any other, that thinks it's better, more powerful, is more prideful or greedy, that uses fear or manipulates history or creates falsehoods to gain status over those they decide are lesser than them.

JJ
I am currently Thoughtfull
I am listening to 60 Buddy Holly songs

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