June 25, 2008
An Urgency of Joy
By Robert C. Koehler (Tribune Media Services)
The culture of war goes quietly about its business. Last week, Congress fed it another $162 billion, perhaps with some nostalgia: This was the final war-funding request of the Bush administration, the lame-duck, despised status of which making absolutely no difference in the dispatch with which the money was delivered.
Yes, there was some protest - 155 nay votes on the funding amendment, to 268 yea - and we can take a little wan heart in this trend, but the protest strikes me as largely symbolic. I fear that while the anti-war-funding contingent in Congress may want to be on record as morally correct, it understands that the war is inevitable and cannot be opposed in some structural and career-endangering way.
This was evinced a few weeks ago by the cryptic words of House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey (D-Wis.), who, as reported on CQ.com, said that he "opposes giving any more funding for the war but felt he had a professional obligation to produce a bill that can pass."
Continue reading "An Urgency of Joy"
Posted by mwblog at 06:06 PM | Comments (0)
June 12, 2008
Now What?
By Robert C. Koehler (Tribune Media Services)
Funny how we can't seem to hear the truth until it's uttered by a professional liar.
Thus Scott McClellan, who was George Bush's press secretary for three years, beginning shortly after we invaded Iraq — the very Scott McClellan who personified lock-step obedience to the cause — has acquired sudden street cred as Someone To Listen To, as he tells us what we already know. Our society may not convene truth commissions, but it does publish tell-all books by ex-aides of the powerful, which feed us pieces of truth in the form of scandal.
McClellan has given the country a bit more (unwanted, embarrassing) self-awareness than it had a week ago, prior to the release and subsequent media splash of "What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception." His book raises a lot of questions, but only one that matters: Now what?
Posted by mwblog at 07:58 AM | Comments (0)
February 27, 2008
A Mighty Wind
Every once in a while, a mighty wind blows.
The political sentiments now storming America in the form of support for Barack Obama are a mighty wind indeed. For those trying to say this is all just hot air, it's time to point out that so is a windstorm. And storms have a function, in nature and in us. They blow away everything not built on a firm foundation, and make room for a lot of new growth.
I'm a boomer, so I know this feeling. We have been here before. We knew what Bob Dylan meant when he sang, "Something's going on here, but you don't know what it is....Do you, Mr. Jones?" And something is going on again. What we're experiencing here is a new conversation– something qualitatively different than the promises of effective problem-solving that pass for an excitement factor in his opponent's campaign.
Continue reading "A Mighty Wind"
Posted by mwblog at 09:15 PM | Comments (0)
January 29, 2008
My Journey To Obama
By Marianne Williamson
I didn't start out with him.
I thought people were projecting wildly onto him, making positive assumptions that he hadn't earned and filling in empty spaces in his resume with mere hopes of substance. But the longer campaign season has worked for me; having watched the candidates move through time, I've seen who's grown and who hasn't. I've ended up – at least for now – with Obama.
I'm perplexed by the question often presented by his opponents, "Yeah, but how is he really going to change things?" To me, he already has. He has awakened the sleeping giant of American democracy, and that is the greatest antidote to every problem we face.
Continue reading "My Journey To Obama"
Posted by mwblog at 08:41 AM | Comments (10)
January 28, 2008
Feminism in the Age of Now
"What! You're not voting for Hillary? But I thought you were such a feminist!"
If I've heard it once, I've heard it a hundred times. So let me explain why I'm not voting with my vagina…
As a feminist, I believe nurturing and nourishing a world trying to be born is the most effective way to heal the malevolent effects of a world that needs to pass away.
That is why I support Obama.
As a feminist, I believe inclusion is more powerful and life producing than is exclusion.
That is why I support Obama.
As a feminist, I believe tending and mending is a more effective way to deal with the world's stress points than is fighting or fleeing.
That is why I support Obama.
As a feminist, I believe having a vision for what I want the world to become is more important than simply solving the problems that have arisen in the world that is.
That is why I support Obama.
As a feminist, I'm more concerned with creating a world my great, great grandchildren can live in than in trying to make things better for me right now.
That is why I support Obama.
As a feminist, I am convinced that building authentic relationships is a more effective, creative way to build peace than just strategizing to destroy enemies and manipulating alliances.
That is why I support Obama.
As a feminist, I relate more to the honest sharing of a wife who sometimes misses a note, to the too-scripted sharing of a woman who never does.
That is why I support Obama.
As a feminist, I look forward to voting for the first woman President; but when I do, I want her to be one whose positions and policies reflect a feminine worldview.
That is why I support Obama.
As a feminist, I get that masculine armor is not our strength, our ability to love is our greatest power, and our urge to repair is our greatest calling.
That is why I support Obama, pray for him unceasingly, try to strengthen his chances…. and will support whoever wins.
----- Marianne Williamson
Posted by mwblog at 08:13 PM | Comments (1)
