FourScore
FourScore's JournalDid I ever tell you about when I hung out with the daughter of the Chief of Police?
He was a white chief in a major southern city. Doesn't matter exactly where except it was the Deep South.
She was quite sweet. She became my best friend.
My parents had fought for civil rights in the 60's alongside some impressive people. It was a conversation she and I had once about our fathers' struggles with race and the work our fathers had done there in the South that began our friendship. We were in high school. It was the 70's.
She talked about the death threats made against her father. She confided in me how often her house had to be guarded by policemen because of threats made against her family.
She described a shootout that was covered live on TV, whereby they falsely reported that her father had been shot and killed in the line of duty, and she and her family fell apart. Her Dad walked in hours later -- not knowing that everyone was grieving his death.
Once on a live, local, talk show, her father was answering call-in questions. Someone called in and said he was stalking and planning to rape one of his pretty blonde daughters. Thank God, it never happened.
She knew that she had to be good, otherwise people would claim that she got away with stuff because of her father. Her whole family used to be republican, but none of them agree anymore with the republican party so they have voted democrat since the 80's. She is a strong environmentalist and her father is an advocate for womens' reproductive rights. He says he has seen too many young girls die from a coat hanger.
I love my friend. She is a deep and wonderful person. And I love her family.
Best Comment of the Year
Thu Mar 29, 2012 at 07:13 AM PDT
by EdinStPaul
This is one of the best bits I've read in a while. This is Linda from Oklahoma responding to Gail Collin's brilliant analysis of events related to the murder of Trayvon Martin:
"Why do lawmakers make it harder and harder to get an abortion, even in the cases where the mother will die, but easier and easier to get a gun? Do they only care about a life before it is born?
Why don't gun buyers have to follow the same rules women are forced to follow? Wait 48 hours after applying. View on ultrasound of a body with a bullet in it. Listen to the heartbeat of someone as they die of a gunshot wound. Get a lecture from a surgeon on what it is like to operate on a gunshot wound. After all that, if a person still wants a gun, he or she can buy one. Why should buying a gun be any easier than having an abortion?"
If you had to pick a song that would best sum up the 21st century thusfar
what would you choose? There are certain songs that capture an era. "Mrs. Robinson" captures the 60's for my Dad. "Miss American Pie" is another one. What would you say for this era?
I need some help with this. Any suggestions would be helpful.
Senator, when you took the oath of office...
THIS IS FLOATING AROUND FACEBOOK:
On Wednesday, March 1, 2006, at a hearing on the proposed Constitutional Amendment to prohibit gay marriage, Jamie Raskin, professor of law at American University, was requested to testify. At the end of his testimony, Republican State Senator Nancy Jacobs said: "Mr. Raskin, my Bible says marriage is only between a man and a woman. What do you have to say about that?"
Raskin replied: "Senator, when you took your oath of office, you placed your hand on the Bible and swore to uphold the Constitution. You did not place your hand on the Constitution and swear to uphold the Bible." The room erupted into applause.
Catholic church abuse: at least one youth castrated for 'homosexuality'
Catholic church abuse: at least one youth castrated for 'homosexuality'Dutch News
Saturday 17 March 2012
At least one boy under the age of 16 was castrated to 'help' his homosexual feelings while in Catholic church care in the 1950s, the NRC reported on Saturday.
But there are indications at least 10 other boys were also castrated, the paper said. The claims were not included in the Deetman report on sexual abuse within the Catholic church published at the end of last year.
The paper says the one confirmed case concerned a boy - Henk Heithuis - who reported being sexually abused by priests to the police in 1956. After giving evidence, he was placed in a Catholic-run psychiatric institution where he was then castrated because of his 'homosexual behaviour'...
SNIP
...Vic Marijnen, who went on to become prime minister in 1963, was chairman of the children's home where Henk Heithuis and dozens of other children were abused until 1959...
http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2012/03/catholic_church_abuse_at_least.php
I Love Her
Follow the link and read the whole post. It is beautiful.Wed Mar 21, 2012 at 03:58 PM PDT
I Love Her
by leavingthezoo
Our friendship began in 1989. I was fourteen. We were nothing alike, and the spark of our relationship began with a playful car theft. I say playful because we warned the boy whose car we were going to steal that we were, in fact, going to steal his car. He drove a yellow mustang. We were bored. Bored girls with access to the keys of a yellow mustang leads to car theft. We returned the car with no damage, and the beginning of a friendship thoroughly cemented.
I knew I loved her then. I just had no point of reference to explain how I loved her.
My mother didn't trust her from the beginning. She was a few years older than me, sported blond bleached hair and wore bright red lipstick. I remember my mother saying to me, "She's too old for you to be hanging out with. She's too fast. She will lead you down the path of ruin." I didn't know if it was true or not, but I was pretty steadfast in being led down that exact path if it meant following her.
We spent the next couple of years cultivating a friendship that would reveal she is a realist. I am a dreamer. She embraces the present while I reach for the future. She is tough while I am soft hearted. She has an ornery streak, and I bring the laughter. For every personality difference we have, we are equally different in appearance. She's blond haired, and blue eyed. My hair is nearly black, and my eyes aren't far behind. She's a short stack. I bump my head on clouds. In most ways, we are different.
As often happens, life led us in different directions. I moved to the state of Washington, while she settled down and married. I always assumed I would marry, too, but I didn't. I would come close a couple of times, but my heart could never settle into the idea of forever. I thought it was because I was too young, or too busy chasing dreams, or noticed red flags in relationships. I didn't realize I had already found whom I wanted to be in my life on a daily basis...
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/03/21/1076523/-I-Love-Her
Things I've Learned from Republicans During Primary Season
Wed Mar 21, 2012 at 05:48 AM PDT
Cheers and Jeers: Wednesday
by Bill in Portland Maine
...Things I've Learned from Republicans During Primary Season
I know there's a ways to go before the GOP anoints its candidate, but to me it seems like the liveliest stretch of the campaign season is sealed in amber. Bachmann: out. Cain: out. Huntsman: [however you say "out" in Mandarin Chinese]. Gingrich: functionally out. No more debates. No more state fairs. While the memories are still fresh, here are a few of the things that I learned from the candidates over the last eight months:
> The unemployment rate doesn’t matter.
> Building a colony on the moon is possible within 8 years.
> It takes 13,000 people living on a moon colony before it can apply for statehood.
> Building a fence that electrocutes Mexicans at the border will teach them a lesson
> Elvis was born on the day he died.
> Having a $500,000 revolving account at Tiffany's is no big deal--everybody has one.
> Corporations are people.
> It's acceptable to boo active-duty servicemembers who happen to be gay.
> 10 dollars in budget cuts in exchange for 1 dollar in tax increases is unacceptable.
> Satan has settled in America disguised as energy-efficient light bulbs.
> The rich are hurting and deserve tax cuts.
> The poor and unemployed are slacking and deserve benefit cuts.
> All our problems can be solved with a 9-9-9 plan.
> The press is made up of meanies.
> The best form of contraception is holding an aspirin between your knees.
> Political appointees of the Muslim faith need to sign a loyalty oath.
> Gay people can get married anytime as long as it's to a member of the opposite sex.
> Dogs love roaring down the highway strapped to the top of a car.
> Allowing the housing crisis to achieve the worst-case nightmare scenario is the wise thing to do.
> The auto industry's spectacular rise from the ashes wasn't done correctly so the results are illegitimate.
> Children are not scrubbing enough toilets.
> A politician who cheats on his wife is doing it out of fierce patriotism.
> A pregnancy created via rape or incest is a magical gift.
> Three federal departments that must be eliminated are Commerce, Education, and the third one.
> Trees in Michigan are the right height.
> If you can't afford health insurance and you get sick, have the courtesy to die before you get to the emergency room.
> HPV vaccinations cause mental retardation.
> America is the most powerful nation on the planet. Porn is going to destroy it.
> Lobbyists and historians are interchangeable.
>Barack Obama bailed out the banks in the fall of 2008 when he was president...
http://www.dailykos.com/
HA!HA!HA!HA! LOVE these numbers!!!!
Wed Mar 14, 2012 at 08:54 AM PDT
Republicans have lost the birth control debate
by Joan McCarter
Nice corner you've painted yourself into there, GOP.
Seventy-seven percent of respondents to this Bloomberg poll think that the political debate over birth control should not be happening, and 62 percent completely reject the idea that this is about "religious liberty," and recognize that is absolutely is “a matter of women’s health and access to birth control.” Here's how one respondent, a Republican woman, responded on the question:
Hopefully a lot of Republicans, like Ms. Vetter, will finally wake up to the fact that the extremists are now in charge of their party. Maybe it will make them pay a little more attention to things like Mitt Romney vowing to end Planned Parenthood and rethink their support.
www.dailykos.com/story/2012/03/14/1074305/-Republicans-have-lost-the-birth-control-nbsp-debate
It lives!!
Sun Mar 11, 2012 at 05:30 AM PDT
It lives!!
by MattWuerker
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/03/11/1073002/-It-lives-?via=blog_1
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