Internal Decay

2005-02-20T02:46:00.000-06:00

I have been pondering the difference in what is acceptable in the different states/localities that we have lived. When my husband & I were first married, we lived in Brookings, SD. The people there acted as if I was coming from a barbaric land. They asked if I was enjoying the local amenities like running water, etc. The funny part of it was that a lot of the farms in and around Brookings did not have running water and their electric lights were just a hanging bulb from the ceiling in 1966. They had cisterns and outhouses. Many of the farmers did not have a telephone either. That really shocked me since we had had running water in the house, electricity, and phone service for years. The only place I knew of that did not having running water was a ranch near Isabel but they did have electricity & phone service. The East River perception was that we were all "cowboys" & "Indians" out west. Needless to say, I was in a state of culture shock.

This is a short list of the differences I have noticed in some of the places that we lived:

The blindness to the poor & prejudice toward Indians in Martin, SD. I have never seen a more disadvantaged economic group of people than the Indians on the SD reservations. There were families living in abandoned, wrecked cars. No houses – just those cars even in the winter! They seemed to walk or bum rides from people with cars in order to go anywhere. And yet, they were very hygienic compared to groups of the poor I have seen in other localities. The weird part was that the "whites" I knew were very sympathetic to those poor "Negroes" down South (remember this was the 1960’s).

Texans were (are) arrogant – blustery, bragging, and never forgot that Texas had been an independent country for a short while. But their personal hygiene left a lot to be desired. According to my sister who runs apartment complexes, that hasn’t changed. She does not want to rent to Texans since they mess up the apartments so badly that it costs too much to clean the apartments in order to rent them again.

Utah was very interesting. You never want to live in a state that a dominant religion controls the state government. Talk about censorship. People told me that the library would not keep books with a Protestant or Catholic bent on the shelves. I tested that statement by giving the library 2 books. Lo & behold, the one with a Catholic story line was checked out of the library in 2 weeks & never returned. A very effective form of censorship without causing waves.

We won’t go into the way that jobs, recreation, and shopping was controlled in that little town. Nor the way that education, especially for females, was substandard. It has been the only place we lived that high school graduates could not read the warning signs placed in the gas refinery where I worked. And yet, the people were very warm-hearted. The flip side through was kids & women seemed to have a lot of black eyes and bruises showing. While we lived there, I heard that Utah had more lawsuits pending than any other state in the Union. The sad part of it is that I believe that statement was probably true.

What I remember most about Montana was the individualistic personalities and their figures of speech. People from Montana say "damn" & "Goddamn" a whole lot. You really sit up & take notice when a Catholic priest says "God-damn" (without emphasis) in a friendly voice. The phrase was just a figure of speech to him similar to a friend on mine's phrase "little shits" when talking about kids.

Here, people seem to be hung up with bowel language. I’ve heard the receptionists’ in the medical clinic inform patrons "I’ve had a brain fart, I can’t remember your name." My daughter's boss in her new job recommended that she take vitamin C but that "it would give her the shits". These are professional people and it really grabs your attention when they speak in this manner.

Guess what I'm trying to say is that every locality seems to have their blindspots. Unless you're an "outsider" calling attention to this blindspot, it is never recognized.

And there's the point.

2004-06-01T08:46:00.000-05:00

Well, how wonderful for Bushie Boy, he got himself a trophy to show his daddy. If it wasn’t clear what this business in the Gulf was it certainly is now.

Bush Keeps Saddam Gun at White House
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A handgun that Saddam Hussein was clutching when U.S. forces captured him in a hole in Iraq last December is now kept by President Bush at the White House, a spokesman confirmed on Sunday.

Did anyone notice that we still haven’t caught Osama bin Laden? As it would seem this war on terror isn't going so well for us, now is it?

Who's the enemy of freedom?

2004-05-12T09:22:00.000-05:00

The beheading of Nick Berg is thick in the news today. I can’t seem to make up my mind weather those that took part in this grisly act were opportunists or were truly trying to make a statement about the abuses in Abu Ghraib prison that have recently reported to the public.

Something like this was bound to happen after the abuses were brought to the public. What gets me is that the Bush administration has taken this incident more seriously then it is taking in punishing those involved in the mistreatment of prisoners in Abu Ghraib. So now there’s a new manhunt underway to bring the people involved in beheading Nick Berg to “justice” with that I agree, they should be punished for killing someone.

White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan said. “It shows the true nature of the enemies of freedom. They have no regard for the lives of innocent men, women and children.”

Clearly the administration is fooling themselves, and maybe even some of the country, people in Iraq could just as easily turn that statement on us at the moment. We have invaded a country, and many people have died that weren’t soldiers. So what regard did the innocent men, women, and children receive in Iraq when we were firing ammo their way?

Related Links
U.S.: Beheaded civilian was warned to leave Iraq
Qaeda Leader Beheads U.S. Civilian in Iraq -Web Site

Events

2004-05-06T02:07:00.000-05:00

I have ignored this blog, Internal Decay, for months because even though I had things to grump about it didn’t seem “cost effective” in time and emotion to write about them. Unfortunately the events that hit the news this week about the torture and misconduct to the Iraq prisoners by American government service people have shoved me out of my apathetic and individualistic mood.

Yes, always there is someone in a service as large as the military that will do what’s easiest and most beneficial. They will do things that they know are wrong but they want the pressure to be relieved. Make it someone else’s problem. That happens in all large organizations. We have rules, codes of honor, chains of command, and especially laws from our Constitution and treaties with other nations that are supposed to prevent such occurrences. Make no mistake about this event. The little people in the military organization were responding to the pressures and the culture of those above them.

Remember Occam’s razor. William of Occam is known for the scientific and philosophic rule that entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily which is interpreted as requiring that the simplest of competing theories be preferred to the more complex or that explanations of unknown phenomena be sought first in terms of known quantities.

Known quantities in this case is the manner of how Pres. Bush and his administration have acted since the 2000 election.
Remember:
- the Koyoto Treaty
- the ABM treaty
- the Guantanamo Bay prisoners
- the declaring of war
- the lowering of taxes after declaring war (?)
- the alienating of our closest allies in the world (Australia turning to China; United Kingdom resenting being dragged into war on false pretenses)
- the non-funding of federal programs (while saying he espousing them)
- the environmental policy
- the Patriot Act

The list is long and those were events just in the forefront of my mind. Whether you agree or disagree with those events, remember the manner in which they came about - this administrations’ manner of action.

Now we have vividly seen part of the fruit of what Pres. Bushes administration is bearing. Most importantly, is this the way we want to go?

Related Links
Two Challenges Leave White House On Defensive
Bush Sr. Has Questions To Answer On Iraq
Bush Faces Fork In Road In Iraq

Essential Knowledge

2004-02-27T13:13:00.000-06:00

As I sit
Quietly following the breath
Mind and body fall away.

Learning to reject the will to live
Not accepting the will to die.

I wonder if I will fall in love
If I will know happiness
If I will know suffering
If I am to wander endlessly
Through this life alone.

None of that matters.
For everywhere I go
I am with myself
Do not grieve for me
As I know my true self.

I continue following the breath
As the body and mind fall away.

Can I die if nobody knows me...

2004-02-25T03:24:00.000-06:00

My body is old and tired, I will soon see the light
My mind is still stirring with the question of my life
The voice in my head seems so right

I am your creative spirit, dear child, there should be no fright
Soon I will move on, if you so choose, with you at my right
You will live on clear as the air and still as the night
To find another song just not in your current life

In answer to the question that you have shown
You can die in this life as unknown
But come with me to guide more along
And then it won’t matter that you passed on

This was literally my first attempt at poetry since SDSU (some 7 years ago); it’s not great but it borrows from Camie’s lines combined, though I'm sure this is not what she was going for. Hopefully it cheered her alittle that I would try after years.

Things running around my head.

2004-02-23T02:18:00.000-06:00

Am I real if no one knows me
If I die would anyone notice
Would it matter
Maybe I’m a dream
Or a whispered breath

Well, it was a shot, sorry Kenz, I can’t get anything to work these days. The next thing that I post will be a story of some kind. If anyone cares to try to improve on all or any of the lines, go for it, I can't seem to get anything but shit to come out.

Eulogy For a Bathroom Scale

2004-02-13T00:24:00.000-06:00

Dear friends and family, I share your grief. Not only was this a scale, but a bathroom scale, the most unloved of scales. It had a good home, was cared for from the beginning, until it took on a mind of its own, only revealing the difficult truth to its users. A union of fast food and mistrust were responsible for that, not to mention a dying 9V battery. Its fate was surely not deserved by any household appliance, being flung out the window into a busy street, smashed into multiple pieces. Yes, it is hard for us to see that anyone could be so cruel to an innocent creation but it shall always be remembered if we choose not to forget. This bathroom scale, with its darkened LCD display, is in a better place now, and by God's Will I pray that we all will see it again. May it rest in pieces.

AMEN...now go out and buy yourself a Silly Shannon doll and be merry. (I couldn't resist)

2004-02-11T18:43:00.000-06:00

If you live in the US the biggest news this week seems to be Janet Jackson’s breast appearing on the Super Bowl half time show (though it was covered somewhat). Sad that this would be the big story of the day when things like this are happening....

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/02/12/iraq/main599796.shtml

Ever get that feeling that we lost the important ball?

2004-01-16T07:31:00.000-06:00

[satire]Coming Soon to Retailers!

The Silly Shannon Doll!!

Now YOU can own the doll modelled after the original Leavenworth St street walker! This 8" inch tall wonder is fully done up with all the trendy clothing you've seen on Sex and the City and Cinemax, the weedwacker style do, and has uneven breasts, just like the infamous street walker herself! All her friends come separately, so don't let her get lonely and buy them all! Also coming soon is the Silly Shannon blow up doll with three orifices and removable male prosthetic genitalia, for those indecisive evenings.
[/satire]

Short Prose

2003-12-04T20:32:00.000-06:00

Waiting for morning stars to flicker
I take out my compass
And as I search for North,
I'm open to the free air that smiles around me.
I'm basking in the dream
Of a starry night's playground.

Watching Jose Padilla

2003-12-04T17:04:00.000-06:00

On June 9, 2002 at Chicago O’Hare International Airport the Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested a known terror suspect named Joe Padilla. At the time of detention every news organization broke their coverage to announce that an arrest had been made in the “War on Terror”.

In the process though, it opened to the public, a glimpse of the broad sweeping powers that had been handed to the President of the United States just days after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks. The House of Representatives and the Senate granted these powers just nine days after the attacks. The legislation of “The Patriot Act” (passed in January 2002) works to strengthen the Presidential powers granted. It also provides direction as how to handle detention of foreign nationals but not how to handle the detention of US citizens.

One of the strongest powers given to the executive branch was the ability to name anyone an enemy combatant of the United States. Generally, in past wartime situations service members of enemy armies, naval forces and collaborators have been arrested/detained on the “field of battle”. In Jose Padillas case though, circumstances are far different than those encountered in recent history. For you see, Jose Padilla is a citizen of the United States of America.

Most citizens of the U.S. take Habeas Corpus for granted. That is to say, that if you are arrested and charged with a crime, that you will be able to speak to and see an attorney in order to guarantee that you are not being mistreated by law enforcement. This is a civil liberty that is guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States. It was at the time of writing what separated us from English monarchial oppression. And has served up to this day what separates us from countries like China, Pakistan, North Korea and others where civil liberties are something that are read about.

Jose Padilla though has not seen an attorney once and he is facing indefinite detention because he has not been charged with any crime. In addition to being labeled an enemy combatant, the President has proclaimed that the courts may not second-guess his designation. This has civil liberties groups in this country screaming from rooftops and mountains. It is also the defining reason the Center for National Security Studies, the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, People for the American Way and the Rutherford Institute have filed a friend-of-the-court brief in Padilla v. Rumsfeld in U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York.

Essentially, on the orders of the executive branch, anyone could be imprisoned indefinitely by the military with no way to assert his innocence. Jose Padilla has been in a Naval brig since the time of his arrest. Which brings another point into this whole mess.

After the Oklahoma City bombing, there was a national dialogue on the roots of domestic terrorism. Much of what was discovered pointed to blatant abuses by the Federal Government. These included the use of National Guard troops and equipment during the Branch Davidian stand off in Waco, Texas. For most Americans it was the first and last time that they would hear of posse comitatus. Posse Comitatus refers to the power of law enforcement agencies to enlist the aid of civilians in enforcing laws.

After the American Civil War the period known as Reconstruction occurred. Legislation was passed at the national level that prohibits the use of US Military personnel and equipment against American Citizens to enforce the law except in specific instances as authorized by Congress (18 USC 1385). This act was later amended and extended to allow for allow for military assistance to civilian law enforcement agencies, such as stationing of DEA personnel aboard Naval and Coast Guard vessels for drug smuggling interdiction operations (10 USC 371-378). Politicians have recognized the dangers in using standing armies against civilian populations. Which brings us back to the case of Jose Padilla.

Jose Padilla was trained in Afghanistan by Al Qaida (The Base) and was definitely working at developing a plan to carry out a possible “dirty bomb” attack and kill dozens of American citizens. These details are not in dispute. And quite frankly, he probably deserves the treatment that he has received or worse. What is in dispute is what the zone of “active combat” is, what the line of jurisdiction is between U.S. military and civilian law enforcement is and how much power should be placed into the hands of one person to determine the fate of anyone.

Definitions

2003-11-26T13:24:00.000-06:00

Thanksgiving is defined according to my dictionary as (1) a formal public expression of thanks to God (2) an annual USA holiday observed on the fourth Thursday of November. Thanks (same dictionary) means an expression of gratitude. Those definitions were rather brief. I'm lazy and didn't want to think deeply. I headed for my Roget's International Thesaurus to get a better understanding of the meaning of thanksgiving and gratitude. WHAM

.1 NOUNS - gratitude, gratefulness, thankfulness, appreciation, appreciativeness; obligation, sense of obligation or indebtedness

.2 thanks, thanksgiving, praise, hymn, paean, benediction; grace, prayer of thanks; thank-you; acknowledgment, cognizance, credit, crediting, recognition; thank offering.

.3 VERBS be grateful, be obliged, feel or be or lie under an obligation, be obligated or indebted, be in the debt of; be thankful, thank God, thank or bless one's stars; appreciate, be appreciative of; never forget; overflow with gratitude.

.4 thank, bless; give one's thanks, express one's appreciation; offer thanks, give thanks, tender or render thanks, return thanks; acknowledge, make acknowledgments of, credit, recognize, give or render credit or recognition; fall on one's knees.

.5 ADJS thanks!, thank you!, I thank you!, merci! (Fr), gracias! (Sp), grazie! (Ital), dank!, danke schon! (Ger),gramercy!, much obliged!, many thanks!, thank you kindly!; I thank you very much!, merci beaucoup!, je vous remercie beaucoup! (Fr).

YIKES - this holiday is not about eating. It's about each of us! It's about our relationship to God, our self, our family, our ancestors, our community, our state, our nation, and our world.

Have a Great Thanksgiving!!!! May we all be good guests on this planet Earth.

P.S. Have a great meal too!!!!!!

Presente!

2003-11-23T19:58:00.000-06:00

I've been invited to blog here too, what were they thinking??? I've had a blog for over a year and I'll continue to post to it, but I'll be posting new poems on here from time to time.

Perception Anyone????

2003-11-16T19:34:00.000-06:00

Okay, when I was asked if I had anything I wished to rant about & wished to post, I thought that I would be sounding off about a lot of stuff that is happening within the USA & around the world. I DO get very frustrated about the politics, governing decisions, and just junk that happens in life. I'm sure that I'll get around to that stuff sometime soon but I have just finished reading a book that has caused me to reflect on perceptions - mine & others.

The book, A Mango-Shaped Space by Wendy Mass, is about a young teen that sees sounds, numbers, and letters in color. Sounds neat - but an incident in the 3rd grade taught her that other people do not have the same ability, her classmates call her a freak, the school contacts her parents, and she decides to hide this aspect of herself from everyone. She's doing fine, not great, acting normal until she hits the classes of Algebra & Spanish. The colors of words & letters of the same words in English & Spanish do not correspond, they are totally different. And algebra is just a nightmare of clashing colors. She's flunking those classes from day one. Her grades causes her to confess her perceptions to her parents & they actually start exploring the medical options which leads to her being diagnosed as having synesthesia (For more information about synestesia visit http://wearcam.org/synesthesia/synesthesia.html).

The book continues about handling changes in life but I was struck by how perceptions & how they happen really influence our decisions & how we act. Once the girl was diagnosed as having a condition that is medically called synesthesia, people treated her as a "more" normal person but until that occurred she either had to hide her color perceptions or consider herself crazy. AND everyone wants to be "normal" and accepted but just don't show any of the abnormal stuff that we all have to anyone else. How many of us in our life have learned to "hide" our reactions to stuff because it isn't "normal" and think of all the ways that it has changed our behavior to others & ourselves. It's mind boggling!!!

All of this reminded me of another story which is told to young kids but we all forget the story because more pressing concerns - life's happening - crowd out the truth of the story. Do you remember the story about two kids who are great friends? They play together while young, do everything together, tell each other everything that happens to themselves and then there is break in seeing each other. When they get back together, they find they cannot share all their thoughts & emotions like they used to be able to do. Each one misunderstands the other. Soon they are building "stone walls" around themselves for fear of being misunderstood. Each decides to build a stone fence around their "property" and after that they start throwing stones at each other. Finally one of them is killed.

The perception that the other could not understand how they felt caused from different life events caused them to "wall" themselves from each other. Then FEAR took control of the situation and they proceeded to hurt the other until one of them dies.

Roosevelt was so correct when he told us that "...first of all let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself---nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance" in his first Inaugural speech on March 4, 1933. He was addressing the nation concerning world events but that part of the speech is so true for personal feelings too. Bertrand Russell can be quoted from An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish when he writes, "Until you have admitted your own fears to yourself, and have guarded yourself by a difficult effort of will against their myth-making power, you cannot hope to think truly about many matters of great importance, especially those which religious beliefs are concerned. Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom, in the pursuit of truth as in the endeavor after a worthy manner of life."

Do you think that perceptions can lead to fear about others and ourselves? Do you suppose that FEAR is the driving force of "bad decisions" between people & nations? Is Fear controlling our decisions instead of love & understanding? Does fear lead to internal decay for nations and people????

Politics in Kenzy's World

2003-11-12T22:26:00.000-06:00

*Since I don’t use my journal for this sort for post I have asked Camie to post this here. Thanks Camie! Also, I thought that the title of her blog was more then appropriate given the following content. Comments as always are appreciated.

I have been sitting here stewing over the world scene after more deaths that occurred this week. And something entirely fascinating hit me, that could solve a few of the problems in the US - though in it’s wake leave a few more problems. Anyway here’s the idea, let’s give back Texas we don’t need them and some of their residents have been bitching about this very idea for years. Okay so we give back Texas, minus the oil fields of course; we’re keeping those cause God knows how many politicians of ours those have bought in the past.

Now let’s make this retroactive, we give them back Bushie Boy he isn’t a US resident any longer. Let him go back to murdering people via the death penalty, as he did before. For those that aren’t aware Texas under Bush’s reign killed more people via the death penalty then all the other states combined; not to say that I don’t believe in the death penalty but let’s be honest it is still just murder.

This also solves another problem, the border between what used to be the US and Mexico is no longer our problem. We now have a large buffer zone between Mexico and the US, and since we really won’t have a problem with many from Texas trying to come through as illegal aliens. we just have to watch for the same thing we did before.

Now that we have taken care of that part, let’s outlaw career politicians, they have been nothing but a nuisance since the fad started. They are a corrupt bunch that can’t find a real occupation, or want to improve things for themselves or their buddies that are rich, or will be after alittle “help” from their friend at the top. To hell with the rest of us, as we must not have anything to important to contribute. It’s time to give this country back to the people that actually work, and die for it, yep you got it the middle and lower classes.

This plan would cause a few things to slow down, but I can almost guarantee that we wouldn’t be seeing many, if any pissing contests between the US and other countries rulers. Be honest what has been going on since 9/11 has been a pissing contest, Bushie just got the perfect excuse that day, to do something that he was going to do anyway. To me the entire situation stinks, Bushie Sr. created a monster that, once backed into a corner and forgotten, bit back with a vengeance. What did we expect? You don’t give people weapons and fund the training of said people to kill, then walk away after telling them to fly a kite, and not get something bad as a result.

Don’t get me wrong I do love my country, but I’m not going to the one that turned into some kind of patriotic fool that started hanging flags because people died in NYC. I know that my country could be so much more then it is, and it kills me that the towers falling should have been a wake up call to this nation, that we have made some very piss poor decisions, have said, and done things that should not have been said or done. Instead we have started striping freedoms from our people, the very freedoms that generations before us have died to protect. And the sad part is that no one is noticing or they are rationalizing, that because of the attacks we should just hand over these freedoms for safeties sake; our ancestors that fought and died for the freedoms must be rolling in their graves.

How many senseless deaths will occur before something is done to stop these politicians from murdering not only our people but people from other countries as well? Why have the deaths of those unfortunate people on 9/11 caused freedoms to be striped away from the rest of us left standing? I’m sure that those that died that day (9/11) are rolling in their graves as well, about what has happened as a result of their deaths. Those that are rationalizing the effects from 9/11 are doing a disservice to those many people that perished on 9/11 and since then, in the fight of terrorism.

And so I leave you with these:

Every generation must wage a new war for freedom against new forces which seek through new devices to enslave mankind.
~Progressive Party Platform 1924~

One of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the great struggle for Independence.
~Charles A. Beard~

Thinking loudy,
Kenzy