"Georgia Christian Queens Meet Governor Sonny Perdue."And, here I thought the south was conservative and not very inclusive.
Had to post something to counter the behavior below, or maybe just to soothe my current mood. Therefore, the cartoon. It's from gapingvoid.com.
06 August 2006, in the eveningTake action. Contact the Israeli Consulate, 6300 Wilshire Blvd. Los Angeles, CA. Here are links to the consulate in SF, NY or one near you.
Dear Friends,
I regret coming to you again today, again with a story of hateful behavior, but I believe that it is a story I am to tell.
I was scheduled to leave Tel Aviv on Swiss Air flight number 255D at 15:55 this afternoon. I proceeded as usual to the baggage and security clearance area. After asking me both relevant and non-relevant security questions, the young woman security officer concluded by questioning why I did not have an Israeli visa even though I was carrying an Israeli passport!! Then she let me put my bags on the conveyor belt so that they could be screened, after decorating both bags and my passport with blue and green stickers. Then I saw her rushing to a supervisor who ordered the belt stopped. Approaching me he asked, "English or Hebrew?" I responded, "Please, Arabic." Arabic is one of two official languages of the State of Israel and I knew that it was my right in this "oasis of democracy"" to make that official request. Because I refused to speak other than Arabic, because I informed them that I am an Arab-Palestinian-Christian, and because down deep I knew that their behavior was designed to humiliate me, I insisted in conversing with them in the language I master which is Arabic, my mother tongue. At that point, Tal Vardi, the Security Duty Manager also showed up and insisted on speaking in any language other than Arabic. I refused. An Arab from Nazareth who happened to be present offered to translate when Mr. Vardi turned his back and turned toward me only to say, "You will not fly today!"
I called Mr. Caesar Marjieh, Director of the Department for Christian Communities who tried his best to assist me, but he did not succeed. I waited two hours thinking that someone with enough courtesy and good judgment would come, but to no avail. I had no alternative but to return to Jerusalem and inform my friends who were expecting me in Geneva today and London tomorrow of the situation. Later in the week I will file a suit in the High Court against the Security Duty Manager and his staff for violating my civil rights without cause.
My indignation is not for me, but it is for all people in occupied territories who face this kind of oppression and humiliation every day of their lives. This happened to an Anglican Bishop with special identification given him by the Department of the Interior and the Ministry of Religious Affairs. What do you imagine happens to others?
In, with, and through Christ,
The Rt. Rev. Riah H. Abu El-Assal
Bishop
The Diocese of Jerusalem
Palestine, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria
A photographer for the Times-Picayune of New Orleans who has undergone severe personal trauma since hurricane Katrina hit was arrested Tuesday after trying to get police to shoot him to death. Police said he claimed he was depressed after he found out he didn't have enough insurance money to rebuild his Katrina-damaged home.
Global warming is great. Granted, maybe it isn't really happening, and if it is there are strong reasons to doubt that humans have anything to do with it. But if the world is warming, I say "bravo." People in most parts of the globe should have no objection to a warmer, wetter climate. If the aliens were watching they'd conclude we were making our planet more habitable on purpose.He never gets around to things like increased wildfires, hurricanes, and other weather extremes. Just think of all the additional real estate that would be habitable and all else is irrelevant.
So if we see global warming for the beneficial trend that it is rather than a looming threat to life and limb, none of the "solutions" being proposed by the alarmists are necessary. There is no challenge posed by a slow-rolling phenomenon like global warming that cannot be overcome; and when deserts start blooming, blizzards stop hitting, and you are enjoying the surfing at your beach house in upper Newfoundland, you won't care what caused global warming, you'll just thank goodness it happened.
Barry Taylor, who blogs at Nevermind the Bricolage, teaches at both Fuller Seminary and Art Center in Pasadena, and is always insightful, gave the sermon this past Sunday at All Saints' Beverly Hills, as part of a three part series called "God in The Movies." (We are in Hollywood, so what do you expect.) You can listen to it here (about 15 minutes of your time, but worth it).
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has become increasingly dismayed over President Bush's support for Israel to continue its war with Hezbollah.
State Department sources said Ms. Rice has been repeatedly stymied in her attempts to pressure Israel to end strikes against Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon. The sources said the secretary's trip to the Middle East last week was torpedoed by the Israeli air strike of a Lebanese village in which 25 people were killed.
"I've never seen her so angry," an aide said.
This cartoon from the Christian Science Monitor says it all. It sure seems to me that Bush and team have no idea what they are doing and so they are just letting the situation deteriorate, but we can always claim "Mission Accomplished." Effective PR solves everything.
Harrods' corporate communications director Peter Willasey said the August launch came in response to high customer demand.Who are these people?
Nothing seems to be pissing me off this morning. Am I mellowing or is it a slow summer news day? (I guess since Bush is on vacation the world slows down.)"You can command the latest M-1 tank, feel the rush of a paratrooper freefall, fly a Cobra Gunship or defend your B-17 as a waist gunner," according to the proposal by Universal City Property Management III of Orlando.Maybe, instead of video games they will allow you to shoot real terrorists.
A Bloomberg/Los Angeles Times poll of Americans age 18 to 24 found Bush's approval rating was 20 percent, with 53 percent disapproving and 28 percent with no opinion. That compares to a 40 percent approval rating among Americans of all ages in a separate Bloomberg/Times poll.
A few weeks back I commented on a story about Las Vegas banning an outdoor soup kitchen. Now this Christian Science Monitor article details additional cities doing the same thing. How sad that efforts to feed the hungry are being hindered by NIMBY attitudes.But his Saturday morning feedings became so popular that the city booted him from Pritchard Park, a downtown hang-out, to suburban Aston Park, where a limited number of people come by.
"It's infuriating, because they're deliberately pushing us out of the way," the college student says, after a recent breakfast at Aston. "Plus we don't get as much foot traffic out here."
Asheville is one of several cities that is cracking down on mobile soup kitchens - "soupmobiles" - especially those stationed too close to established neighborhoods or high-rent districts.
A curious aspect of high temperature is that while crime and aggression rise with the heat, beyond a certain point, you start to see less violent crime.
Watching the Bush administration deal with the current crisis in the Middle East, I have been wondering how one solves a problem like this without talking to both sides. When I have been involved in VORP, an alternative approach to our criminal justice system, one of the keys is to talk to both the victim and the offender. Then to bring them together.Some, even within the White House, have started referring to the "Condi Rice show" -- suggesting that the Secretary of State spends too much time on television talking to a domestic audience and not enough in international negotiations.
Now, I would have loved to have been here.A thumping bass filled the nave of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in downtown Richmond, Virginia, on Wednesday night. A choir offered a simple and hypnotic chant from rapper Kanye West’s song “Jesus Walks” as young African Americans danced down the center aisle behind a thurifer and other acolytes.
As part of the Union of Black Episcopalians (UBE) 38th national conference, the Rev. Tim Holder of the South Bronx celebrated the Hip HopeMass that he and many hip hop artists created in 2004.
Dancers in a first wave were frenetic and elastic, changing their moves every few minutes. A second wave ambled together two-by-two in a combination of hip hop moves called snapping and stepping. The procession wound up and down the aisles of St. Paul’s three times, and when “Jesus Walks” concluded, the congregation roared its enthusiasm.
knees in front of me but Bishop Gene Robinson, whom I had met at GC 2003. A wonderful, godly man and a hero to many. We had a brief conversation after the service. He was in town to lead a retreat for some local Catholic clergy.
