Guest Blogger: What if Teabaggers Weren’t White?

Tim Wise is among the most prominent anti-racist writers and activists in the U.S. Wise has spoken in 48 states, on over 400 college campuses, and to community groups around the nation. Wise has provided anti-racism training to teachers nationwide, and has trained physicians and medical industry professionals on how to combat racial inequities in health care.

Excerpt:

“Imagine that hundreds of black protesters were to descend upon Washington DC and Northern Virginia, just a few miles from the Capitol and White House, armed with AK-47s, assorted handguns, and ammunition.

And imagine that some of these protesters —the black protesters — spoke of the need for political revolution, and possibly even armed conflict in the event that laws they didn’t like were enforced by the government? Would these protester — these black protesters with guns — be seen as brave defenders of the Second Amendment, or would they be viewed by most whites as a danger to the republic?

What if they were Arab-Americans? Because, after all, that’s what happened recently when white gun enthusiasts descended upon the nation’s capital, arms in hand, and verbally announced their readiness to make war on the country’s political leaders if the need arose.

Imagine that white members of Congress, while walking to work, were surrounded by thousands of angry black people, one of whom proceeded to spit on one of those congressmen for not voting the way the black demonstrators desired.

Would the protesters be seen as merely patriotic Americans voicing their opinions, or as an angry, potentially violent, and even insurrectionary mob? After all, this is what white Tea Party protesters did recently in Washington.

( read the entire post here)

Parent Alert: Kids' Tylenol, other drugs recalled

Company says more than 40 children's medicines affected

“McNeil Consumer Healthcare issued the voluntary recall late Friday in the United States and 11 other countries after consulting with the FDA. The recall involves children's versions of Tylenol, Tylenol Plus, Motrin, Zyrtec and Benadryl, because they don't meet quality standards.” Photo source

Kent State slayings 40 years later: Special graduations set

This years’ Special Graduation for the Kent State Class of 1970 is about closure.

I wonder when I, and the other Americans who went into Cambodia and sparked this sad incident, will ever get closure?

Who will talk about our experience and disillusionment when we found out that students our age were being shot by the National Guard because they were protesting what we were doing in Cambodia? We were there to end the war. We knew the enemy command center was operating out of Cambodia for years. They’d cross the border and then dash back to Cambodia, knowing our politicians wouldn’t let us chase them down.

Then the decision was made to bring the conflict to an end by killing and capturing the NVA Command structure that was staging attacks in Cambodia. At first, most Americans didn’t even know we were there, let alone what our mission was. When bits and pieces leaked out about our activities the general picture formed by college students, and activists, was that the war was being extended and more people were going to die. They reacted accordingly. What followed was a tragedy.

I wish someday our story would be put into a different context. We thought we were bringing an end to the war, and that we’d be greeted as heroes when we defeated the enemy. Instead people remember what happened to the students and it seems like those of us that went into Cambodia were/are the bad guys in history. Even the men that died fighting there have been given no respect. Their ghosts haunt me, and I guess they always will.

Excerpt:

“Forty years later, Gary Lownsdale is still haunted by what he felt and what he saw in the last days of his senior year.

Shock and outrage over the May 4 National Guard slayings of four Kent State University students, on the other end of Ohio from his University of Cincinnati campus. Then fear and confusion as schools across the state and much of the country saw the demonstrations against the expansion of the Vietnam War into Cambodia swell into angry, combative confrontations.”

Nothing Screams Charity Like Naked Women

The first non-profit that I noticed using naked women as a lure was PETA. Apparently, there are plenty of other organizations (like the two non-profits mentioned in this article) that use the same female hook to bring in the bucks in the name of something.

“Is it the shock value that will get more attention to the project, and hence more money to the cause? Or maybe, just maybe, this is just the closest men can come to paying for sex and both get away with it AND feel good about it?”

It’s been 35 years since the fall of Vietnam –what have we learned?

It’s hard to believe over three decades have passed since I was slogging through rice paddies. My experience there changed my life. All of my world views went out the door as I learned how to survive by whatever means. I had to numb myself against the almost daily horrors there. When I returned to the states I was so lost that I led a homeless life for two years – living out of my old 1964 Chevy Impala.

So what has our country learned about the futility that was the Vietnam War? In my opinion, our government hasn’t learned a damn thing. The lesson didn’t soak through to the Pentagon Hawks who steered us into TWO WARS (better than one!). Afghanistan, in particular, is a mirror of the Nam. How could people not see this?

Then again, some people knew all about history, but ignored it for the cause of greed. Greed, you say? Let me explain; we know that Iraq was an “oil war,” but are you aware that Afghanistan is one too? That’s right. Testimony before the US Congress is circulating on the internet. It pertains to a proposed oil pipeline through Central Asia that is applicable to the current war in Afghanistan.

See “Is pipeline behind the War?

I think we have the answer as for learning our lesson in Vietnam. We didn’t, and the Hawks in the Pentagon continue to sacrifice our troops in the name of greed. What really pisses me off is when we try to take the high ground and claim we just want to free the Afghanistan people from tyranny. What a hypocritical lie that is!  

35 Years after the Fall of Saigon in pictures and story.

Excerpt:

“By the time American forces withdrew in 1975 and Saigon fell to Ho Chi Minh's Communists, 58,000 Americans and between 1 million and 2 million Vietnamese had died. It was the longest war in U.S. history and the most unpopular American war of the 20th century. In this 1965 photo, paratroopers cross a river in the rain near Ben Cat, in the south.”

They only want to help the little guys…right?

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Why Obama should not have checked 'black' on his census form

Here’s a good opinion piece by Elizabeth Chang,  on why President Obama should have acknowledged both his black and white backrounds when he filled out the census form this year.

She also correctly pointed out it was important to recognize all of one’s heritage. Not just one side. There’s no stigma to being biracial these days, and I agree with the author – Obama blew it.

“I have always considered Barack Obama to be biracial, and I had hoped that his election would help our country move beyond the tired concept of race. Unfortunately, the president is not getting with my program.

Although I knew Obama self-identifies as African American, I was disappointed when I read that that's what he checked on his census form. The federal government, finally heeding the desires of multiracial people to be able to accurately define themselves, had changed the rules in 2000, so he could have also checked white. Or he could have checked "some other race." Instead, Obama went with black alone.” Go here to read the rest.

Folk art on four wheels

Whether you consider them to be transportable treasures or just a bump in the road of modern-day car culture, it's impossible to ignore art cars when they come into view.You'll know them when you see them — they're those wacky vehicles that artists transform from anonymous look-a-like automobiles into one-off works of art using paint, glue, magnets, lights and a wide variety of attached materials and objects. Go here to read this article.

VAT’s All the Fuss About?

Have you heard about the value-added tax (VAT), a horrible new tariff Americans will soon have to shoulder?

The alarm is sounding on the conservative Web site Townhall.com, in the editorials of The Wall Street Journal, and on the opinion pages of The Washington Post (as well as in the pages of NEWSWEEK): consumers can expect to soon see the feared VAT sneaked into price tags nationwide.

How an unlikely tax became right-wing pundits' latest fascination                                           

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Where are the Tea Partiers when you need them?

Activists for Latino and immigrant rights -- and supporters of sane governance -- held weekend rallies denouncing the new immigration law in Arizona and vowed to do everything they could to overturn it.

You know who I was looking for?

 The Tea Partiers. Why shouldn’t I have looked for these patriots who believe that an overreaching government poses a serious threat to individual freedom? It seems to me that a law allowing individuals to be detained and interrogated on a whim -- and requiring legal residents to carry identification documents, as in a police state -- would send the Tea Partiers into a frenzy.

But there were no “Don’t Tread on Me” flags waving. There were no men and women wearing colonial clothing and passing out copies of the Constitution. I looked for the placards calling for the good old days – We Want Our Country Back! But there were none. Several weeks ago I wrote a column Tea Party Utopia: no taxes, no government that generated a lot of reader input on the T-S chat forum. The following observation enraged some people and they called me a racist. 

“I've yet to see persons of a minority race at a political tea party. I'm not sure why that is. It would be nice to see the mainstream media showing tea party rallies that include people of different races calling to “get their country back.” I don't think that's happened yet. I could be wrong.”

So I ask again, why weren’t the Tea Partiers out there supporting the American Hispanics who would be adversely affected by this new immigration law? What about their rights? What about that talk of Big Brother waiting to take away the common Americans rights? 

 Or is there some kind of exception if the people whose freedoms are being taken away happen to have brown skin and might speak Spanish? You tell me.

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PHARM CO. TO PAY FINE FOR PROMOTING SEROQUEL AS ANTI-PTSD DRUG USED BY THE VA

This news should be of great interest to millions of veterans who were given AstraZeneca.

Thanks to VAWatchdog.org :

AstraZeneca has to pay a half billion dollar fine for claiming Seroquel was as anti-PTSD drug. The medicine was used as part of the VA's deadly PTSD cocktail given to PTSD sufferers.

Feel down? It may be better to talk to the dog

My pug Millie (shown here) is a great listener. She’s also a great therapy dog. I better watch out here – she isn’t a licensed therapy dog and I don’t want some therapy dog activists getting upset thinking I’ve don’t know the difference.

In one of my recent columns I talked about therapy dogs: 

What do dogs, cats, and PTSD have in common?

When the column came out most people enjoyed it, but there were some therapy dog trainers with organizations that felt I was misleading the public when I said my pug Millie is my therapy dog (in the column). I was being light-hearted about it, but some people just didn’t get it I guess.

Anyway…let’s segue into today’s article on pets and people:

Many married couples say they share their troubles with their pet, poll finds

Excerpt:

“A third of pet-owning married women said their pets are better listeners than their husbands, according to an Associated Press-Petside.com poll released Wednesday. Eighteen percent of pet-owning married men said their pets are better listeners than their wives”

‘Sunset Daze’ reveals bawdy reality of seniors

Retirees display dirty mouths, sense of adventure on new reality program

“Sunset Daze,” which makes its debut tonight, pushes the button as it tries to hold its own in the boozy, oversexed reality TV genre. The first episode has commentary on vibrators and going “commando,” slang for not wearing underpants. WE positions the series as “The Golden Girls” meets “Jersey Shore,” the ribald MTV series that spawned Snooki.

Mexico warns citizens in Arizona

Turnabouts fair play I’d say. How many times have we issued warnings to our citizens traveling in Mexico?

This is an issue that’s growing bigger by the day as November elections loom nearer. We’re already seeing plenty of grand-standing, but folks…we ain’t seen nuthin yet! 

Critics decry new immigration law as discriminatory

“Mexico warned its citizens living in or traveling to Arizona that they could be "harassed" there after the state passed one of the toughest immigration laws in the United States last week.”

Newborn diminutive pinto stallion may be a record-breaker

Four-year-old Garrett Mullen watches three-day-old pinto stallion named Einstein in Barnstead, N.H., Sunday, April 25,2010. The diminutive horse born in New Hampshire could lay claim to the world record for lightweight foal. The pinto stallion named Einstein weighed just 6 pounds and measured 14 inches in height when he was born Friday in Barnstead, N.H. Those proportions fit a human baby just about right but are downright tiny for horse, even a miniature breed like Einstein.

Go here to see more photos of Einstein.

Are Tea Partiers Racist?

A new study shows that the movement's supporters are more likely to be racially resentful.

Since the Tea partiers emerged there has been accusations that they are racist. There’s been no empirical evidence to support those claims…until now:

Excerpt:

“A new survey by the University of Washington Institute for the Study of Ethnicity, Race & Sexuality offers fresh insight into the racial attitudes of Tea Party sympathizers. "The data suggests that people who are Tea Party supporters have a higher probability"—25 percent, to be exact—"of being racially resentful than those who are not Tea Party supporters," says Christopher Parker, who directed the study. "The Tea Party is not just about politics and size of government. The data suggests it may also be about race."

Vintage ads - What are these people doing?

What are they doing? Apparently, the girl on the left is choosing a modern-styled lamp, and the couple on the right is preparing to drill and paint things (and can barely contain the excitement).

If you like this kind of vintage advertising go here to see more.

CCLE advancing freedom of thought

The Center for Cognitive Liberty & Ethics (CCLE) is a network of scholars elaborating the law, policy and ethics of freedom of thought. Their mission is to develop social policies that will preserve and enhance freedom of thought into the 21st century.

The CCLE is dedicated to protecting and advancing freedom of thought in the modern world of accelerating neurotechnologies. Their paramount concern is to foster the unlimited potential of the human mind and to protect freedom of thought.

The CCLE supports technological advances, and believes that the application and regulation of new drugs and neurotechnologies are best channeled by a renewed allegiance to the fundamental right to freedom of thought. Their guiding principles are privacy, autonomy and choice.

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Betting on Ruin – threats abroad and at home

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Do space aliens pose risks to Earth? One genius thinks so

Growing up I watched every Sci-Fi movie that came out. The majority of the space aliens depicted during the fifties and early sixties were threats to mankind.

But things started to change in the late seventies and early eighties and space aliens got a makeover. Instead of being threats, aliens were friends with earthlings. Think E.T., and it’s popular spawn of good space aliens that followed on the big screen.

A noted Astrophysicist, Stephen Hawkins, recently told his peers (and the press) that earthlings better avoid contact with space aliens because he doesn’t think they are going to be nice to us.

Shoot…Hawkins even suggested that if space aliens discover our world that they will probably want to colonize it.

I’m not sure how this genius (and I’m not being rude because he is a real genius) came to the conclusion he did, but the way I figure it there was always a 50-50 chance of extra terrestrial’s being good or bad. Call it universal odds. The fact is we can speculate all we want about visitors from space. Until contact is made the story won’t be told. If anyone’s still around to tell it that is!