Flinging Poo

Last night I went to a friends house. He was hosting a cast party for a show he's in. The main room we're doing our social thing in has a table with food in the center and arrayed around it are the small groups of people talking about this or that. Prominently displayed on one wall is a picture. The picture are photos and paintings of 6 famous people. First, is Judas Escariot. Then, there's Mary Antoinette, Rasputin, Hitler, Joseph McCarthy, and finally Bill Clinton. It's obviously a witty commentary because you have what is a collection of disreputables and grouped with them is Clinton, infering that he belongs to this group. Beneath his portrait is printed: "Coming soon". Witty, no doubt, but lost on the person putting these tyrants together on one canvas is the irony, and boy is it rich. It is most obvious the policital leanings of the 'author' of this work. The person, in grouping Clinton with the bad seeds is suggesting that he is too and nobo...

1. I have been ernest many times in my pleas to ask something of God and I've never received a whisper of a voice back. I've wanted to talk to my Dad, but have never heard any voices talking back. I would venture to say that if I had heard either, anyone upon hearing of that would think I'm 'mental' and suggest I see a psychiatrist, no? How about priests? They say they 'talk to God' and that God 'speaks' to them, but they never claim to have actually heard an actual voice. If all this time the real audio communication is only one-way, how is there any proof that anything is on the other side? 2. Sure, there are stories of miracles, but in your life or mine or anyone we know... When was the last time there has been an unequivical miracle happen that cannot be explained away as anything else but a miracle? 3. When people get a touchdown, they thank God. When they're rescued from a burning building, they thank God. When they're rescued from a pr...

What are some trends I see and the possible directions they might go - Education and Libraries - After high school, I see community colleges playing prominant roles. They cater to needs particular to the area so are more relavent to the graduates, who come out with the skills to 'hit the ground running'. Academic universities I see eventually moving to Cyberspace. Continually rising costs and uncertain value post-graduate-wise will I think allow online universities to gain traction. I believe eventually all academic universities will end up online, save those that require direct involvement (hard sciences). Even with these, there is the possibility of having home labs. They'd be expensive, but how much more expensive than moving on campus and the course costs and books? Likewise, I see libraries moving almost exclusively online. Healthcare - Whether the neo-Nazi's like it or not, universal healthcare, in one form or another, will have to come to the United States. Rem...

It would be fair to say that some of my earliest memories of childhood were of my mother being beaten by my father. They weren't the only ones, but they were the strongest and have had the most lasting effect on me emotionally. I recall many memories from back then. I had many normal experiences and it was like I led a normal life, but had this other part of my life that I kept hidden from others, like a second life where I stood witness to the brutalities of my father. My mother has said he used to beat me, but I don't have memories of this. They are all of my mother. I remember her being pulled around part of the kitchen by her hair. I remember him yelling and throwing a ketchup bottle at her and it smashing against the refridgerator and all the red spraying against it's side. I remember him beating her with his belt, or asking her to get a coat hanger for him. When she wouldn't he demanded that I get one for him. I remember panicked and crying because I would have to...

Shorty- -Was a roommate with Jason Miller (actor, priest in Exorcist), for a summer at his mothers summer stock (?) -Was a driver for Paul Newman and his wife during one of his movies - "Rachel, Rachel" (Paul's wife talked about publishing his poetry, which he wrote on the stock sheets). He smoked pot with the screenwriter (Stewart Stern?). Promised a part in a new movie being produced in NYC. He turned it down. He knew the guy they went with instead and how they got him to blush for the camera ("He was a young guy and kind of innocent and Paul shouted as they were shooting 'Look at her nice tits'"). -Sat on Buster Crab's knee one a kids show on ABC that his father producted/directed. -There's a picture of him in a crib, being strolled by the elder Carradine (Keith's father). My mother has the picture. - Invited to have lunch with Elvis; decided against it because he wasn't 'cool anymore'. - Greenwhich Village - Harper Bergoff Sch...

Like many Americans, I find the issue of Health Care (as an oxymoron, ironically enough), a leading issue. Unlike many Americans I don't see the correlation between a Single Payer system reform and Communism. Let me give a few reasons why moving to a Single Payer system offers many advantages over what we presently have. From a purely macroeconomic view moving to a Single Payer system of health care in America gives advantages to our businesses, whether a Mom and Pop shop or a major multinational corporation. If you ask a small or medium-sized business owner what makes his service or product uncompetitive in the marketplace, he is likely to point out the crushing burden of having to pay health coverage to his employees. We certainly don't have to look so far down the ladder for that insight, however. General Motors has priced itself out of competitiveness and likely in the future out of business entirely due to weight of it's health care costs to its employees, especially t...

Tuition was raised by an average of 6.6% over last year. Overall, it could be said that inflation ( Consumer Price Index), has outstripped average wage increases. It is so much a part of common knowledge that it no longer outrages anyone and people just shrug their shoulders and say 'what can you do?' in resignation. Clearly, this is not the case for everyone, but for a large number of Americans, it is. If there was one thing that some of the Post-WWI Democratic Presidents did, it was address the gaping difference in income between the wealthy and the poor. What this did initially was to increase the size of the Middle Class. It was soon discovered that a well-financed Middle Class was the key to powering an economy, especially if they were in the majority. This expanded our economic power and enabled us to have enough money to throw around to field foreign armies without blinking. Then, Reagan came in with his "Trickle Down Economics". The assumption here was that y...