Here is the NYT analysis of the speech:
http://www.nytimes.com/...

Former Vice President Al Gore said on Thursday that Americans must abandon fossil fuels within a decade and rely on the sun, the winds and other environmentally friendly sources of electric power, or risk losing their national security as well as their creature comforts.

Mr. Gore called for the kind of concerted national effort that enabled Americans to walk on the moon 39 years ago this month, just eight years after President John F. Kennedy famously embraced that goal.

Math mania will be an occasional series.  This post is an edited version of one I wrote for Education/Uprising, more than a year ago. A list of earlier diaries is here).

What if kids loved to learn?

What if at the end of class, they wanted it to be longer, and kept the teacher in the hallway answering questions?

What if they learned that coupling their imaginations to their powers of reasoning would give them a tool of awesome power for exploring the cosmos?

What if an 11 year old got so excited by his insights that he yelled out

OH WOW! I get this now!

What if all this happened in math class?

Conflicted.

This is how I feel this Independence Day.

We are a diverse nation, full of promise, potentially capable of leading the world into a safer, more humane future. I reject the one that has been perverted by a small group of greedy corporatist thugs into a massive killing machine, counting upon institutionalization of fear and bigotry to motive it's citizens.

My first allegiance is to humanity.

That does not mean I must necessarily reject my nationality; being an American is part of who I am, as well. But 'being an American' does not mean accepting the worst policies of the government, accepting the actions of powerful rich elites who set our national path. I refuse to accept fear, ignorance and bigotry as part of my patriotism, I will not let the propaganda of hate sully my membership in this common wealth we share, that we call 'America'.

(Cross posted from Docudharma)

"Modern man likes to pretend that his thinking is wide-awake. But this wide-awake thinking has led us into the mazes of a nightmare in which the torture chambers are endlessly repeated in the mirrors of reason."

Octavio Paz

In late September of 2001, I was awakened by the sounds of sirens.  My roommate, who was an EMT, awoke also, and identified the sirens as police and fire, but not ambulance.  We lived in the downtown area of a mid-sized urban center, so sirens were nothing new.  These were rather close, though, and it was a bit disquieting.  After a few minutes, however, we shrugged our shoulders and went back to bed.

In the morning, I told David I was walking down to the corner store to buy some cigarettes.  The walks had almost become a ritual; in the mornings, I walked down to buy cigarettes, and in the evenings, David walked down to buy beer.  I jounced down the stairs to the sidewalk, walked down two blocks, and rounded the corner.

There, where David had bought beer for us not ten hours earlier, stood a blackened, twisted heap of concrete blocks and charred wood.  I think I just stood there stupidly for a few minutes, staring, until my half-somnabulant mind connected the sirens of the night before with the wreckage in front of me.

Over the past few weeks the issues of unity, partisan politics, and media objectivity have been hotly debated.  As I listen to people sharply divided on issues like civil liberties, gun control, and the war it’s gotten me to wondering the reason we’re all in this country together anyway.

Why did we go through the Civil War?  Why didn't Lincoln just propose 'the divided states of America'?  Or a ‘two sides of America’- the South could be the lower east side and the north the upper east side of the nation (visually speaking).  Today we have more intricate titles for these distinctions- we have red and blue states. (Which always always seems to conjure up thoughts of Dr. Seuss.)  And just for the fun of muddling it all, the media has recently introduced the term ‘purple states’.  And now we can’t just chop the country in half; there’s no one region that’s completely red or blue.  Wanna declare the northeast Democratland? ‘Not so fast’ says New Hampshire...

Then there’s the real beauty of it all...

Sorry for the shortness of the diary.

I just got word at 6 PM CST today that my father passed away.

I know that many people here in the land of DK were concerned about his condition and it very much touched me.

I know I will probably never meet many or any of you in "real life" and I also know to some of you I am an "outsider" as a Republican (Although I often write about how I disagree with the GOP)

<More after the break>

If anyone would want, the family is taking donations (as flowers are not commonly used in our religion) at http://www.chai.org.il/... in whatever name you would see fit. (Or you can email me at houstonbfskinner at netscape.net for more information.)

It has taken me four days to get my wits together and write this diary.  I can't promise that it will be anything close to coherent.  I just know one thing.  We desperately need to elect Barack Obama as the next President of the United States.  The humanity of our nation's children depends on it.

I have been teaching Art in the urban public schools of Miami for 26 years.  I just lost my job, since any student who cannot score above a certain level on the FCAT exam that Jeb Bush instituted as a requirement for graduation does not receive any elective courses throughout their entire high school career.

It is a tragedy beyond my wildest nightmare.

A Love Story

(Note: although the following deals with what has been happening in my own province, I feel that the subject of the matter and its dénouement are quite à propos for any secular, free and "open" society - especially with regards to the still on-going debates about immigrants and immigration)

The Bouchard-Taylor Commission on cultural differences and immigrant integration in Québec launched a series of public hearings in September 2007, travelling throughout the province in order to hear from individual citizens, groups and institutions, in addition to experts on cultural communities, immigrant issues, religion and Québec's identity.

The commission, headed by philosopher Charles Taylor and sociologist Gérard Bouchard, aimed at capping the often bitter public debate on reasonable accomodation and integration of immigrants in the province.

The report has been released and is now available online for public consultation (the english version is to come "shortly").

Iceland topped Vision of Humanity's Global Peace Index of 140 countries that analyzes how peaceful they are regarding international policy and domestic conditions, The Financial Times reported Tuesday.

Because of continued violence since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, Iraq ranked last in the index developed by the organization based in Australia.

So says annual study ranking nations on how peaceful they are

"Communist China".

I've been hearing those words ever since I can remember--often linked together just that way.  It used to run a distant second to "Communist Russia".  But there's no question who the new big kid on the block is these days.  There's no question who the next superpower will be, if the world as we know it makes it that far.

Thus has China become the new great American bogeyman, the new rising empire that, in years to come, some of our leaders (especially our good Republicans) will attempt to incite us to hate and fear.

History tells us something about the handoff of global power from one state to another: it very rarely comes without a greal deal of bloodshed between the old power and the new one.  

With that, please come with me across the jump...

Cross-posted at The Dead Guy

You would think I wouldn't have to say more. That we have all heard the news. That we all knew what was done was against the law - both domestic and international. One day, maybe soon, we all will know. One day, maybe soon - we'll see our 43rd President, along with current and former members of his administration, hauled before an international court for crimes against humanity in time of war.

In today's interview with ABC News, President Bush admits he was aware and approved of his senior advisers were making decisions, on a case by case basis, on what interrogation techniques (including waterboarding and other extreme inhumane activities) would be utilized.

As we spin and cycle into an increasingly toxic environment of who shot who, and what did he knows when he knew it, and what did she know when she knew it, and who Judas is, who was the betrayer, and drama of all sort, it would do us well to understand that we vote from our hearts first.

Everyone knows that I am rather relentless in my push for spaceflight, and space development.  And, yea, you could say that I am something of a true believer.  But, I always feel the need to try and stay grounded, with what I feel is moderate to good success (although I am sure there are people who'd disagree with me).  

But I am also a liberal/progressive.  And to me, part of that is a belief in the potential of Humanity, and the hope for a better future.  I make that point, because, I've always felt that is part of what distinguishes us from Conservatives - a belief that humanity can do better, and that we need not fear the other, and, above all, that human life is important, and worth saving.  

And that is why I am always troubled by some recent comments.  This election season, there has been a lot of talk about hope.  But this isn't about a particular candidate - this is about us, progressives/liberals/Democrats.  Join me over the fold

Ok, so the title may be a little over the top. But you know what? For all that the Obama candidacy isn't a cult, it is most assuredly about faith - in ourselves, in our nation, and yes, in our leader.

And like so many other faiths, we sometimes fall short in the expression of our principles.

So here's the challenge, Obama supporters (and I count myself in that group) - can we live up to the ideals our chosen candidate espouses and expresses? Can we work to uplift our entire nation, Republican and Democrat, black and white, Clinton supporter and Obama supporter alike? Can we walk that high road together?

What I saw today was a speech that took true courage to deliver upon and public who may not have wanted it but certainly needed it.  I saw a man face his own flaws and weaknesses as well as those of an entire nation and show them a path.  There was something greater in that speech today something more then Presidential for which it certainly was, this was something the Pundits and Pontificators will certainly miss.  There was humanity.  The same humanity you see in an Aids victim’s eyes sill so full of life staring back at you from inside a decaying body.  The same humanity felt when a mother in Africa lifts the lifeless body a child to her breast for the last time or a young mother in America does so for the first time.  It is the humanity found in the human condition during times of triumph and turmoil.  Barack Obama faced one of humanities greatest tragedies with strength and dignity so rarely found in our leaders but above all he showed his humanity in doing so.  Barack Obama had the Courage to be Human, frail, weak and naked to the world.  What more could any of us say beyond what he has already?  Now it is our turn to show our worth, and will we be found wanting?

No pooties involved, sorry.

Here's the scoop. A woman was ruining running a puppy mill in Peotone, Illinois, with 49 dogs of various ages, all abused, all suffering, all in dire straits, (but without the sexy guitar) and the

TINLEY PARK PAWS organization
8301 191st St
Tinley Park, IL 60448
(815) 464-7298
(thanks to Shedhead - below the fold is the site)
took control, and tried to save and have adopted the pups.

A judge halted all plans and allowed a sister of the miscreant to recover a "brutalized 6-year old Bichon Frise named Lance".