In the vast number of tributes and reflections today, this is just another.

I remember walking into my office, here in Miami, when the first plane struck the World Trade Center in New York, thousands of miles away. The sheer implausibility and ridiculousness of even the possibility of that act made even the concept that such a thing could happen, incomprehensible.

I remember that, with tears streaming down my face, all I could think about were the individuals – the secretaries, the maintenance workers, the file clerks. A political statement was the last thing on their minds that morning. They didn’t ask to be part of history. They only wanted to live.

I remember the generosity of spirit that followed. People looked to fulfill their dreams: get married, buy homes, start families. Because in this new world, you just never know when a plane might fall out of the sky.

And I remember that all of that generosity, all of the good will was twisted and squandered by men perverting the memories of the innocents toward their own ends. And we lived in fear. And even the fear was perverted.

Enough. Enough fear and hatred and animosity. I will not live looking over my shoulder and looking at the sky as if it were my enemy. That is not their legacy, nor will it be my future. Don’t let it be yours.

With all the back and forth nonsense about President Obama’s speech to kids, this morning, read it now. Then decide.

Now, I ask you: Why wouldn’t you want your kids to hear this? I’ve read the speech, and I just can’t imagine why anyone wouldn’t want their child(ren) to hear it. Well, yes I can. The same people who don’t believe that President Obama was born in the United States, and those who believe that health care reform means euthanasia for the elderly and infirm. And the people behind the scenes who egg them on. The fear-mongers. They don’t want children to be inspired by the first black president of the United States. There. I’ve said it out loud.

Glen Beck called him a racist and Sarah Palin called him a communist. I really hoped these denizens of the dark would skulk back into their caves after the election. I really hoped that the politics of fear would be replaced by civil discourse and exchange of opinions and ideas with the mutual vision of a better future for all.

We are a nation of freaking sheep, and I guess I’ve been watching too much Star Trek again.

*p.s.* Recipe Monday (on Tuesday) appears below.

Photo courtesy PDPhoto.org

You did it, America! You made History! And in a good way!

We went over to the Shoes’ last night for a little viewing party with Miz Shoes, the RLA, Star, the Surrogate Daughter #3 (hers, not mine), Yogi and BooBoo (don’t ask – they chose their own names). We ate. We drank. We agonized over just WTF was taking Indiana so long. The first great cheer occurred when Ohio went BLUE. I was so proud!

We had our first inkling how Florida would go when one of the talking heads on MSNBC noted that our beloved (Republican) governor, Charlie Crist, had to return to Tallahassee on some “urgent legal matter” and left McSame’s “victory” party. Heh heh heh. When both my birth state and my home state turned BLUE on the map, my heart swelled with pride.

Senator Obama’s speech was inspirational and motivating, tempered by realism. I was moved practically to tears. Once again, I was watching a pivotal moment in history. And a movement away from the politics of fear to the politics of ethics and HOPE.

May I have another glass of Kool Aid, please?

With apologies to Crystal Gayle, et.al., here’s a little ditty I just whipped up in honor of the Blue Wave that’s coming:

Don’t It Make Those Red States Blue
(Sung to the tune of “Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue”)

How long since the map’s so blue?
I know what’s come over you
We finally got a clue
And don’t it make those Red States Blue

Republicans can pack their bags
Forgive us if we’re none too sad
A new day dawns a brilliant hue
And don’t it make those Red States Blue

Eight years of secrets, Eight years of lies
Gave us no reasons, gave us alibis
Held us hostage to fear, then laughed while we cried
Gutted our freedoms, said God’s on your side

We’ll be fine when Bushy’s gone
We’ll just party all night long
America can Hope anew
And don’t it make those Red States
Don’t it make those Red States
Got to make those Red States Blue!

Don’t it make those Red States
Don’t it make those Red States
Got to make those Red States Blue!

Don’t it make those Red States
Come on all you Red States
Got to make those Red States Blue!

Just a little something to hum while you’re standing in line to VOTE this Tuesday.

Am I getting a little ahead of myself? Of course, I am. I want this change so badly, I can taste it. But to make this vision a reality, you must VOTE on Tuesday (if you haven’t already done early voting). I’m serious, people. We can’t stand another 4 years like the last 8. We can’t let the dream slip away because of a little rain or snow, or a few cops standing around the polling places. White, black, and every color in between, we’re all in this together!

Ooo! Ooo! What do you think of “I Can’t Stand McCain”, sung to the tune of “I Can’t Stand The Rain”?

If you think you get plenty of ranting political e-mails from friends and acquaintances on an average day, they just seem to multiply exponentially during Political Season, don’t they? I have a favorite antagonist – normally the sweetest guy on the planet – who, if you were to judge solely by the e-mails he forwards to me, can’t decide if he’s a Libertarian militiaman or a Fascist. This week, he’s a secret Democrat — he just hadn’t really given it quite enough thought before he forwarded this one:

—Original Message from xxxxxxxx@comcast.net:

I just can’t resist tweaking this guy… it’s become one of my favorite sports:

Thank you and God Bless You for my smile of the day. I didn’t know in how high regard you hold ol’ liberal Democrat Harry Truman!

I thought you’d like to know more about your new favorite former President.

From the Truman Library’s biography of Give ‘Em Hell Harry:

“In his domestic policies, Truman sought to accomplish the difficult transition from a war to a peace economy without plunging the nation into recession, and he hoped to extend New Deal social programs to include more government protection and services and to reach more people. He was successful in achieving a healthy peacetime economy, but only a few of his social program proposals became law. The Congress, which was much more Republican in its membership during his presidency than it had been during Franklin Roosevelt’s, did not usually share Truman’s desire to build on the legacy of the New Deal.

The Truman administration went considerably beyond the New Deal in the area of civil rights. Although, the conservative Congress thwarted Truman’s desire to achieve significant civil rights legislation, he was able to use his powers as President to achieve some important changes. He issued executive orders desegregating the armed forces and forbidding racial discrimination in Federal employment. He also established a Committee on Civil Rights and encouraged the Justice Department to argue before the Supreme Court on behalf of plaintiffs fighting against segregation.”

From the White House’s biography:

“In June 1945 Truman witnessed the signing of the charter of the United Nations, hopefully established to preserve peace.

Thus far, he had followed his predecessor’s policies, but he soon developed his own. He presented to Congress a 21-point program, proposing the expansion of Social Security, a full-employment program, a permanent Fair Employment Practices Act, and public housing and slum clearance. The program, Truman wrote, “symbolizes for me my assumption of the office of President in my own right.” It became known as the Fair Deal.”

I know you like quotations, so here are a few that I’m sure you’ll enjoy:

“Men make history, and not the other way around. In periods where there is no leadership, society stands still. Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better.”

“When you have an efficient government, you have a dictatorship.”

“It’s a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it’s a depression when you lose yours.”

My personal favorite from Truman’s Special Letter to Congress on the Internal Security of the United States (August 8, 1950) (click for the full text… substitute the word “terrorists” for “Communists”, and boy, that sounds familiar!):

“…[T]here are some people who wish us to enact laws which would seriously damage the right of free speech and which could be used not only against subversive groups but against other groups engaged in political or other activities which were not generally popular. Such measures would not only infringe on the Bill of Rights and the basic liberties of our people; they would also undermine the very internal security they seek to protect.

Laws forbidding dissent do not prevent subversive activities; they merely drive them into more secret and more dangerous channels. Police states are not secure; their history is marked by successive purges, and growing concentration camps, as their governments strike out blindly in fear of violent revolt. Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.

We must, therefore, be on our guard against extremists who urge us to adopt police state measures. Such persons advocate breaking down the guarantees of the Bill of Rights in order to get at the communists. They forget that if the Bill of Rights were to be broken down, all groups, even the most conservative, would be in danger from the arbitrary power of government.”

So, hats off to you for admitting your admiration for one of the greatest acknowledged unapologetic liberal Presidents of the 20th Century!

Changed your Voter’s Registration to Democrat yet?

So, if you’ve been following along, on Tuesday, I posted about some pro-Obama mass e-mails I had received from a friend. Those e-mails had been replied to by someone else on the mailing list, a woman who had obviously imbibed the Republican/fundamentalist/right-wing Kool Aid. Repeatedly. I then responded to her, in what I thought was a (mostly) civilized and rational manner, and sent my responses to the whole list, as she had.

The next morning, I received an e-mail from several people who supported my remarks, and a couple from people who did not. Mostly, the “nots” requested that I not e-mail them with my views. A wholly irrational concept, if you think about it. After all, it was not my e-mails that originally began the exchange, and it is not my address list. I’m not psychic, people.

As it turns out, the original responder (“R”) is a sister of my friend who sent the original correspondence. And one of the people who requested that I not tax their brains with an opinion that runs counter to their deeply-held Rove-inspired fantasies or – God forbid! – actual facts, is another of her sisters (“A”). This last, privately sent e-mail, got under my skin for some reason. I guess, because of its sheer childishness. And because it’s a core sample of Uber-Conservative American thought. It’s classic avoidance behavior – I don’t like what you have to say, so shut up so I don’t have to hear it.

Again, I have reproduced her e-mail and my response. The names have been redacted to protect the guilty.

“Please do not copy me on your email replies. I do not know you and do not care about your political stance, stupid or otherwise. If you received a reply from me in regard to an email, it was an accident – I hit “reply all” when replying to my sister M. I am not interested in your views and would appreciate you not sending me anymore emails.

M – please talk to your angry democratic friends and tell them to stop emailing me.”

My response:

A -

I wasn’t going to reply, but you have succeeded in irritating me sufficiently that I can’t write my Project Runway recap until I did.

I’m sorry that you were upset by reading my responses to R’s e-mails. They were not directed to you. R chose to respond to M’s e-mails via the entire e-mail list. Hardly an accident, since she did it 3 times. I merely did the same thing she did, only I happen to have actual facts on my side. I did receive your reply. Despite what you say, yours was not directed to M, either. It was obviously intended to be seen by the group as well. What did you say? Wait a minute, let me dig it out of the trash…… Oh yeah, here it is:

“R – thanks for speaking up for all of us that know the REAL truth.” Whatever that is. Would you be at all interested in knowing that the New Testament bible that you cling to so fiercely, was assembled by a barbarian (non-believer) king? He picked and chose for inclusion only the parts he felt wouldn’t incite the newly-minted Christians to rebellion against him and his fellow monarchs. Left a lot of the good stuff out. Actual, historical, documented fact. No, I guess you wouldn’t be interested.

I’m not angry, A. No, I take that back. Yes I am. I’m angry because this country that we all love and call home, was founded by immigrants looking for religious freedom. They left their homes, countries, and everything they ever knew to come to a place where they could worship as they pleased, without fear. Our families immigrated to this country, because it is the best hope for freedom and prosperity in the world. That includes your family, too.

Yet, here we are, several hundred years later, and we’re back at the beginning, with one group of people who believe that their way is the only way, trying to impose their beliefs and their way of thinking on the rest of us. And when someone calls you on it, instead of having a reasonable conversation or civilized debate, the best you can do is stick your fingers in your ears like Peewee Herman – LALALALALALA! I can’t hear you! and tell me that my opinion is stupid and I should just go away and never darken your doorway again. Figuratively speaking, of course.

I can’t guarantee that you won’t get anymore e-mails from me, A. If M sends something out to the list and I feel like responding to that, or to someone else’s comments, by way of the mailing list – which is my prerogative, by the way, just like you and R – you just might get another e-mail from me. I’m not going to sit here and pick through all the names on the list simply to make someone whose name I’ll probably forget next week, more comfortable. As I see it, if you see my e-mail address in your mailbox, you have three choices: 1) You can read it and act like a grown-up; 2) You can tell M to remove you from her mailing list; or 3) click “Delete”.

And by the way, you do sort of know me. I am a friend of M’s for many years, and you and I met at your father’s funeral. I am still very sorry for your loss.

Best regards,

RJ

You know, I’m not going to touch the “suspicious birth” of Sarah Palin’s 5-month old Down’s Syndrome baby. Truth be told, while I’m sure there are exceptions, we are all familiar with Down’s Syndrome as a birth defect of children born to women over 40. So I’m just not going to go there.

Sen. Obama has stated publicly that his opponents’ families are off-limits, and especially that their children are off-limits and not relevant to the campaign. I agree. I have always felt that the behavior, sexual orientation, religions of politicians’ families are irrelevant to how that government official or candidate does or will govern. So I will not pick on Ms. Palin’s teenage-pregnant-out-of-wedlock daughter, either. Personally. That does not mean, however, that I will not pick on Ms. Palin and more importantly, Mr. McCain. High road? What’s that?

In fact, I find Ms. Palin’s behavior and demeanor most troubling. She is “pleased” at the prospect of being a grandmother at age 44. Can we imagine that a 17 year old girl and an 18 year old boy (except in the rarest of circumstances), are delighted to rush – shotgun style – into a marriage of political convenience? You can imagine the scene behind closed doors while they were figuring out what to do, right? The Republican spin machine is going at it full-force, is it not? They hope that this will cast Ms. Palin in the role of “a parent just like you”, facing the trials and tribulations of raising teenagers. And a special-needs infant, simultaneously. Does anyone, besides me, get the feeling that these poor kids – especially the poor son of a bitch getting shoved to the altar – are nothing but props to this woman?

Unlike you, however, Ms. Palin is running for Vice President of the United States. Unlike you, Ms. Palin – should Mr. McCain (G-d forbid) win this election – Ms. Palin would be the proverbial “hearbeat away from the Presidency.” If I thought Ms. Palin’s “family values” were suspect before, I’m sure as hell convinced of it now. She is sacrificing her child(ren) on the altar of political ambition. An offering to the Golden Calf, if you will.

As for Mr. McCain, does this not cast some pretty big doubts on his decision-making processes and judgment? Despite all the other old (and young) white dudes whose names were being dropped as potential running mates, it’s no great surprise that he really wanted a woman to put on his ticket. After all, the Hillary crowd would flock to anyone with a vagina, no? But everyone assumed it would be someone with a track record and a known quantity, like Kay Bailey Hutchison. As to the issue of experience, Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz of the 20th Congressional District (encompassing 29 separate municipalities in two counties here in Florida), has said: “My congressional district has more people than the entire state of Alaska.”

How thoroughly was Palin vetted before the decision to bring her onboard was made? Who peeked into her closets and decided that the ethical skeletons didn’t rattle loudly enough to worry about? Which bright boy wrote the definitive memo saying that it was a good idea to choose a funadamentalist uber-Christian, who thinks abortion should be banned – even in cases of rape and incest; that contraception is murder; someone who deliberately chose to bring a deveopmentally disabled child into the world and display this innocent infant and a pregnant teenager as her badges of integrity as casually as the American flag pin in her lapel, to “balance out the ticket”? And was McCain drinking Kool Aid at the time?

I know. I’ve asked lots of questions here, most of which will never be answered. But I think the most important question is: Why has no one called Children’s Services? ‘Cause you know that if the shoe were on the other foot the Rove-ian scum-mongers would have been all over it like white on rice.

I find the Republican double-standard amusing and frustrating at the same time. If she were a Democrat, instead of lauding Palin as the living embodiment of a working wife and mother who overcame the odds to pursue her career and struggles to be a good parent just like you and me, she would be vilified as an evil morally depraved self-centered slut who can’t stay off her back and can’t discipline her equally libidinous offspring.

I’m just sayin’.

This post is inspired by an “opp” on SocialSpark sponsored by Reader’s Digest. They have a feature on their website called “Make Your Mark.” It’s about the power of one person to make a difference. I know, I know. Reader’s Digest. But honestly, there actually is a subject near and dear to my heart at RD.com – Make Your Mark. On the RD.com “Make Your Mark” page, there is a feature called the Weekly Challenge. It’s a challenge to you out there in Interwebsland to do one small thing (or an even bigger thing) differently, socially or environmentally, etc.. Coincidentally, this current week’s challenge has to do with helping our troops overseas. So, whether RD wants me or not, I am inspired to let it all hang out.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: While I don’t condone this war in Iraq (I can justify Afghanistan), I support our troops. There are plenty of politicians out there who mouth their support, but screw the boys and girls with every vote (cutting hazardous duty pay, cutting health benefits for their families, cutting their healthcare after losing their limbs and their minds — all because the pols put them there, mind you! Rant, rant, rant!) These poor bastards (male and female) in our military have been getting screwed left right and sideways by this president and his minions.

MJ, who is a student of military history going back to the Revolutionary War and beyond, will be the first to tell you how, even in the worst of times, a GI used to be able to get his necessities and a cup of coffee free of charge, mind you, provided by the military. It was the least they could do after grabbing you up out of your nice comfy bed and dropping you into the middle of a war zone. Will you be surprised to know that it’s not the case anymore?

Truth. Today a soldier (marine, airman, sailor, take your pick) gets virtually nothing for free. Not toothpaste, not deodorant, not even a freaking cup of coffee. They’ll get their meals – if they happen to be around when the DFac (dining facility) is open. If they happen to be out on night maneuvers or on duty in the middle of the night, too bad. Today’s soldier overseas is scrounging a microwave (if they have the right kind of electricity) or is being supported by family back home (if they can afford it). They get their uniforms and a couple of uniform t-shirts, etc., but once those are in the laundry or beyond repair, they have to buy their own. Socks. Underwear. Snacks. If the PX even has anything in stock. And the more remote the location, the less and less is in stock. They get a bed and a towel, but no sheets or pillows. Hand-to-God. The whole thing is an embarrassment.

Pisses me off. You know what really pisses me off? For the most part, these men and women aren’t. Pissed off, that is. They miss the creature comforts, the Cheetos, and are desperate for something to flavor the endless bottles of water they have to consume (desert, you know), but any complaints are expressed with humor. This is their duty, you see. They go where they’re sent to do whatever needs to be done. And a lot of them are going out among the people and giving candy, toys and school supplies to the local children. Technically, that’s not really in their job description. You know?

So here’s another deep dark secret from my checkered not-so-past and present: For the last 2 years, I’ve been sending care packages to our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan through AnySoldier.com. At various times and according to the season, I’ve sent food, hot cocoa, Slim Jims, snacks, Girl Scout cookies, Crystal Light singles, blankets, sheets, magazines, newspapers, personal hygeine stuff for men and women. I’ve got a stack of stuff in my craft room right now, waiting for me to pack up and ship out. In January, I’ve sent packages of blank valentines, so they could send some back home to their kids and other loved ones. In the summer, I send sunscreen. I send Chapstick all year-round. Sometimes I hear back from the recipients, sometimes not. I’ve had e-mail correspondence and letters and Christmas cards and photos. And sometimes nothing. But they’re kind of busy, you know? So I really don’t expect to hear back from them, but they know that some people back home remember them and care. Whether you’re one of the gung-ho or otherwise. I fall into the “otherwise”.

So, are you inspired? If you are, Adopt a Soldier! Send letters, emails and care packages. You can connect with servicemen and servicewomen of any service branch serving overseas at AnySoldier.com

I’ll tell you what. On my own re-reading of this – prior to clicking the “publish post” button – I’m not quite in the traditional Reader’s Digest mold, am I? It will be really interesting to see if they do accept this.

Want more ideas on how to Make Your Mark? Then visit RD.com – Make Your Mark and take the Weekly Challenge. It’ll make you think.