My friend, the Squirrel

This has been an interesting week.  The most notable parts seem to have been bookended by a dead squirrel.

Yes…a dead squirrel. I was going through the Declaration of Independence and the abridged Constitution to see how it is perceived that the Obama administration is violating them (or doing so in any way that could be construed as more than the Bush white house); I went outside for a smoke, and lo…

It looks like he had fallen from the largest tree in our backyard onto the driveway, and probably didn’t feel much after hitting the ground. Technically, roadkill. It was then that I realized that squirrels are conservative by their nature–quite content to scamper by and around the dead one, eating nuts, chasing each other–basically ignoring the dead one and its misfortune. For my part, I didn’t know what to do with it; dead, gross, a rodent, and covered with ants already. I figured the squirrel community wasn’t going to get together and throw “a Celebration of Life,” so I watched it over the next few days, and hoped that the cold snap that was keeping the odor down would hold.

I realized on Monday that there is a new job scam…you apply for a legit looking job posted somewhere, you get back a legit looking email response.  Then they ask you to pull your credit. From a link theyprovided in the e-mail. So, alas, no real job there, as I haven’t heard back from two of them since I sent a reply that I had gotten my free yearlies from www.annualcreditreport.com, the one that is the official partnership of the three agencies. The job charlatans are smart, though. There are so many rackets out there, waiting to ensnare the desperate jobseeker. A word of advice: NEVER pay to work. Not ever.

I have to say I was disappointed at Iran’s launch of long-range missiles.  This is probably not the best move to make while all the time insisting that the country’s nuclear program aims are peaceful. I went to check out the IAEA’s minutes and other info on Iran from the past couple of years to see if they did report the building of the under-mountain site…apparently, almost everything that goes on between a sovereign nation (like us) and the IAEA is supposed to be confidential.  Iran was pretty upset about a few details that leaked in the Bush years, which ultimately led to more U.N. sanctions against the country.

In other news, it’s pretty crappy that while being pounded by a typhoon, about 3 huge earthquakes occur causing giant tidal waves. That is nuts for a region of the world to endure at the approximate same time.  As I write this, for the Philipines, there’s another typhoon looming; for Indonesia, another earthquake just rocked the area.

But Derrion Albert will never read this blog post. No, he was beaten to death with boards and vicious kicks, while being filmed on cell phone, while trying to walk home from school (or help a friend…details are foggy). My mistake was watching the video, which his family wants to remain on the web, to raise awareness.  My heart broke when he tried to get up, and the boys just jumpedon him and ended it all. From where I was in front of the computer, I wanted to stop it somehow, but by the time I saw the video, this Chicago honor student was gone forever. If you’ve ever been a teacher (or ever been in school, for that matter), you know that kids will run to wherever the fight is, and just watch transfixed–that is your worst fear for the school day. But this was outside of school, and apparently no-holds-barred. I am saddened and sickened. Again, I’m reminded that this could have been my baby brother, just a year older than Derrion was. I can’t even grab all these kids–gang members and spectators–by the shirtcollar and explain to them how utterly dumb this kind of behavior is.  I hope the judge can.

On the subject of Chicago, I think it’s a bad idea for the windy city to host anything.  Let South America have the games for a change–Illinois doesn’t need the debt anyway (they have plenty).  And, not saying that the Olympics are full of terrorists, but I’d rather not take the chance 100 miles from where my grandma lives.  There are enough Chicago people (see characterization in paragraph above) in my small hometown to make me nervous for her safety already.

I also decided to try and learn Arabic.  I’m working my way through a couple of resources and methods on the web, but I wish I could take a class.  Oh well, we’ll see how this goes first. If anyone knows of any outstanding websites for learning how to speak and read/write, let me know.

Then…on the third day…he was…gone? I went outside to have my wake-up cigarette on Thursday morning and the squirrel was just gone.  I only got a half-chuckle when I informed my fiance that I’d given our buddy (who we’d been watching succumb to nature and ants) a new, Biblically-inspired name. Well, I thought it was funny, even though I was pretty sure that one of the neighborhood cats finally came by.

At any rate, I have tons of stuff to do today. We’re going to our university’s homecoming weekend activities, and I have to pack and run a few other errands. I never did finish looking for the parts of our Declaration and Constitution that had been stomped on, but hopefully nothing too crazy will happen today.

Left, Middle [East], Right…

I honestly cannot believe those of us on the left that are frothing and chomping at the bit for radical change to the makeup and practices of the United States still do not realize the value in moderacy. We cannot run willy-nilly, pushing our agenda like we’ve only got 4 years to make up for all the lost freedoms, injustices, and societal ills from the past three decades or so.  It looks panicked.  The U.S. has enough going on that just needs to be fixed, or at the very least, stabilized.  An economy in shambles, with nearly every single major  American industry affected, job losses like we haven’t seen in a while, and a war on a distant front (three of them) that is all but forgotten and our medicaland social support systems can’t do much for the wounded and broken young men and women when they get back…the American dream  is weaker than ever. Let’s test out the minds of a younger, more team-solution oriented American workforce to solve some problems in the financial sector.  Let’s see what deadlines do for the car manufacturers, and apply those deadlines (in a more creative way ) to TARP and stimulus funded states on those shovel-ready programs we promised before we were sidetracked.  Let’s take dead US manufacturing jobs and create an in-house green supply industry; working to build the parts that will make green energy attainable, get our best scientific minds finding the best methods,  or fund building the systems that make our wind, solar and geothermal energy sources work for us. If we do well enough at this, we fix the job problem (by creating some), we fix the global warming/dirty energy issue  and save the earth, and we fix the trade issue by creating a product that other countries would invest in or purchase. Let’s also stay away from as many special interest groups as possible.

If our party wants to do the greatest good, we need to first strengthen what we know is broken, win the support of the very people our party is founded upon–even if they are not Democrats–and once the danger of utter collapse is past, then take our newfound support and make America great again by proving that if our ideas are great when we’re working with the “big ticket” items, wait and see what we can do with the emerging ideas, job markets, and concerns.  If we focus on this “strategy”, we may have at least four more years of time. Instead of splitting our energy into a million + one things that liberals have wanted to accomplish for a long time (and feel like Obama’sadministration is the perfect time to do so), we probably need to focus on restoring our image as a party of the people and do the most beneficial work for as many Americans as is possible.  Sure that may sound socialist, but given the alternative…an America in despair…I’d rather sound socialist.

Speaking of that distant war, remember the war in Afghanistan that turned into the war in  Iraq that turned into the war in Pakistan (which, save the border areas, we are largely uninvolved in)?  See if we can name all the countries in the middle east that haven’t made the news for conflict lately.  Let’s see–there’s Oman, which from the lack of fiery reports, sounds like a wonderful country to take a holiday in. I haven’t heard much about Lebanon lately,  or Jordan, or Yemen or oddly enough, Saudi Arabia.  The last one concerns me, since the entire region is suffering through no small amount of instability and they are second only to Iran in size, smack in the middle, but why do we not hear the Saudi voices of concern about the state of their region?  Now, I am not a Saudi Arabia hater–no!–I was just as enthralled by all the cool stuff that Air Force Dad brought back from Saudi as the next military kid, but I just find it so odd that they are so silent. Maybe they’re not talking to us since we crashed the stock market–that was full of their money.  If anyone has any insight or any news from al Jazeera that I may be missing, please don’t hesitate.

Poor Pakistan. Is this the price a country that appearsto be an ally of the US must pay? Pakistan went from a normal country, fairly progressive even, in the Middle East to a warzone in a relatively short amont of time. They were warned, though.  Even the Bush administration had enough sense to warn Pakistan to get their border region in check, but they only half listened.  Our drone attacks haven’t helped any.  I worry about my Pakistani friends’ families and if they’re in an affeccted region, because as bad as it already is, it could get worse relatively quickly.  I feel like the U.S. as “visitors” in the region are at a distinct disadvantage simply because we are in the middle of some really fierce “family feuds” right now and do not adequately understand the culture after all this time, becuase through all the years of the random acts of west-hating terrorist attacts, Iran-Contra and even prior transgressions (such as creating Israel and the ensuing fallout) we never tried to understand who they were, we just assumed they would conform to the ways of the western world and simmer down.  To make matters worse, Iran is poking at the exposed wounds of several countries in the area to provoke…well…I don’t know, but they are certainly provoking some kind of response.  There is no action great enough and no words wise enough to help even a single person in the most embattled parts of the Middle East, and I feel so sad and powerless to make this any better in my lifetime.

Heading back to the Right, I have to say I have had this incredible craving for news radio, and so during my lunch breaks, there is only a 2 minute blurb of the day’s events so far on NPR, and I indulge in the Rushbag’s show.  I have to say, some of his rantings are coherent and well thought out.  but lately he’s been on this “blah, blah…this only shows who Obamais…blah, blah” kick.  Sotomayor proves who Obama is. The auto bailout proves who Obama is. So on, and so on.  I’m not sure what that’s all about, but I do agree with him on the fact that Republican party does not need to “cow down” to every popular opinion.  It makes even the real, good, and conservative politicians seem less real.  I still have a soft spot in my heart for John McCain who is real (he just picked a dumb running mate) and out of every politician in D.C., I’d like to hear more of what he  has to say about the torture memos.  Speaking of those, does Dick Cheney know that he is not in charge of destroying the United States anymore? I don’t want to be scared to death–I want a solution to make the world insurgents live in more stable so that they want to function as a part of the normal  society in their home country, which makes ours more stable as a desireable by-product.

Honestly our country is in a make or break position.  We have some real challenges that cannot be tackled when our pols on the left or right cannot refrain from sensationalizing their displeasure in anything that wasn’t their idea.  This is destructive, and we need to drop the partisanship now.  Especially now that millions of Americans are suffering through the temper tantrums without jobs and homes.