Date

Prairie Sunshine at the Clothesline

barbara — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 21:29:50 -0600

barbara and Prairie Sunshine shoot the breeze over the Clothesline:

barbara: You know, Sarah Palin is the gift that keeps on giving. Thanks to her, I discovered today that I can see Prairie Sunshine’s clothesline from my kitchen window. And Prairie lives a few hundred miles away from me. Who knew? Hey, Prairie. Welcome to Clotheslineblog.

Prairie: Hey, thanks, Barbara...and happy birthday! I was just playing with my own clothesline today. You know, the stuff you can buy in the hardware store just for emergencies, real antique, doesn't even stretch like bungee cords.

But clotheslines are adaptible. And I used some of mine to wrap around and tie shut the doors on my compost bin. Seems the neighborhood squirrels found the stale pistachios to their liking; unfortunately also, some of the kitchen detritus that I hope will season over winter into some usable compost. But cleanup was just a few minutes with the rake and shovel.

Unlike the political garbage. Whether it's Saucy Sarah or Lyin' Liz, there's no hope for those gals turning into something that grows anything but weeds.

barbara: Well, weeds and stuff that smells really disgusting. Ever notice how those lovely paper-whites stink? Just sayin’.

Anyhoo, I’ve been so caught up in the pulse-pounding excitement of Hallowe’en (punctuational purity) and my ownself’s birthday that I almost spaced November 4! Do read on, please!

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(((katymine)))

barbara — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 23:13:38 -0600

barbara writes

Sometimes life is harsh. Did you ever have this happen to you? Someone you maybe didn't know very well died and the news of that was somehow inexpressibly sad? For me, today was the day.

On Hallowe'en morning, early, early, a wonderful blog colleague of mine and of Prairie's was finally done in by her cancer. Her nom de blog (h/t, PS) was katymine. I just learned today that she and I and another blogger friend share the same birthday.

When she was healthy, katymine was an activist's activist. Even before her dire diagnosis and totally gutsy battle against the cancer beast, she advocated long and hard for health care reform and a host of other things that matter deeply to liberals. She was in the trenches on behalf of all of us.

Her illness took a terrible toll, as cancer so often does long before it has fully slaked its greed. But every time she could summon up energy, katymine popped back online to encourage, inform, offer wisdomlets (when she was too exhausted or too sick to offer her usual wisdom).

She leaves behind a grieving family (including her beloved husband, Elmore), and a community of virtual friends. She was a keeper and yet we could not keep her.

Just wanted you to know.

(((katymine)))

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Please don't miss Maddow interview with Al Gore

barbara — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 09:53:56 -0600

barbara writes

(link to second page repaired; did I not tell you it's always something?!)

I think it was Rosanna Rosannadanna who famously said, "It's always something." Yup to that.

Brother G has been in/out/back in to hospital this past week and had surgery yesterday. All of which is by way of saying I'm caught up in the details of restoring his health.

So in the interim, I'm posting the above clip that I stole from firedoglake.

On the way home from the hospital the other night, I was listening to MPR, whose guest was a climate change expert from Australia (if I recall correctly). And his comment was that in his country, Al Gore is not labeled a political dude but rather the man on this planet who has the best handle on climage change and also the visibility and cojones to keep it before us.

It's sadly entertaining to watch the political right lob verbal grenades at Gore. I think it is not so much that they don't get it as that they get it and hate it and have decided that since it doesn't much affect their own here-and-now, it is easier to feign righteous political indignation than take even the smallest measure of responsibility for the fouling of the planet. I suppose if one sleeps in one's own poopy pj's long enough, one simply adapts. Not this one, however. A little bit more.

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Coffee, Sex and the Stupak Amendment

susan — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 13:06:11 -0600

REP. STUPAK WITH WOMEN SMURFS

Susan writes:

What better way to make my re-entry here than a Sunday morning caffeine-fueled screed? Hang on, it's been a while since I vented.
Not that there haven't been bile-inducing moments in the year since we, ah, the Dems, took control of everything and failed to deliver. I mean, it's been nine months, long enough to make a baby fer pete's sakes, and Barack Obama and the Dems have failed failed failed to turn the toxic dump they were handed into a verdant valley where unicorns prance under an azure sky.

In a direct rebuke to everything Obama stands for, the people have spoken and rejected TWO unappealing white men in New Jersey and Virginia. They also rejected the most unappealing one of all, the Palin-Pawlenty backed Doug Hoffman in NY's 23rd district, but that was an anomaly in an otherwise Republican surge.
More.

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Be afraid -- be very afraid!

barbara — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 18:20:39 -0600

barbara writes

So is it just me or do you sometimes receive disturbing emails that surprise you in light of who sent them?

Here’s the deal. I grew up and attended school in what I now recognize as a white bread, white kid, white glove, middle-class neighborhood. I had absolutely no idea what the political persuasion of my friends’ parents was. No, that’s not true. Our next door neighbors were Democrats. And my staunch Republican parents let it be known that Democrats were some kind of suspicious beings. My parents liked Ike and Barry, and later, Dick and Ronnie. Died before the ascendancy of George the Younger. My father loathed Hubert Humphrey and my mother despised Paul Wellstone because…well, just because...he irritated her.

Anyway, politics was irrelevant to kids when I was in school. So was religion. I was vaguely aware that most (but not all) of my childhood friends attended high steeple, mainline Protestant churches. Some of ‘em attended my little Congregational (now UCC) church. A few worshipped at synagogues.

Many of my Protestant pals got pretty heavy into a Young Life group that met one evening a week or so at a church across the street from our high school campus. Because I didn’t follow the herd to that particular activity, I never knew what it was about and assumed it was a purely social thing. And maybe it was. Or not.

I’ve kept in touch with a few of my high school friends over all these years. Fun to do, mostly. But with the advent of the internet, I began receiving strange stuff from them (and others – apparently I’m a magnet for weirdness, and please keep your thoughts to yourself, thank you very much).

From time to time (like today), I sit slack-jawed at my computer, reading a piece of dreck that has just washed up in the surf. It was like most of the stuff that trends toward the hysterical--racist, classist, religious righteous screeds, warnings, fear-mongering, none of it authenticated. Snopes and Google exist so people can check things out. Hmmm. Do Republicans know about Google?

Today’s exhibit was a piece about Golda Meir’s alleged bodyguard and terrorism savant Juval Aviv. Recognize this? It’s been making the rounds for four (4) years. And in it, Aviv is said to be predicting a terrorist attack in the U.S. within the next few months, to wit: Read on.

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Promise Breakers

barbara — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 15:18:43 -0600

barbara writes

(My "little brother," at the state capitol.)

“THE LEAST OF THESE”*

You know how something just smacks you upside the head and sends you over the brink? My brink plunge du jour was precipitated by an article in this morning’s Star Tribune.

Seems there is a 65-year-old Minneapolis man named Frederick Becton who is living in poverty, owing at least in part to his severe, debilitating medical problems. He’s been receiving a small monthly sum from the State to help meet his special nutritional requirements. Last month, he was notified by the State that his funding is history and that he needs to figure out some other way to keep from dying.

*Frankly, I’m not crazy about that language, but it will help Bible literalists get my drift.

THE PROMISE BREAKERS: Back story

Meet Minnesota’s ultra-conservative, religious-right governor, Timothy Pawlenty. Perhaps you’ve heard of him. He makes occasional cameo appearances in Minnesota as a side-line to his full-time national and international job of pursuing his presidential aspirations.

In a little Minnesota moment this summer, while the state legislature struggled to sort its way through a fiscal toxic waste site (aka, the budget), Pawlenty arguably* exceeded his authority by deciding to unilaterally “unallot” $2.7 billion in funding to what compassionate people consider essential programs.

*There is a pending lawsuit initiated by the Minnesota House that challenges Pawlenty’s apparent disregard for law by slashing funding without legislative consent. Read more, please.

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Gratitude

barbara — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 10:29:41 -0600

barbara writes

Today, I am unilaterally declaring The Clothesline a snark-free zone.

Today, though not for the first time, I am grateful for much and for many.

Today, I give thanks for all that we have, all that we are, and all that we can be.

Today, I give thanks for you, and you, and you (okay, it's not snark, but I sound like Miss Betty on Romper Room, don’t I?).

Today, I hope to spend my time steeped in gratitude.

Care to join me?

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