Heart thread - 12/04/2010

Susan S. asks for our prayers:

For David who just died at 45 years of age in Oregon, his mother Hildred, a member of our choir and a dear friend, and his "good brother" Carl.

I remember Hildred from the choir at St Mark's, Berkeley, when I was a member there in the early 80s.

For Tim, husband of Vicar Rhonda, who had a double knee replacement on Tuesday and now struggles through pain management and physical therapy so he can heal and begin enjoying new knees.

For Doug's mother.

Some days, she seems to be aware of her surroundings and to know who people are. Other days, she seems not to recognize anyone or anything. We don't know yet if this is temporary or permanent.

Jack M. Lynn, 2001

For the repose of the soul of Jack McGregor Lynn, my father-in-law. For my in-laws as they work through their grief.

For the unemployed, about whom the Republicans in Congress do not give a damn.

Keep watch, dear Lord, with those who work, or watch, or weep this night, and give your angels charge over those who sleep. Tend the sick, Lord Christ; give rest to the weary, bless the dying, soothe the suffering, pity the afflicted, shield the joyous; and all for your love's sake. Amen.

--the BB

Economic policy

I don't remember who wrote this or where I got it but, amid the current discussions of our baleful economy, I thought it needed to be put out there again.

Obama Promised

Looking back

From November 2004:

Halliburton has lost 1/3 of government property in Iraq
by Plutonium Page
Sat Nov 27th, 2004 at 00:31:10 PST

Halliburton says they're doing a great job tracking their inventory in Iraq.
However, an external audit shows that they're embellishing on the truth... big time.
What the audit showed:

A third or more of the government property Halliburton Co. was paid to manage for the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq could not be located by auditors, investigative reports to Congress show.
Halliburton's KBR subsidiary ''did not effectively manage government property'' and auditors could not locate hundreds of CPA items worth millions of dollars in Iraq and Kuwait this summer and fall, Inspector General Stuart W. Bowen reported to Congress in two reports.
Not good news for Cheney's former company.

To see what Halliburton says, look below the fold. [Click link above.]


Laurence Lewis reports today:

Earlier this month, it was reported that one of the largest U.S. government contractors in Afghanistan was being fined nearly $70 million for having "knowingly and systematically overcharged the U.S. government." But just two months after a whistleblower revealed the Louis Berger Group's deliberate and systematic overcharging, the U.S. Agency for International Development awarded the company a new joint contract worth $1.4 billion. That seemingly large fine turned out to be but a minor business expense.

Once again we must ask:

What would "victory" in Afghanistan look like?

Is that even remotely achievable?

What the fuck are we doing there?

I know, we're enriching the military-industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us about in his farewell speech. But other than that?

--the BB

Family Research Council a hate group?

You betcha.

Well, the Southern Poverty Law Center declared them to be such and they took umbrage. Must have hurt their little feelings to think all they do for Jay-zuz could ever be characterized as hate speech. As one link at TMC says: "FRC's Tony Perkins Rips SPLC ... For 'Slanderous Attack And Attempted Character Assassination'."

Clutch the pearls, Tony. (And I would not be surprised if Mr. Perkins has some pearls to clutch.)

John Aravosis has a lengthy list of comments from them over the years that pretty well demonstrates what I consider hate speech against gays. If all you knew of homosexual persons came from the FRC you'd assume we all hate children (when we're not molesting them), family, and Jesus and are bent on destroying society. You would be convinced, despite all logic, that equal rights are "special rights."

Of course, if gays disappeared from the planet tomorrow FRC would go broke, losing the bogeyman they use to raise money. They need us like lung cancer needs a lung.

If you're one of the folks being talked about by the Family Research Council, you know hate when you hear it. Mr. Perkins can shove his indignation and his pearls somewhere quivering with guilty desire. And yes, that's hate speech. I am not about to play nice with those vile people.

--the BB

The aftermath

So, for the first time in my life I hosted Thanksgiving dinner. It was collaborative. Guests brought the turkey and the pumpkin pie. I provided all the side dishes: mashed potatoes, stuffing, creamed spinach, apples and yams in butter and brown sugar, cranberry sauce, cranberry-orange relish, gravy, and whipped cream for the pie. Huge thanks to Bill for helping me cook and generally get ready.

I kept a little for myself (all I really wanted) and sent guests home with lots of leftovers. Between tryptophan, wine, and the painkiller I'm taking for trauma after drilling and filling a huge cavity in a tooth two days before Thanksgiving I almost went to bed at 6:30. Two hours later I am still something less than alert.

Many thanks for all who have held the family in prayer during my father-in-law's final illness and death and through yesterday's memorial service. You are all appreciated.

Anticipating a slow day at work tomorrow and a matinee at the cinema with Kathy on Saturday. Time to chill.

--the BB

The REAL Thanksgiving Story!

"It Gets Better" — Love, Pixar

Fauré Requiem In Paradisum

For those whose time has come to enter larger life....

The bulbs are in

I worked in the yard last Sunday, bought more materials on Thursday, and worked off an on most of yesterday. I have planted something in the neighborhood (I lost count) of 600-700 bulbs, about 20 bearded iris, eight small mums, and over fifty pansies and violas. Four bags of detritus has been sent to the trash, filled with dead annuals, tree and rose prunings, and empty bulb bags. Numerous bags of compost, planting soil, and mulch have been added to the yard.

I still have lots of yanking and pruning to do but it is a goodly start.



There is a honeysuckle on the left. The green plants are snapdragons that has perdured until now. You can see bearded iris plantings sticking their little noses up. This is the south border.


You have seen the low retaining wall on the north half of the yard. All kinds of bulbs are planted beneath the pansies and chrysanthemums.


There is now a second retaining wall on the south side. Here are pansies planted over more bulbs, all in the neighborhood of the Methley plum tree (which put out a few blooms the week before last; go figure). The mulched area between the plum tree and the French lavender is planted with daffodils and freesias.


The north border has some new bearded iris and white and pink daffodils. Also ranunculus. The area circling the rose bush has pastel tulips.

And that's the excitement on the gardening front.

I treated myself to a massage on Thursday. I could have used it more yesterday or today but I'm still glad I did it. It relaxed me so much I went to bed that night at 8 and slept until 6 the next morning.

--the BB

Republicans win office, kill jobs immediately

Republicans win office, kill jobs immediately

Yo! If you voted Republican you should have anticipated this because there is a demonstrable track record that the GOP does not give a shit about American workers. If you thought they would help the jobs situation you have paid no attention to our history or their track record. Wake up and start paying attention now because those who put them in power are culpable not for what they surprisingly do but for what they predictably do.

--the BB

Impunity

R. Jeffrey Smith writes in the Washington Post:

Human rights experts have long pressed the administration of former president George W. Bush for details of who bore ultimate responsibility for approving the simulated drownings of CIA detainees, a practice that many international legal experts say was illicit torture.

In a memoir due out Tuesday, Bush makes clear that he personally approved the use of that coercive technique against alleged Sept. 11 plotter Khalid Sheik Mohammed, an admission the human rights experts say could one day have legal consequences for him.

...

Georgetown University law professor David Cole, a long-standing critic of Bush's interrogation and detention policies, called prosecution unlikely. "The fact that he did admit it suggests he believes he is politically immune from being held accountable. . . . But politics can change."

What Mr. Smith does not say, and should have been said, is that the United States declared waterboarding to be torture in WWII and prosecuted enemies for doing it.

That war criminals like George W. Bush and Richard B. Cheney can make admissions like this with no apparent fear of consequences speaks volumes about the lawlessness of their regime and of this nation.

--the BB

End douchebaggery

h/t to watertiger

--the BB

No Anglican Covenant

On this feast of Richard Hooker I offer the following news release:

No Anglican Covenant Coalition
Anglicans for Comprehensive Unity
noanglicancovenant.org


NEWS RELEASE
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2010
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE



INTERNATIONAL CAMPAIGN SEEKS TO STOP ANGLICAN COVENANT

LONDON – An international coalition of Anglicans has been created to campaign against the proposed Anglican Covenant. Campaigners believe the proposed Covenant constitutes unwarranted interference in the internal life of the member churches of the Anglican Communion, would narrow the acceptable range of belief and practice within Anglicanism, and would prevent further development of Anglican thought. The Coalition’s website (noanglicancovenant.org) will provide resources for Anglicans around the world to learn about the potential risks of the proposed Anglican Covenant.

“We believe that the majority of the clergy and laity in the Anglican Communion would not wish to endorse this document,” according to the Coalition’s Moderator, the Revd. Dr. Lesley Fellows, who is also the Coalition’s Convenor for the Church of England. “Apart from church insiders, very few people are aware of the Covenant. We want to encourage a wider discussion and to highlight the problems the Covenant will cause.”

The idea of an Anglican Covenant was first proposed in 2004 as a means to address divisions among the member churches of the Anglican Communion on matters ranging from human sexuality to the role of women. The current draft of the Covenant, which has been unilaterally designated as the “final” draft, has been referred to the member churches of the Communion. The proposed Covenant establishes mechanisms which would have the effect of forcing member churches to conform to the demands and expectations of other churches or risk exclusion from the Communion.

Critics of the proposed Anglican Covenant, including members of the new Coalition, believe that it will fundamentally alter the nature of historic Anglicanism in several ways, including the narrowing of theological views deemed acceptable, the erosion of the freedom of the member churches to govern themselves, and the concentration of authority in the hands of a small number of bishops. Two English groups, Inclusive Church and Modern Church, ran anti-Covenant advertisements in last week’s Church Times and the Church of England Newspaper aiming to make more members of the Church of England aware of the dangers of the proposed Anglican Covenant.

"If the Anglican Communion has a problem, this is not the solution,” according to former Bishop of Worcester Peter Selby. “Whether those who originated the Covenant intended it or not, it is already, and will become even more, a basis for a litigious Communion from which some will seek to exclude others."

The launch of the No Anglican Covenant Coalition website coincides with the commemoration of the sixteenth-century theologian Richard Hooker. “Hooker taught us that God’s gifts of scripture, tradition, and reason will guide us to new insights in every age,” according to the Canadian priest and canon law expert, the Revd. Canon Alan Perry. “The proposed Anglican Covenant would freeze Anglican theology and Anglican polity at a particular moment. Anglican polity rejected control by foreign bishops nearly 500 years ago. The proposed Anglican Covenant reinstates it.”

The No Anglican Covenant Coalition began in late October with a series of informal email conversations among several international Anglican bloggers concerned that the Covenant was being rushed through the approval process before most Anglicans had any opportunity to learn how the proposed new structures would affect them.

noanglicancovenant.org

Revd. Dr Lesley Fellows (England) +44 1844 239268
Dr. Lionel Deimel (USA) +1-412-512-9087
Revd. Malcolm French (Canada) +1-306-550-2277
Revd. Lawrence Kimberley (New Zealand) +64 3 981 7384

The Collect for Hooker's feast, November 3:

O God of truth and peace,

you raised up your servant Richard Hooker

in a day of bitter controversy

to defend with sound reasoning and great charity

the catholic and reformed religion:

Grant that we may maintain the middle way,

not as a compromise for the sake of peace,

but as a comprehension for the sake of truth;

through Jesus Christ our Lord,

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,

one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

--the BB

Go Giants!

Bay Area folks and former Bay Area folks are pretty excited about the San Francisco Giants winning the World Series (and beating the boys from W's team to boot).

As unlikely as it seems, I was in a bar when they won the pennant and we knew they were going to the Series. Whole lotta shouting going on and I, a total non-sports-fan, was pretty stoked about it too.

I trust this celebratory post will not be deemed trademark infringement. We're just so damned proud of the boys from Baghdad by the Bay (as Herb Caen used to call it).

Yes, I miss Herb and his column.

All right, San Francisco, first we vote. And Wednesday we party!

--the BB

Heart thread - 11/01/2010

We remember Kirstin in our prayers daily, yes? She has offered some focus for our prayers and I ask you to read her latest post here.

She needs folks to travel with her for treatments and we're trying to get the word out in case someone who can do this will read and say "Yes."

If you can come with me, come with me. If you can’t, pray and let me know that you’re praying. Thank you.

and

Honestly, when you don’t see me is when I most need you. If you think of it, e-mail and say hi.

There was a time when she was in seminary and she and I traded e-mails endlessly. I have failed of late. May God help me to do better. God knows I have not forgotten her but I have not told her often enough.

--the BB

Heart thread - 10/31/2010

My father-in-law, Jack, is declining rapidly. I ask your continued prayers that he may be delivered from anxiety and pain in his last days. Thanks to all who have prayed for him and the family.

My cousin Michael and his wife Danielle are grandparents. Aria Evans has entered the world on October 29, her mother's birthday.

So many of my friends and their families need prayer that I cannot begin to list them (and in some cases it is confidential), so I offer them to God and to your prayers.

I also offer thanksgiving for the SF Giant's victory tonight because I can't help myself.

--the BB

You should be afraid

Paul Krugman points out the destructive path we are on if the fecking Republicans gain power. They only have a very few goals: destroy the President and serve the wealthy and corporate power. That is their entire agenda. They don't give a shit about the common welfare, the health of the economy, true national security, their red herring "values" issues, the working class, the Constitution and the rule of law, or anyone but their cronies. It's sad but true.

The Democrats are flawed humans and I try to hold them accountable but the Republican corporate structure is outright evil. Oppose it at every possible opportunity. And do your best not to be silent when lies or stupidity are uttered.


--the BB

I Remember

Televangelist Oral Roberts' gay grandson says "it gets better"