November 30, 2004

Now I see why they want my tax money to fund their marriage training programs and “defense of marriage” Constitutional amendments. From William V. D’Antonio in the Boston Globe:
The Associated Press, using data supplied by the US Census Bureau, found that the highest divorce rates are to be found in the Bible Belt. The [...]


This has been making the rounds, and since the duties of the president have been redefined to upholding “God’s Laws” rather than the laws of the United States of America, I thought these questions appropriate:
Dear President Bush,
Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God’s Law. I have learned a great deal from [...]


From Ari Berman in The Nation:
Epidemics
** 400,000 Iraqi children suffer from chronic diarrhea and dangerous deficiencies of protein, according to a UN development report. Iraq’s child malnutrition rate now roughly equals that of Burundi – a war-torn central African nation – and is far above both Uganda and Haiti.
** 60 percent of rural residents and [...]


And that’s just the Iraqis. The latest on Americans killed and wounded, that have reached record levels in November, from Editor and Publisher:
As the toll of Americans killed and wounded in Iraq in November approaches record levels for one month in this war, is the press only telling part of the story?
The Pentagon’s [...]


November 29, 2004

The hypocrites who proudly support the death and dismemberment of hundreds of thousands for no reason, otherwise known as the Iraq War, are expressing “moral outrage” over a woman’s bare back at a football game. Get that woman a burkha. From Frank Rich in the New York Times:
To see how the hucksters of [...]


Got this today, funny stuff:
1. Get that abortion you’ve always wanted.
2. Drink a nice clean glass of water.
3. Cash your social security check.
4. See a doctor of your own choosing.
5. Spend quality time with your draft age child/grandchild.
6. Visit Syria, or any foreign country for that matter.
7. Get that gas mask you’ve been putting off [...]


Have you had a chance to read this one by Mel Gilles? An excerpt below:
…Listen to George Bush say that the will of God excuses his behavior. Listen, as he refuses to take responsibility, or express remorse, or even once, admit a mistake. Watch him strut, and tell us that he will only work [...]


Someone sent me this when I was trying to figure out why people routinely use slurs against minorities and women, without thinking about the impact on these groups. Some background, this was from an Asian support newsgroup that had been invaded by trolls, and the author’s patience had been sorely tested. Still, I [...]


From James Galbraith in Salon:
…if the Ukraine standard were applied in Ohio – as it should be – then the late lamented U.S. election certainly was stolen. In Ohio, the secretary of state in charge of the elections process was co-chairman of the Bush campaign in the state. He obstructed the vote count systematically – [...]


November 27, 2004

From Ian Soloman in the Baltimore Sun:
How can we expect voters – especially young, disadvantaged or newly registered voters – to have faith in our voting system? How can we expect our allies to take seriously U.S. efforts to hold elections in Iraq and elsewhere? How can we be confident that the most fundamental principles [...]


Must see political cartoon by Kirk Anderson


November 26, 2004

I was reading some letters to the editor where people were objecting to their local newspapers that featured photos of the dead and dying in Iraq. Here is one letter that says what I’m thinking rather well, from the Rutland Herald:
Images of the sick, dying and dead children in Iraq are hard to shake. [...]


I can’t get these images out of my head. And none of it ever had to happen. From Tom Lasseter of Knight Ridder:
Inside the house, the family that fled left handwritten verses of the Quran on the doorways, a tradition intended to keep homes safe. Baby formula was scattered around and a kerosene [...]


From Leonard Steinhorn in Salon:
Recent surveys by the New York Times and Newsweek show large majorities of Catholics favoring married priests, female priests, gay adoptions and birth control. And barely a third want abortion outlawed, no different from the proportion in the rest of America.…Much has been made of the Roman Catholic hierarchy’s opposition to [...]


From W. Joseph Stroupe in Asia Times:
Controversial and ill-advised unilateral US economic and foreign policies since September 11 are only fueling the fire. In the immediate aftermath of the re-election of President George W Bush, international support for the dollar and for related US economic and foreign policies is noticeably weakening, at a time when [...]


And they even managed to swindle the American Indians once again. From NOW:
Since that report, three of Tom DeLay’s close political associates have been indicted in the case. But all those candidates he had helped elect to the state legislature saw to it that Texas was gerrymandered in time to defeat four Democratic incumbents [...]


Half the country couldn’t care less, while the other half can’t sleep at night knowing such things are happening. From Antiwar.org:
“In one 48-hour period, we killed over 30 civilians in vehicles that got past our roadblocks. We just lit ‘em up with gunfire. But when we went to pull the charred corpses out of [...]


Don’t say we didn’t tell you so. But that huge tax break all you Bush voters get on your inheritance from your billionaire grandfathers will more than compensate, right? Ha ha ha. From Joe Conason in Salon:
…the forthcoming White House tax plan is pure simplicity. It will transfer the tax burden from [...]


November 25, 2004

My God. The priest in the article sounds like he worships at the altar of Bush, not Jesus. From Evan Wright, who was embedded with the Marines in Iraq, in the Village Voice:
…Late that afternoon, the Humvee I was in was following about 50 feet behind a Marine Light Armored Vehicle when it [...]


In the history books, those who voted for Bush will be in the same chapter as those who allowed Hitler to take power, entitled “How lazy, greedy, immoral people screwed the world.” From Rana Kabbani in The Guardian:
…A year and a half ago, CIA wings wafted [Ayad Allawi] and his ilk back to long-suffering [...]


From Nicholas Blanford in the Christian Science Monitor:
“It’s like an adviser from Saddam Hussei’s regime has come back to Iraq and is now advising the Americans.If one image symbolized the US-led coalition’s victory over Saddam Hussein it wasthe toppling of the dictator’s statue in central Baghdad last April. Yet that signal moment has been replaced [...]


November 24, 2004

More interesting stuff over at MyDD.com… Jerome says “It’s a 10:1 ratio in the number of corporations favoring Republicans over Democrats, but for the actual money, it’s much higher, 25:1 or greater.” And make that trip to Lowes instead of Home Depot, folks, Home Depot is one of the worst offenders…


Check out this excellent post by Jerome Armstrong on MyDD.com – love his concluding line:
” If you feel slightly amazed that you now find yourself standing on the far left wing of your own party, alongside 80-90% of the rest of the Democratic Party, in opposition to the unilateral occupation in Iraq, and to government [...]


This cartoon by Matt Wuerker says it all


How does a woman (or girl) without resources or civil liberties abstain? From Reuters:
A worldwide “pandemic” of violence against women is fueling the spread of HIV/AIDS, human rights group Amnesty International said Wednesday.
Mass rape and sexual violence in conflicts, coupled with collapsing health systems in countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo, put women [...]


November 23, 2004

From Brett Arends in the Boston Herald:
Stephen Roach, the chief economist at investment banking giant Morgan Stanley, has a public reputation for being bearish.
But you should hear what he’s saying in private.
Roach met select groups of fund managers downtown last week, including a group at [...]


From Canada.com:
Prime Minister Paul Martin is urging Canadians to remain peaceful if they want to protest against U.S. President George W. Bush’s visit next week.
Some protesters sported anti-Bush headbands and waved posters hurling every imaginable epithet at Bush, including murderer and assassin.The prime minister made the request while Chilean police pelted protesters with water cannons [...]


This explains quite a few things. Note: GAO vs. Cheney was settled in the way John Dean feared. As Congressman Henry Waxman said, ?The decision is another Bush v. Gore. It is a convoluted decision by a Republican judge that gives Bush and Cheney near total immunity from scrutiny. In Bush v. [...]


From the AP:
Whoever wrote a legislative provision to give broader congressional access to income tax records should be tracked down and held to account, a Democratic senator said Monday.
Republicans countered that the provision was not meant to weaken privacy laws. “Honest mistakes were made, but there’s no conspiracy here,” said Rep. Ernest J. Istook Jr. [...]


Once again we get to watch Republican campaign donors, this time in the financial industry, get rich off the American taxpayer (and that burden will be shifted even more sharply to the middle class under Bush’s new tax plan.) From Liberal Oasis:
Sen. John McCain didn’t get the memo about the Republican charade to pretend [...]


November 22, 2004

If only the Bushublicans cared a fraction as much about fair elections in the U.S…. From Reuters:
The United States on Monday threatened to review its relationship with Ukraine and to take punitive steps if the Ukrainian government fails to investigate allegations of fraud and abuse in its presidential election.
More than 100,000 Ukrainians poured into [...]


From the San Francisco Chronicle:
Acute malnutrition among young children in Iraq has nearly doubled since the United States led an invasion of the country 20 months ago, according to surveys by the United Nations, aid agencies and the interim Iraqi government.
After the rate of acute malnutrition among children younger than 5 steadily declined to 4 [...]


From Gawker:
Freemans, tuesday night the 16th of nov. the bush twins , along with 2 massive secret service men, tried to have dinner. they were told by the maitre’d that they were full and would be for the next 4 years. upon hearing, the entire restaurant cheered and did a round of shots… it was [...]


Those who voted without a clue are about to get one, as this anti-contraception/anti-birth control adminstration with their rubber-stamp Republican Congress hits its stride. Their policies put the health and lives of women and their families in jeopardy, as Anne Looser points out in the Daily Utah Chronicle:

…The druggist had no knowledge as to [...]


From Katha Pollitt in The Nation:
… Has the Christian right really so little to show for its self-sacrifice? “John Kerry’s defeat notwithstanding,” Frank Rich argued in his New York Times column recently, “it’s blue America, not red, that is inexorably winning the culture war, and by a landslide.” So you might think if you watch [...]


The governor who had the worst environmental record in Congress got a bit miffed at the Baltimore Sun when they reported his plans to sell off Maryland park land to developers. So he told state employees to keep his plans secret from now on. From the Baltimore Sun:
The Ehrlich administration has taken [...]


Let’s see, childhood malnutrition doubled, the torture of prisoners, the bombing of entire cities, no electricity or running water, newspapers shut down, a ruler picked by us… From Rich Adams in the Cheboygan Tribune:
Iraq’s Electoral Commission on Sunday set national elections for Jan. 30, and a spokesman said ballots would be cast nationwide.
Iraqis will [...]


November 20, 2004

From the New York Times:
While assembling a new national security team, President Bush is confronting what could become the biggest challenge of his second term: how to contain Iran’s nuclear program and what some in the administration believe to be Tehran’s support of violence in Israel and insurgents in Iraq.
In an eerie repetition of the [...]


November 19, 2004

A complete reshuffling of the deck in favor of the wealthy. From Michelle Goldberg in Salon:
The Bush administration is pushing a system in which someone who lives off interest and dividends – say, Paris Hilton – would pay less tax than the person who cleans her bathroom.…Was the White House really suggesting eliminating incentives [...]


We’ll be riding off in old Model T’s to pick grapes before long. From CNN:
The dollar inched down on Friday, heading back towards record lows against the euro as traders braced for a meeting of G20 finance ministers that is not expected to act against the dollar’s recent weakness.
Expectations that the Group of [...]


From the Los Angeles Times:
The battle for the city of Fallouja is giving U.S. military commanders some insight into this country’s insurgency, painting a portrait of a home-grown uprising dominated by Iraqis, not foreign fighters.
Of the more than 1,000 men between the ages of 15 and 55 who were captured in intense fighting in the [...]


From David Cole in Salon:
…With the possible exception of the right to bear arms, it is difficult to name a constitutional guarantee that Ashcroft did not trample upon.
The right to liberty itself has given way to mass preventive detention, effected through pretextual law enforcement, abuse of the material-witness authority and designation of detainees as “enemy [...]


I hope this is the first of many such challenges to this administration’s attempts to undermine our country’s democratic traditions. From the AP:
A Democratic senator warned CIA director Porter Goss yesterday that his efforts to make major changes could have ”a significant and negative effect on the agency.”
In a letter to Goss, Senator Dianne [...]


November 18, 2004

This, Bush supporters, is but one reason your talk of moral values rings so falsely in my ears. Spare me your lies. From a letter by J Scott Smith in


From the AP:
The battle for control of Fallujah has sharpened divisions among Iraq’s major ethnic and religious groups, fueled anti-American sentiment and stoked the 18-month-old Sunni insurgency. The recapture of Fallujah has not broken the insurgents’ will to fight and may not pay the big dividend U.S. planners had hoped to improve security enough to [...]


November 17, 2004

Check out these political cartoons:
Red State Jesus
A Cabinet In His Image
The “Liberation” of Falluja
Farewell, Colin Powell
Moderation’s Last Stand
Four More Wars
W, W, W, W, W…


My, how they’ve quickened the pace of dismantling the Constitution since the election – who’d have thunk 4 years with no worries about being elected at the end of them would have this effect? From the AP:
…In his second month on the job, [CIA Director Porter] Goss sent out an e-mail this week to [...]


Is it just me that thinks we should be alarmed that we can’t eat fish anymore? I don’t know, seems kind of like a red flag of some kind to me, but the Bush Administration only sees the color of money. From Katharine Mieszkowski in Salon:
Under the legislation the Bush administration calls Clear [...]


The half of America that knows what’s going on (otherwise known as the “reality-based community”) just saw the moron alert level go from orange to red… From Suzanne Goldenberg in Salon:
President Bush Tuesday named his foreign policy tutor and trusted confidant, Condoleezza Rice, as America’s envoy to the world, signaling that his second administration [...]


From Dan Froomkin in the Washington Post:
Stephen J. Hadley, who President Bush yesterday named his new national security adviser, has had a prominent role in many of the Bush administration’s bigger mistakes, such as the under-reaction to al Qaeda threats before Sept. 11, 2001; the spreading of faulty intelligence about weapons of mass destruction [...]


November 16, 2004

What a despicable little man. From John Nichols in The Nation:
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, the health insurance industry heir who went into politics for the purpose of protecting his family’s financial interests against even the most tepid federal regulation, is not exactly an expert on the workings of Congress.
But that has not stopped [...]


November 15, 2004

“As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.” ~ H.L. [...]


From Robert Scheer in The Nation:
It’s time to get over it.
We’ve had our week of mourning, and there is no shame in losing a presidential election by .001 of the national electorate – the equivalent of 136,483 misguided Ohioans. More important, there is no room for a crippling depression on the part of Democrats [...]


And the latest news comes that Doctors Without Borders must leave. How can you win the “hearts and minds” of those who watch their children die? From Reuters:
Aid agencies have called on U.S. forces and the Iraqi government to allow them to deliver food, medicine and water to Falluja, and saying that four [...]


November 14, 2004

So much for the “moral values” myth. “If the Republican party’s next round of leaders are all cool with blue culture, why should Democrats run after the red?” From Frank Rich in the New York Times:
…[There] stands a single ambiguous phrase coined by an anonymous exit pollster: “Moral values.” By near universal agreement [...]


Just as I was wondering what this Bush Co. crook has been up to… From Naomi Klein in The Nation:
Less than twenty-four hours after The Nation disclosed that former Secretary of State James Baker and the Carlyle Group were involved in a secret deal to profit from Iraq’s debt to Kuwait, NBC was reporting that [...]


From Greg Mitchell in Editor and Publisher:
Dozens of embedded reporters re-enlisted this week, and hundreds of newspapers breathlessly recounted the invasion of the insurgent stronghold (which turned out to be not quite as strong as expected), as if it was the turning point in the war. The embeds were far from the scene, however, when [...]


Saw this in The Nation:
“A little patience, and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their spells dissolve, and the people, recovering their true sight, restore their government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are suffering deeply in spirit, and incurring the horrors of a war and [...]


November 13, 2004

If we don’t talk about this now, then when? I dunno, sure seems like a good time to me… From John Belisarius in the Emerging Democratic Majority:
In the last few day’s accusations of massive vote fraud, ballot theft and suppression of the Democratic vote during the 2004 elections have mushroomed to such a level [...]


Liberal Oasis has an interesting (and optimistic) breakdown of the races.


Bush and Ehrlich shared rides in Sinclair helicopters, and they share a hatred of the environment. Ehrlich is doing to Maryland what Bush did to Texas. That’s what happens when the Democrats field a weak candidate in a blue state. The shortsighted, greedy Republicans won’t be satified until all of America from [...]


From David J. Morris in Salon:
…While no one questions the profound, ongoing sacrifices of the soldiers and Marines slugging it out in the town, it is nevertheless important to recognize that within the context of the dynamic insurgency the United States faces in Iraq, Fallujah’s impending recapture is largely symbolic; it is but one victory [...]


From Moby’s Blog


November 12, 2004

Liberal: favoring reform or progress… Yeehaw is not a foreign policy… I don’t just hug trees, I kiss them too… Peace – back by popular demand… Thanks for not paying attention (a message from Bush – Cheney)… How can I trust you? You fell for Bush’s lies… United we stand (with a map [...]


And then there were the US and Britain… and don’t forget Poland! But they are pulling out, too, Mr. Bush. From Reuters:
The Dutch cabinet has decided to bring home the 1,350 Dutch troops in Iraq (news – web sites) in March next year, confirming a decision first made in June, the Dutch news [...]


51% asked for a war president, and they got a war. But how many of the Iraqi’s asked for it? From the AP:
The Iraqi government rushed reinforcements Friday to the country’s third-largest city, Mosul, seeking to quell a deadly militant uprising that U.S. officials suspected may be in support of the resistance in [...]


My country, ’tis of thee, foul land of fascism? Hitler’s right hand man Goering once said:

“Of course the people don’t want war. But after all, it’s the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it’s a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or [...]


Ashcroft saying we shouldn’t criticize the president, now stations afraid to air Academy Award winning movies because of the FCC – which now seemingly must approve content. And they talk of context – is that a code name for, if it’s within the administration’s agenda, it’s OK, othewise forget about it? I read [...]


If a maturity challenged person has been gloating with one of those so-called Bush Country maps with red counties, show him these. The first is a companion to their map, showing population density in those red state counties. The second is a red state/blue state map resized for population (electoral vote.) And [...]


We know abortion rates went up significantly under the Bush Administration. The Bush administration has set up roadblocks to contraception not just in this country, but throughout the world where their influence could be extended – see the links in the right side bar of this blog. And now the case that made [...]


From the AP:
…Whether voters named “moral values” their key issue partly depended on whether that subject was included in a list of choices provided by pollsters, according to a Pew Research Center analysis released Thursday.
When “moral values” was included in poll questions, it was named more often than any other issue. But when voters were [...]


The memo. From < a href="http://www.alternet.org/rights/20475/">Alternet:
An August 2002 Justice Department memo “was vetted by a larger number of officials, including…the White House counsel’s office and Vice President Cheney’s office.” According to Newsweek, the memo “was drafted after White House meetings convened by George W. Bush’s chief counsel, Alberto Gonzales, along with Defense Department general [...]


Leaders of progressive Christian groups are standing firm to the progressive pro-choice position, while directing the focus of the “moral values” discussion toward those values that were the focus of Jesus. From the Washington Post:
… “The values that were promoted most within the conservative religious community were almost always tied to a fear factor, [...]


This sort of thing must be looked into – if not now, when? From a volunteer letter:
…I was in Columbus working for ACT for the four days leading up to the election and on Election Day. I worked the phones, the neighborhoods, and the polls for ACT. There is no doubt that [...]


This talk about abortion surfacing from badly worded exit polls must have Jerry Falwell’s heart all aflutter. Heaven help us, Falwell, who once said:

“I listen to feminists and all these radical gals… These women just need a man in the house. That’s all they need. Most of the feminists need a man to tell [...]


November 10, 2004

Must see Sorry, Everybody…


The media is playing along, of course. Exploding the myth, Jacob S. Hacker & Paul Pierson in The New Republic.


November 9, 2004

Amazing that so many Bush supporters have nothing better to do than troll liberal websites and flaunt their ignorance. Yes, ignorance – that for which there is no excuse.
To the willfully uniformed people who keep parroting the Saddam = 9/11 nonsense to justify the slaughter of innocents in Iraq: I know [...]


November 8, 2004

What foolish red state voters don’t know – and will find out only when it’s too late. From Dennis Jett in Salon:
At some point in the next four years there will be a great scandal that will make Watergate look like a fraternity prank. All the elements are already in place.
…More money will be [...]


November 7, 2004

An inside report of civilians awaiting attack from the BBC…


Michael Kinsley puts perspective on this nonsense in the Los Angeles Times:
The election campaign made it official. These are the Disunited States. There is “red America”: conservative, Republican, religious. And there is “blue America”: liberal, Democratic, secular. Everybody’s message from the election results is that red America won, and blue America must change or die.
But [...]


From Greg Sargent in the American Prospect:
… let?s remember what actually happened here. The real story of this race is that on many levels, the Republicans ran a campaign that was sleazier, more ruthless, and more dishonest than anything in memory – by far. The key Bush attacks on Kerry were, first, that he would [...]



So much for “cultural issues” – I think Bush “won” because he started a war and scared everyone to death.
55% said abortion should be always or mostly legal
60% said they support either same-sex marriage or civil unions
CNN Exit Polls
“Why of course the people don’t want war… But, after all, it is the leaders of the [...]


The religious right voting block gives Bush and the Republicans the edge in elections. And they all know it. From the Guardian:
To understand what is happening in the Middle East, you must first understand what is happening in Texas. To understand what is happening there, you should read the resolutions passed at the [...]


We tried to stop it. I don’t know what else to say… From The Nation:
…I know something about the costs of an unjust war, for my son, Nick – an infantryman in the US Army – is fighting one in Iraq. I don’t speak for my son. I couldn’t even if I wanted to, [...]


Jerome and Chris at MyDD have been examining this issue, so check out their articles. Also, from John Fund in the Wall Street Journal:
…The general GOP euphoria over Tuesday’s election results should not obscure the fact that the election was close and that Republican victories become scarcer as you go further down the ballot. [...]


November 6, 2004

Divided Times Newsletter


Not that folly ever stopped the Bushublicans. From Mother Jones:
Here we go again: President Bush is making yet another push for privatizing Social Security, as part of his pledge to create an “era of ownership” if he is re-elected for a second term. In a new TV ad, the Bush campaign is touting the [...]


From the Cincinnati Enquirer:
The nation’s employment grew by a surprising 337,000 jobs in October, the best gain in seven months, with big gains in construction, health care and temporary services, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday.
The unemployment rate, however, ticked up to 5.5 percent, as more people joined the work force but have yet [...]


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Reference
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Quotations
Women

"Grab the broom of anger and drive off the beast of fear." ~ Zora Neale Hurston

"Life can be wildly tragic at times, and I've had my share. But whatever happens to you, you have to keep a slightly comic attitude. In the final analysis, you have got to not forget to laugh." ~ Katharine Hepburn

"A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song." ~ Maya Angelou

"If only we'd stop trying to be happy we'd have a pretty good time." ~ Edith Wharton

"Mistakes are the dues one pays for a full life." ~ Sophia Loren

"For most of history, Anonymous was a woman." ~ Virginia Woolf

"Woman must not be awed by that which has been built up around her; she must reverence that woman in her which struggles for expression." ~ Margaret Sanger

"Probably, hanging onto the past brings more destruction than any other single cause. ...It's the Muslim fundamentalists who worship the past and ignore the reformist spirit with which Muhammad viewed women. It's the backward-looking Christian literalists who interpret religious teachings in a way that consolidates their power..." ~ Gloria Steinem

"'Inherent differences' between men and women, we have come to appreciate, remain cause for celebration, but not for denigration of the members of either sex or for artificial constraints on an individual's opportunity." ~ Ruth Bader Ginsberg

"Feminism is and always has been about women acting in the world as full-fledged citizens, as real participants in the world of ideas and policy and history." ~ Susan Faludi

"As a woman, I have no country. As a woman, my country is the world." ~ Virginia Woolf

"...remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors... If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation." ~ Abigail Adams

"Bloody treason, murderous act
Not by women were designed.
Bells o'erthrown nor churches sacked
Speak not ill of womenkind."
~ Gearoid Iarla Fitzgerald

"We are coming down from our pedestal and up from the laundry room. We want an equal share in government and we mean to get it." ~ Bella Abzug

"Too often the great decisions are originated and given form in bodies made up wholly of men, or so completely dominated by them that whatever of special value women have to offer is shunted aside without expression." ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

"There cannot be true democracy unless women's voices are heard. There cannot be true democracy unless women are given the opportunity to take responsibility for their own lives." ~ Hillary Rodham Clinton

"If we are to achieve a richer culture, rich in contrasting values, we must recognize the whole gamut of human potentialities, and so weave a less arbitrary social fabric, one in which each diverse gift will find a fitting place." ~ Margaret Mead

"Of my two 'handicaps' being female put more obstacles in my path than being black." ~ Shirley Chisholm

"Sometimes, I feel discriminated against, but it does not make me angry. It merely astonishes me. How can any deny themselves the pleasure of my company?" ~ Zora Neale Hurston

Nature

"Eventually, all things merge into one; and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world's great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs..." ~ Norman Maclean

"There was a strange stillness. The birds, for example - where had they gone?... It was a spring without voices." ~ Rachel Carson

"If you have men who will exclude any of God's creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who will deal likewise with their fellow men." ~ St. Francis of Assisi

"I have from an early age abjured the use of meat, and the time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look on the murder of men." ~ Leonardo Da Vinci

"God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand straining, leveling tempests and floods; but He cannot save them from fools." ~ John Muir

"The idea of wilderness needs no defense, it only needs defenders." ~ Edward Abbey

"We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it... Our delight in the sunshine on the deep-bladed grass to-day might be no more than the faint perception of wearied souls, if it were not for the sunshine and the grass in the far-off years which still live in us, and transform our perception into love." ~ George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans)

"Those who dwell, as scientists or laymen, among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life." ~ Rachel Carson

"When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world." ~ John Muir

Freedom

"The will of the people is the only legitimate foundation of any government, and to protect its free expression should be our first object." ~ Thomas Jefferson

"A nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood of ideas in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people." ~ John F. Kennedy

"I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." ~ James Madison

"When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion." ~ C. P. Snow

"Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth." ~ Albert Einstein

"Necessity is the plea of every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves." ~ William Pitt

"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." ~ Benjamin Franklin

"No matter how big a nation is, it is no stronger than its weakest people, and as long as you keep a person down, some part of you has to be down there to hold him down, so it means you cannot soar as you might otherwise." ~ Marian Anderson

Truth

"Rules are not necessarily sacred, principles are." ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt

"If somebody tells you you ought to quit, it's because they're afraid you won't." ~ Bill Clinton

"The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice." ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

"Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance." ~ Robert F. Kennedy

"I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant." ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery

"Find things that shine and move toward them." ~ Mia Farrow

"The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me? But the good Samaritan reversed the question: If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?" ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Abuse of Power

"We can have democracy in this country or we can have great wealth in a few hands, but we can't have both." ~ Louis Brandeis

"Usually, terrible things that are done with the excuse that progress requires them are not really progress at all, but just terrible things." ~ Russell Baker

"O, it is excellent to have a giant's strength; But it is tyrannous to use it like a giant." ~ William Shakespeare

"I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be." ~ Thomas Jefferson

Violence

"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it." ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

"When men talk about defense, they always claim to be protecting women and children, but they never ask the women and children what they think." ~ Patricia Schroeder

"I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity." ~ Dwight D. Eisenhower

"What difference does it make to the dead whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty and democracy?" ~ Mohandas Gandhi

"Mankind must put an end to war, or war will put an end to mankind... War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today." ~ John F. Kennedy

"Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God." ~ Jesus

"Every gun that is fired, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. The world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children." ~ Dwight D. Eisenhower

"When will our consciences grow so tender that we will act to prevent human misery rather than avenge it?" ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

"I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent." ~ Mohandas Gandhi

"The old law of an eye for an eye leaves everyone blind. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding; it seeks to annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends by defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers." ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Hypocrisy

"And thus I clothe my naked villany with odd old ends stol'n forth of holy writ, and seem a saint when most I play the devil." ~ William Shakespeare

"And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing... in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men... But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret..." ~ Jesus

"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man & his god, ... legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state." ~ Thomas Jefferson

"Persecution is not an original feature in any religion, but it is always the strongly marked feature of all religions established by law." ~ Thomas Paine

"I believe a woman has a right to an abortion. That's a decision that's up to the pregnant woman, not up to the pope or some do-gooders or the Religious Right.... There is no place in this country for practicing religion in politics." ~ Barry Goldwater

"Being pro-choice is trusting the individual to make the right decision for herself and her family, and not entrusting that decision to anyone wearing the authority of government in any regard." ~ Hllary Rodham Clinton

Politics

"I never was surer of my position that no self-respecting woman should wish or work for the success of a party that ignores her political rights." ~ Susan B. Anthony "In America, anybody can be president. That's one of the risks you take." ~ Adlai Stevenson

"On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron." ~ H.L. Mencken

"All political movements are like this - we are in the right, everyone else is in the wrong. The people on our own side who disagree with us are heretics, and they start becoming enemies. With it comes an absolute conviction of your own moral superiority. There's oversimplification in everything, and a terror of flexibility." ~ Doris Lessing

Pretended Patriotism

"Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism." ~ George Washington

"Heroism on command, senseless violence, and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism - how passionately I hate them!" ~ Albert Einstein

"True patriotism hates injustice in its own land more than anywhere else." ~ Clarence Darrow

"When a whole nation is roaring Patriotism at the top of its voice, I am fain to explore the cleanness of its hands and purity of its heart." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them." ~ George Orwell

"To (say) that we are to stand by the president right or wrong is not only unpatriotic and servile, but it's morally treasonable to the American public." ~ Theodore Roosevelt
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