This is how the Dutch do it. America can do it too if only it wanted to.
h/t- Levees.org
August 31, 2009
August 29, 2009
August 28, 2009
August 26, 2009
“The Dream will never die…”
I am a Kennedy child. My parents were adamant supporters of the family and the Civil Rights movement. My early life was steeped in the words and sentiments that the various members of the Kennedy clan espoused. The mold was made and my soul was poured into it. The rest of my life would be lived in accordance to their teachings.
I remember the day JFK was killed. We were sent home from school without any word of what had happened. I found my mother crying next to the radio and she grabbed me in a desperate hold. She said that I must never forget what could be for our country. A few years later she and I repeated the same moment when Sirhan Sirhan killed Bobby. Three years later she would be dead at the age of thirty-four, but her words and inspiration never left me. I was a fucking Progressive pup, and I had to follow through to see the day that the Dream would become Reality.
And then there was Teddy. The scandal over Mary Jo bothered me, but during those years I learned that when one is drunk they don’t always notice details. People do make mistakes. Through the remaining years I came to respect the man who held the name Kennedy in our Congress. The Americans With Disabilities Act, the efforts to help people with HIV. The caring for Seniors and the little ones always grabbed me. These last few months when it finally seemed that he would achieve his desire for healthcare for all Americans felt to me like the crowning act of a person, who despite their position and wealth, lineage, always worked for little folks like me. Teddy was the real deal.
Three-something this morning, as I scanned my news feeds, I saw the notice of his death. I went through the same kind of feelings I had for Jack and Bobby, but this time I felt this event to be both a challenge and a promise, a further example of what this Nation was meant to be… a Nation of Equals.
Thank you Senator Edward Kennedy, Teddy in my mind. You continued the concepts of your brothers and broadened them into a philosophy for all people in this country. You are a great Spirit, and you will not be forgotten by those of us steeped in the ideas you promulgated. We are your kids, the Kennedy kids.
Teddy, here is my promise to your life and works; I will continue to fight the good fight for all people, even to my last breath. And as my Spirit leaves my corporal form, I will pass knowing that the Dream shall never die.
August 25, 2009
August 22, 2009
Time To Go Back To Blogging
Over the last few months my Blogging has almost become non-existant. It’s not that I don’t have enough to rant about… I’m just tired. Four years of slogging and smacking down mooks for being stooopid on top of the cares of rebuilding our home and lives, care for friends and love for New Orleans have taken much out of me. It has also upset that delicate balance that I had acheieved years ago with my little dance with HIV.
For months I’ve been more of a news aggregator funneling good pieces onto dear old FB and just letting the chips fall as they will. I had gotten away from what I started doing right after the Flood in educating folks about what was going down here and explaining the arcane systems that the powers-that-be had concocted for the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast. One-liners followed by a link doesn’t fit the bill in my book.
This weekend I was with many of us original NOLA Bloggers for the Rising Tide 4. I felt connected again and so proud of what they continue to do even now at the eve of the 4th anniversary of the Federal Flood. I realized that I wasn’t a parrot, but an owl. My life has spread half-way around the World twice, I have the Blessing to be able to have been able to rebuild my life and Being as it must be and I am surrounded, physically and in cyber with some of the best souls I have ever known. Some of the folk there asked why I had gotten quiet on my Blog, that they missed the rants and the snarky diatribesand the Tales of Our City.
The Blog no longer had any meat.
There has to be the meat, the processing of a news article by a person in order to make sense, show some relation and postulate what a political decision can lead to down the line.
So I’m going back to Blogging more regularly. If someone trashes New Orleans of the Gulf Coast, I am going to freaking eat you alive. Some politician wants new rules that will be to our disadvantage here, I will dig to refute or abuse you in creative ways. And when I just want to talk about life or my beloved New Orleans, I will do just that. There is a story to be told about a chunk of the country that has been used and abused for the Nation’s benefit but is sadly lacking when it comes to being helped to heal. (the volunteers who have come understand and we hail them). I’m talking State and Federal governments and the oil/gas companies. I’m talking about the destruction of our wetlands… the disregard for the folk of the swamps as just fools and simple folk. About buying a populace and culture and just running it into the ground because “people of this region do not count”.
Yes we do. Without us and the sacrifices over the last century the rest of the U.S. would not have what it has now. Our homeland, bought as just swamp and some chattel have been almost crushed, but life still flows here.
Sinn Fein!