quote Archives - Page 9 of 15

2014/12/22

Wisdom is Where You Find It

Spent a few hours today with my mother, who is on the Alzheimer’s path. . .on a “good” day, she knows something is not right, and tries to figure out what that is. . .she is one smart lady. . .tough and practical. . .she did not know where she was going to sleep tonight. . .I tried to reassure her without triggering her. . .at one point, she looked at me and said, “When we were younger, the things we thought were hard were really pretty easy.” I am still making my back into the solar system after being blown away by that observation from a “demented” person. . .Mom, I am developing more and more admiration for your courage as a practicing human being dealing with what life has delivered to your front door step. . .I hope on some level you are aware of that fact. . .

A note from my brother James Michael

2014/04/03

Hucksters selling you a ray-gun-proof magic hat…

The following quote is from an op-ed piece in the New York Times. I found it exceeding rich and to the point.

‘“Do you think that storm was from global warming?” everyone asked after coastal New York and New Jersey were smashed by Hurricane Sandy. “Well, maybe,” was the best anyone could say; there have always been storms.

But the aliens are in the backyard, Granny, and it’s time to start hitting them with the cast-iron pans. The [climate] deniers are the equivalent of hucksters selling you a ray-gun-proof magic hat.‘

Hear that Ann Wagner?

Here is a link to the full article: The Aliens Have Landed

2013/12/302024/07/21

So It Goes

Robin sings in the choir at The Center for Spiritual Living here in St. Louis. They tend to end meditative/pray moments with the saying, “And so it is.” This sounded familiar to me and then I realized it is very, very close to Kurt Vonnegut’s famous saying, “So it goes.”

“Unlike many of these quotes, the repeated refrain from Vonnegut’s classic Slaughterhouse-Five isn’t notable for its unique wording so much as for how much emotion—and dismissal of emotion—it packs into three simple, world-weary words that simultaneously accept and dismiss everything. There’s a reason this quote graced practically every elegy written for Vonnegut over the past two weeks (yes, including ours): It neatly encompasses a whole way of life. More crudely put: “Shit happens, and it’s awful, but it’s also okay. We deal with it because we have to.”

~~ from an article by By Tasha Robinson, Kyle Ryan, Josh Modell, Noel Murray & Scott Gordon 15 Things Kurt Vonnegut Said Better Than Anyone Else Ever Has Or Will

2011/11/222011/12/02

And Another Thing I Do Not Understand

And another thing I do not understand is this. Why do Evangelicals always quote scripture to you like that is the final authority on everything? Obviously, if you are a non-believer, that is a logical argument of the dog chasing his own tail variety.

This branch of religion (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) has it roots in nomads who could not figure out for 40 years how to cross the Sinai Desert to get from Egypt to Israel. The distance is less than 500 kilometers. The piece de resistance is that while they wandered for 40 years in this barren place, food rained down from the heavens upon them. I can think of many places today that this would be a blessing indeed. I’ve yet to see it though.

Once they finally figured where the heck Israel was, they went on a genocidal tear to take the land from the inhabitants that were already there.

Then we get into Jesus, a religious figure with no historical record. It just seems improbably to me that a personage of this import would not put at least a minor verifiable page into history. All we really have is mythology. This puts him in the same company as Zeus, Thor, and Shiva.

Put that hound on a trail that I can see, feel, smell or otherwise sense, then get back to me.

2011/09/262014/08/12

Most welfare fraud by doctors, hospitals, pharmacies…

I’ve been looking for a statistic on the percentage of welfare/Medicare fraud by recipients. I kept seeing this quote all over the Internet. While I did not find the original study, I am going to trust the Boston Herald.

“A study in Massachusetts showed that more than 93 percent of the money recovered from welfare fraud came from vendors.”

Read the full story at the Boston Herald at this link: The real cheaters

2011/09/062023/05/13

Disillusioned Republican laying it out

I am disillusioned… still

Our government/legislative process has been hijacked by nut cases and our Maginot Line of defense against these fruit cakes is a batch of spineless Democrats. Mr. Obama apparently has taken Neville Chamberlain as a role model on how to lead a nation.

Mean time, back at the ranch USA, Snidely Whiplash has kidnapped Nell and Dudley Do-Right has fallen into an inter-galactic black hole. No serious money is betting on him coming out the other end, and creditors are foreclosing on the ranch.

Below is a quote from the article Goodbye to All That: Reflections of a GOP Operative Who Left the Cult by Mike Lofgren at truth-out.org.

“But both parties are not rotten in quite the same way. The Democrats have their share of machine politicians, careerists, corporate bagmen, egomaniacs and kooks. Nothing, however, quite matches the modern GOP. Continue reading “Disillusioned Republican laying it out”

2010/10/012010/10/01

California’s Pot Vote

The only time bootleggers and preachers voted the same was to keep Prohibition. Apparently this is the case again in California where the legalizing marijuana for recreational use is on the ballot. Two big opponents funding the opposition to the bill are the liquor industry and the medical marijuana industry. Both feel they will lose some portion of the profit pie they are currently enjoying. Medical marijuana is going for $300 an ounce. One study predicted with legalization for recreation use, a price drop of 90 percent. That would bring it down to 1970s prices, and even cheaper if you consider our inflated dollars.

It is crazy to keep this substance illegal for any number of well documented reasons. Continue reading “California’s Pot Vote”

2009/04/152009/04/15

The Quiet Coup

Author of the article, The Quiet Coup, is is Simon Johnson, former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund.

Here is a quote from the opening of the artilce:

“The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government-a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF’s staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. And if we are to prevent a true depression, we’re running out of time.”

Scary stuff.