via the [ Washington Note ]

Every gun that is made, 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.

This 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. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some 50 miles of concrete highway. We pay for a single fighter with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people…

- President Eisenhower, Chance for Peace Speech
April 16,1953

Thomas Adaptive Reuse, Infrastructure, International, Misc, National, Ways of Seeing, What I am Looking at

I just had an ah - ha moment and gained a little insight into myself, for me emotions are not just internal, they have location and I have to spend time with them before I understand from whence they come or how to approach them (time / space relativity). I suppose this is mostly obvious to anyone reading this blog.

Thomas Misc

“There are somethings in our society, in our world, for which I am proud to be maladjusted.”

- MLK

Thomas Misc, What I am Looking at

An impossible story in the telling.

Thomas Misc

via [ movements.org ] “How To Be an Effective Dissident”

Hillary Clinton and the U.S. State Department mainstreaming youth dissident culture -

[ Promo ]

I wonder if we could use this network for a campaign against the Tar Sands?

Thomas Information Graphics, Misc, Politics

I’ve been out of town for the past week and missed the news of Margaret Burroughs’ passing. This from the Chicago AP

A founder of one of the oldest African-American history museums in the country has died.

A spokesman for the DuSable Museum of African American History in Chicago, Raymond Ward, says Margaret Burroughs died in her sleep at her Chicago home Sunday morning at age 93.

Further details were not immediately available.

President Barack Obama said in a statement that Burroughs was “widely admired for her contributions to American culture as an esteemed artist, historian, educator, and mentor.”

Burroughs founded the museum with her husband and others on Chicago’s South Side in 1961.

The museum has pieces of art, exhibits on civil rights and a display on Chicago’s first black mayor, Harold Washington. It was named after Jean Baptiste Point du Sable, widely regarded as Chicago’s first permanent resident.

What Will Your Legacy Be?

Legacy? Legacy?

Do you know what the word “Legacy” means?

Well, if you don’t know, let me tell you what the dictionary says it means.

Legacy: property or money left to someone by a will; something handed down from those who have gone before; a legacy of honor, our legacy, of freedom.

In this poem, I’m not referring to material things like property or money, either of honor or of freedom.

I am referring to what a person has done with this life that God has given to him or her.

Yes, I want to know what will your legacy be? This is a question that I would like to put to each and every one of you?

What will your legacy be?

When you have finally cast off these mortal coils?

When you have crossed the great divide?

What will your legacy be?

When you can no longer run life’s race.

When you no longer have a place; when you have at last completed the circle round and when an escape is no longer to be found.

What will your legacy be?

When you walk into the unknown all by yourself and alone,

What will your legacy be?

Stop for a moment and listen to me and answer this question if you can.

What will your legacy be?

When you must cross that great divide into an area from which none can hide. When you, alone, with no one by your side with no friend to lead you or to hold your hand?

What will your legacy be?

What deeds have you done in your lifetime which will be left for you to be remembered by?

Will it be just a gray decaying tombstone standing alone in a cemetery or will it be, as it should be some act, some service or some deed that will insure that you will be remembered on and into the eternity of life’s game?

I ask you. What will your legacy be?

Will it be the fact that you helped somebody along the way, during the time while you were here on earth?

What will your legacy be?

Will it be similar to the legacies left to our generation by people like Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, John Brown, Ida B. Wells, Mary Bethune and so many others who made of their lives a bridge for us to cross over on and whose lives were an inspiration for us of today to make of our lives bridges for future generations to cross over on?

What will your legacy be?

Legacy! Legacy!

Let us stop for a moment and recall some of our people who left their lives as legacies to us, and who always will be honored and remembered. They were people like:

Harriet Tubman: her legacy was the work that she did on the underground railroad in which she brought hundreds of our ancestors out of the bonds of slavery; and,

Frederick Douglass: his legacy was the work that he did to help abolish slavery; and, fought against the evil of black men being lynched in this country; and,

Mary McLeod Bethune: her legacy was that she worked for the education of our youth by starting on faith, a small school which grew to be a great university; and

Dr. Martin Luther King’s Jr.: his legacy was that he devoted his life to fighting for full equality for our people; and,

Sojourner Truth: her legacy was her fight for the liberation of and full equality for all women in our country; and,

John Brown: his legacy was that he sacrificed his life for an end to slavery and for freedom of our people; and,

Bessie Coleman: her legacy was that she became the first woman in America, black or white, to acquire a pilot’s license; and,

Paul Robeson: his legacy was that he was a renaissance man. He was a concert and folk singer, an athlete and a linguist and that he fought for the liberation of all oppressed people all over in the world; and poets,

Langston Hughes and Margaret Walker: their legacies were the many inspirational poems that they wrote which expressed the soul of our people; and

Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois: his legacy was his life long struggle for the liberation of our people in his actions, his speeches and his writings; and,

Dr. Carter G. Woodson: his legacy was the fact that he early brought to the attention of the world the numerous and significant contributions of people of Africa and African descent to the attention of the world; and,

Booker T. Washington: his legacy was the fact that he worked for the education of our people when he founded and opened Tuskegee Institute in Alabama; and,

George Washington Carver: his legacy was his significant and important accomplishments in the field of science; and,

Jean Baptiste Point DuSable: his legacy was the fact he, a black man, was the first person to settle in the area that became Chicago and grew into a great trading center from the little post that DuSable of African blood started over 100 years ago; and, last but not least,

Charles Gordon Burroughs: his legacy was the first black history museum in the world which he as co-founder started in his living room at 3806 South Michigan Avenue in Chicago.

This act inspired many who were interested in the recognition and preservation of black history to the point that today there are over 100 black history museums in our country.

These are just a few as you well know.

There are many, many others who like these, left, though their contributions in their lifetime, their legacies as bridges for us to cross over on. So, I ask you, what will you leave as your legacy, as a bridge for those now and those coming on to cross over on. What will your legacy be?

I ask you, what will your legacy be? Do you know? How you thought about it? Do you have an answer? What will you leave as your legacy? If you have no answer, if at this point, you cannot say: Hearken! Listen to me! This is the moment. This is the prime moment for you to think and to get to work and identify what you will leave as your legacy for you to be remembered by. You are here. You are still here, alive and quick and you have time. You have time on your side. You have time to begin even now so get busy and do something to help somebody. To improve the conditions of life for people now and for those who come after. To build institutions to educate and broaden the minds for people now and for those who came after and to make your life a contribution that will be your legacy. Do this and your name will be remembered from now on and into eternity.

What will your legacy be? Hopefully, it will not be just a gray and decaying tombstone.

Think now! Act now! To insure that your legacy will be a positive contribution to humanity and you will be remembered, yes you will be remembered, on and on and in eternity as God wills it.

Articles: [ Chicago Defender ] [ Chicago Sun times ] [ Chicago Tribune ] [ NY Times ] [ People's World ]

Thomas Misc

via [ Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism ]

A panel of experts from the press, government, and academia discuss their new and upcoming projects. They discuss different methods of promoting investigative journalism, ranging from building non-profit institutions to converting the country of Iceland into a “free press haven.”

Unfortunately, I’m having problems with the video player. You can view the entire video here at:

[ Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism ]

The panel features Gavin MacFadyen (The Bureau for Investigative Journalism, UK), Chuck Lewis (American University), Julian Assange (WikiLeaks), Birgitta Jónsdóttir (Member of Parliament, Iceland) and Jon Weber (The Bay Citizen). Lowell Bergman moderates.

Thomas Misc

Via Yahoo News By PAUL FOY, Associated Press Writer – Mon Sep 13, 7:30 pm ET

Thomas Misc, Tar Sands

takeoff from cole rise on Vimeo.

Thomas Misc

Nell Irwin Painter’s “History of White People”

Thomas Misc

via [ NPR ] A Very Scary Light Show: The “US” Exploding H-Bombs In Space

Thomas Misc

via [ IDEM ]

The Grand Calumet River Restoration Fund (GCRRF) was established by Trust Agreement after settlement with “Industrial Users” in the case “United States of America v. The Sanitary District of Hammond, et al., Civ. Action No. 2:93-CV-225 JM”, for the benefit of the Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM), the Indiana Department of Natural Resources (IDNR), the Deputy Director of IDNR’s Bureau of Water and Resource Regulation (IDNR Co-Trustee), and the Assistant Commissioner of IDEM’s Office of Environmental Response (IDEM Co-Trustee). The purpose of the Fund, as established in the Trust Agreement is to “…address and correct environmental contamination in the Area of Concern, including particularly the cleanup of contaminated sediment and the remediation and restoration of natural resource damages within the Area of Concern….and, more specifically, in and around the West Branch of the Grand Calumet River in the State of Indiana (the “Hammond Reach”).”

The administration of the GCRRF was established by a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) among the Commissioner of IDEM; the Director of IDNR; the IDNR Co-Trustee; the IDEM Co-Trustee; the Regional Director of Region 3 of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service; and the Regional Administrator, Region 5, United States Environmental Protection Agency. Each of these “Parties” appointed a representative to serve on a GCRRF Council, the purpose and function of which is to “….coordinate the Parties’ activities relating to the GCRRF in order to achieve the maximum environmental benefit.” The Council is authorized and directed to:

• conduct and oversee scientific and technical studies, sampling, and other activities necessary to the development and implementation of sediment remedial action plans and natural resources restoration plans; make all necessary decisions for the management and administration of funds in the GCRRF in accordance with applicable law and this MOU;
• and arrange for contracts with professional consultants as necessary to provide services to the Parties to undertake activities pursuant to this MOU and the GCRRF Trust Agreement.”

The GCRRF Council has initiated Restoration Alternatives Development and Evaluation for contaminated sediment cleanup and restoration of natural resources in the West Branch Grand Calumet River. This project was divided into 3 phases: Phase I was to compile historical information on sediment contamination and to identify data gaps necessary for alternatives development (results of this portion of the study are included in Technical Memorandum Restoration Alternatives Development and Evaluation West Branch of the Grand Calumet River Indiana, February 2002); Phase II was initiated to collect samples necessary to fill data gaps identified during Phase I - Roxana Marsh and West Branch Characterization studies were initiated (documents related to each of these studies can be accessed below); and Phase III will be the Development and Evaluation of Alternatives.

Read more…

Thomas Misc

Neda: “What are you really thinking?”

I wish I could have protected you, the innocence. Your arrival is memorizing.

Thomas Misc

via [ Esquire ] “Biography of Usain Bolt, Mutant” By Luke Dittrich

A few months ago I posted this quote on facebook. There are Ah-ha moments and then there are moments of aw.

His top speed is such a spectacle, so phenomenal, so searing that many who witness this race, who see Bolt cross the line in 9.69 seconds, breaking his own three-month-old world record by three hundredths of a second, don’t notice, until they see the replay, what is perhaps the most salient and frightening thing about his performance: Approximately eighty meters into the race, twenty meters from the finish line, Bolt stops trying.

Thomas Misc

Thoughts:

via Paul Kane from comments [ The Messenger ]

This was a bloody slaughter, a bloody slaughter with global implications for the relationship between each of us and our goverment, for the utter bloody impunity of government.

via [ Matthew Yglesias ]

Gaza doesn’t contain nearly enough arable land to support the Strip’s population as subsistence farmers. Which of course is true of many other places on earth. But the effect of the embargo is to make meaningful commercial activity in Gaza nearly impossible, pushing living standards down to what would be a below-subsistence level were it not for the trickle of aid that flows in. The Hamas authorities exercise some fairly rough justice over the area, extremist groups burn down summer camps and Israel launches airstrikes periodically sometimes injuring dozens sometimes hurting no one. The overall situation is incredibly bleak. Construction supplies aren’t allowed into the area, so it’s been impossible to rebuild since the war there from a couple of years back, and all the physical infrastructure is just degrading over time.

via Steve Clemons of [ The Washington Note ]

From a distance, what seems to be happening is that Israel is ratcheting up its test of what it can do in the confines of the US-Israel relationship. It is testing to see whether there exist any limits or conditionality on Israeli behavior at all. Israel believes that the Obama team is weak — and is pushing aggressively to compel the US to tolerate anything the State of Israel does as a signal to the rest of the Middle East that is itself clamoring for any sign that the Obama administration is willing to put some muscle and substantive action behind the President’s Cairo speech and other comments to the governments and people in the Arab world.

The flotilla may have been populated by peace activists who really did want to get humanitarian supplies to Gaza — but the leadership of this flotilla was trying to expose the “false choice” contradiction that the US and other powers were making between Israel’s interests and the interests of the rest of the Middle East.

This was a strategic flotilla — designed to elicit exactly the response that Israel gave. This flotilla knew which button to push to animate Israel’s military response. It is not dissimilar from what al Qaeda did by attacking New York and Washington and drawing the US military to intervene in the Middle East.

Israel, like the United States, showed itself incapable of nuance and of outmaneuvering this flotilla by resorting to means that would not have helped the activists succeed in their objectives. At the Doha Forum, I am speaking to Arabs, Jews and Christians who represent senior governmental and non-governmental organizations in their home countries — and no one here that I have found thinks that the Israeli government responded to the flotilla sensibly — even if one buys the argument that the blockade of Gaza is justified.

The U.S. really can’t afford to make the choice of Israel over the Arab world. There will be enormous geopolitical and geoeconomic consequences if it does

Thomas International, Misc

Thomas Misc

via [ Harvard Ethics Course ] By Michael Sandel

About Justice:

Justice is one of the most popular courses in Harvard’s history.  Nearly one thousand students pack Harvard’s historic Sanders Theatre to hear Professor Sandel talk about justice, equality, democracy, and citizenship. Now it’s your turn to take the same journey in moral reflection that has captivated more than 14,000 students, as Harvard opens its classroom to the world.

This course aims to help viewers become more critically minded thinkers about the moral decisions we all face in our everyday lives.

In this 12-part series, Sandel challenges us with difficult moral dilemmas and asks our opinion about the right thing to do.

He then asks us to examine our answers in the light of new scenarios.  The result is often surprising, revealing that important moral questions are never black and white.

Sorting out these contradictions sharpens our own moral convictions and gives us the moral clarity to better understand the opposing views we confront in a democracy.

Thomas Misc, Politics, What I am Looking at

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Thomas Misc

Thomas Misc

Thomas Misc