The Old Feminist Goes Domestic Goddess, Again

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One of my all time "dump-it-all-in" recipes. It is on my mind because this is what I cooked for supper tonight. I can freeze the left-overs and serve another evening (no cooking -- Hurray!). This is always a hit at those pot-luck suppers, too. The men really like it.

Okie (or Texican) Beef Dump

1. In large, heavy skillet, brown 1lb xtra lean ground beef; 1 chopped onion; 1 chopped stalk of celery.
   
2. Dump into a 3-qt casserole--

• the meat mixture;
• 16oz can beans drained (red kidney, pinto, or 2 cups of those delicious home done Anazi beans);
• 12oz can vacuum packed corn (or 1 1/2 cup frozen corn);
• 4oz can drained chopped green chilies (more if you like it hotter);
• 2oz jar drained chopped pimento;
• 8oz can tomato sauce;
  
• 1tsp granulated sugar;
• 1 garlic clove, well-minced or crushed;
  
• 1 tsp freshly (this is important) ground cumin seed;
• 1 tsp freshly ground black pepper;
• 1tsp salt.

Stir well; cover loosely; microwave at HIGH for 4-6 minutes, stirring after 2 minutes.

Let rest for 5 minutes; reset microwave to MEDIUM; cook for 8 minutes; let rest for 5 minutes. This can be repeated as long as necessary and this dish only gets better the more it is reheated.

To serve: spoon each serving into a large flat soup "plate;" make a ring around the edge of slightly crushed corn chips (Fritos) and top with grated Mexican blend cheese (or cheddar); cover & wait for the cheese to melt or microwave at MEDIUM HIGH until cheese melts; hit with a dollop of sour cream and serve.
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More Lawn Care

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Maxine says:

"It's important to keep you lawn at the proper height.

Two to three feet is good for hiding just about anything."

An Insult to Service

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You need to see/read this. Then send a copy to everyone you know--including your representative and both senators.

An Insult to Service by Jayne Lyn Stahl

• There is nothing new about this story, and it isn't one that is easy to read. And, for a country that is hooked on novelty, it is even harder to get down, but, on a holiday designed to pay tribute to those who serve this country in times of war, we owe it to those who return from battle to take a hard look at how best we may serve them.
• As of this month, according to the Veterans Administration's own Web site, about one-third of the adult homeless population has been in the armed forces. Current population estimates are that, on any given night, as many as 154,000 veterans, of both genders, are homeless, and possibly twice as many experience homelessness during the year.
• 97% of homeless veterans are male; the vast majority of whom are single. Homeless vets tend to be older, and far more educated than their civilian counterparts. 45% are said to suffer from some form of "mental illness," and more than half are African-American or Hispanic.
• Of those veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, as reported by Aaron Glantz more than a year ago, those who return from battle with some kind of physical, or psychological disability, often fall prey to the Department of Veterans Affairs which victimizes them further by delaying their claims often for months, and sometimes for years.
• Somewhere around 300,000 returning wounded soldiers have filed for disability benefits, and have waited for as long as two years to find out if they've been approved. Denial of these benefits have led to homelessness.
• Those whose claims have been thrown out, and who appeal, often have to wait an average of five years for a response.
• In the first half of 2008 alone, more than 1,100 vets died before hearing if their claims were approved. And, since the onset of the Iraq War seven years ago, the number of veterans filing for disability has nearly doubled.
• Those who return from war with what the VA simply calls "mental illness," but what we now know to be Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome, must first prove that their illness is service-related in order to have their treatment covered by the VA.
• Any suggestion that the Office of Veterans Affairs use the IRS as a pardigm for how to handle claims was dismissed as unworkable by VA upper managment.
• Then, there are those who don't return at all. The Army's suicide rate has reached record levels in the past year alone. The number of suicides in the military has increased more than 60% since the war in Iraq started, and it now surpasses that of the general population. Many attribute the growing problem to a seven year war with as many as three tours of duty, but in a volunteer army, loss of faith in leadership, or disillusionment with the reasons for combat, as well as the absence of an exit strategy, may also be seen as compelling factors.
• But, what of those who survive the battlefield only to die by their own hand? Alarmngly, soldiers, age 20-24, who served during the "war on terror," now have the highest suicide rate of all vets. The suicide rate among Iraq war veterans is egregiously high, and growing. And, importantly, suicide is a reflection of hopelessness, as well as a sense of displacement.
• When you consider that suicidal ideation is considered a symptom of PTSD, the Office of Veterans Affairs adds insult to injury by setting up road hazards for those who file PTSD disability claims by making them prove that their mental health issues are directly attributable to their service in uniform. This is an outrage, and it is almost as much of an outrage as it is that any member of our armed forces should be released to face the cold pavement of an inner city street.
• It's not enough for the VA to acknowledge the problem of homeless vets by simply regurgitating the statistics. The VA, and the Obama administration, must work to address the underlying displacement, and disenfranchisement, as well as work to undo the angst of returning from a battlefield where one expected to be treated like saviors by people who,can't wait for us to go home.
• Expanding benefits under the GI Bill, a measure which was rejected roundly by the Bush administration, would be a good place to start in honoring our returning veterans, but taking the $80 million Defense Secretary Gates was willing to spend on a brand new supermax prison, and using it instead to build low income, federally subsidized, housing for homeless veterans would be a far better way to show what our government thinks of those who have served them honorably. Anything less would be an insult to their service.

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Fear

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"...the only thing we have to fear is fear itself -- nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts." FDR

Ever since 9/11, this has become a nation of fear. GW famously told us to go shopping. He did not tell us that we would prevail. He did not tell us that as a nation, we could get through this. He did not tell us that nothing anyone could do to this country would change who we are. We should have listened.

For the rest of his 2 terms, GW & his minions worked very hard to instill fear in us. It seems that they have largely succeeded. We should have listened. They also changed who we are as a country--declaring war against a nation that had not attacked us, extraordinary rendition, torture, diminution of civil rights, unauthorized wire tapping, allowing a great national treasure of a city to drown, politicization of the justice department, etc, etc, etc. We should have listened.

Now, Cheney is happily going about spewing more "be afraid, be very afraid." And Americans are listening. Many are so fearful that they refuse to have terrorists incarcerated anywhere in this country -- "nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror..."

What have we become? Cowardly, spineless, fearful piles of jello?

Have Americans forgotten that during WWII, this country was home to thousands of Nazi POWs. Citizens were not afraid then. My home town had a POW Camp where only the "worst of the worst" were housed--the hard core Nazi officers and non-coms. No area citizen was killed nor even harmed by any POW. Very few even escaped. Most were recaptured.

We have to regain our self-assurance as a country. It is a matter of facing our fears and making the decision to abandon them. "No" you say? Then, what next? Carry your "what-if?" game clear out to the end. Answer the "what if?" What if a terrorist gets loose in this country? Aren't our law-enforcement personnel capable of re-capturing him? Then back to lock-up. What if? Not so fearful.

Don't say, "No." It is truly just a matter of making the decision. Quit asking "what if?" Decide that we can manage in any situation. We will not be afraid. We will not live with fear.

Make the decision. Quit being afraid. This is the United States of America. We will not live in fear. We can do anything.
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Update: here is what an interrogator on the ground in Iraq has to say about Cheney's talking and talking and talking.

What It Truly Means to "Choose Life"

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Stolen unashamedly from Marie Wilson -- with my small comments bracketed [...].

• When President Obama appeared ... at Notre Dame, he called for greater understanding on both sides of the abortion divide. While his nuanced approach deserves appreciation, what bothers me about the continued dissection of this issue is that it is not honest at its root.[My feeling for years and years and years.]
  
• The decision to "choose life" is simply a false choice. The recent Gallup Poll, for example, asked people if they were pro-life or pro-choice. But such a dichotomy is not only polarizing -- it offers "choice-less" options. As a mother, grandmother, and advocate of women's issues, I refuse to be labeled "pro-choice" or "pro-life." I am both, and I suspect the same of the majority of Americans. Let's not parse words; to be pro-choice is also to be pro-life -- it's just a matter of which life you're discussing: the fetus in the womb or the woman carrying it. [Aha! Amen, Sister. Preach it!]
  
• Being pro-choice or pro-life is a false distinction created by fear, and it is not founded on the moral high ground it clams to hold. Instead, the division of the abortion issue into two divergent camps is based on cultural anxieties regarding motherhood.
• Before we go any further, allow me to offer my mothering bonafides: I have five children, including an adopted son, and seven grandkids. I cut my teeth in the '70s and '80s working on the issues of childcare and early childhood education. As it turned out, one of our children had special needs, and I became a Montessori teacher so I could take him to a school that would enhance his potential.
• The most important issue for me has always been how women and men participate in work, family, and community. I have always believed that to be "for women" is to be for families -- including men -- no matter how often conservatives paint feminists as anti-male. (Emphasis mine.)
  
• Nothing has validated my feelings on this issue more than my experience in the past decade working to get more women into leadership alongside men (an avenue, by the way, which will transform our nation by bringing all of our resources to the table). Connie Buchanan, the former Associate Dean of Harvard Divinity School, was the most influential voice to me on this topic. As she wrote in her book, Choosing to Lead, despite the enormous gains we have made in the last twenty-five years, "the cultural ideal of women in America is that of wife and mother."
• I have personally witnessed this "cultural ideal" keeping women out of power, from the political landscape to the corporate arena. As co-founder of Take Our Daughters to Work Day, I heard over and over the same question from girls visiting the workplace: " Can I have a family and work here, too?" In my current role at The White House Project, as we train thousands of women to lead in civic and political life in America, I hear the same tune again as women continue to question female politicians about work and family.
• So what does this have to do with being pro-life or pro-choice? Essentially, it forms the crux of the entire abortion debate.
• As Kristen Luker said in her 1984 book, Abortion and the Politics of Motherhood, real concern about abortion has to do with whether women will stop choosing motherhood if we have other choices. [Eureka!moment right here!] Although the mantra of the pro-choice movement is prevention and not abortion, and though focus has been on the myriad ways women and men can use contraception, the rabid opposition to abortion continues. Interestingly, during the Clinton administration, abortions decreased, while under George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan, both "pro-life" presidents, abortions increased. [Truly, truly fascinating. Attention, gentle snowflakes, make note of this set of facts. Use it often.]
  
• What if the immense amount of energy and money, the anger and divisiveness that go into the "pro-life" movement were to go toward movements that help men choose fatherhood [eureka, redux & emphasis mine], and help communities support families through abundant childcare? As a former preschool teacher, I know children prefer being with groups of other children and learning together, and that working with children alongside other adults (what amounts to tribal ways of raising children) is far superior to isolated nuclear families. [Not to mention "Home Schooling"--please don't get me started!]
  
• Fortunately, this is the direction Obama took in his address at Notre Dame. He encouraged respectful dialogue and policies that care for and support women and their children. When hecklers in the audience stood and shouted hateful epithets, the audience drowned them out, retorting with Obama's campaign slogan, "Yes, we can."
• That is what it truly means to "choose life."

Ms Wilson has written everything I have been trying to say since the very early 70's. All my feelings on this subject are capsulized in these few paragraphs. I always knew the argument was wrongly framed; I just couldn't find the words. Here they are.
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Bring Back John Edwards

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Now, before you think the Old Feminist is for marital infidelity, let me reassure you, I am not.

What I miss about John Edwards was his unflinching support for the working class, for those yearning for the middle class, for the working poor, for those in poverty. You recall, the "Other America?"

He may be rich now, but, apparently, he REMEMBERS.

Poverty is an accident of birth that can destroy all in its path. No child deserves to be poor. No child deserves to be malnourished. No child deserves an inferior education. No child deserves to be denied opportunity.

• If you are poor, you pay more for things those firmly ensconced within the middle class take for granted. "The poor pay more for a gallon of milk; they pay more on a capital basis for inferior housing," says Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.). "The poor and 100 million who are struggling ... actually end up paying more for transportation, for housing, for health care, for mortgages. They get steered to subprime lending..." (The High Cost of Poverty)
• The rich have direct deposit for their paychecks. The poor have check-cashing and payday loan joints, which cost time and money. Payday advance companies say they are providing an essential service to people who most need them. Their critics say they are preying on people who are the most "economically vulnerable." (The High Cost of Poverty)
• "There is evidence that credit-card mills have recently started trolling for the poor. They are targeting the recently bankrupt." (Blumenauer) (The High Cost of Poverty)

Poverty is real. It's relentless. It's cruel.

In the fight to end poverty, there's a gaping hole in the system. Edwards had concrete plans for plugging that hole, getting low-income kids to college, expanding access to bank accounts (28 million Americans don't have one), and raising the minimum wage.

Carlos Watson says, "... Obama need[s] people to push him to ensure that everyday people -- the "Other America" that Edwards referred to so often on the [campaign] trail -- get a fresh start ahead of Wall Street bondholders. ... Leveling the playing field will yield a more just America, and a more economically and socially dynamic America, as well. "

During the course of the presidential campaign, there were signs and bumper stickers supporting Mr. Obama which read, "Imagine Hope." For the poor, imagining hope is another luxury they can't afford.
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Defending Torture

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In testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee in October 2007, Rear Admiral John Hutson, (Retired Judge Advocate General of the Navy) observed, "torture is the method of choice of the lazy, the stupid and the pseudo-tough. And that should not be the United States. "

It is going to be a long, long time before we live down what was done in our names.

No investigation, no truth commission is ever going to wipe this stain from our national soul.

Even if George Bush, Dick Cheney and the neo-cons, are eventually proven right about going to war with Iraq, they will NEVER, EVER be right about sanctioning torture.

And now, Cheney is running around like a chicken with his head cut off, defending torture!

Torture will never offer us truth or security or even guaranteed useful information. The very dynamics of torture are power, sadism and dehumanization. Torture is the very antithesis of freedom.

Defending torture and doing so insistently, means one's moral compass is pointing straight down to hell.
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Random Thought

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Why is it that those who believe the world is only 6,000 years old --

--are the same people that are obsessed with drilling for fossil fuel?
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Old Feminist

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Well, you knew I would have to say something.

A filly won the Preakness. Rachel Alexandra ran practically pole to pole in the lead.
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Lessons: Giraffe

Stand Tall.

Reach for new heights.

Don't be afraid to stick your neck out.

Eat fresh greens.

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Follow the Logic

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If our stated objective is to keep our troops safe, and

If the way to do that is by keeping evidence of torture--say, photographs--secret,

Then, does logic not suggest, that it is the torture itself that makes them--and us--less safe?
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Life

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The more you strive to be sensible and serious and meaningful, the less chance you have of becoming so.

The primary objective is to laugh--at yourself if necessary.

Remember, none of us are going to get out alive.
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Health Care "Reform"

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The health care industry has announced that it will "voluntarily" lower its costs by $2 TRILLION over 10 years.

OK, well, I have three really simple questions:

1. If the health industry is saying it can lower costs by $2 trillion over 10 years, then isn't the industry admitting that it has been and was planning to absolutely bilk consumers? Or to put it another way, isn't the industry admitting that it's entire business model is outright piracy?
2. Why should we, the American public, believe the health industry is going to voluntarily do anything to reduce its profits? Health executives have a contractual fiduciary responsibility to the shareholders to maximize profits. Voluntarily lowering those profits would violate that fiduciary responsibility. Are we really expected to believe these hoggish health executives will, out of the goodness of their supposed hearts, violate their fiduciary responsibilities? What has changed to suggest that they will violate these responsibilities and now help health care consumers?
3. Aren't these executives simply trying to legitimize and add credibility to their voices that can later be raised to derail serious health care reform? By this announcement industry executives are now trying to convince us that the health insurance industry should be trusted. But any serious health care reform will need to take on the health insurance industry in a way that will make that industry very, very unhappy. (Actually, I would like to drown it in a bathtub.) When that eventually happens, won't the previous efforts to legitimize the health insurance industry's voice add credible weight to its opposition for reform?

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"Family" Photo

First row seated (L - R): Michelle Malkin, Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck.

Second row standing (L - R): Joe the Quitter, Rupert Murdoch, Brit Hume.

(Now that Joe's run away, do we have to re-shoot?)

With Thanks to Crooks and Liars.

Only the Republican apologists could look even creepier than the "true" Addams Family--and I do mean the TV cast which I love almost as much as I do the original cartoons.

Hate that TV series theme song, though. What was with those lyrics?

But back to the above: Murdoch as Grand-mama! Priceless. And Hume as Lurch is almost too perfect.
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Well, You Can't Say We Haven't Been Warned

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• By Christine Harper, Betty Liu and Erik Holm

• May 2 (Bloomberg) -- Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Vice Chairman Charles Munger, whose company is the largest private shareholder in Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Wells Fargo & Co., said banks will use their “enormous political power” to prevent changes to the industry that would benefit society.
• “It will be very hard to accomplish the kind of surgery that would be desirable for the wider civilization.”
• “We need to remove from the investment banking and the commercial banking industries a lot of the practices and prerogatives that they have so lovingly possessed,” Munger said. “If they are too big to fail, they are too big to be allowed to be as gamey and venal as they’ve been -- and as stupid as they’ve been.”
• [So far] the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve have spent, lent or committed $12.8 trillion, an amount that approaches the value of everything produced in the country last year, to stem the recession.
• Munger said the financial companies spent $500 million on political contributions and lobbying efforts over the last decade. They have a “vested interest” in protecting the system as it exists because of the high levels of pay they were earning.

Now we know. The question then is, what are we going to do about it?

Write/email your congress people (House & Senate); tell them to do what is right for the country. Not what is good for their re-election war-chests.

Of course, they will not listen to us, but they will know that we are watching.

And we will know whom they consider their constituents by how they approach this matter with their votes.
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National Day of Prayer

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Even though I clutch my blanket and growl when the alarm rings each morning, thank you, Lord, that I can hear. There are many who are deaf.

Even though I keep my eyes tightly closed against the morning light as long as possible, thank you Lord, that I can see. There are many who are blind.

Even though I huddle in my bed and put off the effort of rising, thank you, Lord that I have the strength to rise. There are many who are bedridden.

Even though the first hour of my day is hectic, when socks are lost, toast is burned, and tempers are short, thank you, Lord, for my family. There are many who are lonely.

Even though our breakfast table never looks like the pictures in magazines and the menu is at times unbalanced, thank you, Lord for the food we have. There are many who go hungry.

Even though I grumble and bemoan my fate from day to day and wish my circumstances were not so modest, thank you, Lord, for the gift of life.
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Lawn Care

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Well, once again, I must admit that Maxine seems to have been reading my mail or driving by my home.

Wisdom according to Maxine from today's Maxine calendar:

"Time to start treating the lawn ...

................... I usually treat mine with contempt."

Yep, you can ask anyone who knows me --- yard work is not my thing. Neither is housework. Don't wash my car a whole lot either.

According to modern society (and most of my neighbors) this is some kind of character flaw. Yet, I wonder.

If things are too meticulously cared for, they seem somehow sterile and flat. I always thought, "Picture Perfect" a slam and not a compliment. Life is messy.

If what matters most is acquiring the latest "toy" or other material trapping of success, where are the pleasures of time, companionship or even solitude?

Here is a little observation I made while living for a time in a suburb: The quality of child nurturance in a home is often in inverse proportion to the amount of time and attention lavished upon the lawn.

So, how well tended is your lawn?

Maybe, your time would be better spent with your kids.

I promise, your lawn will not remember the afternoons you spend mowing.
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A Moral Imperative

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Only a true single-payer system (“Everybody in, nobody out”) can yield the administrative savings — estimated at $400 billion annually — needed to provide comprehensive, affordable care to everyone.

Placebos that preserve the role of the private health insurance industry, ... with or without a public option, can’t even come close to these results.

Adoption of a publicly financed health care system has become an economic and moral imperative.

Quentin D. Young, M.D., M.A.C.P.
National coordinator
Physicians for a National Health Program

Quoted from a letter to the editor, Politico 05/05/09.

Christians? Torture?

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• WASHINGTON (CNN) — The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new analysis.
• More than half of people who attend services at least once a week — 54 percent — said the use of torture against suspected terrorists is “often” or “sometimes” justified. Only 42 percent of people who “seldom or never” go to services agreed, according the analysis released Wednesday by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.
• White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified — more than 6 in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only 4 in 10 of them did.
• The analysis is based on a Pew Research Center survey of 742 American adults conducted April 14-21.

Did these "Christians" absorb nothing of Jesus? On what do they base their lives?

• Jesus said, ... for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.' Then the righteous will answer him, `Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?' And the king will answer them, `Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.'
  

Surely, torture lies somewhere within this passage?

What, oh, tell me what, does this say about the "Christians" within this country?
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