The Darkness and Light of Winter Holidays

At the risk of sounding like Scrooge, most of the time I find myself saying "Bah Humbug" to Christmas. It's not a holiday I celebrate. I am not a Christian. I don't believe in Jesus. I give gifts all year round because I like giving, not because I'm expected to come up with something just because everyone else is. Having my own shop makes gift-giving a lot more fun because if I don't see something I like, I just make something I do like. I really enjoy how my friends and family look forward to my gifts now because they know I made them. That's how gifting should be; it shouldn't be this cringing feeling of what am I going to do with this piece of crap from Auntie Weirdo every year.


For those same reasons, I've made my own cards for several years. Usually I make just a small amount and they are handpainted, individually created little works of art for those near and dear to me. I send Winter Solstice cards to the Pagans and Witches, live Turkeys grazing happily for the non-carnivores in my life, lots of images of candles and light for Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Solstice, and even Christmas because light is special during the darkest time of the year.



As an informative aside, that's why major holidays during this time celebrate with light. Anyone who has ever lived in a far northern climate like I do knows that light is precious this time of year. Those delightful 10 pm summer sunsets are now replaced with the gray turning dark around 4:30 and regaining its gray hue sometime around 8 or 8:30 am. It's still early...wait until next month when we have about 8 hours of light, if you can call it light when it is mixed with wind, sideways driving rain, and that perpetual grayness of late fall, early winter. Candles and light are big this time of year and necessary. Even warm, desert climates acknowledge the shorter days of winter, the lack of light, and create art for their holidays that is filled with candles and colored bulbs and bright colors.


To acknowledge both this upcoming season of light festivals, I've taken several of my most favorite artwork cards, recreated them for the digital world and turned them into cards in my store.

And besides the need for light, I've also kept in mind the non-carnivores for this upcoming Thanksgiving holiday. This is the card I just sent out for Thanksgiving

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It was inspired by a dear friend who told me that most people never see a live turkey or even know what beautiful birds they are in "real life." So I made this card for her and I have to agree, they are lovely birds. I thank her for opening my eyes to their beauty and I hope you share it with others in your own lives.

Here's the link to the card if you want to buy some. There's currently a 25 percent off sale that goes through the 19th, so you'd have to hurry: Wild Turkeys You get six with envelopes for 11.25 with the discount, which is a great price for special holiday cards! I will leave them at the special price of 15.00 through the holidays as I feel that is both affordable and also reflects the time I spent to make them unique.

This card and most of the alternative offerings is from My Holiday Store, a shop that is separate from Ursine Logic. I started it so I would have a place to buy alternative holiday items and non-religious Christmas cards and gifts. Although most of the items in Ursine Logic are not exactly mainstream and make great gifts, I wanted a special store to acknowledge there are more ways to celebrate Winter than with Christmas.

May you enjoy my offerings and send them to many of your friends who will hopefully enjoy them as well.

The Darkness and Light of Winter Holidays

Understand the "Win"

I wanted to wait for a few days before I wrote about the election because as overjoyed as I am over winning Congress away from those thieving, lying, warmongering parasites, I don't have much faith in their Democratic replacements. I didn't want to give the impression that I believe everything is going to be alright now that the elephant got its butt kicked. I may be an idealist, an optimistic, a believer in the inherent goodness and compassion of human beings, but I am not stupid. Never have been. Not about to start now. ;-)


So here is my take on it all after a few days of doing a lot of reading, a lot of comtemplating, a lot of thinking how things could and could not go. First and foremost, these are career politicians one and all. To get elected to office in America requires millions of dollars and a whole lot of promising to kiss certain asses in payback of donations rendered. Yes, the Democrats won. Now the question must be asked and explored: who do they owe for this victory? We learned too late that the GOP was beholded to the oil companies, the insurance companies, the munitions companies, the pharmaceutical companies...well, the list is long and yes we knew before but we never really knew the extent of that beholding.


Therefore, I propose that one of the first things we do is make a list of these contributors and keep it safe and updated on different blogs and websites. Make it easily available. Make it open. Make it transparent. And then when any legislation comes up for a vote, match its benefits against the list of contributors. When an obvious or not so obvious match pops up, that is the time to take action. Call and write your congressional representatives. Create blog swarms to move the connection to the top of search engines, blogs, personal websites, listservs, and newsletters. Shine a light on it and make noise. Remind your representatives that what the voter gives, the voter can take away.


On a related note, make some noise in the direction of your representatives to enact some real campaign and lobbying reform. Our country is now at the mercy of those who have the most money to throw at an election. Right-wing lunatics like Mellon-Scaife, Murdoch, and the public media who are first and foremost weapons manufacturers and media outlets second, should not be able to enforce their ideology, bloodlust, and war profiteering on our country anymore. This will require even more effort, even more noise and pressure on the congresscritters as many of them are beholden to these bastards.


And finally, for now at least, the most important thing we need to change in this country is protecting the right to vote. It is disgraceful that elections have become no more than a sporting event for some people, an unethical, no rules, no respect, unsanctioned sporting event. Anyone, and I mean anyone who messes with an American's right to vote in any way should be sent to prison as the law currently demands but hasn't been enforced since Bushco lied and cheated their way into power. When all the evils of this administration are studied years from now, interfering with the cherished American right to vote will overshadow all others. We don't need voting reform so much as we need to punish those who interfered with the right to vote. Let's start enforcing the laws and we won't need as much reform. If this means putting the president of Diebold in jail, so be it.


So there you have it for now. Yes, it's a good thing we won, but it is also an awesome responsibility and it is a lot like inheriting a run-down, stripped bare and plundered crack house. The bones of the house are solid but it will take a lot of work, time, money and patience to restore it to its once splendid glory. It will take commitment and strength from all of us working together to take back not just the country but the foundation upon which it was founded.

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Design from Ursine Logic Changing minds one t-shirt at a time

Understand the "Win"

Why I Vote

Why I Vote

I've been asked several times by people of all ages, stripes, and colors why on earth I continue to vote in elections that are rigged and will not reflect the will of the people. My answer is always the same: I will not let these evil, manipulative bastards that are in control kill my hope because once that is gone, they own me. I continue to believe elections can only be stolen if they are close. Don't let this one be close. Get out and vote if you haven't already. Bring a friend to the polls. Make turnout so overwhelming that the will of the people cannot be subverted again.


Sometimes the hardest thing is to admit our own complicity in a bad thing. I see this administration as the result of mass apathy and voter indifference. It's no different than having a swarm of creepy, crawling vermin moving into your house because you don't care enough about it to engage in periodic pest control. These pathetic excuses for human beings, these warmongering cretins who care nothing about human life, are in charge because most of us let them get in and stay there.


I can understand that after 911, most of us were stunned into submission to whomever promised to make the pain go away. These evil Bushco bastards manipulated fear, shock, and very likely even set up the whole thing--or at the very least, allowed it to happen on purpose, for one thing only: to enrich and empower themselves. They care nothing about us. They care only about themselves.


Yes, there was a period of time in this country when we deserved representatives who were as selfish and indifferent as we were. Life seemed like one, big, never-ending party...until Bushco came to town and took over the dance halls, saloons, and our hearts and souls. Did we fight back? Did we question their right to do this? Did we even fucking object?


America is one of the most medicated countries in the world. We either take prescribed drugs that numb us to all feeling, or we buy them off the street or from the liquor stores to numb our pain at being used, abused, manipulated and lied to by these thugs. Many of the repugs have ties to the pharmaceutical industry. Do you think it is an accident, a minor coincidence that all these drugs to numb us started appearing just as they were beginning their takeover of our country?


As the professionals often tell those who are trying to break free from addictions and other destructive behavior: you have to want to get better. It has to come from inside you. That's why you need to get out the vote tomorrow. It's the first step toward getting better.

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Image from Ursine Logic Changing hearts and minds one t-shirt at a time.

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For those of you who are wonderfully crazy enough to read my words after all this time, here's a special sale for the holidays on greeting cards and ornaments as a special reward: 25 percent off. This is only on greeting cards and ornaments. No coupon or code needed. Prices marked down on site already.

Why I Vote

Barack Obama--A Glimmer Of Hope

Lately Politics has been a depressing obligation for me. I have serious differences with many of those running for office...and most of them are people I'm voting for. I have to hold my nose and vote for Maria Cantwell even though she blatantly panders to the military with her vote for the war in Iraq and a half-hearted bone of "it's Rumsfeld's fault" is tossed to the rest of us. No, Maria. It is your fault and the fault of a Congress who no longer listens to the people, but instead kisses the ass of every lobbyist promising campaign dollars. This is NOT representation. This is whoredom.


But the alternative is even worse...a lobbyist, a corporate clone, more of the same selfishness to enrich themselves at the expense of the working class. I'm appalled but no longer surprised that the employees of Safeco and its insurees had to take the financial hit so McGavick could get that multi-million dollar golden parachute. It's what happens when you put corporations in charge of the country. No one should be surprised. It's like getting mad at a predatory animal for ripping into a hunk of fresh meat. That's just corporate behavior. It won't change.

But my vote will go to Democrats no matter how offensive they are in their political pandering, because Bush and his warmongering religious whackos need to be reined in, they need to have some oversight, some accountability for their greed and psychotic visions...or they will get their damned Armaggedon over our dead bodies.

I turn off the news because it might as well be stamped "Made in the Pentagon" for all the objectivity it has. It makes me wonder what Bushco's illegal wiretaps uncovered in their surveillance of private citizens? Drugs? Closet Homosexuality? Bankruptcies? Mistresses? Boy Toys? What would make a Congress that once so elequently spoke against the mindless obedience of citizens in totalitarian regimes become that which they once opposed? What secrets keep them rubberstamping approval for torture, secret prisons, the destruction of the Constitution, unqualified stooges for positions that once required the best and the brightest, and the out and out thievery of their own grandchildren's natural resources? Are they even capable of feeling shame anymore?

The news is bad enough, but the constant assault of meanness, of outright lies and distortions, of attacks on character and race and sexual orientation that has become the new campaign themes of the GOP is a playground gone mad with no supervision. When I do turn the TV on, the sound is mostly muted to spare me the worst of the assault.

But something slipped through today. I saw a man speak with a kind of dignity that we haven't seen in this country for decades. I heard him talk about what would be good for America, what he would bring to us, what he would support and work to make happen for us. I was so stunned I stopped what I was doing and sat down and listened to him. I saw a man who would not bring his uncultured, savage version of diplomacy to other countries, but instead would restore our honor and dignity with his quiet intelligence and cultured demeanor. I saw a man I would be proud to have represent me and what I believe and what is good about America to the rest of the world. I saw what I've been hungry for: a dignified human being who spoke to others with respect and drew respect back for the words he spoke.

That man is Barack Obama. It is my most fervent hope that he runs for President in 2008. We need him. America needs him. The world needs him. Please, Senator Obama. Only you can give us back our dignity and respect. Please be our next President and help heal the wounds inflicted on us all by the current administration.

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Design from: Ursine LogicChanging hearts and minds one t-shirt at a time.

Barack Obama--A Glimmer Of Hope

GOP Sleaze

Before you vote for a Republican, click on these links and find out the sleaze and slime and unethical behavior they are hiding from you.
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Jon Kyl Rick Renzi J.D. Hayworth John Doolittle Richard Pombo Brian Bilbray Marilyn Musgrave Doug Lamborn Rick O'Donnell Christopher Shays Vernon Buchanan Joe Negron Clay Shaw Bill Sali Peter Roskam Mark Kirk Dennis Hastert Chris Chocola John Hostettler Mike Whalen Jim Ryun Anne Northup Geoff Davis Michael Steele Gil Gutknecht Michele Bachmann Jim Talent Conrad Burns Jon Porter Charlie Bass Mike Ferguson Heather Wilson Peter King John Sweeney Tom Reynolds Randy Kuhl Robin Hayes Charles Taylor Steve Chabot Jean Schmidt Deborah Pryce Joy Padgett Melissa Hart Curt Weldon Mike Fitzpatrick Don Sherwood Lincoln Chafee Bob Corker George Allen Frank Wolf Mike McGavick Dave Reichert

GOP Sleaze

Bush Has No Clothes

I've always had a friendly yet frustrating relationship with a member of my extended family who has been a life-long Republican. The only time she deviated from a straight ticket punching the Republican candidates in her long voting life was her vote against Nixon. She called him "creepy," which at the time, was the strongest language a lady of her culture and breeding could use in public and around children like myself.

But that same lady, now a dignified matriarch in her 90's, uses language far more descriptive when describing the current GOP. "These are not Republicans," she tells me. "These are damned thugs, piece of shit thieves and liars."

Her crumbling started with the out of control spending to reward corporate donors that she defined as "Halliburton bridges to nowhere." Every piece of pork in the budget was a gift to some big business abuser and she grumbled out loud that the small businesses the GOP once swore to protect were being taken out by Walmarts and other big box donors to the GOP. "This is NOT my Republican party," she complained every time another small business went under because it couldn't compete with its corporate-sponsored rivals.

She was also uncomfortable with the huge tax break given to the rich. As a wealthy woman this is significant because she always complained about how much she had to pay in taxes. But she also was angry that people like me had so much deducted from my paychecks. "I can afford the extra hit. People who are supporting families on your kind of salary cannot. That isn't right."

But what started the downward slide for her was Katrina. She believes in America, what it represents to the rest of the world, the whole concept of a Democracy, a country where all people are created equally, even if it doesn't always work out that way in real life. She believes in the idea that hard work is rewarded and we take care of our own. Katrina put a lie to all that. It exposed Bushco as an entity who could have done something but did not. The final straw was Bush playing guitar at a GOP fundraiser while bodies remained unclaimed in the devastation of New Orleans, especially the often played tragic sight of that poor woman who sat dead in a wheelchair outside the superdome for days. If anything began the dismantling of the Bushco compassionate conservatism myth, it was that dead woman in a wheelchair. "He's out there raising millions of dollars and there are people dying just a few miles away from his neglect."

By the time she understood that she's been lied to about the reasons for invading Iraq, the cover-up and protection of pedophiles, and especially the swiftboating of veterans who actually served by those who did not, she was already seeing a naked emperor every time Bush showed up in the news. But it took Cheney saying how great things were going in Iraq...as the news scroll beneath him showed over 60 Americans killed in Iraq so far this month, for her to say the words she hadn't spoken since the 1960's: "I'm voting for the Democrats." There was no joy in her voice. Just acceptance of something that had to be done for the sake of a greater good.

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This design available on t-shirts, stickers, magnets and many other products at Ursine LogicChanging hearts and minds one t-shirt at a time.

Bush Has No Clothes

Getting Scared Stupid

I've written a lot on fear and how Bushco uses it to keep the sheeple huddled in the pasture, but I have a difficult time accepting how people give themselves up so easily. Understanding is not the same as accepting. That's why I can see the manipulation of fearmongering when it appears as primary color terror alerts that make it simple to stay in the right stage of fear, and it's why I can take apart tactics and see that making people dump out their liquids in the airport line is training them to stand in stupid lines like herds of obedient cattle without asking too many questions or demanding too many rights. But it doesn't explain why people allow themselves to be subjected and manipulated in such a way.

Sure you say, and how do I get on a plane without being a stupid ass sheep? I don't. I haven't flown for three years. I drive everywhere. Yes, it takes me longer to drive than fly, but then I haven't really needed to go anywhere that I couldn't get to in two or three days of driving. It helps that I love traveling by car. I love stopping in small new places and going for walks and getting to know people. I don't know yet what I'll do when I have to fly somewhere because I won't have the required amount of time to drive. Maybe I'll take a train. Maybe I'll join up with one or more people who feel like I do and we can drive in shifts. I just don't know because I'm not in that situation yet. I used to fly two or three times a month for my job. I've managed to still do my job and turn the required traveling that I used to dread, into a series of mini-vacations. I feel a personal sense of victory in denying the airlines my cash for the last three years. They've lost thousands of my dollars and I've kept my sense of self intact.

I also know there are some especially distasteful reasons that people sell out and many times it is because they want something in return for that. I think of people in positions of power who could have come forward and said what they knew about Bush and his lies before all these people died. But they held their nose because it meant a promotion, an opportunity to make money, a chance to meet someone influential, an in to some situation of exclusivity they might otherwise be denied. These are the people with blood on their hands, and they will eventually wake in the night trying to wash it off and discovering that it is burned into their souls.

But the ones I pity are the poor fools who huddle in that pasture and live in such fear because they have no self to lose. They don't even know they have such a thing. And if they accidently stumble on it, if they suddenly against all odds wake up one day and discover they have a mind and it was meant to think for itself, well...I don't want to be around to see that. It's not pretty when someone realizes they've been played for a fool, especially when it's Bushco that took their religious faith and played it as it were nothing more than a shiny toy they would later discard when it outlived its usefulness. Just like Gays, any people of faith who vote for more of the same will have only themselves to blame when the door on the pasture slams shut and they can no longer leave it standing up.

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Design from Ursine Logic where getting scared for Halloween is a good thing.

Getting Scared Stupid

Pedophiles in Congress

I thought I was beyond being shocked by the actions of the GOP controlled congress after several years of being lied to about the reasons for going to war, the abuse of power, the cronyism that resulted in totally inept people occupying positions of responsibility, the outright theft of the taxpayers money and resources for their own personal enrichment and gain, the blatant "for sale" sign hung up in the halls of congress for lobbyists, and an endless list of crime, corruption, sleaze, manipulation, and total disregard for our country and its constitution.

But by covering up the actions of the child predator/pedophile Mark Foley, I am beyond shocked. This is exploiting children for personal gain and profit. This is covering up the actions of a sick and twisted individual in order to cover their own asses. Is this some more of what they mean by family values? Is this more of what they meant when they said they were going to restore the honor and integrity of congress? Is this more of what they meant when they vowed to protect the children of America from the evils that threatened them on a daily basis?

I am so disgusted that I can't even find words to describe how I feel, other than to say they have betrayed every child in America with this unforgivable conduct. Even if you think voting is stupid or worthless or that your vote won't count, please go to the polls on November 7th and vote these pedophile protectors out of office. Vote by absentee ballot if you are worried about your vote counting. Pick it up in person. Fill it out. Drop it off in person. The only way we will keep them from stealing another election is by voting in such overwhelming numbers that they can't steal it again. Just remember, a low turnout is a ticket for them to steal. Don't give it to them.

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This design available on t-shirts, stickers, magnets and many other products at Ursine LogicChanging hearts and minds one t-shirt at a time.

Pedophiles in Congress

Halloween Horror Stories

I was going to write something cheerful and informative about Halloween as it is one of my favorite holidays. But the events of the last few days with the GOP revealing themselves even more as the party of liars, cheats, warmongers, war profiteers, and now perverts, has left me disgusted with the state of our poor country. How did we let this country sink so low to put these creeps in charge of our lives? My heart aches for all of us. So instead of writing, I'm going to invite you to visit my Halloween store and try and remember what it was like to be a kid and not have to worry that your elected representatives were going to come after you for bad and evil things. Happy escaping. And please remember to vote. Voting these disgusting excuses for human beings out of office in November is our only hope to restoring dignity and honor to our country.

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My Halloween Shop

Halloween Horror Stories

Torturer-In-Chief

Bush wants to "re-define" the meaning of torture. I can't believe this is even a subject for discussion. He is proposing that the little moral high ground we have left in the world's eyes be further tarnished by what is clearly a move to cover his own ass. Once again, Bush serves as a reminder of how far we have fallen since he and his cabal of lying warmongering thieves stole the White House. He wants to legitimize torture and make us equals to the countries we have previously condemned for using torture. He wants to take us out of the elevated realm of civilized behavior and into the same world of the evil-doers he condemns.

There are several things he has conveniently ignored in trying to backdate the law in order to prevent his third term being served out in a prison cell. The first one being that most our courts, the courts of law in the USA that are the envy of many in the world, would not allow confessions obtained by torture. As far better minds than Bush have determined, such evidence does not demonstrate truth but rather the desire for the person being tortured to make the torture stop.

Any of us, no matter what our political and religious beliefs, have a tolerance threshold for pain. Once we reach that level we will confess to anything, even things we could never do, no matter what the circumstances. That's why it is called torture, because it is something few human beings can endure for any period of time. And it is not valid in courts of law, which is why Bush has his secret installations to deal with that little technicality. It is why he avoids trying in a real court any of the thousands who are rotting away in illegal prisons without ever being brought to trial or charged with a crime that is related to terrorism.

Bush claims that we need to torture people in order to prevent terror attacks in the planning stages. So he rounds up everyone who looks Arabic or went anywhere near a Mosque or is of the Islamic faith, and sticks them in secret prisons where they are brutally tortured until they confess to something, anything that will then be put together and announced as a terror alert, preferably before major and minor elections.



Keep in mind this is the same man who holds the record for executions in Texas while Governor. With this record, his attempt to make torture legal, his assault on civil liberties, and his penchant for being the punisher-in-chief, he gives Torquemada and the Inquisition a run for their money.

The other thing he fails to understand is this puts our own troops in severe danger. He would understand this if he did not shirk his own military duty. He would understand this if he ever put his own ass in a position where it could be captured.



I have had many discussions with a former POW. He told me many times that his captors were very familiar with the limits of the Geneva Convention and followed those limits because they knew their own troops would be treated accordingly. Strange as it may seem to many, civilized countries, which is most of the world and not the one painted and portrayed by Bush as "all evil all the time," go by our guidelines on how to treat prisoners.



We are, or rather WERE, the model of decency throughout the civilized world. Having rules against torture, against secret courts and tribunals, being allowed to see the evidence of the crime we are accused of committing, those were the things that made us good in the rest of the world, the things that made us occupy a higher moral ground in their eyes. Bush is taking this and more away from us in order to cover his own crimes, to perpetuate his own mental illness and greed.

And to refute those who say well how are we going to stop another terror attack if we don't torture, I say to you there's nothing anyone can do about the murdering fanatics, anymore then there was anything we could do to prevent our own homegrown fanatic McVeigh from blowing up the federal building. We did not round up southern white men and torture them to find out where the next attack was going to be. We followed the rules of law, gave him a fair trial and then executed him according to those laws.



This is how morality works. This is how you can talk about morality to the rest of the world and not seem like a damn hypocrite. Obviously it is just one more thing Bush just does not get and we are the ones who end up having to pay for his ignorance.

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Design from Ursine Logic Changing hearts and minds one t-shirt at a time.

Torturer-In-Chief

Who Bush Thinks He Is

I finally figured out who Bush "sees" himself as--one of those crazy televangelists. He's watched too damned much tv and one of them snuck in, sucked out all his gray matter, and inserted Reverend Dubya, put on earth to save YOU! I've read in several places that the Grahams of tv preacherdom and walmart style church baptisms are the ones who brought him to his knees, along with thousands of other ill-educated, bigoted, Bible-thumping morons who are now considered foreign policy experts. That's "experts," as in their limited little pea brains had some poetic metaphor from the Bible read to them and interpreted for them as some sign the world was coming to an end.

What those poor fools stuck somewhere in the middle of the evolutionary process between pond scum and prehensile tails fail to understand is that they are the ones creating the end of the world. It's not some them. It is THEM with their crazy talk of nukes and big old bombs and devils hiding in the ground way beneath the earth. I cannot imagine anything more destructive and dangerous than a bunch of unevolved, dumb, jingoistic, goose-stepping, lacking in cranial capacity idiots put in charge of things like nukes. Now THAT'S what scares ME.

But Bush, like the preaching fool that he is, is on the campaign of fear trail for Jesus, who apparently favors the Republican party. He is spreading stories of demons, devils, ghosties, ghoulies, evil-doers, and other residents of his own personal hell. He is shouting from the pulpit that we must believe or we will fry in the hellfire of people with names he can't pronounce. He is threatening our eternal damnation if we don't vote Republican. He is prophesizing the end of the world without telling us he is the one with his finger on the nuclear trigger. And like all good for nothing televangelists, he is picking our pockets in the name of salvation.

If there is such thing as a god, I'm sure that he, she, or it will be profoundly pissed at those like Bush who use fear and oppression to crush the unbelievers in god's name.

Who Bush Thinks He Is

A Measure Of Your Humanity

I'm not much for celebrities because I tend to value people based on how they affect me with their humanity and not what they do for a living. But lately those in the world spotlight have used their celebrity status to do good in the world. In this way, they affect me with their humanity and I applaud and thank them. I especially thank George Clooney because not only does he put himself out there for those who are suffering, he went and saw that suffering for himself and let it affect HIS humanity.

Today he told the UN Security Council Members that millions of lives were at stake in Darfur and that we, as human beings, need to do something about it. He asked them to send peacekeepers to the region to stop the genocide going on. He put himself out there for people who are having a difficult time getting noticed in a world where there is so much war, hatred, division, and tragedy. Because he did this, I am speaking up and asking all of you to do so as well. We have until September 30th to get our voices heard because if we don't, as Mr. Clooney said: "After September 30, you won't need the UN. You will simply need men with shovels and bleached white linen and headstones."

Darfur is not just a place on the map where people are dying; it is a test of our owh humanity, our own compassion, our own right to even call ourselves human beings. We had the chance to stop the killings in Rwanda by not demanding the UN act then and close to 800,000 people were murdered. This is happening again in Darfur and again there are not enough voices demanding that the killing stop. We MUST speak up or the blood of more human beings will be on our hands. So far over 200,000 have been murdered and over two million people have become displaced since 2003. They are homeless, traumatized, and living in fear of their lives and those of friends and family. We must help them or our own humanity suffers.

On Sunday, The Save Darfur Coalition, a combined force of over 170 faith-based, humanitarian and human rights organizations, will rally in New York's Central Park. There will also be simultaneous events worldwide. Get out there and let your voice be heard. The African Union's Peace and Security Council will meet on Monday in New York, just before this year's U.N. General Assembly speeches. Let them know your voice speaks for those who cannot speak for themselves. If we are to move forward into the next century, let us do it with our humanity intact and a record on Human and Civil Rights our grandchildren will point to with pride instead of shame.

A Measure Of Your Humanity

Are You Scared Yet?

Do you know what a dying beast does? It puffs itself up with one last gasping breath and snarls threateningly in an attempt to overcome its enemy by fear because it has nothing left to fight with. It huffs, puffs, gasps, accuses, belittles, intimidates, scares the crap out of, digs up past enemies in an attempt to distract you from its death throes, and it won't stop until you are quivering in fear in your hole in the ground. Remember that hole in the ground? The one with all the duct tape and rolls of plastic? That hole. That's the one it hopes you crawl into so you won't notice it is all bluff and bullshit.

This is Bushco now. It will stop at nothing to scare people because that is all it has to run on. Fear is the Republican platform. Fear is the Republican agenda. Fear is all it has and it hopes you buy into it because if you don't, then there is nothing. They can't run on getting Osama because they didn't. They can't run on protecting us at home because Katrina proved they had no interest in doing so. They can't run on lowering your taxes because unless you are wealthy, you didn't get a tax break. They can't run on honor and integrity because they've stolen, cheated, betrayed, committed treasonous acts for revenge and personal enrichment. They can't run on the economy because the housing market is going to hell, gas prices are insane, and people go to work sick because they can't afford to take a day off, even if they did have health insurance--which most don't. They can't run on freedom because we have less civil rights now than ever before. They can't run on tolerance because their agenda was to create hatred and division. They can't run on Democracy because that's for other countries. They can't run on education because teachers have to buy school supplies from their own pockets. They can't run on peace because their whole reign has been to make war on anyone and anything in order to destroy our rights under the guise of "being at war." They can't run on honesty because they have lied about everything and everyone since they first soiled the government they lied and cheated to take over. They have nothing but fear.

So listen carefully to the hatemongers on right-wing radio. Watch for the too slick message packaged in nice neat little bundles of propaganda when you turn on the TV. Watch who they attack, what they say, and why. Know it for the distraction, the lie, the diversion it truly is. Nothing this administration says or does is honest, truthful, or ethical. They will stop at nothing to keep power because the minute they lose it their next term will be behind bars.

That makes them very very dangerous. Pay close attention. Take nothing at face value. Their corporate handles will not let you kill their golden goose very easily. Know your enemy, your true enemy, and the fear tactics will roll off you like the shit it is.

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Design from Ursine Logic

Are You Scared Yet?

Impeach

Impeach

Mean People STILL Suck

People often say that it doesn't matter who is president or who makes up congress because it has no real world effect on THEM. While in many ways I agree, especially when we only seem to have a real choice between right-wing Christian whackos who make the Taliban seem moderate and lukewarm Republican-lites. Somehow, someone defined the rules while most Americans were sleeping and made it okay to deviate from the middle on one side and not the other.

I want to know how come it's okay to be an out there whack job if you're a Republican and not okay if you're a Liberal Democrat? You mean to tell me it's okay to form a party based on such mean and cruel crap such as discrimination against people based on their gender, their spiritual beliefs, their income, their appearance, and it's not okay to form one that wants equality for all human beings regardless of gender, religion, nationality, sexual preference, income, color of skin? Who made these rules, and why are we helping to enforce them with our silence and indifference?

As for not affecting us, well yes, it does. You see, these people who are currently running things are what is referred to as "rot from the top down." When the Republican party begins to stand for things like greed, corruption on a scale that over-shadows all political scandals to date, perpetual war to enrich the War Party, and downright hatred of anyone who isn't white and strapped into a restraining suit and tie and has butt burns from endless hours on church pew, then the rot begins to infect us all.

In a government without accountability, people get the idea that it's okay to do whatever they want. Human decency gets lost in the need to be first in line by shoving others out of the way, fastest on the freeway by cutting off other cars, the quickest to buy and turn over a piece of property and put it out of reach for the average person who can't afford to speculate on a place to live--and then make laws punishing people for being homeless.

It creates a society where the wealthy compete with each other to see who can hire the cheapest labor and thereby increase the profit higher than his or her competitor. It creates a society where there are only the wealthy and those who serve them. It creates a taxation system that is more unfair than the one during feudal times. It creates a society that cares more about a blob in a Petri dish than it does a child who is forced to live on the street for lack of social safety nets. It creates a society without a heart that sucks the blood from those who have nothing left but their hearts.

And you still believe it doesn't affect you?

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Design available on over 80 different products at Ursine Logic Changing hearts and minds one t-shirt at a time.

Mean People STILL Suck

Fleecing The Sheep In An Election Year

The First Amendment states: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.

For those of you who spend more time worrying about arming bears than your rapidly vanishing personal freedoms, let me break it down for you...no branch of American government, whether it is Congress, the President, or paid lobbyists for corporate spirituality has the right to establish ANY form of religion as the law of the land.

That includes them ALL. Get it? No matter what you want to believe, America is a country of Free Thought by law. It is not a country of Christianity, Judaism, Bozoism, or any variation of the themes. It is a nation whose earliest document some are so fond of quoting when it's about guns, also says right above that amendment, that no one can force their religious beliefs on everyone else.

You can't have one amendment without the other. Either give up your guns or give up your religious freedom. It's not pick one and ignore the rest. It's all or none.

And as far as that thing with the money and god, well the truth is that the regular use of "In God We Trust" on US coins did not begin until 1908.

"In God We Trust" was not made an official motto of the United States until 1956, and the motto did not appear on paper money until 1957.

So much for the claim of that one and only deity being around since our forefathers amused themselves by shooting the crap out of each other while stinking drunk. God didn't get into the fight until your grandpa got into his first brawl over religion...1908. Unless our founding fathers had some kind of longevity serum in their veins, they were long dead by the time our money was altered to suit the political whores of religious pandering.

Therefore, when the pious pleas for your hard-earned money start flying around the pulpits and state-run media, just remember...if they lie to you about our founding fathers and religion, what else are they lying about? Do you really want to pay for that kind of misguided and foolish nonsense?

And it's a perfect time as you are calling them on these lies, to have them show you in what book, in what document, they think gives them the right to spread hate, war, intolerance and just plain stupidity without decent people calling bullshit on them?

And if you are a believer and want to be pandered to in the name of equality, I've made some designs to publicize that you too were left out of the founding fathers early days of constructing what would become the laws of this country, and it is time your palm was greased with some silver...or at least a nice bridge across some swampland or something.

Actually, since our founding fathers did not choose a religious framework for our country, Atheists might have a valid claim that American is an Atheist nation.

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Wear these designs and strike fear in the mean little hearts of those who can't see beyond their own ignorance when it comes to human rights. They will know the truth is out there and you are wearing it.

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Designs available on everything from t-shirts to mugs at:

Ursine Logic Changing hearts and minds one t-shirt at a time.

Fleecing The Sheep In An Election Year

Pink's Song "Dear Mr. President"

I've had Pink's heartwrenching song "Dear Mr. President" as my profile song for several months now. The first time I listened to it I cried. A few days ago I shared a bulletin with the song and some images that were powerful and heartbreaking at the same time. I also cried but there were tears of anger as I watched these images of war and the horrors that grew stronger because of Bush's attempt to bomb another country into his hallucination of democracy. I wept angry tears at the legacy he is leaving behind such as torture, the loss of innocent people, the complete and total destruction of the lives and homes of those who had nothing to do with the reasons, the excuses, the lies that started the Iraq war. I felt angry that because of him and his actions, much of the world sees us as inseparable from his policies. We are him in the eyes of the world. It made me more determined to speak up and let at least the small part of the world I can reach see that he does not represent ALL of us.

Then today I watched the version where Pink is singing to an audience with her other bandmembers. I saw the same anger, the same passion, the same despair in her eyes as she sang that are in me. I felt her reasons for writing it. I KNEW them as well as I know my own passion for peace, for justice, for the equal and humane treatment of all living beings. I felt her frustration and rage that such things still go in this so-called civilized world, and within moments I was crying harder than the other times. There was something in her face and in the face of her audience that was painful to watch because it was the raw emotion of witnessing mass injustice and knowing who was reponsible, and knowing he walks free while others die for his madness. I saw people singing along with the same passion, the same anger, the same disgust at this awful excuse for a President.

When the song ended I felt something growing in me, a fire to do something, a desire to not sit back and let those who shout write the script of my life and the lives of those in places like Iraq. Often I tend to adopt the quiet path of small change instead of being confrontive, or rude, or mean or abusive because I feel that way change grows stronger because it is more solid, more carefully nurtured and tended.

I still believe that and will continue to do that, but I also want to be more active, be more out there with my voice because so many people retreat into themselves when the world becomes as horrible as it is now and it us up to the loud voices to draw them and us out.

There are many ways to be loud. Write letters to the editor because the warmongers fill the space with their very loud voices. Call those same radio and tv talk shows where people yell at each other and call it news. Make your voice as loud as theirs. If you see biased coverage or stories, call the stations and complain. The warmongers certainly do when they see something that displeases them. Call advertisers and threaten boycotts if they don't start forcing publications and other media to provide balanced coverage of events instead of using them as opportunities to instill fear in the vulnerable. Get as loud and as active as those who are and continue to be responsible for inflicting the cruelest, most ignorant and shallow president on us that we've ever had. Let people know he does NOT speak for you.

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Here are the latest designs I made as a response to my anger. Buy a shirt or give one as a gift. They help spread the word that Bush needs a congress that can challenge him instead of kissing his ass so they can feed at the war trough with him.

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Designs available on many items including shirts and mugs at Ursine Logic Changing minds one t-shirt at a time.

Pink's Song "Dear Mr. President"

Are You Being Used?

It's not easy to convince someone that he or she needs to kill another human being. It takes time and effort and the right seeds. It takes a cheering section of already convinced plants to lead the call to kill, kill, and kill some more. It takes emotional language: war, revenge, payback, pre-emptive defense, spreading democracy, eminent domain, the right of kings, acquisition of territory, theft of resources, or any other variation of the same theme, to get people to agree to let others kill in their name. And it all comes down to one carefully planted and tended seed.

That seed is the product of an industry whose only purpose is war and the products of war and the selling of those products to countries at war. It has nothing to do with ideology except as something to manipulate in order to do their business unchecked. These whores of war will pretend to be fundamentalist Christians, Jews, Muslims or any other belief that will allow them to become rich on the sales of their wares. They are Atheists when they sell arms to socialist and communist regimes. They are believers when they are required to be believers. But they really believe in only one thing: the obscene profits of the armaments industry and how they can get their share by legal, illegal, and mostly immoral means.

They will create an enemy that is scary enough to rally everyone around their demands for war. They will attack with all their means those who threaten their free reign to sell weapons of mass destruction to any country they want. Those who object to their lies and manipulations are labeled treasonous traitors, liberals, extremists or any other term that is the antithesis of what their hand chosen cheerleaders believe.

And they own these cheerleaders because they bought their loyalties by holding pep rallies with free hotdogs, massive quantities of corn-syrup sweetened beverages, watery beer, and music that is the country-western version of Wagnerian calls to war. They trained them with inspirational speakers, televangelists, big box churches. They trained them to spread their seeds of hate. They use them to attack visible groups that are "not them" such as homosexuals, non-white and non-Christian ethnic groups, foreign countries, and of course--those opposed to war and senseless stupid killing. They know that people who hate are easily manipulated into doing their bidding, no matter how vile and how evil. They tell them god is on their side. They tell them their weapons will prevent another 9/11. They tell them god wants them to kill.

These cheerleaders become willing soldiers in the war between good and evil. Good is the side that makes the merchants of death even wealthier. Evil is anything that stands in the way of their excessive profits. The hatred they spread is mainlined into them with narcotic frequency. It is spewed at them from hate radio. It is regurgitated at them from fake news shows whose mission is to sow division and fear. The cheerleaders end up believing in this hate far more than they ever believed in any god.

And once they are so completely trained, they will come for you, for your mind, for your heart, for your fears, for your prejudices and biases, for your desire to belong and not be judged for being different, for your lack of love and acceptance, for your need to believe. They will use and twist you until you hate and then they will have you as a willing servant to their sick and perverted souls. And the merchants of war will have free reign to continue unchecked their pursuit of their one true god: wealth and the power it brings.

Are you strong enough to resist them? Are you strong enough to stand for peace and against war? Are you strong enough to stand down hate with love? Are you strong enough to defeat them? Are you strong enough to accept that a seed is one small piece of a very large world, but without it, there is no forest, no country, no planet. Are you strong enough to be that seed?

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Design from Ursine Logic
(changing minds one t-shirt at a time)

Are You Being Used?

Impeach Bushco

Add your voice to the growing chorus to impeach the corrupt, warmongering bastards. Go to: http://www.impeachbushco.com for instructions on how to join the choir.

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Design from Ursine Logic Changing minds one t-shirt at a time.

Impeach Bushco

Why We Love Pirates

I was trying to understand why pirates are so popular these days. Even people who turn their nose up at organized fun you have to stand in line for like Disneyland, are standing in line for "Pirates of the Caribbean." At first I thought it could be explained by people's need for escapist fantasy in a world growing meaner and more brutal everyday. Then I thought it was just the hunky guys playing the pirates or the sex symbol hollywood wax figure of the week starring alongside them. Or maybe it was the simple plot in a too complex world that gave people a nice break from reality.

It's probably a little bit of all of the above, but also has a lot to do with the fact that we ARE living in a time of pirates. Look at the people in power now. Surely they fit the definition of pirate quite well. They care only about accumulating treasure and booty, killing and pillaging their way to democracy and even sadder, still use rape as proof they can conquer and humiliate a weaker enemy.

The romantic ideal of pirates seems to ignore the bad side of piracy, if there can even be a good side to it. We think Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom instead of Cheney and Rumsfeld. We want our thieves to be handsome and driven by altruism instead of ugly old white men driven by greed and cruelty. We want to believe pirates were the last of the rugged individualists instead of hired thugs employed by expansionist-minded governments to act as cover for their crimes, much as that paid whore Oliver North did for the Reagan administration.

Today's pirate ships are called Halliburton, Exxon, Neoconism, Bushco and other names we've come to associate with our poor excuse for a government. They are here for one purpose only: to steal as much as they can for themselves and their masters before someone comes and boards their ships of corrupted state and hangs them all for the treasonous criminals they are. After all, pirates rarely die of peaceful old age. They mostly end up getting exactly what they deserve in the end and history, except for the few brief periods when romanticism takes over from reality, records them for posterity as the bastards they truly were.

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Design from Ursine Logic Changing minds one t-shirt at a time.

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Why We Love Pirates