A Trapdoor In The Sun

I know I said I was done with politics, but I heard this last night on Hannity and had to bring it up. I come off as liberal to a lot of people, and that's fine with me...but I do have strong roots in conservative idealism. My problem with Republicans currently, as I've oft stated, is that they have forgotten what they are supposed to believe in. Barry Goldwater must be rolling over in his grave right now. Republicans Are in Denial By TOM COBURN May 27, 2008; Page A21 As congressional Republicans contemplate the prospect of an electoral disaster this November, much is being written about the supposed soul-searching in the Republican Party. A more accurate description of our state is paralysis and denial. Many Republicans are waiting for a consultant or party elder to come down from the mountain and, in Moses-like fashion, deliver an agenda and talking points on stone tablets. But the burning bush, so to speak, is delivering a blindingly simple message: Behave like Republic...

1. American Beauty. I can't put into words how much this movie moves me every time I watch it. It's not a spectacle. It's not over the top. There are no real special effects. But the true meat and bone of American Beauty is the concept that no matter how hard we try in life, attaining perfection is a near impossibility. For Lester Burnham, perfection was going back to his teenage years, driving the cherry hot rod, dating the cheerleader. Now in his 40's, his life had become estranged from everything he wanted it to be. For his wife, Carolyn, perfection was success. For their daughter, it was simply love and attention. The last five minutes of this movie are spellbinding... 2. La Vita è Bella (Life is Beautiful) I caught this gem on DVD a few years back. Roberto Benigni put on the performance of his life in this story of a Jewish Italian bookstore owner who finds the love of his life only to be forced into the Nazi prison camps with his son. I love this movie...

Some of you more conservative types may be offended at what I'm about to say... but I want to personally THANK you people who voted George W. Bush into office again back in 2004. THANK you for the $4.00 a gallon gas prices and a dollar that's worth CRAP. THANKS for tax cuts that really only benefit the well off yet are being PAID FOR with our INCREASING debt to COMMUNIST CHINA! THANKS ONCE MORE, for this UNENDING war in Iraq that will end up costing MY SON TRILLIONS during his adulthood! Thanks for all the jobs lost to India and stagnant wage increases! Believe me, I could go on!!! Think about those things when you go to the polls this November. The right wing talking heads WANT the issue to be about a supposedly racist pastor (who, by the way, ISN'T running for President) and other issues that ARE NOT ISSUES. They want you to believe that the billions that have been wasted (ie. squandered) in Iraq have made America safer. They tell us that if we didn't fight them o...

RETIREMENT PLANNING FOR 2008 If you had purchased $1000.00 of Nortel stock one year ago, it would now be worth $49.00. With Enron, you would have had $16.50 left of the original $1000.00. With WorldCom, you would have had less than $5.00 left. If you had purchased $1000 of Delta Air Lines stock you would have $36.00 left. But, if you had purchased $1,000.00 worth of beer one year ago, drank all the beer, then turned in the cans for the aluminum recycling REFUND, You would now have $214.00. Based on the above, the best current investment advice is to drink heavily and recycle. It's called the 401-Keg Plan.

This was once a hot button issue, but the discussion has died down recently to make room for debates over Barack Obama's preacher, Hillary Clinton's dirty campaigning and well, quite frankly, not much about McCain. Still, to many of us Americans, this IS an important issue, especially now that more of the middle class' hard earned paychecks are going into our gas tanks and money is getting tighter. Both Democrat candidates have introduced proposals for government ran health care. Hillary's system forces everyone to be insured one way or the other, while Obama's plan makes buying into a national system optional, and allows individuals to continue to use private insurance. His plan also creates standards to which private insurers must meet in order to continue business as usual. McCain's proposal focuses more on reform. His plan also has utilizes standards and forcing more competition in the health care arena - something that is needed. There are currently five m...

I need one of these for when I go to the theater and a bunch of bratty teenagers in front of me decide to talk through the whole movie! NEW YORK (AP) -- A wall-mounted gadget designed to drive away loiterers with a shrill, piercing noise audible only to teens and young adults is infuriating civil liberties groups and tormenting young people after being introduced into the United States. The Mosquito, which targets loiterers, projects a shrill noise audible only to teens and young adults. Almost 1,000 units of the device, called the Mosquito, have been sold in the United States and Canada after the product debuted last year, according to Daniel Santell, the North America importer of the device sold under the company name Kids Be Gone. The high-frequency sound has been likened to fingernails dragged across a chalkboard or a pesky mosquito buzzing in your ear. It can be heard by most people in their teens and early 20s who still have sensitive hair cells in their inner ears. Whe...

I'm letting go of you. Finally. I thought it would be different, I really did. A year flowed by under my unmoving feet. A year of self discovery, self preservation. Self indulgence and sometimes self pity. Still pieces of me remained motionless. A door closed and reopened elsewhere. I stepped through. I waded through the heartbreak and remorse. Jealousy was lost, but the anger and hatred remained. Until now. I'm letting that, go. This is where my universe has shifted itself to. I once told you I would be your beacon. That you could always follow me home if the waves became insurmountable. The light has been turned off. For my own well being and to be fair to those I now love. I am so sorry. You are on your own.

she closes her eyes and imagines her life beneath palm trees that dance on an ocean breeze and endless blue skies the clouds that reside dance in her head where memories lie of lighthouses and heavy storms comfort her when she is alone and loneliness is unforgiving and emptyness is unrelenting and happiness is as easy as just dreaming of the sand beneath her toes and she's the only one who knows

the sun gently slips behind the january mountains leaving the sky to fend for itself against the harsh, black, moonless night i, myself, a bystander watch from a hill high above the oilfields and smoke a Marlboro gathering my makeshift thoughts and trying to grasp some sort of perspective of myself sometimes i feel crowded... that there's just one too many kooks aboard this square yellow bus sometimes the clown is driving with his self-depreciating humor but the smile he wears is painted on he hides behind it and sometimes I glimps it as a single tear runs down his white cheek splashing harmlessly against his grey faded lapels at other times it is the demon who smiles devilishly and who delights in steering us slightly askew seemingly intreagued by the suffering of others at his own gain when he is driving we all duck and cover then sometimes the intellect drives and takes us on a cultural tour of life that surrounds us as he feigns concern at the p...

too far gone to care... i want to but i don't dare the drone of machinery envelopes me in cold metallic wings too numb to feel too blind to see too dulled to need sudden exctacy biting hooks tear open skin exposing insects deep within gnawing on my strange disease a simple request - give this to me don't offer stolen hope i only want to sear if there's eternal darkness it isn't far from here

Estranged emotions, held in check Twisted understanding, bleached in the sun Bubblebath of memories, so appealing, so inticed I will hold my breath, behind this shaded guise Release the catch, hold my aim Steady as the crow flies, under darker skies There was a time, not long ago I could see, my own face In a different light, gently smiling There was a time, now I've passed behind Bear the weight, hold the shame Steady as the crow flies, under darker skies It's me or me, one of us will go Decisions final, released before me I don't belong, don't fit in Don't live here, just visiting Pull you down, end the game Steady as the crow flies, under darker skies

Thank God I don't have these sort of dark flashes anymore! ------------------------------------------ in my pocket, the one on the right i carry three wooden matches i take the first and strike it agaist the wall to light my cigarette and discard it watching a small puff of smoke escape from it's charred tip the second match lights a picture of her the flame rides a wave of blackness until i can no longer see her smile and after a bath of gasoline i light the third

lover... where are your eyes wandering too? you know now i'm wondering too has my relevance escaped you? lover... you want that i should see past this diversion until it's passed and trust that this is nothing to... concern myself about but the more you give away is the more i live without will there be no crumbs left to stay around for... now? lover... i hope that you understand we all draw lines in our own sand that are easily erased by time lover... i can just huddle in fear and watch your visage disappear let my eyes follow the contrails you left behind it's just a game we play to keep the flame from fading out but newness always walks away so would you so easily trade away what you will have to live without? we can share our lives as whole numbers or divide them into fractions but i can never settle down and be the 68th distraction that keeps you somewhat centered in a life that is broken and splintered while you decide if i'm your lover or no more than a brother t...

inside thse four grey walls i dream sweet, warm images not the truth, but only what i wish was steadily looking deep into your eyes, your soul where your feelings sleep waiting to be swept up so i come open defenses down as we hold each other - close closer... melding together..fission..explosion and then i wake, brutally the repercussions still echoing etched into my memory cells leaving me cold and hungry shaking like an addict without a needle to satisfy to sooth me, to cover me an opiate for my mind

Trade away an unknown fate For sure existance without wait Time meanders like a child Lost, confused, not reconciled When hands of silence grip the air A million thoughts fall from a stare And lose themselves inside a place Where hope is bitter to the taste Like a wave that will not fold A dream forgotten, a lie untold A sillouhette of memories past A ghost in spaces shadows cast Life is just a dream that we are all in love with

I watch you from the corner of my mind Drifting by like a vapor cloud That I could never capture or take in You leave my words hanging in mid-air Suspended in time and space Like a funny comic thought balloon From somewhere in the Sunday paper Only followed by three conspicious dots For they are unfinish ed...

she says she's happy out on her own she smiles and tells me she's starting to bloom but beneath her still voice the monster has grown it slowly consumes her when she's all alone ripples and whirlpools surrounding her head treading the currents the best that she can but fear is a riptide that pulls from within she's being slowly sucked under again a rainbow of colors emptied out on her bed "i've got a prescription to leave here." she says and why would you exit with so much to lose "i hate myself." remains her only excuse and i've tried to sweep it under the rug avoiding her questions with only a shrug and somehow i feel that i am to blame she has a full house but she's quiting the game

First of all, I hope this blog doesn't come off as 'racist'. That isn't it's intent. The ethnic group I am blogging about has much to be proud of, and personally, some of the hardest working, most family dedicate d people I know are Hispanic. I use this group as an example. One could draw the same conclusions, from a religious standpoint, to current trends in the American Islamic communities. I may be looked at as a liberal on certain issues, but this is one that I definitely fall into the conservative camp on. I got into a little bit of a debate with Lilly this morning on the telephone over multiculturalism in America. The topic came up when we were discussing taxes oddly enough. I made the comment that as someone who had lived in Southern California for many years, I had some negative feelings towards the growing immigrant population, specifically in that state. I'm not going to bring up citizen status here, as undoubtedly many of these people are here ille...

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/5677117.html Skybus announced last night that they were ceasing all operations as of Saturday April 5th. The Columbus based carrier was less than a year old and touted a limited amount of $10 fairs on every flight. They join Aloha Airlines and ATA in the low cost carrier graveyard. Skybus blames decreased consumer spending along with skyrocketing fuel costs for the decision. I blame poor business decisions on the part of the airline management as well as the City of Columbus for the failure. When Skybus first approached the City of Columbus with it's business plan, I was worried that the whole thing could end up a disaster. The airline wanted to offer flights throughout the country on a first-come, first-serve tier level. That is, the first 10 seats of every flight went for $10 ($20 after taxes) one way. This included flights to the west coast. Then the prices went up to $25 for the next 20 or so, $50...ect. The airline would fly only ...

Why is it that the majority of pro-lifers (correct me if I'm wrong here) are also pro-death penalty? All crime and punishment aside, doesn't sticking a needle into a man's (or woman or teenager) arm and purposefuly terminating his existence achieve the same net results as terminating a pregnancy..ie. one dead human being (or viable fetus, zygote, however you view it)? For the record, I support the death penalty. However, I have to call out the hypocracy here. The first arguement to be made will be that babies are innocent and convicted deserve to die based on poor choices that have effected others. This may be true, but there have been many cases recently of death row inmates being falsely convicted and imprisoned, only to be vindicated through DNA evidence. The state of Illinois recently recended it's death penalty because of cases as such. If you truly live by the Ten Commandments, how do you get around 'Thou Shall Not Kill'? I don't remember hearing abo...