America the Fun

 

Why can't our Donkey & Elephant be as fun as these guys?         

     Why do these private entities get to consider themselves statesmen and run the country?  Political parties are not mentioned in the Constitution, and their status interferes with the checks and balances of the Constitution.                  
                                                            

Pathways

Our society is a little crazy right now.  The internet makes it worse.  Things come across as if our whole society is SJW's (Social Justice Warriors) vs. neo-chauvinists; no gun restrictions at all vs. total banning of guns; unrestricted capitalism vs. full socialism; MAGA vs. laissez faire belief systems; hard core Christian evangelicals vs. atheists; etc., etc. When you get people talking, get them away from labels, there's still a lot of overlap in the directions Americans think this country should go.  There need to be methods to support the consensus areas.

Beyond Dreaming

 

• This MLK Day, how about we do something more than dream it?  How about we live it?  --Marie Byars

The [Slave's] Complaint*

[written to be sung to the popular ballad, Admiral Hosier's Ghost] 

Forc'd from home, and all its pleasures, 

Afric's coast I left forlorn; 

To increase a stranger's treasures, 

O'er the raging billows borne. 

Frederic Shoberl, 1821 (depicting Virginia, USA)

Men from England bought and sold me,  

Paid my price in paltry gold; 

But, though theirs they have enroll'd me, 

Minds are never to be sold. 

Still in thought as free as ever, 

What are England's rights, I ask, 

Me from my delights to sever, 

Me to torture, me to task? 

Fleecy locks, and black complexion 

Cannot forfeit nature's claim; 

Skins may differ, but affection 

Dwells in white and black the same. 

Why did all creating Nature 

 Make the plant*** for which we toil? 

Sighs must fan it, tears must water, 

Sweat of ours must dress the soil. 

Think, ye masters, iron-hearted, 

 Lolling at your jovial boards; 

Think how many backs have smarted 

For the sweets*** your cane affords. 

Is there, as ye sometimes tell us, 

 Is there one who reigns on high? 

Has he bid you buy and sell us, 

Speaking from his throne the sky? 

Ask him, if your knotted scourges, 

Matches, blood-extorting screws, 

Are the means that duty urges 

Agents of his will to use? 

Hark! He answers!—Wild tornadoes, 

Strewing yonder sea with wrecks; 

Wasting towns, plantations, meadows, 

Are the voice with which he speaks. 

He, foreseeing what vexations 

Afric's sons should undergo, 

Fix'd their tyrants' habitations 

 Where his whirlwinds answer.**

— William Cowper, 1877; Stanzas 1-5 [English poet, hymnwriter & clergyman] 

 *The original title of this poem was "The Negro's Complaint." This archaic term was not intended to offend; it was the term used at the time. As you can see, Cowper took the heart and soul of the Black man very seriously. 

**Fierce weather in the Caribbean, where many English slaves were sent More information on Cowper (prounounced "Cooper") Biographical Info and Quotes of William Cowper

***Sugar cane in the Caribbean

Juneteenth

     Juneteenth -- a blending of the words June and nineteenth -- is the oldest known US celebration of the end of slavery. It commemorates June 19, 1865. That's the day that Union Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger rode into Galveston, Texas, and told slaves of their emancipation from slavery.

     "In accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free," Granger read to the crowd that day. It came more than two years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation.
     In 1980, Texas was the first state to make Juneteenth a state holiday, although it had been celebrated informally since 1865.

Article II, Section 8 U.S. Constitution

"The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare [emphasis mine] of the United States... "

The conservative, "narrow" constitutionalists of our day do not have a "lock" on the Constitution.  It was meant to be a living, growing document.  The provision for "general welfare" encompasses many things.   In other words, sometimes the government helps those less off to promote everyone's "general welfare."  Societal unrest destroys the general welfare.

Harmonious

 
     I just want to remind everyone that Moses's 2nd wife was probably Black. See Numbers 12:1--she was a Cushite, an Ethiopian.

Nubian Woman, between 1880 & 1890
Public Domain

     His first wife, Zipporah, was a Middle Eastern Midianite, more closely related to the Israelites? So, some people in this world need to get a grip.

       How did Moses meet her? Maybe she left Egypt with them. Exodus suggests some other people attached themselves to the Israelites and their God and left with them.

Another Generic Meme

Again, you're welcome!

(And, yes, the "puke green" is intentional.)

Wisdom for Facebook

With all the crazy fake news on Facebook and other random, short-sighted spoutings-off on social media, these words of a classic Greek philosopher take on new meaning:


"Wise men speak because they have something to say; fools because they have to say something." ---Plato

modernized detail (Plato & Aristotle) from Raphael's "School of Athens", 1509-1511

Try Something New

Here's a novel thought: how about putting more people with a sociology or cultural anthropology background into the State Department??? ---Marie Byars