I can’t say that Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday as it seems to be centered around food and food isn’t a driving force in my life, but nevertheless, I will spend hours making yeast bread and candied yams to take to our family get together tomorrow.  It will be a large gathering of family..and will probably include some of the holiday conflicts that plague most large families.  But, in spite of the family squabbles, it’s still fun and it’s still family and for that I am thankful.

I hope each of you have a blessed, happy and fun filled Thanksgiving.

• 1 out of every 3 American women will be sexually assaulted in her lifetime.

• The United States has the world’s highest rape rate of the countries that publish such statistics. It’s 4 times higher than Germany, 13 times higher than England, and 20 times higher than Japan. SOURCE

Those are the only statistics I will include here as this isn’t about statistics, it’s about attitudes.

My first week living in Miami the sister of a friend was gang raped in her apartment.  Her boyfriend who shared the apartment with her opened the door (it was daytime) to a man he recognized from the apartment complex.  That man and two others who weren’t in view at first forced their way into the apartment.  They physically overcame the boyfriend, tied him up and proceeded to gang rape his girlfriend in front of him.  Police seemed to think that it was a drug deal gone wrong and the rapists were never brought to justice.  Regardless of any supposed drug deal, the woman wasn’t fair game for an act of revenge.

A couple of years later, I was living in another Miami apartment complex where I was friends with the manager’s wife.  One morning as we met by the pool, she told me a 16 year old was raped in her apartment when she opened the door to a man in a electric company uniform…..the man didn’t work for the electric company, he had used the uniform ploy a number of times in the area to gain entrance to apartments where he proceeded to rape whatever woman was home.  The manager had made the comment to his wife “what did she expect when she walks through the courtyard in her bathing suit.”  As I looked at her in horror as she seemingly agreed with her husband I replied “so do you and so do I.”  It was Miami and we lived just steps to the pool so many of us walked through the courtyard in our bathing suits.

I spoke with the apartment manager and asked if he was going to warn the women in the complex about the man in the fake electric company uniform and he indicated he just wanted to keep it quiet.  I was appalled and I called the local police department who sent a representative to a meeting I set up that was open to occupants of the apartment complex.  The police officer warned the occupant’s that this man had raped before and gave everyone tips to protect themselves.

Unfortunately attitudes toward women who are raped haven’t come as far as we would like.  Many people still wonder what the woman did to bring it on herself.  Maybe she shouldn’t have been out after dark, or maybe she shouldn’t have gone to this party or that bar.  Maybe she really wanted it.

Until we take rape more seriously and become righteously outraged about the crime of rape then the United States will continue to have a shamefully high number of rapes.  We shouldn’t wait until rape touches the life of someone we love….every rape is an act of outrageous violence and should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and punished with the longest prison term possible with no possibility of parole.  Rape  is all too common in our society and it’s time we all work together to change attitudes and ensure the safety of the women of America.

He’s a funny kind of guy who loves to tell a joke, but underneath the exterior is a man who has endured some of the most painful events life can dish out.  His daughter who was born just months before I was, was born with Down syndrome and with a hole in her heart.  Despite everything the doctors could do at that time and the fact her mother, my aunt was a nurse, my cousin died at the age of 7.  Unable to have more children, my aunt and uncle adopted two children.  Twenty years ago, their only granddaughter, age 3, fell down a flight of stairs and died.

My uncle could have become a bitter man.  He could have crawled into a bottle or indulged in any number of self destructive behaviors, but he didn’t.  Instead he has spent years giving of himself to others.  He and his wife cook meals and deliver them to the elderly.  They drive homebound people to the doctor or church or otherwise render whatever help they need.  This unassuming man who now lives in a doublewide out in the country is, contrary to all appearances, a millionaire, but he is a millionaire who remembers the dirt farm he sprang from and the things that he’s lost that money could not buy.

Now one might think that he could be smug and self-righteous about his financial success, but instead he has developed an attitude of gratitude and he remembers the Bible verse, From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked. Luke 12:48   Much the same sentiment is encapsulated in the French phrase noblesse oblige, or nobility obligates.  In the Robert A. Heinlein novel To Sail Beyond the Sunset, Dr. Johnson says, “Does your common man understand chivalry? Noblesse oblige? Aristocratic rules of conduct? Personal responsibility for the welfare of the state? One may as well search for fur on a frog.”¹  It’s a sad commentary on a society when those who are blessed with more feel no obligation to extend a helping hand to those who have less, when the blessed glory in their accomplishments and ridicule those who struggle to survive.

You may be reading this and wondering what this has to do with anything.  Well, I’ll tell you.  I’m often accused of not wanting anyone to ever disagree with me and that’s not really an accurate accusation.  I have lots of people disagree with me on many issues, especially in my very conservative family, and I take it just fine.  What I don’t deal well with is the smug attitude of how smart, how righteous, how very envy worthy one is for having made the right decisions in life.  I don’t deal well with people who don’t seem to know or acknowledge that their very ability to make good decisions and move up in the world are reasons for an attitude of gratitude, not smug superiority to those who may not have the same abilities.

We are each born with a measure of ability, a measure of intelligence and into a family that either encourages and enables us to reach the best of ourselves or a family who itself has no ability to nurture a child into independence and maturity.  One might say it is the luck of the draw or the will of God, but however you look at it, having a family that nurtures one or having the ability to pull oneself up from the pits is not something to brag about and be puffed up about, it is, in my opinion, something that should make one feel humbled and grateful.

If you find yourself patting yourself on the back and feeling superior for your decisions and accomplishments, you might want to take the time to reflect on the saying….there but for the grace of God go I.  And if you find yourself feeling superior and echoing that sentiment here you will probably find us knocking heads as I feel little patience toward such attitudes.  Be grateful that you have been given much and realize that much will be required of you…….you can accept that requirement graciously and with a light and giving heart or you can dwell on the unfairness of it all and become bitter.  The choice is yours.

¹SOURCE

Conservative fear includes:  fear of terrorists, fear of communists, fear of socialist, fear of foreigners, fear of gays, fear of things that go bump in the night.   Conservative fear tells us that they are all out to get us and we must hold onto our guns, kowtow to corporations and have a cop on every corner.  Conservative fear tells us that if it’s fun it’s bad.

Ah, liberal fear is a little more subtle.  Liberal fear tells us that the wafting smoke from a cigarette might break through the exhaust of the much favored by liberals public transit bus that is belching fumes into the air and kill us.  Liberal fear tells us that if mommy government doesn’t  make it illegal to ride a motorcycle without a helmet, bicycle or skateboard we will all fall victim to brain damage.  Liberal fear tells us that Johnny Shotgun  will one day burst out in rage and commit a mass murder .  And liberal fear tells us that the government must regulate how many twinkies a week we are allowed to have lest we die of a massive coronary and cost the health care system more money.

So, you know what makes me crazy?

It’s always one group or the other, either the Conservatives with their big shit bag full of fear, or the Liberals with their sappy Santa sack full of fear, running the country.  Those of us who would like to be left to just live our lives separate from the rest of the countries’ neurosis and paranoia can’t do that because there’s always some idiot politician being pressured by some whining, crying or bitching idiot American (who makes Sybil look emotionally stable), about some perceived threat to their life and wanting a new law to protect them.  (How’s that for a run on sentence?) Lower the speed limit, regulate the use of seat belts, lock up all Arabs, make all but one square inch of the country a no smoking zone….blah blah blah blah blah.

I’ve been asked why I live out in the boonies with the deer, squirrels, birds and raccoons and the simple answer to that is I find the wild critters  easier to live with than my whiny, obnoxious and NOSY fellow Americans.  I don’t care if the gay couple down the road from me is married, shacked up or just having wild monkey sex.  I just don’t care.  I don’t care if the next door neighbor is stoned from smoking pot grown in his back yard.  I don’t care if the idiot speeding down the road is wearing his seatbelt. I don’t care. What I do care about is my fellow Americans shoving their collective craziness down the throats of those who would like to make personal decisions about their personal lives all by themselves.

So, I’m going to share just a little bit of wisdom with all of those who will accept anything from the government in order to feel safe and protected……

YOU AREN’T GOING TO LIVE FOREVER.  No matter that you don’t smoke, don’t eat twinkies, wear your seatbelt, never see a gay person or a foreigner, wear a helmet, or whether or not you own a gun.   The government can outlaw this and outlaw that, it can lock up half the country and wage war on the whole of the Middle East but whether big brother is looking out for you or not, YOU ARE NOT GOING TO LIVE FOREVER.  Heck, I’d settle for a couple of decades without pain.

So, tomorrow I’m going to take my bag of Oreo cookies, my glass of wine, my cigarettes and ash tray out to the porch and commune with the birds.  At least they never give me grief as long as I share my cookies…..and THEY don’t drive me crazy.

I hope this weekend you will throw caution to the wind,take a chance and live dangerously….eat lots of cookies full of hydrogenated oil or get really crazy and have a glass of wine and smoke a doobie.    Whatever you might choose,  have a great weekend.

Sage

In a variation of the Elephant fears the Mouse story,
Pat Buchanan’s White Maleness fears Sonia Sotomayor’s Latin Femaleness

By SKYAGUNSTA

This morning, I listened to Pat Buchanan on National Television rant about how he thinks Sonia Sotomayor is the, “White Man’s” public enemy No 1. Hardly believing what I was listening to, I went back to look for a video clip of Pat’s Buchanan rant this morning and I could not find it, but I did find this clip of Buchanan carrying on during an, “Andrea Mitchell Reports” program last week in which he is basically making the same argument.

According to Buchanan, Sotomayor supports race preferences … “at the expense of the white male to advance people of color”. (discussed here) because her 2008 opinion to throw out the results of a firefighter promotion exam, in favor of the city of New Haven’s Program to uphold what the city wanted: a ruling in favor of Affirmative Action . (Minority Set Asides) , because almost no minorities qualified for promotions, is, in Buchanan’s words, an act of judicial bigotry committed by Sotomayor.

Pat rails and rails against Sotomayor for siding with the city and its Affirmative Action Program: The female Judge, a Hispanic, a Minority herself, siding against the white firefighter.

Pat’s railings against Sotomayor really caused me to stop and think. Did he ever listen to any minority? Did he hear any minority make the case, again and again, and again, that doors in housing, employment, schools, church locations were barred to them just because they are a minority?

Why, Pat Buchanan, are you making it sound as if the Judge stands’ for Affirmative Action Rulings, which you call bigoted rulings are … bigoted? Why are you standing for White Supremacy? Why does it sound so in my ears?

You are calling your stance, a stance in favor of equality? What equality is there in a land where the White Man has reigned supreme for years, and years and years while minorities of every color have been held down, passed over, discounted, made to walk on a different tier?

You want Sotomayor to be honest and say what she thinks, what she really thinks but then, are you really being honest about why you are railing so against her?

Pat Buchanan devalues Sotomayor’s pick for consideration for a place at the bench of the SCOTUS, because, he says, she was picked for it because of affirmative action; because she is a woman, and because she is a Hispanic, and because, he says, Obama believes in Affirmative Action she was elected to be Obama’s nominee; thus, denying in one fell swoop, whatever accomplishments or achievements Sotomayor may have garnered throughout her career as a Judge, or that she was picked precisely because of whatever accomplishments, achievements, discernments, good opinions, Sotomayor accumulated on her C.V.

He goes on to take her down, distorting her words, by saying, “what is it about a Latino Woman that can make a better decision than a white male,” even when, as Bob Shrum points out that, what Sonia Sotomayor said, was:

” I would hope, given my background, that more often than not, I would make a better decision” .

As John Lorenz points out, Sotomayor was refuting an argument made by Sandra Day O’Connor that wise men and women will rule the same way:

• in context she was answering back and refuting a comment that had been made by Sandra Day O’Connor that ‘wise men and women judges will rule the same way” on court cases. Sotomayor is arguing in the context of this quote that NO, a person’s background and experience often ARE a factor in the conclusions they come to. And when a person of minority background rules on a gender and discrimination case, if it is a woman in this case, she will be influenced differently from white judges by her minority background experience when deciding this kind of cases.  All she was doing was refuting Sandra Day O’Connor’s statement to the effect that judges all rule according to the same instincts no matter what their gender or background.

• Lorenz, further highlights the point being made by Sotomayor that “a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male WHO HASN’T LIVED THAT LIFE”

Pat Buchanan, Rush Limbaugh, and many others seeding fear, hatred and antagonism against Sonia Sotomayor in the hopes of taking down her nomination for a spot on the bench of the Supreme Court of the United States might as well just be screaming at the top of their lungs .

A MOUSE, A MOUSE  -  all the time wishing that their antagonistic antics against Sotomayor will cause a stampede against her nomination which will give them, the White Man as they see the White Man, their corporate state, their supremacy, a continued hold on this country, sending, meanwhile, a real chance for equality rolling down a hill to the valley of  Minorities need not apply.

It is my hope that America can see through Buchanan’s and the others’ ploy and give America a chance for the equality which could come from the wise rulings of someone who has met inequality face to face.

I think Giddy finds it upsetting that someone other than a white male has been nominated to the Supreme Court….his argument is that the Supreme Court isn’t intended to be a representative body.   Is there some law prohibiting it from being representative?  What does the Constitution say about the Supreme Court?

Article III

Section 1. The judicial power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behaviour, and shall, at stated times, receive for their services, a compensation, which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office.

Section 2. The judicial power shall extend to all cases, in law and equity, arising under this Constitution, the laws of the United States, and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority;–to all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls;–to all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction;–to controversies to which the United States shall be a party;–to controversies between two or more states;–between a state and citizens of another state;–between citizens of different states;–between citizens of the same state claiming lands under grants of different states, and between a state, or the citizens thereof, and foreign states, citizens or subjects.

In all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and those in which a state shall be party, the Supreme Court shall have original jurisdiction. In all the other cases before mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions, and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.  SOURCE

I’ve done some research and so far I haven’t found anywhere in the Constitution or law that requires a Supreme Court Justice to meet any special qualifications.  The Constitution doesn’t even specify how many Justices there should be, (Congress has set the number of Justices at 9 but it wasn’t always so¹) much less what the make up of the court should be concerning age, sex, race, etc.  So what we have is nothing but Liddy’s  sexist and racist opinion that the court shouldn’t be representative.

G. Gordon Liddy On Sotomayor: ‘Let’s Hope That The Key Conferences Aren’t When She’s Menstruating’

G. Gordon Liddy looking angryYesterday on his radio show, conservative host G. Gordon Liddy continued the right wing’s all-out assault on Judge Sonia Sotomayor. First, just like Tom Tancredo, Liddy slammed Sotomayor’s affiliation with the civil rights group La Raza — and referred to the Spanish language as “illegal alien“:

LIDDY: I understand that they found out today that Miss Sotomayor is a member of La Raza, which means in illegal alien, “the race.” And that should not surprise anyone because she’s already on record with a number of racist comments.

Finished with the race-based attack, Liddy moved on to denigrate Sotomayor’s gender:

LIDDY: Let’s hope that the key conferences aren’t when she’s menstruating or something, or just before she’s going to menstruate. That would really be bad. Lord knows what we would get then.

Finally, Liddy disputed the entire idea that there’s anything wrong with the paucity of women and total lack of Hispanics on the Court:
LIDDY: And everybody is cheering because Hispanics and females have been, quote, underrepresented, unquote. And as you pointed out, which I thought was quite insightful, the Supreme Court is not designed to be and should not be a representative body.
Rest of Article

What possible reason could there be for the Supreme Court to consist of only white males?  What’s wrong with a representative court other than the fact it takes away the rights of white males to interpret law in a manner biased toward white males?

I knew that Liddy was an ex-con²  who capitalized on his notoriety, making one wonder why conservatives and Fox News find him a suitable commentator.  Why would anyone give any credence to this thug’s opinion much less listen to him on the airwaves?  Does he demonstrate the high moral values the conservatives are so proud of?

Liddy was convicted for his role in the Watergate break-in, for conspiracy in the Daniel Ellsberg case and for contempt of court, spending about four and a half years in prison. In 1986, a federal appeals court found Liddy liable for $20,499 in back taxes on Watergate slush-fund money, rejecting his claim that his benefits did not exceed $45,000. As one of the White House “plumbers,” Liddy spent about $300,000 engineering political dirty tricks and the Watergate break-in. SOURCE

Of course Liddy is entitled to his opinion as am I and my opinion of Liddy is he is a thug, a racist and a sexist pig.

¹ SOURCE
² SOURCE

By: Skyagunsta

Sonia Sotomayor has been selected by Barack Obama as his nominee to be parsed, hacked, and hashed over by a Senate Confirmation Panel and by a full Senate Confirmation vote if she gets through the hurdles of Republican antagonism for anything that does not contain a Bush political gene in it.

Sonia Sotomayor, I have heard it said, is someone who would be very much like Thurgood Marshall was to the Supreme Court. Someone with a heart beat, placed right smack in the middle of that cosmos which makes up the common man or woman, the struggling class, the discriminated against.

They say of Sonia Sotomayor that she TOO, defiende al humano porque siendo hermano se vive major–ROUGHLY TRANSLATED IT MEANS THAT SHE WOULD STAND, in defense of the humans because being in a sisterhood being, in a brotherhood one finds inner peace.

I am not really sure how I feel about Sonia Sotomayor. I think no one can measure up to Thurgood Marshall and the human beat he brought to the Supreme Court. I don’t think America can ever replicate it, or duplicate it. I do think America lost a major heartbeat when Thurgood Marshall retired from the Supreme Court.

(Did at any point I read that she clerked under Thurgood Marshall while he was still in the Supreme Court? I am not sure now whether I read it or not. I am no sure if my brain is making this up because I so long for someone good, with a good understanding of the human struggle to sit on that bench in the Supreme Court of the United States. But, I think I did read it. Now, I don’t know if having a good understanding of the human struggle makes anyone out to be a good God-Given-Giving Liberal. I do know that is the label the Bushes, and any of the Bushes’ followers, give anyone with a good understanding of the human heart who, in understanding the human struggle, struggles themselves to make it an easier, less painful, a more balanced road, for countless ordinary American men and women who dream of democracy and of the American Dream to..

But . if I did read that Sonia Sotomayor clerked under Thurgood Marshall, and if she learned how to use her mind to let her heart speak on behalf of, and for, the countless ordinary Americans whose numbers have been exponentially increased by Bush policies . then I have to say, Sonia Sotomayor is like the flower one unexpectedly finds in an outing in the fields . an unexpected blessing. A drop of dew in a very parched land.)

Unlike so many Hispanics in the media who celebrate Sotomayor’s selection just because she is a Hispanic woman, I have to say, that as a woman of half Hispanic ancestry myself, it is not Sotomayor’s Latino or Hispanic ethnicity which makes her selection as a nominee for the supreme court palatable to me. It is the fact that she may have learned something of real importance during her time clerking under Thurgood Marshall and that she applies those learnings to her rulings.

That resonates with me.

That alone is what makes Sotomayor important and relevant to me, even when the Bushes and their followers are going to try to paint her as an evil liberal whose nomination needs to be, according to them, stuffed down a toilet somewhere.

Shame on them.

America needs as much dew and as many lilies in the field as it can get!

About the author:
Skyagunsta is a long line descendant of Andrew Pickens ,who fought in the Revolutionary War, alongside Francis Marion better known as the Swamp Fox. He is credited with the victory of the Battle of the Cowpens … a crucial victory for the colonies in their fight against the Crown.

She is a liberal at heart, therefore, a true opposer of the Bushes, their policies, their politics, and their derivatives. She opposes corporatism, the stealing of elections and she believes in the rights of ordinary, every day Americans.

My thanks to Skyagunsta for sending this to me and agreeing to me posting it.

Daniel Hauser is 13 years old and suffers from Hodgkin’s lymphoma.  In the past Daniel had responded positively to chemotherapy but his parents decided to go with a natural healing course that I will discuss more fully below.  Daniel, according to the judge who issued the arrest warrant for his mother, suffers from a learning disability and cannot read, making it unlikely that Daniel fully understands the extent of his illness and the pros and cons of chemotherapy.

The Hausers belong to a group known as the Nemenhah Band that believes in natural healing.   Who or what is the Nemenhah Band?

The Nemenhah Band claims to be a group of American Indian healers; however, their practices have been criticized by many Native Americans. One such critic is Al Carroll, a Mescalero Apache, Ph.D.-holding author and Fulbright scholar who moderates a website dedicated to exposing people who exploit American Indian traditions for profit.

SOURCE

Being a curious person I went to the Nemenhah Band website and found that for $250,  sent along with a filled out form you can be adopted into the band and become a natural healer.

Click to enlarge

I also found that  the Nemenhah group’s leader, Phillip Landis, who has been convicted of fraud in two states for misleading investors in an alternative-health mushroom-growing business.¹

On the forum attached to the Nemenhah Band’s website Chief Cloudpiler says that the program is self-directed, which doesn’t give me a lot of faith in their program and healing abilities.²

In the forum is a post by someone using the screenname drorganics:

Even after attending the last 2 day trial and knowing the family, I still come away confused as to what the latest court decision really means for us as Nemenhah. If your like me, your contemplating the safety and wellbeing of your family members. How could this case effect other potential cases in the future? What if this happened to me or somebody I love? And shouldnt the courts have recognized the laws guarding indiginous[sic] peoples’ rights? The ultimate question you may be asking is “Is being Nemenhah really good enough anymore?” SOURCE

Laws guarding indigenous peoples’ rights….interesting choice of words given that the Nemenhah Band is not recognized as a tribe but as a religion. drorganics goes on to say that Minnesota law gives one the right to forgo traditional medical treatments in favor of alternative treatments but the good doctor fails to acknowledge that we are talking about a minor child here, one that can’t read no less.

By AMY FORLITI, Associated Press Writer Amy Forliti, Associated Press Writer – 42 mins ago

NEW ULM, Minn. – Authorities nationwide were on the lookout Wednesday for a mother and her 13-year-old cancer-stricken son who fled after refusing the chemotherapy that doctors say could save the boy’s life.

Colleen Hauser and her son, Daniel, who has Hodgkin’s lymphoma, apparently left their southern Minnesota home sometime after a doctor’s appointment and court-ordered X-ray on Monday showed his tumor had grown.

Brown County District Judge John Rodenberg, who had ruled last week that Daniel’s parents were medically neglecting him, issued an arrest warrant Tuesday for Colleen Hauser and ruled her in contempt of court. Rodenberg also ordered that Daniel be placed in foster care and immediately evaluated by a cancer specialist for treatment.

[snip]

“I don’t know why they started this situation in the first place,” he said. “Why does someone believe they have the right over your child?”

[snip]

The judge has said Daniel, who has a learning disability and cannot read, did not understand the risks and benefits of chemotherapy and didn’t believe he was ill.

[snip]

The Hausers are Roman Catholic and also believe in the “do no harm” philosophy of the Nemenhah Band, a Missouri-based religious group that believes in natural healing methods advocated by some American Indians. Colleen Hauser testified earlier that she had been treating his cancer with herbal supplements, vitamins, ionized water and other natural alternatives.

REST OF ARTICLE

Further information from the Nemenhah Band website further explains the “standing” of the band:

Federal Law dictates that a ‘Native American Practitioner’ or ‘Traditional Spiritual Leader’ must be either an enrolled member of a Federally Recognized Tribe or Band, or he/she must be recognized as such by Tribes, Bands, or other Native American Traditional Organizations. Therefore, every member of the Nemenhah Band enjoys recognition, not as Tribal Medicine People, such as Lakota or Yankton or Mandan, to name few, but rather, as Nemenhah Medicine Men or Women and Ministers of the Oklevueha Native American Church of Sanpete.

[snip]

This is the pivotal message that the United States Supreme Court delivered in Gonzales vs O Centro de Espirto Vegetal – that blood quanta and Tribal enrollment are incidental if the organization is recognized by Tribes, Bands, or Traditional Organizations.

[snip]

Nemenhah Medicine Men and Women declare that Natural Healing is part of their Spiritual Orientation and that they will ‘First Do No Harm.’ If you can make this declaration, the Nemenhah Band invites you to request Spiritual Adoption and join with the Community of the Nemenhah.

Membership is only by Spiritual Adoption. It is also the only way the Nemenhah Seminary can accept you into the program and designate you a Medicine Man or Medicine Woman. As a Nemenhah Medicine Man or Woman you will be able to practice your Healing Ministry under the full weight and protection of the Native American Free Exercise of Religion Act 1993 (NAFERA) and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act 1993 (RFRA).  SOURCE

There is no requirement for Native American blood to be a member of the Band:

After reading the Constitution of the Band, if you wish to request Spiritual Adoption and to begin your training as a Nemenhah Medicine Man or Woman, click on the link below, download the PDF application for spiritual adoption, fill it out, and mail with the suggested donation to:

Nemenhah
P.O. Box 126
Weaubleau, MO 65774

SOURCE

The Sacred Giveaway is the method by which the Nemenhah Program is supported. The Suggested Offering amount for the Ceremonial Service of Individual Spiritual Adoption is $250.00 initially and $100.00 annually. Thereafter, Nemenhah Members of good intention, willingly make regular, monthly offerings from out of their own financial stewardship. They do this prayerfully, relying on Spirit to direct them in the amount or kind of offering that is most appropriate. They never neglect this part of the Adoption Covenant, understanding that if they do, the Nemenhah Band cannot continue in its important work and its offering to Humanity globally.

All of the Educational Modules of the Core Curriculum are offered with the request that you make a donation of $30.00 (or as much as Spirit directs you) for each module.

If you have already been spiritually adopted and you already made your initial $250.00 offering, please remember to support the program by making additional offerings for the Course Modules on a regular basis. All offerings are strictly voluntary and non-refundable. SOURCE

Safety net or circumvention of law?

Our Mission is to provide a safety net for Natural Healers by effectively bringing the Sacred back into Natural Healing. We concentrate our efforts in the Healing of the Body Physical, the Body Familial, the Body Societal and the Whole Earth.

Our Offering goes out to all Natural Healers of Good Intention. If you are willing to publicly declare that Natural Healing comprises part of your Spiritual Orientation, that you will First Do No Harm, and that you will work to further the work of perfecting and unifying the Band and the fulfilling of its mission, promising your support for its services and offerings, you are invited to become part of our Permanent Population through the ancient Principle of Spiritual Adoption. SOURCE

I approached this research and article with as much objectivity as I possibly could.  I personally much prefer finding natural or alternative treatments for illnesses when at all possible.  I went to chiropractors for years, well before they had the credibility that they enjoy today and I credit them with keeping me out of surgery for my back for years.  I found that magnesium has relieved me of a number of ailments much better than drugs.  AND I have a drop or two of Native American blood myself, giving me a willingness to be open to possibilities.

My conclusion is as an adult I am free to believe any way I choose and to forgo medical science and treat my physical ailments as I see fit, BUT I do not have the right to withhold medical treatment from a minor child who does not have the ability to understand the pros and cons of treatments and whose very life is dependent on the treatment decisions.  I did an Internet search for testimonies from those healed by the ceremonies and treatments particular to the Nemenhah Band….I didn’t find any so it would be impossible, even if I had the medical training, to assess the treatments and the veracity of claims of healing.

I guess the question that must be asked and answered is “where does religious freedom begin and end” and “at what point do the rights and beliefs of a parent become abusive and negligent”? I have a lot of problems with the government dictating medical treatments but I also have a lot of problems with parents refusing standard medical treatment for a minor in favor of unscientific treatments. As parents we are called upon to make decisions every day for those in our care and it is up to each of us to make the best life giving decisions possible.  Hope and belief does not, in my opinion, substitute for scientific, medical treatments when it is proven that the medical treatment has a track record of being effective for the particular illness.

I hope Daniel Hauser is found in time for medical intervention to save his young life.  Please remember not alternative therapies are created equal.

¹ SOURCE

² SOURCE

• I mean, let’s face it, we didn’t have slavery in this country for over 100 years because it was a bad thing. Quite the opposite: slavery built the South. I’m not saying we should bring it back; I’m just saying it had its merits. For one thing, the streets were safer after dark.

• Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it.

• They’re 12 percent of the population. Who the hell cares?

• I think the media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well.  They’re interested in black coaches and black quarterbacks doing well.  I think there’s a little hope invested in McNabb and he got a lot of credit for the performance of his team that he really didn’t deserve.

SOURCE

Did Sykes go over the line?  That’s for each person to decide….as for me, I just really don’t care.  Rush pretty much deserves whatever he gets.

Michael Steele is promising a drastic makeover of the Republican Party’s image — and he really means it!

“We want to convey that the modern-day GOP looks like the conservative party that stands on principles,” Steele told the Washington Times. “But we want to apply them to urban-suburban hip-hop settings.” ¹

Recently we have heard a lot about the “new face” of the Republican Party and a “party makeover” and yet when presented the perfect opportunity to make the rhetoric factual the Party passed on the opportunity.  When Sen. Arlen Specter defected to the Democratic Party, a move more to save his own re-election bid than a change in ideology, the Republicans chose not to put a new face on the Senate Judiciary Committee but instead chose none other than Sen. Jeff Sessions.  Who is Jeff Sessions?

Sessions entered national politics in the mid-’80s not as a politician but as a judicial nominee. Recommended by a fellow Republican from Alabama, then-Senator Jeremiah Denton, Sessions was Ronald Reagan’s choice for the U.S. District Court in Alabama in the early spring of 1986. Reagan had gotten cocky by then, as more than 200 of his uberconservative judicial appointees had been rolled out across the country without serious opposition (this was pre-Robert Bork). That is, until the 39-year-old Sessions came up for review. ²

When Sessions came up for review there were charges that he was “racially insensitive”, which was just a nice way of saying he is a racist.  The year prior to being nominated to the federal court, Sessions had unsuccessfully prosecuted three civil rights workers, the Marion Three, on a shaky case of voter fraud.  At the same time Sessions overlooked the same violations by whites and the Marion Three were acquitted in four hours.

Had that prosecution been the extent of his “insensitivity” we probably wouldn’t have heard anything more about it but it was just the tip of the iceberg.

Justice Department employee, J. Gerald Hebert, testified that Sessions had, in a conversation with him, labeled the NAACP and the ACLU as “un-American” and “communist inspired”.  Hebert went on to testify that Sessions claimed the two groups had “forced civil liberties down the throats of people.”  Sessions never denied making these statements and in fact justified that such groups actually could be construed as un-American.  Other incidents that pointed to a less than sterling attitude toward blacks included Sessions comment that a white civil rights lawyer was a “disgrace to his race” for litigating voting rights cases.  Sessions again did not deny the comment and further admitted that he called the Voting Rights Act of 1965 “intrusive”.  (Intrusive on what I wonder?  The rights of white people to oppress black people and other minorities?)

Not surprisingly, Sessions made other equally offensive comments:

• Sessions was heard by several colleagues commenting that  he “used to think they [the KKK] were ok” until he found out some of them were pot smokers.  Sessions claimed to be joking, not the first and only time he tried to sluff off his comments as jokes.
• U.S. Attorney in Alabama, Thomas Figures, testified that Sessions had called him “boy” and that after hearing him chastise a secretary Sessions warned him to “be careful what you say to white folks.”
• Figures echoed Hebert’s claims that Sessions called numerous civil rights organizations un-American including the National Council of Churches and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. ³

Bear in mind that Sessions never denied he made these comments but merely insisted he was joking.  At best Sessions showed an amazing degree of tactlessness and insensitivity and at worst demonstrated a decided bent toward racism.  In his own defense, Sessions insisted he could not be a racist because his children went to integrated schools and he had shared, on occasion, a hotel room with a black attorney….a defense which was quite typical and laughable.

Not only is Sessions not a new face he instead embodies the worst of everything wrong with the Republican Party.

I get the definite impression, in spite of what Michael Steele has said, that the Republican Party has no intention of attempting anything more than a facade of a makeover….the lipstick on a pig approach.

If you read Skyagunsta’s article The National Council for a New America, you discovered the “New America” and “new face” are represented by Jeb Bush, John McCain, and Mitt Romney.  Bobby Jindal also belongs to the group and is the only one even remotely new, but his ideology is decidedly the same old thing.  Did the party not learn anything from the disastrous administration of George W. Bush, which administration, in my opinion, was only marginally worse than his father’s, George H.W. Bush.  Why in the world would anyone in their right mind consider listening to yet another Bush?

It has been said that Sarah Palin is a new face for the Republicans and yet she represents the group that led the Republican Party down the garden path that landed them in the fix they are in now….the religious right.  Until the rightwing religious fundamentals are kicked out of the Republican Party’s bed we are not apt to see any significant change in the party.

I’ve come to the conclusion that the best we can expect from the Republican Party is a pretense of a makeover while it continues to embrace the same old ideology.  Quite frankly, that suits me just fine because the country has had enough of the “grand old party”.

¹Source

²Source

³Information and quotes from Closed Sessions