Chamblee54

The story below was found at the website of James Petras . HT to palestinianpundit. Pictures are from The Library of Congress. This is a repost.
The settlements were still being built, financed mostly by Jewish money from America, contributions from Wall Street speculators and owners of gambling dens.
“Good thing”, Joseph thought, “we have a few sheep and olive trees and Mary keeps some chickens. But Joseph worried, “cheese and olives are not enough to feed a growing boy. Mary is due to deliver our son any day”. His dreams foretold of a sturdy son working alongside of him…multiplying loaves and fish.
The settlers looked down on Joseph. He rarely attended shul, and on the high holidays, he would show up late to avoid the tithe. Their simple cottage was located in a nearby ravine with water from a stream, which flowed year round. It was choice real estate for any settlement expansion. So when Joseph fell behind on his property tax, the settlers took over their home, forcibly evicted Joseph and Mary and offered them a one-way bus ticket to Jerusalem.
Joseph, born and raised in the arid hills, fought back and bloodied not a few settlers with his labor-hardened fists. But in the end he sat, battered on their bridal bed under the olive tree, in black despair. Mary, much the younger, felt the baby’s movements. Her time was near.
“We have to find shelter, Joseph, we have to move on …this is no time for revenge”, she pleaded.
Joseph, who believed with the Old Testament prophets in an “eye for an eye”, reluctantly agreed.
So it was that Joseph sold their sheep, chickens and other belongings to an Arab neighbor and bought a donkey and cart. He loaded up the mattress, some clothes, cheese, olives and eggs and they set out for the Holy City.
The donkey path was rocky and full of potholes. Mary winced at every bump; she worried that it would harm the baby. Worse, this was the road for the Palestinians with military checkpoints everywhere. No one ever told Joseph that, as a Jew, he could have taken a smooth paved road – forbidden to the Arabs.
At the first roadblock Joseph saw a long line of Arabs waiting. Pointing to his very pregnant wife, Joseph asked the Palestinians, half in Arabic, half in Hebrew, if they could go ahead. A path was opened and the couple went forward.
A young soldier raised his rifle and told Mary and Joseph to get down from the cart. Joseph descended and nodded to his wife’s stomach. The soldier smirked and turned to his comrades, “The old Arab knocks up the girl he bought for a dozen sheep and now he wants a free pass”.
Joseph, red with anger, shouted in rough Hebrew, “I am a Jew. But unlike you … I respect pregnant women”.
The soldier poked Joseph with his rifle and ordered him to step back: “You are worse than an Arab – you’re an old Jew who screws Arab girls”.
Mary frightened by the exchange turned to her husband and cried, “Stop Joseph or he will shoot you and our baby will be born an orphan”.
With great difficulty Mary got down from the wagon. An officer came out of the guard station, summoning a female soldier, “Hey Judi, go feel under her dress, she might be carrying bombs”.
“What’s the matter? Don’t you like to feel them yourself anymore? ” Judith barked back in Brooklyn-accented Hebrew. While the soldiers argued, Mary leaned on Joseph for support. Finally, the soldiers came to an agreement.
“Pull-up your dress and slip”, Judith ordered. Mary blanched in shame. Joseph faced the gun in disgrace. The soldiers laughed and pointed at Mary’s swollen breasts, joking about an unborn terrorist with Arab hands and a Jewish brain.
Joseph and Mary continued on the way to the Holy City. They were frequently detained at the checkpoints along the way. Each time they suffered another delay, another indignity and more gratuitous insults spouted by Sephardim and Ashkenazi, male and female, secular and religious – all soldiers of the Chosen people.
It was dusk when Mary and Joseph finally reached the Wall. The gates had closed for the night. Mary cried out in pain, “Joseph, I can feel the baby coming soon. Please do something quickly”.
Joseph panicked. He saw the lights of a small village nearby and, leaving Mary on the cart, Joseph ran to the nearest house and pounded on the door. A Palestinian woman opened the door slightly and peered into the dark, agitated face of Joseph. “Who are you? What do you want?”
“I am Joseph, a carpenter from the hills of Hebron. My wife is about to give birth and I need shelter to protect Mary and the baby”. Pointing to Mary on the donkey cart, Joseph pleaded in his strange mixture of Hebrew and Arabic.
“Well, you speak like a Jew but you look like an Arab,” the Palestinian woman said laughing as she walked back with him to the cart.
Mary’s face was contorted with pain and fear: her contractions were more frequent and intense.
The woman ordered Joseph to bring the cart around to a stable where the sheep and chickens were kept. As soon as they entered, Mary cried out in pain and the Palestinian woman, who had now been joined by a neighbor midwife, swiftly helped the young mother down onto a bed of straw.
And thus the child was born, as Joseph watched in awe.
It came to pass that shepherds, returning from their fields, heard the mingled cries of birth and joy and hurried to the stable carrying both their rifles and fresh goat milk, not knowing whether it was friend or foe, Jew or Arab. When they entered the stable and beheld the mother and infant, they put aside their weapons and offered the milk to Mary who thanked them in both Hebrew and Arabic.
And the shepherds were amazed and wondered: Who were these strange people, a poor Jewish couple, who came in peace on a donkey cart inscribed with Arabic letters?
The news quickly spread about the strange birth of a Jewish child just outside the Wall in a Palestinian’s stable. Many neighbors entered and beheld Mary, the infant and Joseph.
Meanwhile, Israeli soldiers, equipped with night vision goggles, reported from their watchtowers overlooking the Palestinian neighborhood, “The Arabs are meeting just outside the Wall, in a stable, by candle light”.
The gates under the watchtowers flew open and armored carriers with bright lights followed by heavily armed solders drove out and surrounded the stable, the assembled villagers and the Palestinian woman’s house. A loud speaker blared, “Come out with your hands up or we’ll shoot.” They all came out from the stable together with Joseph, who stepped forward with his hands stretched out to the sky and spoke, “My wife, Mary cannot comply with your order. She is nursing the baby Jesus”

These visits to alternative reality are from a variety of sources. Included are Facebook (fb), twitter (tw), Futility Closet (fucl) , All Aphorisms, All The Time (Aph) , Texts From Last Night (tln) , and Overheard in New York (ony) . Attempts to maintain a no profanity blog will be suspended for this post. // The meeting of two personas is similar to the interaction between two natural elements; by chance, if there is any reaction both are transformed. (fb) // Girl to gay friend, after conversation about pretty girls in their grade: She’s not ugly, but her mustache is starting to piss me off. Loud woman on cell: I swear, his mustache just fell off! 10-year-old girl with fake mustache to brother: When you wear the mustache, the mustache possesses you. Girl walking her dog: So I call my brother this morning and tell him “I don’t know what happened last night, but I woke up with dice in my ass.” (ony) // G-d, please keep me clean and sober today. G-d please help me to remember that other people may be spiritually sick. Help me to remember that I may act the exact same way in their situation. Help me to be accepting of them. Please help me to not be judgmental, to remember we are all human. G-d, thank you for this day and the many opportunities that lie inherent within in it. Give me wisdom and strength to embrace these opportunities. Thank you for a life that is far better than what I imagined for myself. (fb) // On the 12th Day of Christmas my Facebook gave to me, 12 dudes I’m blocking, 11 friends just watching, 10 corny topics, 9 busted barbies, 8 friends complaining, 7 stalkers stalking, 6 party invites, Fiiiiiiiiiiiiive Drama Queeeensssss, 4 game requests, 3 photo tags, 2 friends-a-pokin & a creep who won’t stop inboxing meeee! (fb) // A loving heart is the truest wisdom. Charles Dickens Madeleine (fb) // Destiny is not a matter of chance; but a matter of choice. It is not a thing to be waited for, It is a thing to be achieved. William Jennings Bryan (fb) // I hate how women are spoken about in recent times. I just saw at least ten tweets with guys using the word “bitch”. It’s disgusting (tw) // First they were muslim. Then they were anti-religion. Now the Obamas are being trashed for liking Christmas too much. http://t.co/4K3Qugue (tw) // Newt decrying meanness and harshness in politics . . . I mean honestly (tw) // Are the GOP candidates running for president of the United States or prime minister of Israel? (tw) // “Generally speaking anybody is more interesting doing nothing than doing anything.” — Gertrude Stein (fucl) // “Teaching science without evolution is like teaching sentence structure without the alphabet,” // A tour bus driver drives with a bus full of seniors down a highway, when a little old lady taps him on his shoulder. She offers him a handful of almonds, which he gratefully munches up. After approximately 15 minutes, she taps him on his shoulder again and she hands him another handful of almonds. She repeats this gesture about eight times. He finally asks her why they do not eat almonds themselves. Whereupon she replies that it is not possible because of their old teeth. They are not able to chew them. “Why do you buy them then?” he asks puzzled. The old lady answers: “We just love the chocolate around them.” (fb) // you went over to those random dudes and told them you were an ordained minister and would like to bless their food. they laughed and agreed, then you said “now bow your heads in prayer” as soon as they did you grabbed a taco off their tray and bolted out the door. (tln) // Boy did I ever crash and burn on the pickled egg pick up line. (tln) // @bennycdoze The incident happened somewhere in Maryland. She is human, that’s the police force we’ve got. She died in custody (tw) // @tejucole I have been robbed at gunpoint and attacked another time. i suggest you talk about it. If you don’t, it sticks in your head. (tw) // RT @tejucole: Children in Osogbo were spared the horrors of education thanks to unknown do-gooders who burned a few thousand schoolbooks. (tw) // True words from @kanyewest- “I’m on the pursuit of awesomeness. Excellence is the bare minimum” Watch at http://jol.ly/0rsG #voyrlife #ad (tw) // Even when you think you have your life all mapped out, things happen that shape your destiny in ways you might never have imagined… (fb) // Your life is such a sacred journey. And it’s also about change… Continuously expanding your vision of what is possible, stretching your soul, learning to see clearly and deeply, listening to your intuition, taking courageous challenges at every step along the way. You are on the path, of exactly where you are meant to be right now… And from here on in, you can only go forward, shaping your life story into a magnificent tale of triumph, of healing, of beauty, of wisdom, of power and of love ~ (fb) // give a man a gun and he can rob a bank. give a man a bank and he can rob the world. (fb) // “DREAMS” get you into the future and add excitement to the present. So dream away, and dream often, and dream big. and never let anyone talk you out of your dreams. Dreams are the Holding Place of God. The bigger the dream the more of God you let in. (fb) // Remember when teachers, public employees, Planned Parenthood, NPR and PBS crashed the stock market, wiped out half of our 401ks, took trillions in taxpayer funded bail outs, spilled oil in the Gulf of Mexico, gave themselves billions in bonuses, and paid not taxes? Yea, me neither… (fb) //Chase said Ashley’s got to be better at praying than photography. Here here. #alistdallas (tw) // #AlistDallas…absolutely disgusting seeing ann coulter spew her ignorance & taylor laps it up. #VaginalVespa (tw) // no idea what that means, maybe becaues both are useless to me #vaginalVespa (tw) //It takes 42 muscles to frown and only four to extend my middle finger and tell you to bite me. (fb) // I hate two faced people. It’s hard to decide which face to slap first. (fb) // What the hell? I went outside there was a couch on my new neighbors lawn close to the house like it was airing out. I guess they left to get another load. I went back in the, then ten minutes later went back out to take out the trash and the couch was gone. They are not back home yet. If they were not getting rid of the couch, and I doubt it since it wasn’t on the curb but next to the porch,…ooops, and… Welcome to the hood! (fb) // He might have if you were a little more subtle about your feelings instead of telling everyone multiple times how much you wanted his dick (tln) // And I think short bridesmaids dresses are the best idea especially for bathroom sex (tln) // I made her a sippy cup with eggnog and whiskey. My meditation app told me to go the extra mile for someone today, so I did. (tln) // …oh my god that’s like anal suicide … I’m aware. I’m writing the eulogy for my colon as we speak. (tln) // Bombed my 8 a.m. exam and the liquor store doesn’t open till noon. Drinking unfinished beers from last night till they open. (tln) // I haven’t found him passed out in the living room covered in noodles for a while now so I guess he’s getting better with the drinking. (tln) // Guy to friend: You can’t expect to get away with killing someone when everyone knows who you’s is. Guy: Remember when we found that dead body? Boyfriend, to girlfriend: Look, the train is coming. You better stop or I’m gonna murder-suicide yo’ ass. Teenage preppy catholic schoolgirl on pink bedazzled iPhone: Oh, please, like I’m gonna wait for that bitch to roll over and die and hope she wills it to me. I want her Prada, and I want it now. I’m a New Yorker–I know how to get what I want! (ony) // Did yall hear about the girl who got Drake name tatted on her forehead? Its big as hell, it covers her whole forehead. (tw) // “Will you try to keep bribes down if you are elected President” (tw) // @ChrisRBarron GOP political consultant, homocon, fitness junkie, GOProud Board Chair, Firebird owner, married, like all things Pittsburgh related, I annoy the left. (tw) // Unlike some political whores my soul isn’t for sale. I value basic decency over a paycheck. I will never apologize for that. (tw) //I wasn’t concerned until I realized he was using the vase my birthday flowers came in as a ” big glass” for his 151 and coke. (tln) // Saw a license plate frame that said “only the best moms get promoted to grandma.” That’s not entirely true; some have slutty daughters and they get promoted anyway. (fb) // Teenage Girl: “Mom, Is it true that babies come out of where boys put their dicks in?” Mom: “Yes. dear, that’s true.” Teenage Girl: “But won’t that break my jaw?” (fb) //@michaelberliner Wicked – I will try to find my old school portrait now, quality might not be perfect: taken with blackberry camera. B nice! (tw) // @TheRealGriff Me too. The bag was a lot smaller in size than they said as well. (tw) // hello all im back sorry i was off for so long just needed some time away from the twitter but in back nothing much has changed in the life!! (tw) // “A man ought to read just as inclination leads him; for what he reads as a task will do him little good.” — Samuel Johnson (fucl) // “Knowledge which is acquired under compulsion obtains no hold on the mind.” — Plato (fucl) // “Oh! it is absurd to have a hard and fast rule about what one should read and what one shouldn’t. More than half of modern culture depends on what one shouldn’t read.” — Oscar Wilde (fucl) // @KLSoltis Bloggers: I look forward to the first use of “How The Gingrich Stole Christmas” as the title of a post/article about Newt’s ascent. (tw) // Your olive oil is lying to you (tw) // for some reason old white men still feel comfortable being racist on da ol radio. #nealboortz u r no @talkmaster but u could b a CUMDUMPSTER (tw) // Im bored, which I had someone to chat on the phone with & laugh & just chat about shit (tw) // @BjCosbyJackson I have a grown man phone, you have a phone that wants to be grown but isnt. I just texted you, did you get a new number? (tw) // Mother to her daughter: Melanie, you want a punch in your face? Daughter: Not again! (ony) // Crackhead female: You wanna know how I know it’s Friday? Crackhead male: How? Crackhead female: Cause I get ma foostamps on Thursdays. (ony) // Teenage girl: I’ve been arrested eight times this year, but I didn’t nothing wrong. Guy on cell: But how is she on parole again? Every time she gets out on parole she does another felony. I don’t understand it. Man on public pay phone: No, they own my ass for the next two years. That’s what parole means! Thug on cell: I pleaded not guilty to postpone the trial… (ony) // Selah

Chamblee54 has an archive with roughly 1900 posts. When the well of inspiration runs dry, the archive is a good place to find text, to go between the pictures. ( Pictures today are from chamblee54). There was an overtitled effort called When Dogs Fly and You Clean Up, which featured a list of puzzling questions. In an effort to waste more bandwidth than before, we are reprinting the unedited list of questions, plus a few from the comments. 01 Can you cry under water? 02 How important does a person have to be before they are considered assassinated instead of just murdered 03 Why do you have to ‘put your two cents in’… but it’s only a ‘penny for your thoughts’? Where’s that extra penny going to? 04 Once you’re in heaven, do you get stuck wearing the clothes you were buried in for eternity? 05 Why does a round pizza come in a square box? 06 What disease did cured ham actually have? 07 How is it that we put man on the moon before we figured out it would be a good idea to put wheels on luggage? 08 Why is it that people say they ‘slept like a baby’ when babies wake up like every two hours? 09 If a deaf person has to go to court, is it still called a hearing? 10 Why are you IN a movie, but you’re ON TV? 11 Why do people pay to go up tall buildings and then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground? 12 Why do doctors leave the room while you change? They’re going to see you naked anyway. 13 Why is ‘bra’ singular and ‘panties’ plural? 14 Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible crisp, which no decent human being would eat? 14 If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares, why is there a stupid song about him? 15 If the professor on Gilligan’s Island can make a radio out of a coconut, why can’t he fix a hole in a boat? 16 Why does Goofy stand erect while Pluto remains on al l fours? They’re both dogs! 17 If Wile E. Coyote had enough money to buy all that ACME cag, why didn’t he just buy something to eat? 18 If corn oil is made from corn, and vegetable oil is made from vegetables, what is baby oil made from? 19 Why do the Alphabet song and “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” have the same tune? 20 Why did you just try singing the two songs above? 21 Did you ever notice that when you blow in a dog’s face, he gets mad at you, but when you take him for a car ride, he sticks his head out the window? 22 Why do we press harder on a remote control when we know the batteries are getting dead? 23 Why do banks charge a fee on ‘insufficient funds’ when they already know there is not enough money? 24 Why does someone believe you when you say there are four billion stars, but check when you say the paint is wet? 25 Why do they use sterilized needles for death by lethal injection? 26 Why doesn’t Tarzan have a beard? 27 Why does Superman stop bullets with his chest, but ducks when you throw a revolver at him? 28 Why do Kamikaze pilots wear helmets? 29 Whose idea was it to put an ‘S’ in the word ‘lisp’? 30 If people evolved from apes, why are there still apes? 31 Why is it that no matter what color bubble bath you use the bubbles are always white? 32 Is there ever a day that mattresses are not on sale? 33 Why do people constantly return to the refrigerator with hopes that something new to eat will have materialized? 34 Why do people keep running over a string a dozen times with their vacuum cleaner, then reach down, pick it up, examine it, then put it down to give the vacuum one more chance? 35 Why is it that no plastic bag will open from the end on your first try? 36 How do those dead bugs get into those enclosed light fixtures? 37 When we are in the supermarket and someone rams our ankle with a shopping cart then apologizes for doing so, why do we say, ‘It’s all right?’ Well, it isn’t allright,so why don’t we say, ‘That really hurt, why don’t you watch where you’re going? 38 Why is it that whenever you attempt to catch something that’s falling off the table you always manage to knock something else over? 39 In winter why do we try to keep the house as warm as it was in summer when we complained about the heat? 40 How come you never hear father-in-law jokes? 41 Why do they call them aPARTments when they are so close together? 42 Why do we park in the driveway and drive on parkways? 43 Is there another word for thesaurus? 44 What’s the difference between normal ketchup and fancy ketchup? 45 Did Noah have woodpeckers on the ark? If he did, where did he keep them? 46 Why do superheros wear their underwear on the outside of their clothes? 47 Why are there ironing instructions on a pair of boxers? Does anyone really do that?  48 With GPS devices eliminating the need to ask for directions, what will female comedians make jokes about ?

1. Cons is not the opposite of poems.
2. Poetry slams can get violent.
3. Prose is not expected to rhyme.
4. Pornography is always prose.
5. Prose does not get set to music. .
6. Knee jerk is better than hip hop.
7. Prose writer pants stay up better.
8. Prose makes more money than poetry.
9. Free verse always winds up costing something.
10. If you are depressed you cannot take poetryzac.
11. Pictures are from The Library of Congress.

SFFILK (Not his real name) passes along a story about Mel Torme. It seems like Mr.Torme was eating a leisurely breakfast at a food court in Los Angeles, and a quartet appeared singing Christmas songs. They wound up performing “The Christmas Song” for co- author Torme…and the singers had no idea who he was. It is a good story, better told in the link.
According to the inerrant Wikipedia, Torme colloaborated with Robert Wells , until they had a falling out. One afternoon, on the hottest day of July in 1945, Mr.Torme went to visit Mr.Wells, and saw the first four lines of “The Christmas Song” (including “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire, Jack Frost nipping at your nose”). The lines were on a note pad, and the two agreed to beat the heat of summer by completing the song. Supposedly, Mr. Torme did not like the song very much. After three divorces, he probably didn’t see many of the royalties.
Mel Torme was the music director of the ill fated “Judy Garland Show” in the early sixties. He wrote a book about it… The Other Side of the Rainbow: With Judy Garland on the Dawn Patrol . The story is that Miss Garland would get blasted, call Mr. Torme in the middle of the night, and pour out her troubles. While the show did not last longer, there are some great youtube clips left over.
This is a repost.

A facebook friend put these fruitcake facts on the internet. PG saw a chance for some snappy text to put between some pictures. He would be nutty as a fruitcake to turn down a chance like this.
Fruitcakes were buried with the dead in Ancient Egypt. It’s true. Ancient Egyptians used to fill the tombs of the dead with all the supplies that they would need to enjoy the afterlife, including food and water. Fruitcake was often put into the tomb of a deceased person because a fruitcake soaked in a natural preservative like alcohol or fruit juice would last a long time. It was thought that the preserved fruitcake would not spoil on the journey to the afterlife. Fruitcake was a staple food of other ancient Middle Eastern, Southeast Asian and Mediterranean cultures as well
Candied fruits are used in fruitcake because using sugar was the only way to preserve the fruit long enough to get it back to Europe from the Middle East. When the Crusaders began carrying exotic fruits back to their European home the fresh fruit would spoil long before they were able to get it home. Ingenious traders began drying the fruits by candying them with sugar which made them an even more delicious treat and preserved them indefinitely. Once the candied fruits were sent to Europe and to other parts of the world they were baked into cakes so that they could be shared with family and friends on special occasions.
Fruitcakes will last for years without spoiling. It’s true. A fruitcake that is properly preserved with an alcohol soaked cheesecloth that is then wrapped in plastic wrap or foil can be kept unrefrigerated for years without spoiling. In the past, before refrigerators came along, families would make fruitcake for holidays and special occasions months in advance of the actual event and then let the covered fruitcakes sit wrapped in an alcohol soaked cloth until the event happened. As long as the cloth was remoistened with alcohol occasionally the cakes not only didn’t spoil, they actually tasted richer and sweeter because they had been soaking in brandy and rum for a couple of months.
To millions of fruitcake consumers, the town of Claxton GA is very special. This south Georgia town, just down the road from Reidsville, is home to Claxton Fruit Cake . This year, a new product is available, Chocolate Covered Claxton Fruit Cake Nuggets.
The story of the Claxton Fruit Cake company is a sweet one. Savino Tos founded the Claxton Bakery in 1910. He hired Albert Parker in 1927, and sold him the business in 1945. Mr. Parker decided to sell Fruit Cake to America. The rest is history.
No story about fruitcake is complete without mentioning the “Fruitcake Lady”. Marie Rudisill , an aunt of Truman Capote, wrote a book of fruitcake recipes. She became a tv celebrity, before going to the bakery in the sky November 3, 2006.
The urban dictionary has nine listings for fruit cake. The ones for homosexuals and crazy people are there. UD gets creative with this selection: “The act of releasing green chunky diarrhea onto your partners face then, ejaculating on it, then punching him/her in the nose causing the colors to mix together to form a fruit cake like color.”
If you tire of jokes about fruitcake, you can go to The society for the protection and preservation of fruitcake . (If you click on the “new URL”, you will be invited to join in the green card lottery.) There is a link on the society page that enables you to buy Fruitcake Mints. “Keep your breath fruitcake fresh with these festive mints! Turns out, the baked good actually tastes decent in mint form.”
Pictures for this entertainment are from ” The Special Collections and Archives,Georgia State University Library”

A conventional army loses if it does not win. The guerrilla wins if it does not lose. -Henry Kissinger
All wars are popular for the first 30 days. -Arthur Schlesinger
Do not let us speak of darker days; let us speak rather of sterner days. These are not dark days: these are great days – the greatest days our country has ever lived. -Winston Churchill
Good things, when short, are twice as good. -Baltasar Gracian
I have never understood disliking for war. It panders to instincts already catered for within the scope of any respectable domestic establishment. -Alan Bennett
If a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. – Bible
In time of war the devil makes more room in hell. – German proverb
In war the will is directed at an animate object that reacts. – Karl von Clausewitz
Let us not be deceived – we are today in the midst of a cold war. – Bernard Baruch
Morality is contraband in war. – Mahatma Gandhi
Television brought the brutality of war into the comfort of the living room. Vietnam was lost in the living rooms of U.S.A. – not on the battlefields of Vietnam. – Marshall McLuhan
The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it. – George Orwell
There never was a good war or a bad peace. – Benjamin Franklin
They will conquer, but they will not convince. – Miguel de Unamuno
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he today that sheds his blood with me;
Shall be my brother. – William Shakespeare
Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee Agreed to have a battle;
For Tweedle Dum said Tweedle Dee Had spoiled his nice new rattle. – Lewis Carroll
When the rich wage war, it’s the poor who die. – Jean-Paul Sartre
We only win at war because we fight another government.
If we fought private industry we would not last until noontime. – R. I. Fitzhenry
War is much too important a matter to be left to the generals. – Georges Clemenceau
War is mainly a catalog of blunders. – Winston Churchill
War is a series of catastrophes which result in victory. – Georges Clemenceau
Either war is obsolete, or men are. – Buckminster Fuller
War appeals to young men because it is fundamentally auto-eroticism. – Northrop Frye
A war regarded as inevitable or even probable, and therefore much prepared for, has a very good chance of eventually being fought. – Anais Nin
War is the unfolding of miscalculations.- Barbara Tuchman
Know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles. – Sun Tzu
What the hell difference does it make, left or right?
There were good men lost on both sides. – Brendan Behan
The supreme excellence is not to win a hundred victories in a hundred battles. The supreme excellence is to subdue the armies of your enemies without even having to fight them. – Sun Tzu
Frankly I’d like to see the government get out of war altogether
and leave the whole field to private industry. – Joseph Heller
War is the national industry of Prussia. – Mirabeau
Sweet is war to those who have never experienced it. – Latin proverb
The possibility of war increases in direct proportion
to the effectiveness of the instruments of war. – Norman Cousins
I don’t know what effect these men will have on the enemy, but by God, they frighten me. –
Duke of Wellington
Boys are the cash of war. Whoever said: we’re not free spenders- doesn’t know our like. – John Ciardi
In time of war the first casualty is truth. – Boake Carter
World War II was the last government program that really worked. – George Will
It’s one of the most serious things that can possibly happen to one in a battle –
to get one’s head cut off. – Lewis Carroll
The world will never have lasting peace so long as men reserve for war the finest human qualities. –
John Foster Dulles
War would end if the dead could return. – Stanley Baldwin
Sometime they’ll give a war and nobody will come. – Carl Sandburg
A man who experiences no genuine satisfaction in life does not want peace. People court war to escape meaninglessness and boredom, to be relieved of fear and frustration. – Nels F. S. Ferre
The object of war is to survive it. – John Irving
So far war has been the only force that can discipline a whole community, and until an equivalent discipline is organized, I believe that war must have its way. – William James

Men love war because it allows them to look serious;
because it is the only thing that stops women laughing at them. – John Fowles
War hath no fury like a non-combatant. – E. C. Montague
Most sorts of diversion in men, children and other animals, are in imitation of fighting.
Jonathan Swift
Nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won. – Duke of Wellington
Human war has been the most successful of all our cultural traditions. – Robert Ardrey
War is the trade of kings. – John Dryden
The whole art of war consists of guessing at what is on the other side of the hill. – Duke of Wellington
It is well that war is so terrible – we would grow too fond of it. – Robert E. Lee
Men grow tired of sleep, love, singing and dancing sooner than of war. – Homer
Vice stirs up war; virtue fights. – Vauvenargues
In peace, sons bury their fathers; in war, fathers bury their sons. – Herodotus
War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today. – John F. Kennedy
The weak against the strong, Is always in the wrong. – Ivan Krylov
Something must be left to chance; nothing is sure in a sea fight beyond all others. – Horatio Nelson
War is like love, it always finds a way. – Bertolt Brecht
The guerilla must live amongst the people as the fish lives in the water. – Mao Tse-Tung
It simply is not true that war never settles anything. – Felix Frankfurter
War does not determine who is right – only who is left. – Anonymous
There are no atheists in the foxholes. – William Thomas Cummings
There is many a boy here today who looks on war as all glory, but boys, it is all hell. –
William T. Sherman
There will be no veterans of World War III. – Walter Mondale
War is the science of destruction. – John S. C. Abbott
The inevitableness, the idealism, and the blessing of war, as an indispensable and stimulating law of development, must be repeatedly emphasized. – Anonymous
Great Britain was going to make war on a kindred nation who desired nothing better than to be friends with her. – Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg
Better pointed bullets than pointed speeches. – Otto von Bismarck
War never leaves, where it found a nation. – Edmund Burke
Veni, vidi, vici. (I came, I saw, I conquered.) – Julius Caesar
(The great questions of the day) are not decided by speeches and majority votes,
but by blood and iron. – Otto von Bismarck
What millions died – that Caesar might be great! – Thomas Campbell
War, he sung, is toil and trouble; Honour but an empty bubble. – John Dryden
By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Their flag to April’s breeze unfurl’d; Here once the embattl’d farmers stood, And fired the shot heard round the world. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
There never was a good war or a bad peace. – Benjamin Franklin
Hang yourself, brave Crillon. We fought at Arques, and you were not there. – Henry IV
It is not right to exult over slain men. – Homer
War is as much a punishment to the punisher as to the sufferer. -Thomas Jefferson
Modern warfare is an intricate business about which no one knows everything
and few know very much. – Frank Knox
0 G-d assist our side: at least, avoid assisting the enemy and leave the rest to me. – Prince Leopold
The ballot is stronger than the bullet. – Abraham Lincoln
War is the greatest plague that can afflict humanity; it destroys religion, it destroys states, it destroys families. Any scourge is preferable to it. – Martin Luther
When after many battles past, Both tir’d with blows, make peace at last, What is it, after all, the people get? Why! taxes, widows, wooden legs, and debt. – Francis Moore
G-d how the dead men Grin by the wall, Watching the fun Of the Victory Ball. – Alfred Noyes
O war! thou son of Hell! – William Shakespeare
A bad peace is even worse than war. – Tacitus
As long as war is regarded as wicked, it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular. – Oscar Wilde
Pictures are from The Library of Congress . These images are from the Crimean War. This was the first war to be photographed. It was also a useless endeavor, the cause of which was forgotten before the dead were buried. It is the war that gave us the Charge of the Light Brigade, with it’s maxim, Ours is not to wonder why , ours is but to do or die.
Quotes were compiled by Famous Quotes and Authors. War is courtesy of crooked politicians.

PG was minding his own business, when he saw that it was time for Chris Wallace on the Mike Gallagher show. Every friday morning, Mr. Wallace is on Mr. Gallagher’s show to promote Fox News Sunday. The two are like fifth graders trading insults on the playground. It is great radio.
While waiting for the entertainment to begin, Mr. Gallagher was mouthing off about Tim Tebow.(Spell check suggestion:elbow) The former Gator is coming under fire for making a spectacle of praying, after he makes a touchdown. Mr. Gallagher said that if Mr. Tebow was a muslim, and bowed to Mecca after a touchdown, then all hell would break loose.
It was mentioned that there was an open line for comments. PG wrote the number down, and on his second try got through. For talk radio, to get through on the second try is rare. (Blogging is talk radio without the busy signal.)
There is a quote from Jesus about not making a spectacle of prayer. Jesus worshipers are well known for selective practice … the parts of the Bible they like are the inerrant word of G-d, the parts they don’t like they ignore. Apparently, for Jesus to say “Pray in private” does not apply to a man who throws footballs.
After the segment with Mr. Wallace, a screener came on the phone. He asked what you were going to be saying. Keep the radio down, and don’t say good morning.
What follows is the exchange. PG is not a fast enough typist to catch everything said, so some of this is going to be paraphrased. The last three lines are close to verbatim.
Many people have had a bad experience with Jesus. to see a quarterback exhibition praying is obnoxious. it does not speak well for Jesus.
how is it? how is it bad to see a man praying to Jesus?
I have had a bad experience with Jesus. I see Jesus in the words and deeds of his believers.
how you would describe your beliefs? are you an atheist?
as they say on facebook, it’s complicated.
I’ll pray for you Luther.
Pictures today are from The Library of Congress

PG came in, turned on the computer, and saw that the internet was down. This was not unusual, because the router liked attention, and every few days needed to be booted. The problem came when the modem refused to turn on. New cables, reset, turn off for ten minutes, reset, pull a few hairs out, reset… nothing seemed to work. After four years, and one year in tandem with a cranky router, maybe it was time for a change.
The computer store does not sell modems. Considering that they were the ones who sold the router, this was not the tragedy it might seem. The man who answered the phone said he got a good modem at walmart.(spell check suggestion:wallchart)
The first store PG went to is a garish facility by the old GM plant. It has the same initials as a bovine product that is synonymous with lies. PG found a display of routers, and a router-modem combination with the Cisco name. The sales man took PG over to the comcast display, and talked to the man there. Yes, comcast can sell you a modem, but you will have to switch over to comcast service. “It’s faster” the man said. PG tried to remember the last nice thing he had heard about comcast, as he walked out.
The second store was in a strip mall, and had the same initials as basketball. A tall man with dreadlocks showed PG a modem. It looked good, until PG looked closer, and saw that it said cable modem. PG has a phone line dsl.
On the way, there was a retail store maintained by the ISP that is used by PG. The company has the same name as a character on the Addams Family. You go in, and talk to a lady at a desk, You give her a name, and wait for a salesman to come out and help you. As it turned out, this man had a little box that would provide both modem and router functions. Better yet, he had one is stock. PG was one step closer to solving the problem.
No computer issue is complete without talking to an english challenged tech rep on the phone. He said m as in mother, and about the twelth time PG understood him. It was something about a security question, and the answer was a total mystery. The good news, after a few minutes of plugging passwords into perfect ports, the new box was working. It even helped get this post up. Pictures are from The Library of Congress.

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. I also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2010, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great. Not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country nor the only America in the Western Hemisphere . Also, this wish is made without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wish. This holiday wish does not represent the views of and is not endorsed by this website, webmaster or any affiliated subsidiaries thereof.
The information transmitted is intended solely for the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged material. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of or taking action in reliance upon this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. If you have received this email in error please contact the sender and delete the material from any computer. E-Mail is not a secure medium and should not be used to communicate confidential or personal information.
This greeting is borrowed from joemyg-d , who received it from “Scott”. This is a repost .

PG received this story as an email today. He does not believe the story, nor does he agree with the message illustrated by this story. Hopefully, this post will reach the ten people requested by the sender. If the reader enjoys the story, and feels better after reading it, then PG is glad. If you don’t agree with this story, and feel worse after reading it, then PG offers his apology. This is a story with a message about Jesus at the end, so you probably know already how this story will resonate with you. It is all right to skip over the story, and enjoy the pictures.
The pictures are from The Library of Congress . These are Union soldiers, from the War Between The States. These pictures meant as much to families, as the picture in this story. They even mean as much as the picture of a Vietnamese soldier, who was killed by the son.
A wealthy man and his son loved to collect rare works of art. They had everything in their collection, from Picasso to Raphael. They would often sit together and admire the great works of art.When the Vietnam conflict broke out, the son went to war. He was very courageous and died in battle while rescuing another soldier. The father was notified and grieved deeply for his only son.
About a month later, just before Christmas,There was a knock at the door. A young man stood at the door with a large package in his hands. He said, ‘Sir, you don’t know me, but I am the soldier for whom your son gave his life. He saved many lives that day, and he was carrying me to safety when a bullet struck him in the heart and he died instantly… He often talked about you, and your love for art.’ The young man held out this package. ‘I know this isn’t much. I’m not really a great artist, but I think your son would have wanted you to have this.’
The father opened the package. It was a portrait of his son, painted by the young man. He stared in awe at the way the soldier had captured the personality of his son in the painting. The father was so drawn to the eyes that his own eyes welled up with tears. He thanked the young man and offered to pay him for the picture.. ‘Oh, no sir, I could never repay what your son did for me. It’s a gift.’
The father hung the portrait over his mantle. Every time visitors came to his home he took them to see the portrait of his son before he showed them any of the other great works he had collected.
The man died a few months later. There was to be a great auction of his paintings. Many influential people gathered, excited over seeing the great paintings and having an opportunity to purchase one for their collection. On the platform sat the painting of the son. The auctioneer pounded his gavel. ‘We will start the bidding with this picture of the son. Who will bid for this picture?’There was silence…
Then a voice in the back of the room shouted, ‘We want to see the famous paintings. Skip this one.’ But the auctioneer persisted. ‘Will somebody bid for this painting? Who will start the bidding? $100, $200?’ Another voice angrily. ‘We didn’t come to see this painting. We came to see the Van Gogh’s, the Rembrandts. Get on with the Real bids!’ But still the auctioneer continued. ‘The son! The son! Who’ll take the son?’
Finally, a voice came from the very back of the room. It was the longtime gardener of the man and his son. ‘I’ll give $10 for the painting…’ Being a poor man, it was all he could afford.’We have $10, who will bid $20?’ ‘Give it to him for $10. Let’s see the masters.’The crowd was becoming angry. They didn’t want the picture of the son. They wanted the more worthy investments for their collections. The auctioneer pounded the gavel.. ‘Going once, twice, SOLD for $10!’ A man sitting on the second row shouted, ‘Now let’s get on with the collection!’
The auctioneer laid down his gavel. ‘I’m sorry, the auction is over.’ ‘What about the paintings?’ ‘I am sorry. When I was called to conduct this auction, I was told of a secret stipulation in the will… I was not allowed to reveal that stipulation until this time. Only the painting of the son would be auctioned. Whoever bought that painting would inherit the entire estate, including the paintings. The man who took the son gets everything!
God gave His son over 2,000 years ago to die on the Cross. Much like the auctioneer, His message today is: ‘The Son, the Son, who’ll take the Son?’ Because, you see, whoever takes the Son gets everything! FOR GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD HE GAVE HIS ONLY BEGOTTEN SON, WHO SO EVER BELIEVETH, SHALL HAVE ETERNAL LIFE…THAT’S LOVE
Please send this to ten people and back to the one who sent it to you. God Bless. If I don’t get this back, I will know you really didn’t read it. I got this from someone and thought the last part was really a good thought.. Too bad that the person who sent it to me did not know 10 people who would admit to knowing the Lord.

This is a double repost of internet entertainment from two years ago . This year’s gabfest on climate change is in Durban, South Africa. ( Democracy Now is broadcasting there all week.)
The progress in addressing the issue of carbon pollution is slight. Approval of the oil sands pipeline has been delayed. Some people are aware of the issue. The bad news is that the deniers have a wide audience. Some say the tipping points are already falling over, and it may be too late to make the changes, even if there were the political will to do so.
PG sat in on a discussion last night. Someone asked, “who doesn’t want to make the world a better place?” PG sensed that people were tired of his cynicism, and held his tongue. The answer he would have given is, the people who make money off the world becoming a worse place.
Representatives from nations around the world are meeting this week in Copenhagen to discuss global warming. There is reason to believe that whatever comes out of this meeting will be a compromise, and will not have any effect on the problem.
Some do not think there is a problem. The science ( which PG does not claim to understand) involves millions of factors. One of the indications of the “climategate” controversy is the vast amount of data involved, and the difficulties of processing this information.
When you believe that there is no problem, and that global warming is a scam designed to weaken capitalist countries, you believe what you want to believe.
TomDispatch posted a feature today from the pessimist side. A money quote “The best human analog to the role physics is playing here may be fascism in the middle of the last century. There was no appeasing it, no making a normal political issue out of it. You had to decide to go all in, to transform the industrial base of the country to fight it, to put other things on hold, to demand sacrifice.”
Seventy years ago, Japan attacked the United States. It was a before and after moment, and America was committed, overnight, to the struggle against Japan and Germany. We did win, at an appalling cost. ( Included in this cost were hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties, and Communist domination of East Europe.)
Even if…a big if…we were to make this sort of commitment to fight global warming, there will be a cost. The energy happy lifestyle so cherished by the west may be a thing of the past. It is easier to make jokes on talk radio.

Dictionary says pro is the opposite of con.
Will Rogers said the opposite of progress is congress.
Is the opposite of a protest, a contest?
Is the opposite of a profession, a confession?
Is it profound that this would confound?
It is a profusion of confusion.