Blue Velvet

Blue Velvet
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Fortuna

Fortuna
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Hassan's Flowers

September Flowers
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Hassan's flower stand is a reliable source of beauty. Simply walking by brings me joy.

Seis Sueños

Cat Friday

You Talkin' To Me?
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Mood Indigo

Mood Indigo
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Cinco Sueños

Cinco Sueños
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Who Will Be the Last To Die For a Failed Policy?

After Pat’s Birthday

By Kevin Tillman

Editor’s note: Kevin Tillman joined the Army with his brother Pat in 2002, and they served together in Iraq and Afghanistan. Pat was killed in Afghanistan on April 22, 2004. Kevin, who was discharged in 2005, has written a powerful, must-read document.



It is Pat’s birthday on November 6, and elections are the day after. It gets me thinking about a conversation I had with Pat before we joined the military. He spoke about the risks with signing the papers. How once we committed, we were at the mercy of the American leadership and the American people. How we could be thrown in a direction not of our volition. How fighting as a soldier would leave us without a voice… until we got out.

Much has happened since we handed over our voice:

Somehow we were sent to invade a nation because it was a direct threat to the American people, or to the world, or harbored terrorists, or was involved in the September 11 attacks, or received weapons-grade uranium from Niger, or had mobile weapons labs, or WMD, or had a need to be liberated, or we needed to establish a democracy, or stop an insurgency, or stop a civil war we created that can’t be called a civil war even though it is. Something like that.

Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.

Somehow our elected leaders were subverting international law and humanity by setting up secret prisons around the world, secretly kidnapping people, secretly holding them indefinitely, secretly not charging them with anything, secretly torturing them. Somehow that overt policy of torture became the fault of a few “bad apples” in the military.

Somehow back at home, support for the soldiers meant having a five-year-old kindergartener scribble a picture with crayons and send it overseas, or slapping stickers on cars, or lobbying Congress for an extra pad in a helmet. It’s interesting that a soldier on his third or fourth tour should care about a drawing from a five-year-old; or a faded sticker on a car as his friends die around him; or an extra pad in a helmet, as if it will protect him when an IED throws his vehicle 50 feet into the air as his body comes apart and his skin melts to the seat.

Somehow the more soldiers that die, the more legitimate the illegal invasion becomes.

Somehow American leadership, whose only credit is lying to its people and illegally invading a nation, has been allowed to steal the courage, virtue and honor of its soldiers on the ground.

Somehow those afraid to fight an illegal invasion decades ago are allowed to send soldiers to die for an illegal invasion they started.

Somehow faking character, virtue and strength is tolerated.

Somehow profiting from tragedy and horror is tolerated.

Somehow the death of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people is tolerated.

Somehow subversion of the Bill of Rights and The Constitution is tolerated.

Somehow suspension of Habeas Corpus is supposed to keep this country safe.

Somehow torture is tolerated.

Somehow lying is tolerated.

Somehow reason is being discarded for faith, dogma, and nonsense.

Somehow American leadership managed to create a more dangerous world.

Somehow a narrative is more important than reality.

Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.

Somehow the most reasonable, trusted and respected country in the world has become one of the most irrational, belligerent, feared, and distrusted countries in the world.

Somehow being politically informed, diligent, and skeptical has been replaced by apathy through active ignorance.

Somehow the same incompetent, narcissistic, virtueless, vacuous, malicious criminals are still in charge of this country.

Somehow this is tolerated.

Somehow nobody is accountable for this.

In a democracy, the policy of the leaders is the policy of the people. So don’t be shocked when our grandkids bury much of this generation as traitors to the nation, to the world and to humanity. Most likely, they will come to know that “somehow” was nurtured by fear, insecurity and indifference, leaving the country vulnerable to unchecked, unchallenged parasites.

Luckily this country is still a democracy. People still have a voice. People still can take action. It can start after Pat’s birthday.




Brother and Friend of Pat Tillman,
Kevin Tillman



Copyright © 2006 Truthdig, L.L.C. All rights reserved.

Quatro Sueños

Quatro Sueños
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Dream Cycle

Dream Cycle
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Tres Sueños

Tres Sueños
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Cat Friday

New Neighbor
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Dos Sueños

Dos Sueños
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Abundance

Abundance
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Sueño

Sueño
Originally uploaded by vajra.

The Yellow Brick Road

The Yellow Brick Road
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Tom Stoppard

Is Tom Stoppard the greatest playwright of his generation? Saw Travesties today and loved it. Other plays of his I've seen and loved are Arcadia, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, The Invention of Love. I love it that he is love with language, and that the mysteries of time, science and mathematics call to him as part of that language.

Search for Solitude

Cat Friday

Cat Nap
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Furled

Furled
Originally uploaded by vajra.

FIfty Miles of Elbow Room

P7260132
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Fifty Miles of Elbow Room


Twelve-hundred miles, it's length and breadth,
That four-square city stands.
It's gem-set walls of Jasper shine,
They're not made by human hands.
One-hundred miles it's gates are wide:
Abundant entrance there.
With fifty miles of elbow room,
On either side to spare.

When the gates swing wide on the other side,
Just beyond the sunset sea.
There'll be room to spare as we enter there.
There'll be room for you and room for me.
For the gates are wide on the other side,
Where the fairest flowers bloom.
On the right hand and on the left hand,
Fifty miles of elbow room.

Sometimes I'm cramped and I'm crowded here,
And I long for elbow room.
How I long to reach for altitude,
Where the fairest flowers bloom.
It won't be long before I pass,
Into that city fair.
With fifty miles of elbow room,
On either side to spare.

Oh, when the gates swing wide on the other side,
Just beyond the sunset sea.
There'll be room to spare as we enter there.
There'll be room for you and room for me.
Oh, for the gates are wide on the other side,
Where the fairest flowers bloom.
On the right hand and on the left hand,
Fifty miles of elbow room.

__Iris Dement

How Far the Gold

How Far the Gold
Originally uploaded by vajra.

It took a long time for me to adjust to the hills of California. Now I think they are beautiful.

Hassan's Flowers

Hassan's Flowers
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Recently, on Saturdays, as we go about our errands, we have chosen to have lunch at Chez Simone. Before you go up the stairs you have to pass Hassan's flower stand. Last week the chrysanthemums were especially lovely.

Wasteland of the Free

Living in the wasteland of the free...

We got preachers dealing in politics and diamond mines
and their speech is growing increasingly unkind
They say they are Christ's disciples
but they don't look like Jesus to me
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

We got politicians running races on corporate cash
Now don't tell me they don't turn around and kiss them peoples' ass
You may call me old-fashioned
but that don't fit my picture of a true democracy
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

We got CEO's making two hundred times the workers' pay
but they'll fight like hell against raising the minimum wage
and If you don't like it, mister, they'll ship your job
to some third-world country 'cross the sea
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

Living in the wasteland of the free
where the poor have now become the enemy
Let's blame our troubles on the weak ones
Sounds like some kind of Hitler remedy
Living in the wasteland of the free

We got little kids with guns fighting inner city wars
So what do we do, we put these little kids behind prison doors
and we call ourselves the advanced civilization
that sounds like crap to me
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

We got high-school kids running 'round in Calvin Klein and Guess
who cannot pass a sixth-grade reading test
but if you ask them, they can tell you
the name of every crotch on mTV
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

We kill for oil, then we throw a party when we win
Some guy refuses to fight, and we call that the sin
but he's standing up for what he believes in
and that seems pretty damned American to me
and it feels like I am living in the wasteland of the free

Living in the wasteland of the free
where the poor have now become the enemy
Let's blame our troubles on the weak ones
Sounds like some kind of Hitler remedy
Living in the wasteland of the free

While we sit gloating in our greatness
justice is sinking to the bottom of the sea
Living in the wasteland of the free
Living in the wasteland of the free
Living in the wasteland of the free


___Iris Dement

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. Great day.

Cat Friday

Gecko Moment
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Prerequisites

What are the prerequisites for the formation of democracy? Since the current administration is spreading "democracy" it might be interesting to find out what produces democracy. First, to show my obvious biases, I know of NO democracy that has been created at the point of a gun. What then does create it?

Ruffles Have Ridges

Ruffles Have Ridges
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Burning Sky

Burning Sky
Originally uploaded by vajra.

Absolute Power Corrupts

Speaker of the House Hastert and Cardinal Law: Separated at birth? And with the same propensity to shield sexual predators to retain their power?