What will it take?

…War is an old habit of thought, an old frame of mind, an old political technique, that must now pass as human sacrifice and human slavery have passed. I have faith that the human spirit will prove equal to the long heavy task of ending war. Against the pessimistic mood of our time, I think that the human spirit - for all its dark side… - is in essence , heroic.

Herman Wouk


There are those who have seen the ravages of destruction. There are also those who have authored with all of their strength what that destruction might have entailed. We must also be remindful to the thought that there are those that have done neither… yet all have wearied in one respect or another for the same soil.

We are in a time in which we are re-writing history, a history that our future will look back upon and question just as we have done and will continue to do, what was it really for? And the question will in our future, just as it has in our past, be wont for an answer, an answer that is understanding of the queries of those who have suffered with all of their varying degrees of sacrifice, an answer that realizes that what we become effects civilization from Bangkok to Boston, and all points North to South, an answer that begs for the spirit of Human to transcend beyond the wages of the destruction that it is so apt to accommodate.

Despite all of the darkness that surrounds our thoughts and perceptions, what will we have become? Will we have made this orb a better place? The tides of time have ebbed and flowed through eons past, yet here we are - with all of our civil unrest and panderings for whatever a conscience can dictate - here we are.

It is said that every generation has its own curse. This notion dictates that whoever we are, whatever we become, we carry that curse with us. It should follow then, that every soul would seek a cleansing from whatever burden it carries. For this reason, do we try to become heroes? Or do we individually decide to make a collective attempt at merely being decent to one another. Or will it become nothing more than an implicit, “It’s your soul, you decide”?

I sit here with a maelstrom of thought, and an incompatible unrest for the reprehensible form of dialectic that is evolving around me, yet I have to believe with all of what is in me, that either despite the dialectic, or in spite of ourselves, each and every one of us should at least have the desire to become larger than the Conundrum, and cultivate an innate wont for the betterment of our souls at large.

We are a great nation, with great virtues, and limitless resourcefulness. We may have the desire to be the heroes of old become new, and we may have a notion that one hero may be better than someone else’s, but the juncture we are at demands that we realize that we are a great nation, and that it will take all of our virtue and every bit of our resourcefulness to maintain it.


Andrew G. Eppler
Right Decision ; Wrong Rules
http://www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi/37/9393
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=State_secrets_privilege
http://www.law.harvard.edu/publications/evidenceiii/rules/509_proposed.htm

Waggle

Waggle----- Original Message -----
From: Mom Stout
To: "Undisclosed-Recipient:;"@webtv.net
Sent: Friday, March 04, 2005 8:52 AM


TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED the 1930's 40's, 50's, 60's and 70's !!

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us.
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing and didn't get tested for diabetes.

Then after that trauma, our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking.

As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.
Riding in the back of a pick up on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, bread and butter and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we weren't overweight because WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.
No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K.
We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We did not have Playstations, Ni! ntendo's, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, no video tape movies, no surround sound, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms..........WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

! We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no lawsuits from these accidents.
We made up games with sticks and tennis balls and ate worms and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes, nor did the worms live in us forever.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them!

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!!

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever!
The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.
We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO BE STRONG AND DEAL WITH IT ALL!

And YOU are one of them! CONGRATULATIONS!



You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives for our own good.


Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?!