What's going on in my world today

I left my apartment this morning in the outfit pictured hoping to attract some attention. I went up to the Greek place to have a short stack of wheat pancakes and then I went out to the patio to talk to residents about a possible karaoke Christmas party with my new six pack of karaoke Christmas songs I have ordered (and Doc paid for). The karaoke lovers were all enthusiastic but nervous about Doc attending since he sort of tore up the karaoke party last year. I had to order him to go home after he made enough people mad with his intemperate remarks. But by that time the main and best karaoke singer who was sober had got mad and gone home, too. He asked me if I could not order Doc to stay sober. I said no, so far, he had never listened to that request, but he would go home if asked. He is bound to put in an appearance especially since he has paid for the new discs.
You might ask why order them? It is to keep Doc occupied with something else from now until Xmas practicing karaoke. We can make videos where he will not have to interact with anyone else. All the drinkers hardly dare make an appearance in public here, since public misbehavior can get them thrown out of here faster than anything. House rules forbid taking alcoholic drinks into the common areas.
I was out to the patio last night talking to Tony, who is the son of another of Doc's drinking buddies. He now has a bad problem with alcoholism and in the recession lost his job and is homeless. He has been staying here with his dad quite a bit but has now been told he has to leave in two weeks. I am worried about him as Dave, his father has been, because he is suicidal and another of Dave's sons already committed suicide. Tony's mother was Pima Indian and she died unexpectedly of cancer about six months ago. She wanted Tony to have her house on the reservation which was paid for but her white husband gave it to another relative. Tony who is also part Navaho through his dad, Dave, had probably expressed himself too strongly to this man while drinking. Doc does not like Tony because he is very articulate but too forceful when drinking. He expressed himself for about an hour and a half non stop in Doc's apartment and he did not dare order his father and him to go home, so he was not happy with Tony.
I like Tony very much when he sober, as he is extremely articulate, funny, and smart, but when he drinks whiskey, his favorite drink he says, he goes on the war path. So he is an extremely tough person to help.
There are other younger alcoholics in here who have gotten disability probably from either the ravages of drugs and alcohol, but who knows what triggers off mental illness. When Tony is sober he does not seem to be mentally ill, but he has very severe problems with employment because of a feeling of more entitlement than the jobs he can get I am sure, and if he kills himself as he almost did last winter with alcohol, he will be seen as extremely mentally ill now dead after the fact. Dave was very worried about his suicide threats last winter. I just hope that the time he has spent here talking to a number of people who now call him friend he will feel better about himself.
His mother must be a powerful spirit because I felt in touch with her almost immediately, but I feel her withdrawing now, knowing that he must leave here. His dad is basically such a recluse who never comes out and mingles with people in order to stay out of trouble, that I fear he does not want Tony to live with him and try to be his caretaker. But if he kills himself this will be another tragedy in his father's life.
So here he is now the sole parent faced with the dilemma of how to help his son. I told Tony yesterday that if Dave wants to help him he should quit drinking so he can assert more control over Tony's drinking. Telling him that if he did put him on his lease as caretaker, they both could not just sit around and drink! Tony just nodded at that. But it sounds like he lives in such a drinking culture both here and up on the reservation around Tuba City there is little hope of him staying sober. I have not felt so upset about the Indian drinking problem for a long time.
What have we done causing alcohol to become such a problem for Indians on the reservation, but hey, alcohol is a huge problem everywhere. We just have to muster up our courage to go on in the middle of it, trying this and that, and hoping for the best even when the worst seems on its way.

Medium interviews famous author after reading bio "Mark Twain: Man in White" by Michael Sheldon

Mark Twain has always been one of my favorite authors because he was such a great humorist. I sent the autobiography he wrote about his early days around to people in the family I thought it was so funny and good. He died April the 19th in 1910. This book was published 2010!
I thought I would try an interview of Mark Twain's spirit. I am sure that would appeal to him as he has probably always wanted to come back as a spirit and be interviewed by a medium.
GERRY: I must say it is only right that I interview you in a spirit of irreverence since that was always your attitude toward great men like Shakespeare who you thought tended to be revered too greatly by mankind. You did become the most famous writer in the world for a long time, so that probably contradicts your philosophy about famous men, wouldn't you say.
MARK TWAIN: I was unable to prevent my great fame because I had to continue to make a living once I started by the sale of my books. Now I can see how a published writer becomes famouser and famouser just in order to pay the bills and keep the wolves from the door.
GERRY: I loved James Agee who said, "Let us all now praise famous men" since people are so impressed by fame they tend to over do their adulation of them.
MARK TWAIN: I agree with his sneer in principle but found myself violating my own aversion to famous men more and more.
GERRY: Accordingly I decided I would avoid fame in order to write about very unpopular subjects which famous men could not touch or they might have become paupers over night as people boycotted their books. My needs were taken care of with disability benefits so why not?
MARK TWAIN: A worthy thought, and so what might some of those subjects be?
GERRY: The homosexual husbands who marry and deceive their wives and children for starters.
MARK TWAIN: Oh Lord no, I could never have written about such a subject. In fact I did not even know there was such a thing, or I could not admit to knowing it in my books. There are only certain subjects a popular humorist can touch once he or she becomes famous and that is not one of them.
GERRY: I think my subject could eventually inspire humor when it has been around and surfaced long enough.
MARK TWAIN: Agreed but you will have to remain unfamous for a very long time waiting for that to happen. I was not able to joke about such subjects in my time. Maybe that is why Shakespeare never left any autobiographies to enlighten the people about what he was really like.
GERRY: Of course, I am surprised you did not think of that when you were writing your book trying to poke holes in the reputation of the most famous writer in the world before you, William Shakespeare. He may have felt he had to keep silent because he was a homosexual who married and had children, and since he could not confess to it, he left no history about himself. Doesn't that make sense?
MARK TWAIN: Makes a lot of sense. I could have understood it better had I been a homosexual who married and had children. As it was I was heavily addicted to cigars and billiards and writing. I could not stop writing, I suppose because people were so accepting of a heterosexual guy marrying a lovely woman like my wife and having children, but making mistakes. Oh did I ever make mistakes, especially after she died and was not there to guide me and keep me being an attentive father. I acquired a secretary who was younger than I, a petite little woman who so beguiled me with flattery that I neglected my daughter who was very ill with epilepsy. I let her talk me into putting her in an institution environment and keeping her there all during her twenties. When I was finally cured of my infatuation with my young secretary and brought my daughter home, she died of a seizure when she was only thirty years old. I even let my secretary, Isabel was her name, as in Jezebel, talk me into sending her to Germany to live to see a doctor there. She could live in Germany but not in my lovely home with my secretary and me. You see when you come out of a violent seizure you may temporarily become violent and my little secretary was frightened to death of Jean's seizures and told the Doctor that I did not think I could take care of her, and then she told me the doctor did not think I could take care of her, that she would be better of in an institution, and the doctor thought she would be better off there instead of with a famous father who was too busy being famous to want her around having seizures.
GERRY: On reading this bio I did think that was the worst thing your secretary did was to influence you to keep your poor daughter away who was very gifted. She could speak several languages, she loved to ride horses, she was active, but oh so sad because her malady kept her from marrying or having a career. I related to her because of my early bouts of chronic fatigue starting in childhood. I eventually became a problem for the family because of the fragility that developed as a result of keeping my father's secrets along with being molested by his partners as well as from his alcoholism. I did not believe I could tell my father's secret until I was in my late fifties and even then it was not greeted with acceptance. In fact, it was not welcome at all and still isn't. I became disabled and since I had chronic fatigue even many doctors did not accept it as a valid disability even though I eventually could not work. But my stamina was compromised so I felt as though I was hobbled compared to other people throughout my life as your daughter certainly felt she was by her epilepsy. She would have had to be helped by her family to live a more enjoyable life. I thought the secretary lived a very enjoyable life actually living with you for a number of years, while she contrived to keep your daughter away and out of your hair.
MARK TWAIN: And I just bragged on my good health despite smoking so damned many cigars. I even turned my vices into something lovable for an old humorist to do, and caused many more men to take up smoking cigars and developing heart disease and high blood pressure. My epileptic daughter had already died by the time I came over here, so I had a lot of making up to her to do when I got here. My wife was not happy with me either. Then I had to watch my only living daughter be taken by a fortune hunter, a gambler and thief, who robbed her of her inheritance as much as he could, talked her into leaving what was left of the money she inherited from my books to him when she died. And none at all to her daughter who he only allowed her to see about a half an hour a day for years! Just when she needed her the most after he own father, a sensitive Russian musician, had died. She had been taught by me how to neglect a daughter, as I also neglected her too. She would leave home and go on singing tours thinking I was preoccupied with my relationship with my cute little secretary. And then after that I had to watch my grand daughter who inherited the last of my earnings on my books die in squalor and alone of alcoholism in her fifties.
GERRY: That was all very sad but you did have some good millionaire friends to your credit.
MARK TWAIN: I presume you are joking and giving me another poke about vacationing in Bermuda with my Standard Oil millionaire friend, Henry Rogers. Well, he was a good friend, but I could be justly accused of preferring the company of my millionaire friends to my poor daughters, not realizing that it was up to me to teach them how to be good friends with me by giving them enough of my time to make a difference. That is what so many busy famous people do, neglect their primary relationships because they don't see the immediate rewards for spending a lot of time with their children, especially handicapped ones.
GERRY: I am sure you have said quite enough about what happened to your family for people to get the idea.

Illegal Immigrants are Career Criminals (by Jennifer Kendall)

I saw this article on the Internet and now on Facebook on Stand With Arizona which I think is so pertinent to our Arizona problems as well as other border states I had to copy it for you to read.

Illegal Immigrants are Career Criminals
by Jennifer Kendall
06/15/2010


The attraction to America is undeniable, but those who are attracted aren’t always just looking for a better way of life. I had the opportunity to speak with a Border Patrol officer in Southern California who wished to remain anonymous. He spoke about the threat illegal immigration imposes on Americans. Many agree that illegal immigration directly correlates to the lack of jobs available, high medical costs, overpopulated prisons, poor education, congested freeways and higher crime rates. These are only a few of the results produced by illegal immigration, but fixing these issues is vital for the future of America.

When it comes to whom illegal immigrants are, the Border Patrol officer says “There are a certain amount of people in the group that are just looking for a better life. They’re hardworking people and they are coming here to do what people have done for many, many years, come here for opportunity. But there’s also a certain amount of those people that are career criminals, you know… they’re trying to manipulate the system. They just come here and break laws, not pay taxes, and benefit from all the public programs and that type of stuff.”

The amount of illegal aliens who break laws will never be known for sure, but those that were caught provide some pretty terrifying insight. The Government Accountability Office, (GAO), released a study it conducted in 2005 of 55,322 incarcerated illegal aliens. The study population averaged 8 arrests each...97% had more than one arrest and an astonishing 26% had over eleven arrests. This only included crimes committed in the US. How many crimes they each committed in their country of origin are unknown.

Each illegal alien in the study averaged 13 offenses and 24% of those offenses were for drug crimes. About 12% were for murder, robbery, assault and sexually related crimes. 21% of offenses were immigration offenses. The other offenses included property related offenses, traffic violations, fraud and obstruction of justice.

“The illegal aliens that we catch have priors like driving under the influence, domestic violence...those two are like a dime a dozen,” the Border Patrol officer said. The GAO study found that 80% of all arrests occurred in California, Texas and Arizona. California accounted for 58% of the total amount of illegal aliens arrested. And, by 2009, an additional 910,000 illegal aliens had entered the US, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

If you think that getting arrested and deported is a deterrent for illegal immigrants, you are highly mistaken. Wayne Cornelius, director of the Center for Comparative Immigration Studies at UC San Diego said, "Even if they are caught, they try again until they are successful," at a congressional hearing on immigration held in San Diego in 2006.
It might not be as hard as you think to get through the American borders either. "Our research shows that 92 to 97 percent of them succeed on the first or second try," Cornelius said.

When asked if after being deported illegal aliens stay out of America, The Border Patrol officer agrees, “No, they’re gonna try again and again until they finally make it.”

Illegal aliens arrested for less serious crimes often don’t show up to their court hearings either. According to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, at the end of fiscal year 2008, there were 557,762 fugitive alien cases left unsolved.


As the Border Patrol officer mentioned, many of the illegal aliens come to America to benefit from programs such as our health care system. California's border counties incurred $79 million in emergency care for illegal aliens, the highest cost in the country according the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). Under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, hospitals with emergency rooms are required to treat and stabilize patients with emergency medical needs regardless of whether or not they are in the country legally or whether they are able to pay for the treatment.

The closer the proximity of a hospital to the US border the more susceptible it is to a high rate of illegal aliens seeking medical care. Tony Struthers, hospital administrator for Saddleback Memorial Medical Center San Clemente says, “People can come up here and get care pretty easily from Mexico. The law says you can’t ask, you gotta take care of them. You gotta provide a screening and stabilize that patient. If you don’t we can get fined and lose our license,” says Struthers.

Struthers used to work in Arizona and he fully understands the added strain from states with high illegal immigration rates. “Border states absolutely there’s more of an issue because once again we are required to take care of [illegal aliens]. Of anyone who shows up,” he adds.
FAIR estimated the medical cost of treating illegal immigrants in California in 2004 to be $1.5 billion. Today that figure would be much higher. And it is those people who currently have health insurance that foot the bill.
“We are required to treat them, but the government is not required to pay for them, so the only way we can recover that is to raise our rates higher for those people that do have insurance,” says Struthers.

If you have health insurance and you are treated at a hospital, “You’re paying for those who came before you who didn’t have insurance,” he says. Those who came before you aren’t always American citizens.
For hospitals, rising costs have become an escalating problem. And while hospitals close to US borders see a larger amount of illegal aliens utilizing their facilities Struthers says, “Illegal immigration is just a subset of that bigger problem.”

There are an estimated 822 illegal aliens crossing the US borders on a daily basis according to the Center for Immigration Studies. Many of them are entering America for jobs, some for health services, some to commit crimes and transport drugs, and a few for other reasons. One of those reasons that should be a major concern for US citizens is terrorism.

The Border Patrol officer says, “We don’t only deal with Mexicans. We deal with people from El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Honduras. You know, any country, you name it. A lot of ‘em come through Mexico because that’s just the way it works. They get themselves to Mexico and they try to get smuggled north from there.” The only way to know who is crossing the US border illegally is to catch them, bring them to the Border Patrol station and identify them. Open borders mean easy access for those who plan attacks on American soil.

When it comes to terrorism the Border Patrol officer says, “That’s one of our big concerns.” He mentions that ever since 9/11, The Border Patrol has tightened their procedures.

When it comes to our borders, “They are more secure than they were 10 years ago, that’s for damn sure. But It could be better and hopefully it will be better,“ the officer says.

Decreasing the incentives for illegal immigrants to come to America by cracking down on employers who hire them and taking away taxpayer-funded benefits is a good way to reduce the flow of illegal immigration. The Border Patrol officer explains that we need to increase internal checkpoints. He said that once illegal aliens get far enough north, they no longer encounter immigration checkpoints and are home free. He also believes having military at our borders would increase our chances of keeping America and Americans safe. Amnesty, on the other hand, attracts more illegal aliens and more crime.

It is time for the US government to support our Border Patrol officers and tighten our illegal immigration policies in order to provide a safer country for us all. Arizona recently passed a law outlining a more stringent policy when dealing with illegal immigrants. Results from a bipartisan poll by Lake Research Partners and Public Opinion Strategies, conducted for America's Voice, showed that 84% of voters supported the new law while only 12% opposed it. American citizens know that our Border Patrol officers are heroes.

The Border Patrol officer explained that in order for him to stay positive he must refrain from reading the press or watching the news, “It doesn’t seem like the government cares,” he said. He feels as though the media demonizes him and shows him as a “destroyer of dreams.” As a result of the media’s negative attention, he feels as though many citizens whom he works to protect on a daily basis oppose his efforts.

The Border Patrol officer says, “We are spending all this money to keep us safe abroad and forgetting to keep ourselves protected here at home.” Luckily he and his coworkers have been working hard to protect us. Now it is time to support what these heroes are trying to accomplish. They are stopping terrorists, drug dealers, rapists, murderers, and more. The least we can do is thank them.

Jennifer Kendall is a graduate of Arizona State University and preparing to attend the Annenberg School of Communication at USC.

Karaoke on the way has cheered me up!

While Doc was recovering yesterday from a mini binge the night before he was feeling guilty so I was able to take advantage and get him to agree to buy 200 karaoke songs in 2 packs of Country Classics and Christmas Songs. There is nothing like starting early to practice Christmas caroling. Besides I lost my fun Christmas karaoke disc with songs on it like Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer. (I like any song with Grandma in it) I have looked for it for years, but finally decided it was lost forever. The only pack I found on Ace Karaoke with that song included cost $70. I did not think in good conscience I could ask Doc to buy it, but the more disgusted I got, the more I lost any such scruples. To my surprise he agreed. I also said I had to have another 100 song pack with Milk Cow Blues on it which I don't have. I often have the Milk Cow Blues, so I asked him if he would buy that one, too. To my surprise he felt sorry for anyone who has Milk Cow Blues and agreed. This will be dedicated to all the women out there who had to milk cows as a girl and men, too. It just doesn't seem like people keep milk cows like they used to. They have got lazy. Kids don't even know milk comes from cows and sometimes it used to get manure in it, too. Especially when kids were milking.
I became desperate to keep Doc doing anything that might inspire him to give up some of these killing binges of his. Accordingly I resurrected this karaoke video for my blog today we did last Christmas with him still trying to sing a David Allen Coe song and get it right. It was listed on Youtube under David Allen Coe singing his own song with a bunch more wannabees and Doc's actually had 347 hits on it, which is a huge success for him, since some of his slower videos only get about 5 hits.
Today he was made happy by one of his step children actually asking to be friends with him on Facebook. She was one he actually tried to raise for 13 years or so. He did not get to raise his own children so settled for helping raise other people's kids. He claims he did not drink then like he does now.
I found out today by looking at some of her photo albums with Doc that Christine is a swing dancer just like my daughter. She had a bunch of photos on her blog showing her out dancing. Doc claimed she was better looking than my daughter. I said, uh uh, my daughter is very good looking, but so is Christine. I am glad to have Christine back in Doc's life (on Facebook). She never knew who her father was. She was also wearing a red Georgie Girl Cap just like mine! She is still slim and beautiful in her thirties. My daughter Ronda is 41. If she came out to Phoenix my daughter would take her to to her west coast swing dance club!

I am not feeling so cheerful today

For one thing a very drunk Doc called me at 5:30 in the morning to 'git down there.' It seems he had been up most of the night drinking and making a video about his past with his fourth wife whose four daughters he helped raise for about 12 years. Doc can't do anything that causes him to get emotional without drinking. He wanted me to watch the video which was about 40 minutes long he was directing to one of his step daughters. He asked me what I thought and I told him I thought he should not send it to the daughter even should she give him an address because he was drunk when he made it and too mean in regard to his wife, their mother. He is going to think about my advice.
So then I said I needed to make a video because I am still contemplating a long hot summer spent in Phoenix, unable to go north by any means whatsoever to the summer musical festival in Boulder. I hoped to attend this summer since I have not been to Utah for three years, but I decided since I had begun to publish my memoirs on my blog about my early childhood this was not a good time to go. I am sure that some of the women I am trying to educate will not be happy about my memoirs if they have either read them or heard about them. I have already received enough unpleasant comments from relatives and friends about doing this, that I do not think this year or possibly any other year will be a good time to go. It is now even more clear why I could not tell about the molesting for so long and never told the family about the part I thought my father played in it until I was 58 years old, 50 years after the fact. I only did it then because my mother had surfaced a long suppressed memory about my father that half way suggested to her that she had caught him in the act of having sex with a man when she came back unexpectedly to their hotel room when she thought she would be away quite a while. But she was not all the way to this conclusion because she got very upset at my confirming her impression with my own memories and commanded me not to tell this story about my father to anyone else! Even after 50 years. She did not appreciate my efforts to educate her not only about my dad but about the man, an entertainer with a good voice, she was living with I also thought was gay. In fact, he had even admitted he was to two of us daughters, but asked us to promise not to tell her because he said our mother would not be able to 'take it.' Besides she was being very generous to him with her money, so he probably anticipated that would be cut off, too, if she decided not to marry him! We were trying to prevent her marriage to a gay man we also thought was too interested in our children with all our might.
Talk about educating old ladies like my mother about marrying gay men to protect her grand kids! This was what was really going on 50 years later that caused me to tell my mother about my impressions of my father whether she wanted to hear it or not! She lived with the man four years before, thanks to our revelations, she finally sent him on his way! No, not all homosexual men are pedofiles, but those who hide these activities in order to marry are more apt to go in other forbidden directions, too, is my observation. I will also risk getting homosexual men angry by saying this, but I am resigned to making a whole of people angry with my memoirs and having to hide out in another state, because that is apparently going to be the result.

Howdy! Howdy!

Feeling very cheerful today. Had fun putting a new template design on Doc's blog (see Rick n Doc Emde on my blog list) to go with the fun graphic Connie sent him that just matches. She also sent him a profile photo of him on Newsweek as the "Old Geezer of the year." He got a laugh out of that one. He told her how he liked her profile photo on Facebook with her picture on Vogue. You no more than give Connie an idea and she is off and running. Besides that she helps in the huge garden she and her husband have put in on their lovely country grounds in northern Ohio besides the flowers and lots of lawn. See her photos and videos on Connie's Place on my blog list. Of course, my header is by the incomparable Connie.

My sister Ann is blogging regularly so check out her blog KanyonlandKing on my blog list. She has photos of flowers in bloom at her place and quilts galore. Ann is an old quilter from way back so she is always promoting quilting in her family in spite of having retired from quilting a few years ago so she could help write on books like Ranches, Homesteads, and Home. She will soon have another book out she has been working on all winter called the Grand Staircase Monument My Home, something like that.
Raymond is blogging again and he's all excited about staging one of his plays, "Under the Desert" in a little desert place up on Thompson's ledge! Yes! You will have to go by 4-wheel drive to the top. That great event is to take place in August. He has been staging theater events for years, so I know it will live up to promise. Check out Cowboys and Bohemians on my blog list for progress.

The photo is of Thompson's ledge. There is no water up there, so we couldn't imagine anyone building a house up on top, but someone did. Raymond has made friends with him. He says he is a fabulous artist and photographer, also a musician, so that is the kind of guy Raymond is sure to befriend.
Dana Bate of Vagabond Journeys (see blog list) sent all who requested photos of his art work. There is something about someone attempting to express themselves on canvas with paints and pencil that has always fascinated people. I know it does me, and having two sisters who have done a lot of art work, I am always eager to gaze upon any kind of art work. I have been studying Dana's pictures that cause me to think this and that. Dana is a complex man so his art work sort of reflects that. He will send you his art work, too, I am sure if you request it.
Which is also why I have a new blog listed by Herrad called Access Denied--have multiple sclerosis. She and Sherry (Have Myelin?)who writes Word Salads and Postcards from the Edge have taught me a great deal about a difficult disease. They both seemed to be in advanced stages so have multiple problems about which they write very well. Anyway Herrad just posted a tribute to Sherry's Daughter Nicole who suddenly passed from these realms a year ago when she was only 34 years old of an illness affecting her lungs. The tribute is composed of art works from the masters and music videos. Herrad always posts art work or great photos so I know you are going to love her blog, especially if you love art.
I am resting as I am also tired from posting a response to Bill Pasadeaux who has long been my greatest critic. Yes, I have known him quite a few years, ever since I started blogging in fact on AOL. I even posted some photos of him on there when we were semi-friends, but he is a liberal democrat and I cross back and forth voting for who I think makes the most sense. I will not just support the party especially since the Democratic party became the party of pro choice. I have always thought the Democratic party helped minorities the most which was why I registered as a democrat.
I am still busy gathering illegal immigration stories. Another Stand With Arizona rally was held at Bolin Park across from the Capitol in Phoenix yesterday. I will post some videos from it if I like them. I laughed at a poll that was taken pitting our Governor Janet Brewer against Barack Obama in the next presidential election. See I told you we are developing a strong Republican woman candidate in Arizona in Governor Brewer. She may soon pass Sarah Palin as the woman we would like most for our president. Ha. Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State and disappeared!
Politics always fascinates me. Barack will really have to earn the next election as people are still mad at him for pushing through the health care bill with a very strong arm, helped by Pelosi and others, when we are so much in debt and still in a marked recession. Now we have got an environmental disaster in an oil spill that won't quit. I hate to even look at the photos which Ann has listed on her blog Beauty in Art. When I get up the courage I will go and see, but that is so upsetting. Big business has got to do better or it will not get back in the good graces of the American people very soon.

Bill wants to argue with me about legalized abortion again

I am often very lonely at the end of the day and have no one to talk to. So I looked at this comment on my side bar and I thought oh, God has sent me someone to talk to, so I had better not complain because it is Bill. As you know we have every kind of person you can think of in this complex. And I am one for trying to make restitution for all the bad things I think my particular race has done to other races and those with different ethnic backgrounds. If a black man is sitting to the table I think here is a chance to do restitution for slavery and a bunch of other bad stuff, if it is an Indian I know a lot of bad stuff we have done to his people when we were illegals flowing into this country by the thousands and thinking up reasons why we not only needed to put Indian land to better use but why not get rid of the Indians entirely who just weren't going to get over the invasion. We had better weapons. Diseases they weren't immune to.
Now the Jews, I have felt particularly bad about what white even supposedly Christian nations have done to the Jews all too recently in the holocausts. When I was a little child I thought Father Abraham, Moses, David, and Jesus really were my ancestors and my people because I heard so much about them in my classes in Church and Seminary. So when the holocaust happened I could not get over Christians turning on Jews. So when I did get a chance to do restitution I was quite taken back at how mean a Jewish guy could be who happened to be Bill. Bill is not his real name. He sounded as brilliant as I expected a Jewish person to be, but was a dreadful skeptic. His favorite book which he kindly lent me to read was Carl Sagan's "The Demon Haunted World". It is now one of my favorite books, too. It had a lot in it about how the Jews were persecuted all down through the ages mainly because they refused to accept Christian versions of Jesus Christ. Many others called heretics were also tortured and burned because they could not please the authorities enough with what they believed. The present holocausts were certainly not the first ones involving the killing of Jews, who have been subjected to many purges.
Well, I was determined to love and accept Bill no matter how he acted. I figured that he had been so embittered by the crimes done to his people that I had to expect some problems with him. But Bill truly tried my soul, however I am still game. I still try to love those who have been sinned against no matter how they act. I believe that only through love will the embittered ever return to the fold, but I must admit it is a tall order to love Bill.
I ground my teeth a little when I read his latest comment which I will post here but after that I will still try to love him according to my philosophy of life.

Bill Pasdeaux said...

What possible business is it of yours whether Sarah Palin decided to terminate or bring her pregnancy to term? I admire the Romper Room Lady who chose, so many ages ago, to avail herself of a safe clinical termination of her pregnancy, which was tainted by exposure to Thalidamide, in Sweden because it was illegal in the US. How many have died, whatever reasons they had, in the aftermath of coat hanger and Oil of Pine torture? You say you're not killing anyone here with your opinions... well, maybe not since Roe vs Wade, or until abortion on demand is fully outlawed by cruel and hypocritical Lawmakers. Allowing choice and making it safely available places the onus of any personal guilt for that choice on the chooser... legislating against the availability of this procedure places the onus of any tragedy to the chooser on the Lawmakers and the constituents who demanded such restriction. Which is closer to the idea of Freedom and Liberty for actual living and thinking Human Beings?

June 12, 2010 4:45 AM

I have to tell Bill that I think the legalizing of the abortionist helps the mother commit a violent act, which is why I think it should be illegal. I don't think we can allow other people to take life with a clear conscience anymore than we can allow parents to abuse and kill their kids after they are born. I think it is just as bad for the humanity of parents to kill their unborn, especially a mother who must undergo what has to be one of the most depressing procedures on earth, with her mind churning about the violence and the finality of the act. Introducing death into the womb where it has not been before can I think have far reaching consequences affecting the life and future well being of the mother, too. The womb shrinks from such a violent invasion, the psyche recoils, everything turns this procedure into a nightmare.
Bill might want women to be left alone to do this if they want to. But the results have been anything but reassuring. More than a million abortions a year in this country alone, which suggests that the more you endorse violence the more people may be tempted to do it. Another reason for restraining them from having the means to do it.
It is just not good for people to have the temptation to commit this violent act reinforced by abortion advocates like Bill, suggesting this is just a harmless procedure and may be the right thing for you to do under your circumstances. I would be willing to put up with a lot of women turned pro choice by legalized abortion screaming and hollering at me that I had taken away their right to choose. I would be willing to sit down with them and patiently tell them my take on the situation, given that I was able to help with the overturning of this law. I would be willing to write books explaining why this ancient taboo against taking the life of the unborn is one not to violate.
Bill could have been the one his mother chose to abort had this law been in effect when he was conceived. My mother did abort her third child by herself with a catheter she got from an aunt. I was her first, but I felt endangered by her act, as she was in an absolute fury at my dad when she did it. My dad was the object of her wrath, but she took it out on the child. He or she had to pay. That might have been the only brother I would have. My mother spanked me throughout early childhood I thought because my dad was too tough and strong for her to whip, and she knew it hurt him for her to whip his little children. I felt her people did not support her, give her good advice, help her with her terrible frustration with her marriage. I came to see that she had good reason to be frustrated with my dad as a husband. She could also have killed herself with the abortion and left us motherless. But her dad was trained to deliver babies so she knew he would come to her rescue if she started bleeding excessively. He saved her life when she nearly bled to death from a miscarriage. He would have done the same with the abortion had she gotten into trouble.
But to my mind, my mother needed to be helped by many around her who were supposed to care for her, her mother and dad and brothers and sisters. Her mother-in-law, her sisters-in-laws and brothers-in-laws. In fact I thought she got more help from my dad's brother than she did from her own family with troubles with my dad. I thought the reasons for my mother's illegal abortion were many, but they all needed to be analyzed and more help forthcoming so she wouldn't be tempted to do it again. She must have gotten some help from many sources, because she had three more children with the circumstances not being much better, but she seemed to have made up her mind that her abortion was a mistake she was not going to repeat.
So instead of just making abortion a way of life, a woman needs to be helped to overcome all the problems that cause her to want to abort a child. Legalizing abortion is only going to add guilt and confusion with an unacceptable solution.
I am sure Bill is not going to be able to accept a loving God into his heart until he is a lot less bitter than he is now. But I do believe he thinks of me as a friend who will reason with him instead of just ignoring him. I think of his bitter comment as a cry for help, because I always know he is in dire straights.
His health is not good so he has difficulty earning money, and his income through disability is too small for him to live within his means. He was evicted from this HUD complex which may mean it will be some years before he is allowed back in one.
I have lived through years of disability so I know how dreary that can be. I am grateful for the subsidized housing which helps me live within my means. I was very sorry to see Bill almost inadvertently do what was going to get him evicted, thinking he was doing a good thing. I heard his justifications many times, but I think he was just too much of a disrupting presence for management to tolerate. I missed him after he was gone as he has a great smile and sense of humor. One of his long suites is being able to read instructions and follow them, but I felt he had to commit himself not being a disruptive presence. No matter what it took.
The only way I can talk to him now or he can talk to me is through my blog. I could reject his comments but I won't do that. I will just try to work with him.
Good heavens, there are thousands of pro choice people whose comments I find to be every bit as corrosive as Bill's. That's what being an abortion protester means to me, is you protest the thinking, and when you get responses, you try to reason with the people, change minds.
A lot of times if you write a protest to a pro choice newspaper, you don't even get the letter published, so you can get comments, but you have to change minds and hearts sometimes one by one. Bill is giving me the opportunity to present my case, and in a blog I am going to do it for the world to read, too, if they choose. Probably not many will read it, but this is my chance to go into what I think effective abortion protesting has to be.
This is more advanced and requires more reasoning power than standing and picketing at an abortion clinic or writing a letter of protest that is not published. I am printing Bill's comment and I am responding. I also put a brief comment after his on that entry, but I thought it also called for a larger response.
So many times in this world we don't acknowledge response even it it is not exactly what we want, even if it is critical and even seems to be nasty, still it is an effort to communicate some of that person's thoughts. He is 25 years younger than I am so he was only about 15 when abortion was legalized. He is an example of a person who has been educated to be pro choice, since he is a liberal democrat, certainly not a conservative republican in any shape or form. He also has to recover from a terrible holocaust of millions of his people. His beloved mother was a concentration camp survivor. His father was a Russian Jew she met in Brooklyn after she came to this country. His father died when he was young. People who don't trust people are bitter. So we have to cut them some slack if we are truly going to do restitution for the violence that was done to them. How can we talk of stemming the violence of legalized abortion if we do not try to stem the violence done to any people for no good reason, other than just for living where they did, having been brought there perhaps years before by distant ancestors. I always think of Jews as being more akin to Jesus who was a Jew so I love them, because I have always loved him.