august 2014

children's sermon today august 10 2014--at 10:45 am the minister explained the 3 b's in sri lanka where he'd been on a mission trip.  birds (lots of pretty ones), bugs (lots) and buddhists (picture of buddha on screens with comment how sad they do not know the true god).  well, i was surprised but no one else seemed perturbed.  i thought 'good americans' were anti muslim.   now we have to go after buddhists too.  can't we do that in america and not travel?    fortunately the last song of the morning was 'many gifts, one spirit' with lines:                                                                        
Many gifts, one Spirit, one love known in many ways.
In our difference is blessing, from diversity we praise
One Giver, one Lord, one Spirit, one Word

guess the diversity part is among christians only


buzzfeed and huffpo -- good sources of journalism

"the big lobotomy  how republicans made congress stupid by glastris and edwards
p.49-59 45th anniversary year Washington Monthly june julu august 2014

p50 'the gingrich revolutionaries of 1995 and the tea partiers of 2011 share the same basic dream: to defund and dismantle the vast complex of agencies and programs that have been created by bipartisan majorities since the new deal.  the people in congress who knew those agencies and programs best and were most invested in making them work--the professional staffers, the CRS analysts, the veteran committee chairs--were not going to consent to seeing them swept away.  so they had to be swept away'

p54  term limits
'so instead of learning deeply about a given subject, debating various policy options, engaging in the nitty-gritty of a topic over the course of years and sometimes decades, committee members nowadays are often asked either to reverse-engineer a piece of legislation based onparty leadership's description of what kind of bill they'd like to see or to simply vote on a bill they did not write to begin with.  is it any surprise that, under those circumstances, deep policy knowledge, curiosity, and innovation have gone out the window?  what's the payoff for doing a good job?'

p55
about  33 % of staffcapacity has been moved from policy making and toward communications roles

p 58
'in the decade after the gop takeover of congress in 1994, the number of senate oversight hearings dropped by a third, and house oversight hearings fell by half, according to the brookings instutution.'

p59
'the problem however is the conservatives as a rule don't see this lack of expertise as a problem.   quite the contrary:  they;'ve orchestrated the brain drain precisely as a way to advance the conservative agenda.  why, when your aim is less government, would you want to add to government's intellectual capacity'



public citizen news, may june '14
5.9 million.  that's how much a single individual--as a result of the supreme court's mccutcheon v federal election commission now can give directly to a political party, its fed candidates and their affiliated policical committees in an election cycle


Life Science by bob jones university press--"bible-believing christians cannot accept any evolutionary interpretation.  dinosaurs and humans were definitely on the earth at the same time and may have even lived side by side within the past few thousand years.   chapter 9 online biblical creationism and dinosaurs in the bible?


10 largest religious right organization:
jerry falwell ministries, liberty university
christian broadcasting newtwork, regent university
focus on the family (james dobson)
alliance defending freedom
american center for law and justice, christian advocates serving evangelism
american family association
family research council
concerned women for america (feverly and tim laHaye)--attacks pub ed, gays, modern science
faith and freedom coalition
council for national policy (tim laHaye)

the cartel of drs that controls medicare  = RUC  specialty society relative value scale update committee, decides how long for a procedure, what procedures get the highest $ value, does not decide whether a procedure benefits patients

insect bites --- use coconut oil

cellulite  - amazon solaray gotu kola

weed killer (but plants too)  =  1/4 c salt and 4 c white vinegar

garden tools in sand bucket

mosquitos  == 1 c witch hazel and 20 drops peppermint essential oil.  spray self and outdoors furniture

counters  =  1/2 c witch hazel 1 c water 1T lemon juice

home freshener  =  1/2 c hazel 1 c water 15 drops your fav essential oil

dog's ears  =  hazel on cloth or cotton

fleas on dogs  =  few drops lemon essential oil on collar where dog can't reach.  NOT FOR CATS-poison

lose weigh  =  water am, grapefruit, lots of veggies

1/4 c castile + 2 c water  = deep cleans plastic

1 1/2 c safflower or sunflower oil + 1 cu lemon juice  =  reconditions wood furniture

1/4 c kosher salt + 2 1/2 c vinegar white  =  revitalizes metal



finished

what      straight talk
then       about the next
must      american revolution
we        do
by gar alperovitz  -- democratizing wealth and building a community sustaining economy from the ground up