Family of the YEAR - - The REITANS!!

This is an article written by Elizabeth Stiras, for Lavender Magazine:

In times of crisis and in times of joy, a family comes together and rises like a phoenix, overcoming its struggles as a united force. The Reitan family—father, Philip; mother, Randi; children, Britta, Josh, Ben, and Jacob—have faced personal, public, and political battles that have made them stronger than ever. The obstacles and the triumphs have brought them to a point where they can take on any challenge.

It’s hard to miss a Reitan. If you haven’t met them at a rally, a protest, or a fund-raiser, you may have seen them at a showing of Daniel Karslake’s film For the Bible Tells Me So. The critically acclaimed documentary confronts the misuse of the Bible to condemn homosexuality, and follows five families of faith with gay children. Alongside notable names like Chrissy Gephardt, daughter of former US House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt and his wife, Jane, and Bishop V. Gene Robinson, the first openly gay bishop of the Episcopal Church, the Reitans talk about their journey of acceptance.

What makes the Reitans’s profile so compelling is how a quiet Lutheran family from the Midwest had their lives transformed in the blink of an eye. While the world at large can follow their story from the comfort of a theater seat in less than two hours, the real story started 10 years ago, and continues to unfold to this day. As a 15-year-old sophomore, Jacob, the youngest of four children, first came out to his sister, Britta.

Jacob recalls, “My sister was home from her first year at college. It was tremendously difficult for me to actually say I was gay. I think it is for anybody the first time they come out. The act of doing so can feel like such a Pandora’s box event. But despite my struggle to actually say the words, I felt safe, because I knew my sister would be supportive of me. Time and again, before my coming out, she made statements to me and others in support of gay rights. In retrospect, those statements were so important in making me feel safe in my own skin.”

"We had talked a bit about homosexuality at the dinner table. Jake knew he would always have our love and support, but it was not an issue that we had ever dealt with before he told us,” Randi remembers.

It took a year before Jacob came out to his parents. They embraced him, but their first reactions were difficult. For Philip, it seemed like all his dreams for Jacob had been shattered. Randi cried, and then headed to the bookstore to learn more. They both went to psychologists, psychiatrists, pastors, and doctors.

“We met with a pastor who said that Jake would have a dark, sad life,” Randi recounts.

The struggle didn’t stay private. Even before Jacob had come out publicly, vandals had left their hateful marks by smashing his car window, throwing rocks through the window of Philip’s law firm, leaving raw eggs in the family mailbox, breaking lampposts in front of the home, and chalking a slur on the driveway.

“I didn’t go to sleep at night until Jake’s car was in the garage,” Randi admits.

Randi and Philip have made their support public through newspaper commentaries, regular participation in Pride events, and protests. They have attempted to deliver a letter to a Catholic bishops meeting in Minneapolis, and traveled to Rome to protest at the Vatican.

In total, Randi and Philip have been arrested eight times. Two of the arrests were at Brigham Young University (BYU) in Provo, Utah, and the US Military Academy at West Point, New York, in demonstrations rooted in the principle of civil disobedience. The arresting officer at BYU told Philip that he was a class act. At BYU, Jacob read aloud a stack of obituaries, each representing a student who had taken his or her life out of an inability to reconcile orientation and faith.

“Parents are taught to not accept their children,” Randi explains.

Randi and Philip participate in demonstrations to support Jacob, but also do so for other families who need voices of acceptance to beckon them away from destructive influences in conservative Christian culture.

“You do the arrests so the students see loving, accepting parents,” Randi says.

“My siblings and my parents each take a role in the fight for gay rights,” Jacob stresses. “Whether it is getting arrested in a public demonstration for gay rights, attending a gay rights rally, giving to a gay rights organization, or marching in a gay rights parade, they each do their part. And as a gay person, when society at times makes me feel like a second-class citizen, it is so wonderful to know my family has my back.”

The cinematic climax of For the Bible Tells Me So comes when Randi, Philip, and Jacob visit the conservative organization Focus on the Family, headed by Dr. James Dobson. It promotes a strict message telling parents of gay children not to accept homosexuality. The Reitans wouldn’t stand for such a message they believed was destructive to families. With a heartfelt letter in hand, the three stepped onto the group’s Colorado Springs, Colorado, property, only to be arrested promptly on the charge of trespassing.

Jacob began working in activism while still attending Mankato West High School by starting the first Gay/Straight Alliance at the school. He has expanded his mission from the walls of a small-town high school into cities all over the country by founding the Soulforce Equality Ride. Inspired by the civil rights activism of the Freedom Riders in the 1960s, he launched the bus tour that targets conservative campuses, and attacks ideological barriers through nonviolent demonstrations and dialogues. In its first year, the Ride hit 19 campuses. This year, it took an impressive journey to 32 campuses.

The Reitan family has been all over the map, their schedule this year a whirlwind of promotional appearances taking them to New York, Los Angeles, and the Sundance Film Festival. Most importantly, Randi and Philip have attended screenings of For the Bible Tells Me So in Midwestern cities like Fargo, North Dakota, and Columbus, Ohio, where it enjoyed a special two-night run. One showing alone drew an audience of more than 500 people. Considering that given the opportunity to vote to support gay marriage, a majority of Ohio voters said no, the location seemed ideal. The Reitans believe it’s important to reach those who haven’t heard the message, or choose to spread pervasive ignorance in the name of the Christian faith.

“They’re the ones speaking the untruths,” Randi emphasizes.

“They’re the ones who need to see it,” Philip adds.

After showings, it’s not unusual for audience members to line up waiting to meet the Reitans.

“They were moved to tears, and it was heartwarming to visit with them,” Randi shares. “There was one gay man who wanted to hug me just because I was a mother.”

The Reitans hope to bring the message closer to institutions of faith, where many of the untruths are entrenched. In the six years leading up to the most recent churchwide assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) this summer in Chicago, they fought for measures that would move toward acceptance, including lifting the ban on openly gay clergy and gay marriage. Despite all the hard work, those measures didn’t pass.

“We worked very hard as Lutherans to make a difference,” Randi points out. The Reitans since have left the ELCA—it became too much. Randi wonders, “How can you sing songs of justice as a congregation, and not live them?” But leaving the church shouldn’t be confused with abandoning faith. “My faith has been strengthened by my journey,” Randi states. Randi and Philip visit services and attend church events all over the Twin Cities. “There are many wonderful people who remain in the church,” Philip notes.

Jacob’s Equality Ride is a part of Soulforce, an interfaith organization that incorporates nonviolent resistance in response to religiously based discrimination toward the GLBT community. Equality Ride is run by Soulforce Q, the young adults division of the organization. Soulforce cofounder and president Reverend Dr. Mel White first met the Reitans in 2001 at an ELCA National Assembly in Indianapolis.

“We believe in taking it to the streets,” White relates. “Too often, these churches talk about us like we don’t exist.”

As well as working with Jacob as an activist, White is also his mentor and godfather

“Jake is the future of our movement,” White enthuses. “He’s a symbol of people who refuse to be quiet. He’s a person of faith, and he’s an activist. Jake is unique in that he calls people to faith and justice.”

Jacob, a graduate student at Harvard Divinity School, takes every issue directly to the core audience. When he took on the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy, he brought his Right to Serve campaign to recruitment centers by attempting to enlist as an openly gay man.

As Jacob watched each of his three siblings tie the knot over the past two years, the issue of gay marriage hit home for him and his family. He served as best man for his brothers and man of honor for his sister. His siblings long for the day that Jacob can enjoy the same privileges as they do, and they speak out whenever they can.

“My heart was full of joy watching them marry the person they deeply loved, but I also cried, knowing that my youngest son could not do what they were doing,” Randi reveals. “All people should be able to marry, and share their love.”

“The whole family is passionate about this issue,” White points out.

The option of civil unions instead of civil marriage establishes an unnecessary and inherently unfair distinction, according to Philip: “There’s no reason for it, unless on some level, they’re saying it’s not equal.”

Looking back, Jacob concludes, “I know how lucky I am to have such tremendous support from both my parents and my siblings. Ever since I was a baby, my parents were an advocate for me. They supported me in all I did. They worked to see that my dreams and hopes could be realized. Therefore, it is not surprising that after they came to accept the fact that I was gay, they also become gay rights advocates. When a pastor, a politician, a church, or a community takes an antigay stand, my mom and dad take it personally. Their protective instincts kick in. For my parents, it’s not just an issue—it is their son’s humanity on the line, and for that cause, there is little they would not do.”

As 2007 comes to a close and 2008 approaches, the Reitans look forward to the future with hope. For the Bible Tells Me So will be coming to their former hometown of Mankato, and Randi and Philip will be speaking at a human rights forum in conjunction with the screenings. The invigorating life of activism, faith, and family embraced by the Reitans have made them an unstoppable force in the realm of religion and the world at large.

Hollywood Farm Girl Inspires Me

http://hollywoodfarmgirl.blogspot.com/

It's Been Awhile

Once again, a few months have passed. I will get better at this, I promise. My sister's wedding in September couldn't have gone more beautifully. It was a gorgeous day, with a stunning bride and her handsome groom; as guests we were treated to a wonderful weekend of fun and time spent together. Kjersti and Alex are planning to move to Minnesota from Atlanta sometime in the next 6 months or so. Nothing will make me happier! I'm thrilled that she's found someone who loves and cares for her the way Alex does. And he's scored himself a pretty fantastic bride, too! I moved in October and have been working hard at making my new house a home. This year, I hosted Thanksgiving, with LOTS of help from my Mom, and sister/brother-in-law. We had the privilege of trying a Duval-Arnould tradition - the Onion Thing. It was fabulous! I used a Martha Stewart recipe for the turkey, and I have to say, it was pretty darn good. There were 8 of us total for dinner, and we had a great afternoon and evening. That weekend, we also had some of the cousins over for brunch. Ben and Emily (looking adorably pregnant), Josh and Jen with little Brock (SO cute!!), along with Britta and Jake. It was a yummy brunch, of course peppered with our normal witty banter and political repartee. It's always nice to dine with such intelligent, intuitive (might I say "like-minded") people!
Fast forward to December: I have yet to begin my Christmas shopping. This will change very soon. I was able to get my tree up during Thanksgiving weekend, with the assistance of my very gracious house guests. I had a little party last week, during which I was introduced to my dear friend Stephanie's new "friend" Keith. Listening to him talk was like sitting in a room with Harry Connick Jr. He had that perfect Louisiana drawl. Not the annoying Texas Twang kind, just that little added lilt to certain words. Suffice it to say, he was a hit. Embarrassingly, I had made my own version of Jambalaya as one of my party dishes (it goes like hotcakes at the office food day!), without knowing that I would have a real southerner here to try it. (I'm guessing Zataran's wouldn't cut it in his social circles down south, even though it did have chicken, shrimp and sausage added...lol) I may have altered my choice, had I realized that in advance. Also in attendance were several friends from work, with their kids, and Chere and Nick, and Maury and Dee Ann - my buds from way back in the day. It was really great to see everyone; that's the kind of thing I want to do more of this year.
I'm on my way now to do a little bit of shopping this evening but more updates will follow. If you read this blog from time to time, you're going to see many tidbits that I find here and there online, but I'll always give credit to the authors. Then, there will be the occasional note from me with some recent event in my life. My cats, Zoey and Bella, may also make appearances.

For now, Merry Christmas everyone!
Donna

My Hero, Keith Olbermann - Dated December 6th, 2007

Finally, as promised, a Special Comment about the President’s cataclysmic deception about Iran.
There are few choices more terrifying than the one Mr. Bush has left us with tonight.
We have either a president who is too dishonest to restrain himself from invoking World War Three about Iran at least six weeks after he had to have known that the analogy would be fantastic, irresponsible hyperbole — or we have a president too transcendently stupid not to have asked — at what now appears to have been a series of opportunities to do so — whether the fairy tales he either created or was fed, were still even remotely plausible.
A pathological presidential liar, or an idiot-in-chief. It is the nightmare scenario of political science fiction: A critical juncture in our history and, contained in either answer, a president manifestly unfit to serve, and behind him in the vice presidency: an unapologetic war-monger who has long been seeing a world visible only to himself.
After Ms Perino’s announcement from the White House late last night, the timeline is inescapable and clear now.
In August, the President was told by his hand-picked Major Domo of intelligence, Mike McConnell, a flinty, high-strung-looking, worrying-warrior who will always see more clouds than silver linings, that what “everybody thought” about Iran might be, in essence, crap.
Yet on October 17th the President said of Iran and its president, Ahmadinejad:
“I’ve told people that if you’re interested in avoiding World War III, it seems like you ought to be interested in preventing them from have the knowledge to make a nuclear weapon.”
And as he said that, Mr. Bush knew that at bare minimum there was a strong chance that his rhetoric was nothing more than words with which to scare the Iranians.
Or was it, sir, to scare the Americans?
Does Iran not really fit into the equation here? Have you just scribbled it into the fill-in-the-blank on the same template you used to scare us about Iraq?
In August, any commander-in-chief still able-minded or uncorrupted or both, sir, would have invoked the quality the job most requires: mental flexibility.
A bright man, or an honest man, would have realized no later than the McConnell briefing that the only true danger about Iran was the damage that could be done by an unhinged, irrational Chicken Little of a president, shooting his mouth off, backed up by only his own hysteria and his own delusions of omniscience.
Not Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mr Bush.
The Chicken Little of presidents is the one, sir, that you see in the mirror.
And the mind reels at the thought of a Vice President fully briefed on the revised intel as long as two weeks ago — briefed on the fact that Iran abandoned its pursuit of this imminent threat four years ago — who never bothered to mention it to his boss.
It is nearly forgotten today, but throughout much of Ronald Reagan’s presidency, it was widely believed that he was little more than a front-man for some never-viewed, behind-the-scenes string-puller.
Today, as evidenced by this latest remarkable, historic malfeasance, it is inescapable, that Dick Cheney is either this president’s evil ventriloquist, or he thinks he is.
What servant of any of the 42 previous presidents could possibly withhold information of this urgency and this gravity, and wind up back at his desk the next morning, instead of winding up before a Congressional investigation — or a criminal one?
Mr Bush — if you can still hear us — if you did not previously agree to this scenario in which Dick Cheney is the actual detective and you’re the Remington Steele — you must disenthrall yourself: Mr Cheney has usurped your constitutional powers, cut you out of the information loop, and led you down the path to an unprecedented presidency in which the facts have become optional, the intel is valued less than the hunch, and the assistant runs the store.
The problem is, sir, your assistant is robbing you — and your country — blind.
Not merely in monetary terms, Mr. Bush, but more importantly, robbing you of the traditions and righteousness for which we have stood, at great risk, for centuries: Honesty, Law, Moral Force.
Mr. Cheney has helped, sir, to make your administration into the kind our ancestors saw in the 1860’s and 1870’s and 1880’s — the ones that abandoned Reconstruction, and sent this country marching backwards into the pit of American Apartheid.
Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Cleveland…
Presidents who will be remembered only in a blur of failure, Mr. Bush.
Presidents who will be remembered as functions only of those who opposed them — the opponents whom history proved right.
Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Cleveland… Bush.
Would that we could let this President off the hook by seeing him only as marionette or moron.
But a study of the mutation of his language about Iran proves that though he may not be very good at it, he is, himself, still a manipulative, Machiavellian, snake-oil salesman.
The Bushian etymology was tracked by Dan Froomkin at the Washington Post’s website.
It is staggering.
March 31st: “Iran is trying to develop a nuclear weapon…”
June 5th: Iran’s “pursuit of nuclear weapons…”
June 19th: “consequences to the Iranian government if they continue to pursue a nuclear weapon…”
July 12th: “the same regime in Iran that is pursuing nuclear weapons…”
August 6th: “this is a government that has proclaimed its desire to build a nuclear weapon…”
Notice a pattern?
Trying to develop, build or pursue a nuclear weapon.
Then, sometime between August 6th and August 9th, those terms are suddenly swapped out, so subtly that only in retrospect can we see that somebody has warned the President, not only that he has gone out too far on the limb of terror — but there may not even be a tree there…
McConnell, or someone, must have briefed him then.
August 9th: “They have expressed their desire to be able to enrich uranium, which we believe is a step toward having a nuclear weapons program…”
August 28th: “Iran’s active pursuit of technology that could lead to nuclear weapons…”
October 4th: “you should not have the know-how on how to make a (nuclear) weapon…”
October 17th: “until they suspend and/or make it clear that they, that their statements aren’t real, yeah, I believe they want to have the capacity, the knowledge, in order to make a nuclear weapon.”
Before August 9th, it’s: “Trying to develop, build or pursue a nuclear weapon.”
After August 9th, it’s: “Desire, pursuit, want… knowledge, technology, know-how to enrich uranium.”
And we are to believe, Mr. Bush, that the National Intelligence Estimate this week talks of the Iranians suspending their nuclear weapons program in 2003…And you talked of the Iranians suspending their nuclear weapons program on October 17th…
And that term suspending is just a coincidence?
And we are to believe, Mr. Bush, that nobody told you any of this until last week?
Your insistence that you were not briefed on the NIE until last week might be legally true — something like “what the definition of ‘is’ is” — but with the subject matter being not interns but the threat of nuclear war.
Legally, it might save you from some war crimes trial… but ethically, it is a lie.
It is indefensible.
You have been yelling threats into a phone for nearly four months, after the guy on the other end had already hung up.
You, Mr. Bush, are a bald-faced liar.
And more over, you must have realized that John Bolton, and Norman Podhoretz, and the Wall Street Journal Editorial board, are also bald-faced liars.
We are to believe that the Intel Community, or maybe the State Department, cooked the raw intelligence about Iran, falsely diminished the Iranian nuclear threat, to make you look bad?
And you proceeded to let them make you look bad?
You not only knew all of this about Iran, in early August, but you also knew it was all accurate.
And instead of sharing this good news with the people you have obviously forgotten you represent, you merely fine-tuned your terrorizing of those people, to legally cover your own backside, while you filled the factual gap with sadistic visions of — as you phrased it on August 28th: a quote “nuclear holocaust” — and, as you phrased it on October 17th, quote: “World War III.”
My comments, Mr. Bush, are often dismissed as simple repetitions of the phrase “George Bush has no business being president.”
Well, guess what?
Tonight: hanged by your own words and convicted by your own deliberate lies…
You, sir, have no business being president.
Good night, and good luck.

I couldn't have said it better myself...

http://janedevin.com/2007/09/28/rosie-music-controversy-and-celebrity-detox/

Letter to the Editor, in the Lafayette Journal and Courier; Published May 13, 2007:

"To the extent that our Founding Fathers had any religious affiliation at all, it was a tepid embracing of the philosophy of deism, a popular system of thought at the time. Jefferson, Franklin, Paine, among many others, held deist, rather than Christian, religious beliefs.

The two documents upon which our country was actually founded -- i.e., the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States -- contain not a word about Christianity, Christian principles, the Bible or Jesus Christ. Neither is there any mention of the Ten Commandments, heaven, prayer or being saved.

In 1797, the Treaty of Tripoli, negotiated by none other than George Washington, declared that "the government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion." Congress unanimously approved the text of this treaty, and John Adams signed it.

Mandatory church affiliation, among other factors, led to the establishment of the term a "wall of separation between church and state," allowing, at each citizen's discretion, freedom of religion or freedom from religion.

The phrase "under God" was added to the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954, and our national motto became "In God We Trust" in 1956 in response to USSRs' so-called "godless Communists." It is historically incorrect to claim that America was founded upon Christianity.

Indeed, it was quite the opposite.

Randall S. Smith
Rossville, Indiana "

Happy Happy Joy Joy

My family has had much to celebrate recently. We've had a barrage of weddings! Three of my cousins have been married within the past two years. Ben married Emily in San Diego in April of 2006. Then Josh married Jen in September of the same year. Britta was soon to follow, with her June wedding in 2007 to Matt. Josh and Jen became the first to make Mama and Papa Reitan grandparents, with the birth of Brock Philip Reitan on August 9th, 2007. He's gorgeous! Now, our pulses barely have time to get back to normal...and it's time for my baby sister Kjersti to get married. Her big day is on September 1st, so we are 10 days out and counting! As the Old Maid of Honor, I have lots to prepare and I hope that everything goes swimmingly. Since Kjersti and Alex live in Atlanta, we'll be truly making a wedding weekend of it. We will have her Bridal Shower on Thursday night. The preparations and rehearsal dinner are on for Friday night. And the big wedding is on Saturday morning with a brunch reception. Kjersti, being of brave mind and soul (Alex being similarly minded and "souled"), has planned an outdoor ceremony and brunch. We've had lots and lots of rain recently, which will hopefully make up for the drought we experienced earlier in the summer. We may have vast rolling hills of green as a backdrop yet...just like she's dreamed of. Selfishly, I'm hoping for cool weather. All my life, I've been a "melty-facer". Anything over about 70 degrees, and I need a fan and a towel. (It made for some really fun high school dances, trust me.) We've got wedding "hair and makeup" scheduled for 7:00 am and our photo shoot precedes the ceremony. We should be able to get lots of great portraits done before the wedding at 10:30. Baby Brock will be in high demand, which may come as a nice break for 1st time parents Josh and Jen. Mom has been in overdrive since right around December (when the engagement was announced). She is doing everything in her power to make this the day Kjersti will remember forever. I just want her to be able to remember it forever without having to see me dripping with sweat. I'll try to post the developments as they unfold.

My Hero, Keith Olbermann (Dated July 19th, 2007)

Good evening from Los Angeles.
And we begin with a Special Comment, on this day’s ominous, almost indescribable events.
It is one of the great, dark, evil lessons, of history.
A country — a government — a military machine — can screw up a war seven-ways-to-Sunday… it can get thousands of its people killed… it can risk the safety of its citizens… it can destroy the fabric of its nation.
But as long as it can identify a scapegoat, it can regain… or even gain power.
The Bush Administration has, tonight, opened this Pandora’s Box, about Iraq.
It has found its scapegoats — Hillary Clinton — and us.
The lies and terror-tactics with which it deluded this country into war — they had nothing to do with the abomination that Iraq has become — it isn’t Mr. Bush’s fault.
The selection of the wrong war, in the wrong time, in the wrong place — the most disastrous a geo-political tactic since Austria-Hungary attacked Serbia in 1914 and destroyed itself in the process — that had nothing to do with the overwhelming crisis Iraq has become — it isn’t Mr. Bush’s fault.
The criminal lack of planning for the war — the total “jump-off-a-bridge-and-hope-you-can-fly” tone to the failure to anticipate what would follow the deposing of Saddam Hussein — that had nothing to do with the chaos in which Iraq has been enveloped — it isn’t Mr. Bush’s fault.
The utter, blinkered idiocy of “staying the course” — of sending Americans to Iraq, and sending them a second time, and a third, and a fourth, until they get killed or maimed — the utter de-prioritization of human life, simply so a politician can avoid having to admit a mistake — that had nothing to do with the tens of thousand individual tragedies darkening the lives of American families, forever — it isn’t Mr. Bush’s fault.
The continuing, relentless, remorseless, corrupt and cynical insistence that this conflict somehow is defeating, or containing, or just engaging the people who attacked us on 9/11 — the total “Alice Through The Looking Glass” quality that ignores that in Iraq, we have made the world safer for Al-Qaeda — it isn’t Mr. Bush’s fault!
The fault, brought down — as if a sermon from this mount of hypocrisy and slaughter, by a nearly anonymous Under-Secretary of Defense — the fault has tonight been laid on the doorstep of Senator Hillary Clinton and, by extension, at the doorstep of every American — the now vast majority of us — who have dared to criticize this war, or protest it, or merely ask questions about it, or simply, plaintively, innocently, honestly, plead, “don’t take my son; don’t take my daughter.”
Senator Clinton has been sent — and someone has leaked to the Associated Press — a letter, sent in reply to hers, asking if there exists, an actual plan for evacuating U.S. troops from Iraq.
This extraordinary document was written by an Under-Secretary of Defense named Eric Edelman.
“Premature and public discussion of the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq,” Edelman writes, “reinforces enemy propaganda that the United States will abandon its allies in Iraq, much as we are perceived to have done in Vietnam, Lebanon and Somalia.” Edelman adds: “such talk understandably unnerves the very same Iraqi allies we are asking to assume enormous personal risks.”
A spokesman for the senator says Mr. Edelman’s remarks are “at once both outrageous and dangerous” and those terms are entirely appropriate and may in fact understate the risk the Edelman letter poses to our way of life, and all that our fighting men and women are risking, have risked, and have lost, in Iraq.
After the South was defeated in our Civil War, the scapegoat was Confederate President Jefferson Davis, and the ideas of the “Lost Cause” and “Jim Crow” were born.
After the French were beaten by the Prussians in 1870 and 1871 — it was the imaginary “Jewish influence” in the French Army General Staff, and there was born 30 years of self-destructive anti-Semitism, culminating in the horrific Dreyfus case.
After the Germans lost the First World War, it was the “back-stabbers and profiteers” at home, on whose lives the National Socialists rose to prominence in the succeeding decades, and whose accused membership eventually wound up in torture chambers and death camps.
And after the generation before ours, and leaders of both political parties, escalated and re-escalated, and carpet bombed and re-carpet bombed, Vietnam, it was the protest movement and Jane Fonda and as late as just three years ago Senator John Kerry, who were assigned the kind of blame with which no rational human being could concur, and yet which still, across vast sections of our political landscape, resonates, unchallenged, and accepted.
And now Mr. Bush, you have picked out your own Jefferson Davis, your own Dreyfus, your own “profiteer” — your own scapegoat.
Not for the sake of this country…
Not for the sake of Iraq…
Not even for the sake of your own political party…
But for the sake of your own personal place in history.
But in reaching for that place, you have guaranteed yourself tonight, not honor, but infamy.
In fact, you have condemned yourself to a place among that remarkably small group of Americans whom Americans cannot forgive. Those who have sold this country out, and who have willingly declared their enmity to the people at whose pleasure they supposedly serve.
A scapegoat, sir, might be forgivable, if you hadn’t just happened to choose a prospective presidential nominee of the opposition party. And the accusation of spreading “enemy propaganda that the United States will abandon its allies in Iraq, much as we are perceived to have done in Vietnam, Lebanon and Somalia,” might be some day atoned for, if we all didn’t know — you included, and your generals, and the Iraqis — that we are leaving Iraq, and sooner rather than later — and we are doing it, even if to do so requires first, that you must be impeached and removed as President of the United States, sooner, rather than later.
You have set this government at war against its own people, and then blamed those very people when they say, “enough.”
And thus it crystallizes, Mr. Bush.
When Civil War General Ambrose Burnside ordered a disastrous attack on Fredericksburg in which 12,000 of his men were killed, he had to be physically restrained from leading the next charge himself.
After the First Lord of the British Admiralty, Winston Churchill, authored and enabled the disastrous Gallipoli campaign that saw a quarter million Allied Soldiers cut down in the First World War, Churchill resigned his office and took a commisson as a front-line officer in the trenches of France.
Those are your new role models, Mr. Bush.
Let your minions try to spread the blame to the real patriots here, who have sought only to undo the horrors you have wrought since 2002.
Let them try it, until the end of time.
Though the words might be erased from a million books and a billion memories, though the world be covered knee-deep in your lies, the truth shall prevail.
This, sir, is your war.
Senator Clinton has reinforced enemy propaganda? Made it impossible for you to get your ego-driven, blood-steeped win in Iraq?
Then take it into your own hands, Mr. Bush.
Go to Baghdad now and fulfill, finally, your military service obligations.
Go there and fight, your war…yourself.

My Hero, Keith Olbermann (Dated July 3rd, 2007)

Finally tonight, as promised, a Special Comment on what is, in everything but name, George Bush’s pardon of Scooter Libby.
“I didn’t vote for him,” an American once said, “But he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”
That — on this eve of the 4th of July — is the essence of this democracy, in seventeen words.
And that is what President Bush threw away yesterday in commuting the sentence of Lewis “Scooter” Libby.
The man who said those seventeen words — improbably enough — was the actor John Wayne.
And Wayne, an ultra-conservative, said them, when he learned of the hair’s-breadth election of John F. Kennedy instead of his personal favorite, Richard Nixon in 1960.
“I didn’t vote for him but he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”
The sentiment was doubtlessly expressed earlier. But there is something especially appropriate about hearing it, now, in Wayne’s voice.
The crisp matter-of-fact acknowledgement that we have survived, even though for nearly two centuries now, our Commander-in-Chief has also served, simultaneously, as the head of one political party and often the scourge of all others.
We as citizens must, at some point, ignore a president’s partisanship. Not that we may “prosper” as a nation, not that we may “achieve”, not that we may “lead the world” — but merely that we may “function.”
But just as essential to the seventeen words of John Wayne is an implicit trust — a sacred trust:That the president for whom so many did not vote, can in turn suspend his political self long enough, and for matters imperative enough, to conduct himself solely for the benefit of the entire Republic.
Our generation’s willingness to state “we didn’t vote for him, but he’s our president, and we hope he does a good job,” was tested in the crucible of history, and far earlier than most. And in circumstances more tragic and threatening.
And we did that with which history tasked us.
We enveloped “our” President in 2001.
And those who did not believe he should have been elected — indeed, those who did not believe he had been elected — willingly lowered their voices and assented to the sacred oath of non-partisanship.
And George W. Bush took our assent, and re-configured it, and honed it, and sharpened it to a razor-sharp point, and stabbed this nation in the back with it.
Were there any remaining lingering doubt otherwise, or any remaining lingering hope, it ended yesterday when Mr. Bush commuted the prison sentence of one of his own staffers.
Did so even before the appeals process was complete…
Did so without as much as a courtesy consultation with the Department of Justice…
Did so despite what James Madison –at the Constitutional Convention — said about impeaching any president who pardoned or sheltered those who had committed crimes “advised by” that president…
Did so without the slightest concern that even the most detached of citizens must look at the chain of events and wonder:
To what degree was Mr. Libby told: break the law however you wish — the President will keep you out of prison?
In that moment, Mr. Bush, you broke that fundamental compact between yourself and the majority of this nation’s citizens — the ones who did not cast votes for you.
In that moment, Mr. Bush, you ceased to be the President of the United States.
In that moment, Mr. Bush, you became merely the President… of a rabid and irresponsible corner of the Republican Party.
And this is too important a time, sir, to have a Commander-in-Chief who puts party over nation.
This has been, of course, the gathering legacy of this Administration. Few of its decisions have escaped the stain of politics.
The extraordinary Karl Rove has spoken of “a permanent Republican majority,” as if such a thing — or a permanent Democratic majority — is not antithetical to that upon which rests: our country, our history, our revolution, our freedoms.
Yet our democracy has survived shrewder men than Karl Rove.
And it has survived the frequent stain of politics upon the fabric of government.
But this administration, with ever-increasing insistence and almost theocratic zealotry, has turned that stain… into a massive oil spill.
The protection of the environment is turned over to those of one political party, who will financially benefit from the rape of the environment.
The protections of the Constitution are turned over to those of one political party, who believe those protections unnecessary and extravagant and “quaint.”
The enforcement of the laws is turned over to those of one political party, who will swear beforehand that they will not enforce those laws.
The choice between war and peace is turned over to those of one political party, who stand to gain vast wealth by ensuring that there is never peace, but only war.
And now, when just one cooked book gets corrected by an honest auditor…
When just one trampling of the inherent and inviolable “fairness” of government is rejected by an impartial judge…
When just one wild-eyed partisan is stopped by the figure of blind justice…
This President decides that he, and not the law, must prevail.
I accuse you, Mr. Bush, of lying this country into war.
I accuse you of fabricating in the minds of your own people, a false implied link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11.
I accuse you of firing the generals who told you that the plans for Iraq were disastrously insufficient.
I accuse you of causing in Iraq the needless deaths of 3,586 of our brothers and sons, and sisters and daughters, and friends and neighbors.
I accuse you of subverting the Constitution, not in some misguided but sincerely-motivated struggle to combat terrorists, but instead to stifle dissent.
I accuse you of fomenting fear among your own people, of creating the very terror you claim to have fought.
I accuse you of exploiting that unreasoning fear, the natural fear of your own people who just want to live their lives in peace, as a political tool to slander your critics and libel your opponents.
I accuse you of handing part of this republic over to a Vice President who is without conscience, and letting him run roughshod over it.
And I accuse you now, Mr. Bush, of giving, through that Vice President, carte blanche to Mr. Libby, to help defame Ambassador Joseph Wilson by any means necessary, to lie to Grand Juries and Special Counsel and before a court, in order to protect the mechanisms and particulars of that defamation, with your guarantee that Libby would never see prison, and, in so doing, as Ambassador Wilson himself phrased it here last night, of you becoming an accessory to the obstruction of justice.
When President Nixon ordered the firing of the Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox during the infamous “Saturday Night Massacre” on October 20th, 1973, Mr. Cox initially responded tersely, and ominously:
“Whether ours shall be a government of laws and not of men, is now for Congress, and ultimately, the American people.”
President Nixon did not understand how he had crystallized the issue of Watergate for the American people.
It had been about the obscure meaning behind an attempt to break in to a rival party’s headquarters; and the labyrinthine effort to cover-up that break-in and the related crimes.
But in one night, Nixon transformed it.
Watergate — instantaneously — became a simpler issue: a President overruling the inexorable march of the law. Of insisting — in a way that resonated viscerally with millions who had not previously understood — that he was the law.
Not the Constitution.
Not the Congress.
Not the Courts.
Just him.
Just - Mr. Bush - as you did, yesterday.
The twists and turns of Plame-Gate, your precise and intricate lies that sent us into this bottomless pit of Iraq; your lies upon the lies to discredit Joe Wilson; your lies upon the lies upon the lies to throw the sand at the “referee” of Prosecutor Fitzgerald’s analogy… these are complex and often painful to follow, and too much, perhaps, for the average citizen.
But when other citizens render a verdict against your man, Mr. Bush — and then you spit in the faces of those jurors and that judge and the judges who were yet to hear the appeal — the average citizen understands that, sir.
It’s the fixed ballgame and the rigged casino and the pre-arranged lottery all rolled into one — and it stinks. And they know it.
Nixon’s mistake, the last and most fatal of them, the firing of Archibald Cox, was enough to cost him the presidency.
And in the end, even Richard Nixon could say he could not put this nation through an impeachment.
It was far too late for it to matter then, but as the decades unfold, that single final gesture of non-partisanship, of acknowledged responsibility not to self, not to party, not to “base,” but to country, echoes loudly into history.
Even Richard Nixon knew it was time to resign
Would that you could say that, Mr. Bush.
And that you could say it for Mr. Cheney.
You both crossed the Rubicon yesterday.
Which one of you chose the route, no longer matters.
Which is the ventriloquist, and which the dummy, is irrelevant.
But that you have twisted the machinery of government into nothing more than a tawdry machine of politics, is the only fact that remains relevant.
It is nearly July 4th, Mr. Bush, the commemoration of the moment we Americans decided that rather than live under a King who made up the laws, or erased them, or ignored them — or commuted the sentences of those rightly convicted under them — we would force our independence, and regain our sacred freedoms.
We of this time — and our leaders in Congress, of both parties — must now live up to those standards which echo through our history:
Pressure, negotiate, impeach — get you, Mr. Bush, and Mr. Cheney, two men who are now perilous to our Democracy, away from its helm.
And for you, Mr. Bush, and for Mr. Cheney, there is a lesser task.
You need merely achieve a very low threshold indeed.
Display just that iota of patriotism which Richard Nixon showed, on August 9th, 1974.
Resign.
And give us someone — anyone – about whom all of us might yet be able to quote John Wayne, and say, “I didn’t vote for him, but he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”
Good night, and good luck.

My Hero, Keith Olbermann (Dated Wednesday, May 23rd, 2007)

This is, in fact, a comment about… betrayal.
Few men or women elected in our history-whether executive or legislative, state or national-have been sent into office with a mandate more obvious, nor instructions more clear: Get us out of Iraq.
Yet after six months of preparation and execution-half a year gathering the strands of public support; translating into action, the collective will of the nearly 70 percent of Americans who reject this War of Lies, the Democrats have managed only this:
* The Democratic leadership has surrendered to a president-if not the worst president, then easily the most selfish, in our history-who happily blackmails his own people, and uses his own military personnel as hostages to his asinine demand, that the Democrats "give the troops their money";
* The Democratic leadership has agreed to finance the deaths of Americans in a war that has only reduced the security of Americans;
* The Democratic leadership has given Mr. Bush all that he wanted, with the only caveat being, not merely meaningless symbolism about benchmarks for the Iraqi government, but optional meaningless symbolism about benchmarks for the Iraqi government.
* The Democratic leadership has, in sum, claimed a compromise with the Administration, in which the only things truly compromised, are the trust of the voters, the ethics of the Democrats, and the lives of our brave, and doomed, friends, and family, in Iraq.
You, the men and women elected with the simplest of directions-Stop The War-have traded your strength, your bargaining position, and the uniform support of those who elected you… for a handful of magic beans.
You may trot out every political cliché from the soft-soap, inside-the-beltway dictionary of boilerplate sound bites, about how this is the "beginning of the end" of Mr. Bush's "carte blanche" in Iraq, about how this is a "first step."Well, Senator Reid, the only end at its beginning… is our collective hope that you and your colleagues would do what is right, what is essential, what you were each elected and re-elected to do.
Because this "first step"… is a step right off a cliff.
And this President!
How shameful it would be to watch an adult hold his breath, and threaten to continue to do so, until he turned blue.
But how horrifying it is to watch a President hold his breath and threaten to continue to do so, until innocent and patriotic Americans in harm's way, are bled white.
You lead this country, sir?
You claim to defend it?
And yet when faced with the prospect of someone calling you on your stubbornness–your stubbornness which has cost 3,431 Americans their lives and thousands more their limbs–you, Mr. Bush, imply that if the Democrats don't give you the money and give it to you entirely on your terms, the troops in Iraq will be stranded, or forced to serve longer, or have to throw bullets at the enemy with their bare hands.
How transcendentally, how historically, pathetic.
Any other president from any other moment in the panorama of our history would have, at the outset of this tawdry game of political chicken, declared that no matter what the other political side did, he would insure personally-first, last and always-that the troops would not suffer.
A President, Mr. Bush, uses the carte blanche he has already, not to manipulate an overlap of arriving and departing brigades into a ‘second surge,' but to say in unequivocal terms that if it takes every last dime of the monies already allocated, if it takes reneging on government contracts with Halliburton, he will make sure the troops are safe-even if the only safety to be found, is in getting them the hell out of there.
Well, any true President would have done that, sir.
You instead, used our troops as political pawns, then blamed the Democrats when you did so.
Not that these Democrats, who had this country's support and sympathy up until 48 hours ago, have not since earned all the blame they can carry home.
"We seem to be very near the bleak choice between war and shame," Winston Churchill wrote to Lord Moyne in the days after the British signed the Munich accords with Germany in 1938. "My feeling is that we shall choose shame, and then have war thrown in, a little later…"
That's what this is for the Democrats, isn't it?
Their "Neville Chamberlain moment" before the Second World War. All that's missing is the landing at the airport, with the blinkered leader waving a piece of paper which he naively thought would guarantee "peace in our time," but which his opponent would ignore with deceit.
The Democrats have merely streamlined the process.
Their piece of paper already says Mr. Bush can ignore it, with impugnity.
And where are the Democratic presidential hopefuls this evening? See they not, that to which the Senate and House leadership has blinded itself?
Judging these candidates based on how they voted on the original Iraq authorization, or waiting for apologies for those votes, is ancient history now.
The Democratic nomination is likely to be decided… tomorrow.
The talk of practical politics, the buying into of the President's dishonest construction "fund-the-troops-or-they-will-be-in-jeopardy," the promise of tougher action in September, is falling not on deaf ears, but rather falling on Americans who already told you what to do, and now perceive your ears as closed to practical politics.
Those who seek the Democratic nomination need to-for their own political futures and, with a thousand times more solemnity and importance, for the individual futures of our troops-denounce this betrayal, vote against it, and, if need be, unseat Majority Leader Reid and Speaker Pelosi if they continue down this path of guilty, fatal acquiescence to the tragically misguided will of a monomaniacal president.
For, ultimately, at this hour, the entire government has failed us.
* Mr. Reid, Mr. Hoyer, and the other Democrats… have failed us. They negotiated away that which they did not own, but had only been entrusted by us to protect: our collective will as the citizens of this country, that this brazen War of Lies be ended as rapidly and safely as possible.
* Mr. Bush and his government… have failed us. They have behaved venomously and without dignity-of course.That is all at which Mr. Bush is gifted.
We are the ones providing any element of surprise or shock here.
With the exception of Senator Dodd and Senator Edwards, the Democratic presidential candidates have (so far at least) failed us.
They must now speak, and make plain how they view what has been given away to Mr. Bush, and what is yet to be given away tomorrow, and in the thousand tomorrows to come.
Because for the next fourteen months, the Democratic nominating process–indeed the whole of our political discourse until further notice–has, with the stroke of a cursed pen, become about one thing, and one thing alone.The electorate figured this out, six months ago.
The President and the Republicans have not-doubtless will not.
The Democrats will figure it out, during the Memorial Day recess, when they go home and many of those who elected them will politely suggest they stay there-and permanently.
Because, on the subject of Iraq the people have been ahead of the media….
Ahead of the government…
Ahead of the politicians…
For the last year, or two years, or maybe three.
Our politics… is now about the answer to one briefly-worded question.
Mr. Bush has failed.
Mr. Warner has failed.
Mr. Reid has failed.
So. Who among us will stop this war-this War of Lies? To he or she, fall the figurative keys to the nation.
To all the others-presidents and majority leaders and candidates and rank-and-file Congressmen and Senators of either party-there is only blame… for this shameful, and bi-partisan, betrayal.

Belated Introduction

This is going to be sort of a mix of things which are important to me. Some of it will be political. Some of it will be personal. All of it will be taken from the context of my perspective on things both local and global. Me, a 38-year-old unmarried-but-in-a-committed-relationship caucasion (Norwegian) Minnesotan gal who comes from a great and diverse (well, okay, in Minnesota, our version of diverse is that we have a couple of red-heads in the family, mixed in with the blondes and the sandy blondes - - which just makes them easier to find at the Lutheran pot-luck dinner) family. Diversity applies to us in some ways, though. We count Artists and Teachers and Sculptors and Communications Directors and Human Rights Advocates and Stockbrokers and Architects and Builders and Public Policy Makers and Mechanics and Lawyers among our family. Oh, and we can't forget our token gay male (my cousin, Jake). He's amazing, and his calling in life has been to open up minds and hearts with dialogue and persistence. So, on that platform, we all unite. It seems odd to say that, I guess. To me, and to us as a family, it seems like there could be no alternative, no "other side" to the story. Why would there be anything other than acceptance of a person based on who they were born to be? But, alas, there are people in this great world of ours who don't see things the Klefstad way. Too bad, really, for them. Think of all of the people they just completely miss out on knowing. All of the experiences they never have. All of the growing they never do. All the light they never see.

So, I started thinking about "blogging" after following Rosie O'Donnell on her wild ride this year. We are all well aware of Rosie O'Donnell's ability to hold her own in a verbal sparring match. She certainly doesn't feel the need to back down when confronted. I respect her for not being afraid to speak her mind on any topic. What really pisses me off is the overblown media reactions to her comments - - any comment she makes, at any time, in any context is guaranteed to be edited, misinterpreted, and applied in whatever way will make the biggest "boom".

One example involves a recent post on Rosie's blog. Apparently, she and Kelli were confronted by a not-so-nice motorcyclist while out in South Beach. Sites that call themselves "news sources" displayed headlines such as: "Rosie O'Donnell throws down with a biker" and "Rosie O'Donnell stands up to hostile biker." Based on these headlines, I knew I had to read her version of the story to know what really happened.

What I read on Rosie's blog was a story of bigotry and Rosie's (fill in the blank: appropriate, poetic, perfect) response. Seems the biker-boy was a tad bit concerned about the proximity of the O'Donnell's vehicle to his precious hog. Rosie had made certain to avoid said hog by assisting Kelli in backing out of their parking spot. Bald biker-man apparently saw only a lesbian woman and her car near his beloved bike and blew a gasket. Insults were hurled by cycle dude and Rosie delivered a parting shot as she and Kelli drove off into the sunset.

Here is her post about this event:

tonight dinner in so beach a very gay city kel and i in r pt cruiser - top down
we had just finished eating about to head home 2 2 many people when
along came a bald screaming infuriated man it’s always a man i tell ya
i stood next to his hog when kel backed out so as not to hit it - i ride
as i buckled my belt he ran towards r car angry“MY MOTORCYCLE BLAH BLAH !!!”
“chill dude -we didn’t touch it” his eyes were wild stretched open wide
he got madder pupils big - snorting like a dragon FUCKING LESBIANS he screamed
the trump card always
and we r supposed to cower to fall 2 r knees ashamed not good enough unworthy
not tonight mr bald muscle man with a pimped out hog not tonight
i stood up in the front seat hands above my head smiled and yelled CORRECT SIR - FUCKING LESBIAN!!!
he stormed back to his table right there in the lincoln mall
sun is setting it is beautiful here in miami dolphins and dreams
peace out

Even when Rosie's actions are in response to whatever vileness was directed at her, there are some in the media who automatically make her out to be the loud-mouthed, off-center one. (Look, it's an out of control lesbian!) Based on what happened, I would have preferred headlines that read something like this:"Rosie and Kelli accosted by bigoted biker" or "Biased biker screams his bald head off at Rosie and Kelli."

These so-called "news stories" should have focused on the newsworthy element of the reported event; the intolerance displayed by the biker's callous disrespect for a fellow human being.

My very first blog...awww, how cute.

I support Rosie 100%. She has done more to bring the truth to light than ANYONE else has since this ILLEGAL war started. People who never thought twice or paid attention to politics have been shaken awake by her words. I honor and respect her truth, and I admire her strength and tenacity with regard to everything going on in Iraq. She supports our troops (as we all do), she loves our country for all that it is (more than any Bushie-clone-drones could ever understand). She simply (and rightfully) hates this criminal administration. And to deal with Elisabeth daily, whose attitude seems to be "the more lip gloss I can smear on, the more credible I become", would be a challenge for anyone. Tougher still when you're as great a woman as Rosie is, and you've become friends with EH on a personal level, outside of the political differences they obviously have. I personally wouldn't have given EH the time of day based on what I'd seen of her on TV. But Rosie did, and she cares about EH - to the extent that she simply can't reconcile the caring crafty family oriented EH with the idiot Bush-supporting-at-any-cost EH we see on the show every day. And what thanks does she get for that? That smug little lip glossed face saying "I AM NOT A COWARD". Whatever, Elisabeth. She didn't call you a coward, she said the act of not defending her was cowardly. And, there's no denying it...YES, it was. OBVIOUSLY, SHE DOES NOT THINK OUR TROOPS ARE TERRORISTS. Just like Rosie said, it's a YES or a NO question. Even EH's 2-year old daughter Grace could have understood the request - but Elisabeth chose not to. She gets to own that choice. I hope she's happy.