This new movie is a "Must See".  If you haven't yet seen it, you really, really should ...

 "Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker Kirby Dick sets out to expose the hypocrisy of gay politicians who passionately criticize the LGBT community in public while concealing their own sexual orientation. In addition to exposing the secret lives of powerful policymakers -- and the damage they've inflicted on LGBT Americans -- this documentary also takes a critical look at the media's involvement in keeping homophobic politicians closeted."

Yes, it's currently available from Netflix.

Take a CLOSE look at the chart above.  Notice how closely the lowest income levels and highest income levels in the 1920's compare to right now? Get the picture?

In this Seeking Alpha article, the writer points to troubling parallels between today and events leading up to The Great Depression:

What a time to be an oligarch! All I wanted to do was vomit when I saw this.

Folks, there is no way we can have economic prosperity in this country when the top 1% has all of the money. The middle class is basically being destroyed right in front of our very eyes. Consumption economies die when the consumers have no money to consume! ...

I see growing signs of desperation and anger as the wealth of this nation continues to get transferred to the elite of this nation.

People are starting to "lose" it as a result. This past week's airplane event in Austin was a disturbing development. I must admit that I really am not surprised. The government shouldn't be either. ...

We are now three years into this crisis and nothing the government has tried has worked. The market may have recovered (for now) but THE PEOPLE haven't. How much pain do these people in Washington think we can take before we start rising up and begin hanging bankers from the lamp posts?

Read the entire Seeking Alpha article here. 

This from the community where I grew up.

Now you know the basis for my twisted sense of humor:

Winter storm causes rule changes at local supermarket

Little blue-haired ladies are apparently at it again:

5,000 'overtly sexual' iPhone apps purged

Today, a friend forwarded one of those anti-Muslim e-mail messages which seem so ubiquitous on the Internet these days. This one featured photos of militant Muslims parading in London, and ended with this question:

"Can you imagine having a Christian demonstration against Islam in downtown Baghdad?"

Well no, of course I can't, for the simple reason that public demonstrations of all kinds are usually outlawed in Baghdad.  How very fortunate we are here in the United States (and also in the U.K.) that we're allowed to express our opinions in such a public way.

But I'm neither so arrogant nor naive to think for a moment that down through history and even in recent memory Christians have not done far worse in the name of a religion I share.

Fact is, while we Christians may claim to abhor violence, we're hardly in any position to ever condemn other religions for strong demonstrations of intolerance and terrorism.

For example:

• The Crusades, between 1095 and 1291
• The St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre in 1572
• The Sons of Freedom in Canada
• The religious conflicts in Northern Ireland
• The Iron Guard in Romania
• Russian National Unity
• The Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda
• Guardians of the Cedars in Lebanon
• The Tsar Lazar Guard in Serbia
• The Ku Klux Klan in the United States
• The Army of God and other anti-abortion groups in the United States
• Aryan Nations in the United States
• ... and many others

... have all committed horrendous acts of terrorism and atrocity in the name of Christianity.

All of which, as a Christian myself, I find not just acutely embarrassing, but as anti-Christian as I can possibly imagine.
  
For further thought-provoking information, see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_terrorism

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_and_violence

"I have a new term for those on the fringes of the religious right who have used the Gospels to perpetuate their own aspirations for power, control and oppression: Christianists. They are as anathema to true Christians as the Islamists are to true Islam." ~ Andrew Sullivan, 2003

This is one of the reasons I really like living in Arlington, Virginia:

P.S. ... I've seen snow plows on my residential street four times today.
It's now down to bare concrete.

Every time one mentions killing that horrendous "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy in the presence of a bigot, the first words out of his mouth are usually something like "But it will kill morale".

As one who has proudly served in the United States Army, I'm here to tell you that's simple bullshit.

Just as it has in the military units of most of our allies, ending this discriminatory policy will NOT cause problems within the ranks.  History proves that it never does.

Let's be realistic here:  Your average military man doesn't give a damn about the sexual orientation of his comrades. Like every other guy, he's usually primarily interested in only three things:  Doing his job well, getting his next paycheck, and oh by the way, staying alive.  He follows orders.  All of them.  To the letter.  Because that's what he agreed to do when he signed up.  Name of the game.

And if one of those orders includes ignoring the sexual orientation of other guys in his unit, he will.

Military men bitch.  All the time.  About everything from the food at lunch to lumpy bunks.  But when it comes to working with other guys in their unit, they realize that each one, gay or straight, is an essentially vital part of their own effectiveness (and sometimes of their very survival).  Yes, they might tease other guys they perceive as being somewhat less than testosterone-drenched he-men, same as anywhere else men get together.  But that locker-room ribbing is typically just harmless fun, and never meant to hurt anybody.

Ever known an effeminate man?  I have ... straight ones at that.  And they're in the military too - straight ones and gay ones.  But just as obviously gay men did in my own unit, most live and work with their co-workers just fine.

It all comes down to this:  Should Obama and Congress correctly and appropriately declare "Don't Ask ..." dead, our United States military forces will simply follow orders.  As they always do.  And they will get on with business just as they always have.

Yesterday, Danny Ingram, President of AVER - American Veterans for Equal Rights faxed a Statement for the Record to the Senate Armed Services Committee to be included in testimony calling for the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell.  In this excerpt from his fax, Ingram sums things up well:

... Virtually every nation with which the United States now ally ourselves in the "free world" has dropped its ban on openly gay and lesbian service members with no detrimental effect to the unit cohesion necessary to military success.  These countries include Australia, Austria, the Bahamas, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and Great Britain, which is not only our closest and most faithful ally with whom we are currently engaged in a joint combat operation in Afghanistan, but the nation which shares the most similar cultural roots with the United States and has a military that is all volunteer, tactically superior, and battle-tested.

Of all the nations that no longer discriminate against gay and lesbian soldiers, the British military command fought longest and hardest against lifting their ban on openly gay service members.  The legendary image of the celebrated British military was at stake.

The British Ministry of Defense commissioned a detailed assessment on the effects of allowing gay troops to serve openly, and despite the overwhelming evidence from other countries that openly gay service had not undermined performance, the commission concluded that the ban should be retained because surveys of British military personnel indicated that the majority of troops preferred not to serve with openly gay people.  Many of those surveyed said they would refuse to work with gay soldiers or obey commands given by a gay officer.

When the European Court of Human Rights forced the British military to remove its ban in 1999, the Ministry of Defense begrudgingly gave in and removed the ban with the expectation of mass desertions and the degradation of centuries of illustrious British military tradition.

Nothing happened.  The British military experienced exactly the same result as every other military that had lifted its ban on openly gay military service members:  no effect on morale, no disruption of unit cohesion, no damage to military effectiveness.  Nothing.

Supporters of DADT claim that foreign militaries have easily accepted openly gay service members because they are somehow different from the American military.  These critics claim that foreign soldiers are somewhat effete, effeminate, or “girlish” compared to American soldiers, and are therefore more culturally inclined to accept gay soldiers who are assumed to be equally effeminate.

AVER suggests that these critics be introduced to a pair of Aussie drill sergeants in a private alley where they can express their beliefs in person. ...

On the AVER web site, President Ingram goes on to say:

"Harry S. Truman did not survey white soldiers to determine if they felt comfortable serving with African-American soldiers before he integrated the US military in 1948.  America's soldiers are not asked if they mind serving with women, Jews, Catholics, Blacks, Muslims, or any other group.  They are not asked if they want to serve with wiccans, foreign nationals, or convicted criminals, or if they mind serving under NATO officers, gay or straight, from countries overseas.  Soldiers serve with whomever they are ordered to serve with, and if they are too immature to do so, they don't belong in the military."

'Nuff said.  Let's get on with it.

To learn more about AVER's efforts in support of the rights of gay military personnel, please visit their web site here.

Like to sing karaoke?  Good at it, or just like to hear your own voice?

No matter.  If you happen to visit the Phillippines, always remember to NEVER sing Sinatra's "My Way".

It could make you dead.

Really.

Details here.

During periods of rough weather like this, if you yourself still have power, it's not unusual to encounter a higher number of web sites which seem to be unreachable.

When that happens to most of us, we wonder "Is it really down, or am I just unable to get there for some reason?"

Here's a handy web site you can visit to answer that question.

Keep this link handy.  When you visit it, then enter the address of the web site you're trying to reach, it will tell you whether it's up or "It's just you".

WASHINGTON – Today, the effort to repeal the discriminatory Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell law received a monumental boost of support from General Colin Powell.  The former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the 1990’s, who supported the laws passage back in 1993, changed his position in a statement sent out today saying, “attitudes and circumstances have changed”.  In voicing his support for the law’s repeal, Gen. Powell threw his full support behind “the new approach presented to the Senate Armed Services Committee this week by Secretary of Defense Gates and Admiral Mullen.”

Read the full HRC story here.

As evidenced by this rather frightening article, yet once again, the cops want easier and quicker access to your private Internet communications.

Now mind you, I'm all for adequate and effective surveillance of individuals firmly suspected of criminal activity.  But IMO, wholesale "oh by the way" Internet fishing expeditions which include innocent individuals are always a really really bad idea which should be strictly off limits.  The supposed "inconvenience" of requiring the good guys to secure a legal warrant before intruding into a bad guy's e-mail is a privacy padlock we all need to remain firmly secure.

What do you think?

"I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~ Thomas Jefferson

Bored?

Nothing on TV?

Even disinterested in further interactive time on-line (incredible as that may be)?

Then click on this link to watch Frontline's "Digital Nation" ... an extremely well-produced look at how our world is becoming increasingly wired - the good, the bad, and the ugly of our digital world.

Learn how the wonders of digital technology let us find more facts faster and that not only is grandma getting connected to her family once again (now that they don't write letters anymore), but that she's adding years to her life.

But also learn how leading researchers decry multi-tasking, proving that not only do we not actually do two (or more) things well at the same time, but  that our brains only give each task 50% of its available attention.  How kids who've grown up with digital media live 50% of their lives in virtual reality.  How those immersed in that virtual world increasingly confuse it with their real world.  How our military is technically disconnecting physically killing people from those who actually do it, and how they're using gaming centers to recruit future warriors.
 
I found it a fascinating 90 minutes.

See it here.

We're getting there.

Finally today, Adm. Mike Mullen, the military's top uniformed officer declared that gays should be allowed to serve openly in uniform, arguing that it is "the right thing to do."

Read the AP News story here.

According to this Washington Post article, international theft rings are now using very sophisticated techniques to steal your money, your identity, and your sanity.  Be careful.  Be VERY careful.