"When they’re 8 years old they throw up; when they’re 12 years old, they won’t sleep; when they’re 19 years old, they’ll have nightmares and they’ll never have a relationship with anybody."...MA Rep. James Fagan, addressing the MA State Legislature last month
I realize that everyone is entitled to a fair trial, but should a defense attorney emotionally destroy a child rape victim in the process of defending an accused rapist?
Listen to this rant by James Fagan of Taunton, MA, who is a representative to the State Legislature and a criminal defense lawyer. In a speech last month opposing mandatory sentences for child rapists, he delivered some shocking statements about how he would make child victims suffer on the witness stand:
......and as a community, maybe we can provide some extra love and support. I don't know him at all, but my heart goes out to him.
In his diary Life and Death, which is slipping down the list, willb48 revealed that he was diagnosed with lung cancer today, and the prognosis is not good. Yet his courage in facing this battle is inspiring.
Hugs and love and prayers and good words might be a real encouragement to him. Thanks so much for reading, and for being a community of people who care.
Markos, us pooties iz not gonna let you floss over this issue. We knows you is a pootie-hater. What us pootiez wants to know is, why you writez diarry about McCainines insted of writting about pootie tooths?
Unless you've been living in Pittsburgh in recent years, you've probably never heard of Mark Madden, let alone had the displeasure of hearing his highly rated low-brow sports talk show on the city's ESPN-owned and operated radio station..........
And better yet, no one except the people in the same room with him will be listening to Madden any time soon in Pittsburgh, and perhaps anywhere else. On Tuesday, he was permanently taken off the air of 1250 ESPN, six days after making despicably vile comments concerning the news last week that Sen. Edward M. Kennedy has been diagnosed with brain cancer.
I've observed that during the eight years of the Bush Administration, a mean-spiritedness seems to have seized many Americans. A smallness of heart, a lack of compassion, a rude way of dealing with people.
Perhaps seeing George W. Bush close his heart to the Iraqi people, to our own wounded soldiers, to the victims of Katrina, to the homeless, to the uninsured ...... perhaps the President's mean-spirited attitude has been contagious. It's one more reason why we desperately need Barack Obama's grace and integrity in the White House. Our country must once again function as a community of caring people.
But not every politican is mean-spirited. This week I've been reading in the Boston newspapers about Senator Ted Kennedy's compassion and intervention in the lives of so many of his constituents. Even as my own heart is broken over his illness, I am inspired and uplifted by what one man with a big heart has accomplished in this state.
I invite you to let these stories lift your own heart tonight. Meanness of spirit is not the American way; compassion is. And compassion has motivated Senator Kennedy's life.
This is an open letter to the pootie haters on DKos...
We pooties have been posting our pictures at DailyKos for a long time. We've been cute and adorable and exposed our pootie butts and generally made assholes of ourselves, just to make you laugh.
But over the past few months we've noticed that things have become progressively more anti-pootie and pro-pooch. Pootie diaries rarely make the Rec List because you people would rather write about politics and social issues than worship at the (four) feet of pooties.
We've put up with the affronts to our dignity because we've always believed that every human has a secret soft spot for pooties, and that our cuteness would in time prove to be irresistible. But alas, DailyKos is not the site it once was thanks to the anti-pootie nature of certain members of our community.
This iz seriouz threat. Us pooties will refrain from posting here if you continue to ignore pootie diaries. A certain owner of this site (who shall not be named) is a known pootie hater, and allows the administrators to post non-pootie diaries on the front page without any fear of consequence or retribution.
A California appeals court ruling clamping down on homeschooling by parents without teaching credentials sent shock waves across the state this week, leaving an estimated 166,000 children as possible truants and their parents at risk of prosecution.....
The Second District Court of Appeal ruled that California law requires parents to send their children to full-time public or private schools or have them taught by credentialed tutors at home.
All evening long, on CNN and MSNBC, I've been hearing speculation that the "momentum" has shifted to Hillary. Huh? Three weeks ago, Obama was 20 points behind in both Texas and Ohio, and has closed the gap. So, WHO has the momentum in this race?
And who has the delegates?
Obama pooties have returned tonight to make you smile:
One catalyst for this diary was BeninSC's humble and self-effacing, This Diary is Not About Me. When I read it, I was cut to the heart at my selfish promotion of pooties, specifically MY pooties, to the exclusion of all the worthy pooches in the world. Yes, I cried and repented in sackcloth and ashes. (Well, actually, I repented in jeans and a sweater, and never managed to squeeze out a tear, but that doesn't sound as dramatic, does it?)
And secondly, I received this heartbreaking note from one of the neglected breed:
I just had one of those "I don't know whether to laugh or cry" moments as I watched the 11PM news on a Boston TV station.
As we all know, our economy is in the toilet, the endless Iraq war rages on, millions of Americans are without health insurance, and a bunch of lying thugs are in charge of America.
But with these mammoth problems facing this nation, what did our government do today?
I was a child during the 50s, born into a time when segregation and bigotry were the norm. My father, the child of immigrants, had no tolerance for anyone who was "different" in race or religion. Not a surprise, I guess, since he had no grace to extend even to his own wife and children.
As kids, we were regularly subjected to his rants against blacks (he used the "n" word, as all bigots do), Jews, Protestants, Japanese, anyone who wasn't a white Catholic. We lived in an all-white suburb of Cleveland, Ohio. I attended an all-white high school, and it wasn't until I started nursing school at a hospital in inner-city Cleveland that I even had a conversation with a black person.
Can you believe our pootie diaries were called "cat porn"?
Yes, during last Saturday's bloodbath in the candidate diaries, two different posters disparagingly referred to our pootie diaries as "cat porn."
Pooties took instant note of such shocking rudeness! Within an hour I got emails from about 3000 pooties whose pictures have been posted in our lovely pootie diaries. Some of the pooties were distraught at being called "cat porn":
But others were spitting mad, and sent attachments with their emails. "Cat porn? We'll give 'em some real cat porn to complain about. If you don't post these pictures we'll quit and go to RedState. "
I believe strongly in the man and his message and would have supported John Edwards' candidacy all the way to the convention, regardless of how many delegates he had. In my disappointed funk yesterday, I told myself that although Edwards is no longer in the race, I'll still vote for him on Super Tuesday. From reading the comments here, it seems I'm not the only one who feels this way.
But today I've reconsidered. My vote, your vote, thousands of votes for John Edwards will not bring him back into this race. Yes, it would feel so good to say, "Screw the other candidates, I'll still vote for John." But my good feelings are not what the primary season is about. It's about choosing a candidate who will win in November and begin the work of re-establishing progressive ideals and programs in America.
I had an incredible revelation the other day. I noticed that no matter how stressed out I get, my cats never share my anxiety. Even when I'm ranting and cussing, the other occupants of this house still look like this:
