PhoneBoy Says

via theoatmeal.com

There are plenty of examples of bad email. I've gotten every single one of them at one time or another.

This message gets to the heart of something very important. The conservative right likes to wrap itself in the flag and paint opposition to its values as un-patriotic and un-American. But tolerance is also an American value. And what is more craven than the fear that the American way of life will be undermined by the exercise of such a value -- by our welcoming of difference, our openness to that which threatens us?

via salon.com

Whoever came up with this is absolutely spot-on.

I was going through some old photos last night when I came across a couple of photos from high school of a play I had done. Seeing as there was a lot of light coming from the back of us, the pictures did not come out all that great. Fortunately iPhoto helped enhance them a little bit.

It's interesting comparing memories with Jennifer, whom I sent one of these photos to on Facebook last night prior to posting. We both had fond memories of this experience of working on and performing this play, though we both remembered somewhat different things about the experience.

We were both so young back then…

For some reason, I thought it would be neat to put my fedora atop my Mac SE/30 and take a picture of it. Might make a great profile picture, what do you think?

"Don't ever tell my children to color in the lines, that anything is a certain color. If the sand is blue in their eyes, then let it be blue!"

"What on earth are you talking about?"

"I never realized where my problems were. I was always told--sand isn't blue, giraffes aren't green, fingers and eyes aren't the extensions of an artist. Do NOT fill my children's heads with that nonsense! Anything can be any color, and lines are only suggestions, not rules."

via thebeadedbranch.blogspot.com

While I've never fancied myself someone who could color or draw very well, I can relate to the core of this piece: that we often have to hide whom we are and what we think in order to "conform" to the expectations of others. It's definitely a creative block.

And yes, I gave away the ending of the piece, but go read it anyway.

Welch: Obama's Policies Anti-Business

Welch: Obama's Policies Anti-Business Part 2

At the Helm With Jack: Intimidation, taxes, trade and labor

via online.wsj.com

This picture reminds me of a sort of cognitive dissonance that occurs whenever I spend an extended period of time taking pictures or video. I get so focused on taking that picture or video, I forget I can see it with my own eyes.

While it's great we can capture things like never before, don't get too caught up in that to enjoy it while it's happening.

It's all over the news. "The recession is over." Themainstream economists say so. This was the longest recession sinceWorld War II, I heard on the news (say, I thought the economy was justdandy throughout that war -- oh, never mind).

The end of this terrible recession into which the free marketplunged us is all thanks to the federal government, of course. Inparticular, we owe the Obama administration our gratitude for itsstimulus program. But we should also tip our hats -- hats we canpresumably now afford to buy -- toward the Bush administrationfor its TARP bailouts, without which the banking system would havecompletely collapsed, credit would have dried up and we would have allstarved to death.

via campaignforliberty.com

Of course the government didn't cure the recession. They created the recession in the first place.