On this Day of Remembrance, two songs by Eric Bogle about the First World War, lest we forget...

And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda (YouTube)

The Green Fields of France (YouTube) (performed by the Dropkick Murphys; video is historic photos ( Read more... )

Had a lot of stuff going on this week.  It's just been terribly busy, and I haven't slept well ( Read more... )

Every year for Mother's Day, this is the hope I post. Let us make of today and everyday a remembrance and an ongoing labor toward peace and tolerance.

Julia Ward Howe's Mother's Day Proclamation, written in 1870:

Arise, then, women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts,
Whether our baptism be of water or of tears!

Say firmly ( Read more... )

We're closing down for the storm this afternoon; the campus will be closed tomorrow. Folks are currently evacuating, but we probably won't. We have a very secure little house without many windows. I don't think I've ever actually evacuated for a storm in my life, but it's really a decision folks have to make for themselves ( Read more... )

... to the author of an editorial about Michelle Obama and stereotypes.  Mom is writing because the woman who wrote the article misrepresents the words of Sojourner Truth, "Ain't I a woman ( Read more... )

The Associated Press: George Carlin mourned as a counterculture hero:George Carlin, the frenzied performer whose routine "Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television" led to a key Supreme Court ruling on obscenity, has died ( Read more... )

Julia Ward Howe's Mother's Day Proclamation, written in 1870.

Arise, then, women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts,
Whether our baptism be of water or of tears!

Say firmly ( Read more... )

Rev. Martin Luther King, Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence:Over the past two years, as I have moved to break the betrayal of my own silences and to speak from the burnings of my own heart, as I have called for radical departures from the destruction of Vietnam, many persons have questioned me about the wisdom of my path. At the heart of their ( Read more... )

Truthdig - Reports - Forty Years On:Forty years on, is it possible to recapture the hope and energy of the days and years before that April 4th? Has liberalism spent enough time in purgatory for the country to revisit how much was accomplished in its name and to acknowledge that the nation is better off for what the liberals did?

We all lost a great man and a great fighter for social justice.

If you want to be important-wonderful. If you want to be recognized-wonderful. If you want to be great-wonderful. But recognize that he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. That's a new definition of greatness ( Read more... )