Rush Limbaugh And What Is Wrong With America.

ABC News, is reporting that Obama has sent 100 US troops to Uganda to help combat the Lord's Resistance  Army. According to the report, "Two days ago President Obama authorized the deployment to Uganda of approximately 100 combat-equipped U.S. forces to help regional forces remove from the battlefield Lord’s Resistance Army leader Joseph Kony and senior leaders of the LRA." 

Joseph Kony, defiant.

The report continues; "The president made this announcement in a letter to House Speaker John Boehner Friday afternoon, saying that  'deploying these U.S. Armed Forces furthers U.S. national security interests and foreign policy and will be a significant contribution toward counter-LRA efforts in central Africa.'"  

Rush Limbaugh, on the golf course, far from Uganda.

Political pundit and talk show entertainer Rush Limbaugh had this to say. "Now, up until today, most Americans have never heard of the Lord's Resistance Army.  And here we are at war with them.  Have you ever heard of Lord's Resistance Army, Dawn?  How about you, Brian?  Snerdley, have you?  You never heard of Lord's Resistance Army?  Well, proves my contention, most Americans have never heard of it, and here we are at war with them.  Lord's Resistance Army are Christians. They are fighting the Muslims in Sudan.  And Obama has sent troops, United States troops to remove them from the battlefield, which means kill them."


Mr. Limbaugh, a coterie of 4 people, having never heard of the LRA does not a consensus make. And if you are right, if that is an accurate statistical representation of the ignorance of Americans to the atrocities committed by the LRA in Uganda then shame on us. Shame on us! The country of Uganda has been terrorized by Kony and his demonic rebels for years. Tens of thousands of men women and especially children have been killed, raped, tortured, maimed or much worse as in the instances, well documented, of the children themselves forced to commit the atrocities on their own families. Turned into killing machines by a coward who hides behind children and lets them fight his wars. The LRA are rapists and they are murderers and they ARE NOT Christians. 


Geez.....


Mr. Limbaugh then goes onto relay the Lord's Resistance Army's objectives as he interprets them sounding almost like a defense of the LRA... "To remove dictatorship and stop the oppression of our people; to fight for the immediate restoration of the competitive multiparty democracy in Uganda; to see an end to gross violation of human rights and dignity of Ugandans; to ensure the restoration of peace and security in Uganda, to ensure unity, sovereignty, and economic prosperity beneficial to all Ugandans, and to bring to an end the repressive policy of deliberate marginalization of groups of people who may not agree with the LRA ideology."  


Mr. Limbaugh meet John Ochola who would rather die than look at himself in the mirror. He bears the scars of Kony's "ensuring of the peace."

Meet some of the of 44 girls abducted and raped and maimed from Sacred Heart Secondary School and St. Mary's Girls School near Gulu. 

Or these two toddlers. Hacked to death by the LRA. Meet these to precious babies Mr. Limbaugh. I could go on posting. For all the American people, the full scope and reach of Kony's evil. The 35,000 child soldiers and slaves. The countless girls repeatedly raped, their young bodies a breeding ground for more soldiers. Not ringing a bell Rush? 

President Obama told John Boehner that sending troops to Uganda: "[is] in the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States..." To which Rush asks rhetorically and sarcastically, with mockery as his intent, "Would somebody explain to me what you think our "national security interests" are in Uganda?" 


Rush, do you need a history lesson. Was it in our national interest to equivocate as Hitler committed genocide to the tune of 6 million? Was it in our national interest to let Saddam pillage Kurdish towns? We responded in both cases, albeit belated. Why? Because terror breeds terror. Evil is an ever quicker spreading cancer. When nations wrap themselves in the ignorance ease affords evil advances. Is it in our national interest to stop Joseph Kony and the LRA? 


Finally, one of Rush's staff apparently googles the LRA and Rush responds; "Is that right? The Lord's Resistance Army is being accused of really bad stuff? Child kidnapping, torture, murder, that kind of stuff? Well, we just found out about this today. We're gonna do, of course, our due diligence research on it. But nevertheless we got a hundred troops being sent over there to fight these guys -- and they claim to be Christians."


Mr. Limbaugh. Do your research first next time. Check out Invisible Children who have been fighting against the LRA for years. Get informed Mr. Limbaugh. Child Trafficking is everywhere. Child exploitation is everywhere. It is on our streets because we are asleep. Full from excess and lethargic. That Mr. Limbaugh is what is wrong with America. That Mr. Limbaugh is what is wrong with you.

Rot In Hell Steve Jobs.

"Rot in Hell Steve Jobs. God hates you". So says the official mouthpiece for heaven's utter  discontent, Westboro Baptist Church, who will picket the funeral of Apple's recently deceased CEO. And to that I say, "good call!" Well played Mr. Phelps and your crazy little coterie of mush-minded minions!

The way I figure it, you are like the shadow that reveals the sun. Everywhere you go you spew the filth of hate and darkness which serves as a brilliant contrast to love and light. So bravo. Continue on my man! You are a pied piper for the lunatic fringe. Play on Mr. Phelps. 

Phelps' daughter makes Westboro's intentions known. Yep, the tweet was sent via Twitter for iPhone. The irony is beautiful.

Dear Westboro Baptist,

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 

You claim to follow Jesus and yet you do nothing, NOTHING he did. You do not reach out in tenderness to a broken world. You do not grieve for those stumbling in blindness. Instead you rejoice in the despair of others. You are NOT Christians! You have never EVER heard the voice of God. You do not speak for God. Your throats are graves and only death comes from them. 

And to you "Reverend"...

Blessed are the Peacemakers Mr. Phelps, for they will be called the children of God. But you, you spread division and foment animosity. You are NOT a child of God Mr. Phelps. You are a cancer on the truth. A festering blight on the perfect beauty of the Good news. May God save your soul Mr. Phelps.

Picket your own damn funeral. 

How Was Church?

I'm glad you asked! The choir, (read Pink Floyd), sang through a rousing rendition of the album Animals and then proceeded to call down heaven, as they say, with a glorious romp through Dark Side Of The Moon.

I sat comfortably enthroned, (or is that entombed), on my pew, i.e. coffee house easy chair. The sacraments went down easy this morning, double espresso and a sensible bran muffin, less guilt, less repentance than that ever-tempting cinnamon roll.

The sermon, a disjointed ramble through the day's headlines- the miseries and malfeasances of the night before, until the Spirit Himself gave voice to the Father's heart. Let's just say, there wasn't a dry eye in the house.

What was on the Father's mind this morning? The famine in Somalia apparently....

Above, an internally displaced Somali woman attends to her malnourished son at the Banadir hospital in Mogadishu. Photo by Ismail Taxta / Reuters. Below, Relatives of Hassan Abdulkadir Adan, third from left (rear), help to lower the body of his 7-year-old son into a grave in a refugee camp in Mogadishu. Photo by Farah Abdi Warsameh / AP. Photo text courtesy MSNBC.com.

Above, Aden Salaad, 2, looks up at his mother as she bathes him in a tub at a Doctors Without Borders hospital, where Aden is receiving treatment for malnutrition, in Dagahaley Camp, outside Dadaab. Photo by Rebecca Blackwell / AP. Below, a mother mourns the death of her son at the Banadir hospital. Photo by John Moore / Getty Images. Photo text courtesy MSNBC.com.

Above, a malnourished child from southern Somalia is weighed in Banadir hospital in Mogadishu. Photo by Farah Abdi Warsameh / AP. Below, a doctor examines Mihag Gedi Farah, a seven-month-old child with a weight of 7.5lbs (the average weight of a first world newborn), in a field hospital of the International Rescue Committee. Photo by Schalk Van Zuydam / AP. Photo text courtesy MSNBC.com.

Osman Ali Aliyow Mursal digs a burial plot for his four-year-old son, Aden Ibrahim, as men prepare to pray over the boy's body, wrapped in a plastic mat. Doctors were unable to save Aden, who died of diarrhea-related dehydration after four days of inpatient care. U.N. Refugee Chief Antonio Guterres says that drought-ridden Somalia is the "worst humanitarian disaster" in the world. Photo by Rebecca Blackwell / AP. Below, A woman from southern Somalia builds a makeshift shelter from tree branches at a refugee camp in Mogadishu, Somalia. Photo by Mohamed Sheikh Nor / AP. Photo text courtesy of MSNBC.com.

Mulmillo closes the eyes of her two-year-old son Mahmud moments after he died from malnutrition and related complications at a local hospital in Mogadishu. Photo by Roberto Schmidt / AFP - Getty Images, text by MSNBC.com.

So political BS aside, and no religious posturing needed. There will be no altar call this morning, the Christian response to hunger is explicitly mandated in scripture. Here's how we can help.

Whatever we haven't done for the least of these...

The "P" In PETA Is For...Porn?

Yep. Rueters announced this week that the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) is launching a porn site. According to the group, "There will be a lot of girl and boy next door content, but we haven't ruled out celebrities on the site as well." Um....

Sasha Grey, porn star and PETA activist. Her racy ad campaign gained the group much notoriety.

So let me get this straight. To combat the exploitation of animals the group is going to exploit women through objectification? Apparently so. PETA spokeswoman Lindsay Rajt ensures these tactics are cleverly thought out and will get results: "We try to use absolutely every outlet to stick up for animals.... We are careful about what we do and wouldn't use nudity or some of our flashier tactics if we didn't know they worked."

Animal meat bad. Women as meat- acceptable collateral damage. But at least it works, right?

Rajt said, ""We live in a 24 hour news cycle world and we learn the racy things we do are sometimes the most effective way that we can reach particular individuals. Instead of focusing on anti-fur, the porn site will raise awareness of veganism. We really want to grab people's attention, get them talking and to question the status quo and ultimately take action, because the best way we can help the greatest number of animals is simply by not eating them."

The programming will consist of porn interspersed with gruesome images of animal torture and brutality at the hands of humans. Now I am no psychologist or whatever, but this seems like a really, really bad Idea. PETA is going to entice people with porn and then inundate them with images of animal cruelty. Isn't there just the smallest chance that in the human mind these two polar opposite urges may become symbiotically twisted creating a huge upswing in people with fetishes for animals being tortured? Again I am no master of the mind's relationship between visual stimulus and the libido, but if you get somebody all worked up and then show them animals brutally killed it seems to me they are either gonna hate you for ruining their sex-perience or they're gonna develop some bestiality tendencies.

Miss Rajt, I am an animal lover myself, and though completely un-related, a vegetarian too, and if I may be so bold as to tell you your business, the best way for you to ensure that people don't eat animals is not to eroticize the act, even if only by it's proximity to porn. And as a lover of women, a man who fights for the end of sexual tyranny over women, your whatever works philosophy disrespects and endangers your gender.

Meet Susanne Eman. The World's First 2000 Pound Woman?

Susanne Eman wants to be the heaviest woman ever. The current record is 1,600 pounds. The 32 year old from Arizona ingests 20,000 calories a day in hopes to reach half her goal by December's end.

And then she plans to increase her caloric-intake. "I'd love to find out if it's humanly possible to reach a ton,’ she says. That isn't hyperbole. She really hopes to weigh 2000 pounds.

According to the Daily Mail online story, Susanne visits the supermarket once a month with her sons Gabriel, 16, and Brendin, 12, and spends up to eight hours filling six buggies. "It's like a full day's work," said Susanne, who uses a motorized scooter to navigate the store.

Suprisingly Susanne believes she can stay healthy. She adds, "The bigger I get, the better I feel. I feel more confident and sexy. Why shouldn't I push the limits and see how fat I can get and stay healthy?"

"Two years ago I hit 400 pounds because I was losing my battle against weight gain," she said. "I noticed I actually started attracting more men, and it made me feel good."

Susanne and her sister.

Susanne cannot work because of her weight, to stay active she says, "I go for a waddle and do stretches and exercises every day. My muscles need to hold up to my weight, so I have to stay strong. I take my blood pressure once a week, and every day, after I exercise, I take readings of my other vitals. I use a pulse oximeter to measure the concentration of oxygen in my blood stream. And I take my blood sugar levels just like a diabetic. If either of the readings go above a certain level, I'll immediately contact my doctor for advice. If I was to get sick, I've arranged for my sister to take care of my kids."

Susanne's daily 20,000 calorie plus diet...

Breakfast: 6 x eggs scrambled, cooked in butter 468 cals. 1/2 pound bacon 1,168 cals, 4 x potatoes as hash browns 672 cals, 6 x pieces toast with butter 600 cals, 32 ounce cream shake 1,160 cals. Snacking 1 x bag of animal cookies 1,950 cals, 2 liter bottle of soft drink 800 cals, 1 x 10.5 ounce bag of barbecue flavour crisps 1,650 cals, 3 x ham and cheese sandwiches 1,576 cals.

Lunch: 3 x beef, bean and green chilli burritos with 1 x cup of sour cream 1,453 cals. Salad (1 head lettuce, 1 cup cherry tomatoes, 1 cup carrots, 1 cucumber, 1/2 cup ranch dressing, bacon bits, 1 cup crumbled cheese, 1 cup chicken 1,479 cals.

Dinner: 12 x filled tacos + 1 x cup sour cream 4,906 cals, 2 liter bottle of soda 800 cals, Dessert 8 x scoops vanilla ice cream 2,080 cals, 1 x small pan of brownies 1,200 cals.

Total: 21,962 calories

Geez.....

There is so much wrong here. First let me address the majority of the commenters on the Daily Mail Online article thread. You're mean. You are hateful. And with very little exception, you revert to playground taunts and personal attacks to make your point, if you even have a point other than blatant disgust. This woman is desperate for love and attention. She is not psychologically deranged, she is pathologically unhappy. She fills the void in her heart with her drug of choice- food. Her self-abuse and waste is not ok, but please play nice.

Secondly, before I get to where I'm going, Susanne, darling.... There is huge difference between self acceptance and self delusion. You are beautiful, but the way you are made and the way you are making yourself are two very different things. Men may pay you more attention, may fettishize your weight but in the end you are killing yourself, you are destroying your children's chance at normalcy, you may very well be orphaning your lovely boys. Please, whatever it is that has broken your heart, bring it to the One who made you and let him fix it. You don't need to be waif-like and wiry to be beautiful but please, even if it means not getting noticed, do what's best for you and your kids. Or at least do what's right.

Finally.

How do I explain this:

To him...

Or her...

In a world where there are 925 million undernourished people, where a child dies every 5 seconds because of hunger related complications, where there is no food shortage only a disproportionate distribution of that food, this type of excess is unforgivable. It is a slap in the face of every mother who couldn't make enough breast milk to feed her newborn because of her own malnutrition and had to watch that child starve. It is an affront to every child reduced to digging the town dump for food...

or begging for scraps...

Every year Americans alone spend 174 million dollars on obesity related medical conditions. This makes mockery of the half of the world without any access to medical care. The millions of children whose lives could be saved by simple anti-dehydration salts or a mosquito net. This is NOT OK!!!

Humanitarian groups spend much of their energies trying to solicit funding to do their humble work. They must stretch pennies into dollars and turn the most meager rations of rice and beans into miracles of sustenance. And it is often politicians that these groups must petition for funding, the same politicians that allow people with self imposed disabilities to milk the system for the money for their daily feast and the medical care to keep the health risks of gluttony at bay. What is wrong with us?!!?? And not to single out Susanne, her situation is barely unique, but this is freakin' ridiculous!!!

Before my brain explodes. Please support the amazing Megan Boudreaux as she and the good folks at Respire Haiti feed 700 children in Gressier, Haiti every week. You can donate directly for their food program here. From the bottom of my heart....Thank you! And for the people around Susanne that enable her, or have fed her delusions with disingenuous flattery or full fledged exploitation....you are endangering her life and may be making orphans of her children. You suck.

Susanne, you are loved. Praying for you tonight...Praying for us all...

God Please Kill Me.

For all the girls who have shared their story with me...

We stayed late

To stack the chairs

And sweep the floor

And you were hungry

So we spread out a choir robe

On the altar

And picnicked on the butt ends

Of the unfinished French bread

Of the broken body of Christ

And you, chewing, said you knew

That God loved you

But thought He might oughtta

Raise His standards

And I said, self-loathing

Was kinda hot

And you shot the grape juice

Of the blood of

The new covenant

Right out your nose

And then you cried right through

Everything your dad ever did to you

As the gathering shadows

Further emaciated

The Son of sorrows

On the large brass crucifix

Above the baptismal pool

And you wept

The most honest prayer

That had been prayed

In that place all day

God please kill me

God hears your broken hearts, your healing is in His arms.

The ABC's of Civil Society. Or Coffee Shop Patrons Et Al.

I spend a lot of time in coffee shops. Espresso, free internet, and espresso being the top three reasons. There are certain traits that make for a great coffee house. It can't be overly bright, can't have bad, mass produced art on the walls, can't have a muzak system oozing emasculated versions of popular music into the air. But all of this can be somewhat forgiven if the patrons are friendly, intelligent, engaged, and polite.

Last night, in the throes of boredom, I pulled into a Starbucks (T-Bones my regular haunt was closed) to borrow their WiFi and within a few short minutes my coffee house experience was sorely compromised. In an open letter to the offending individuals, I hope that by highlighting their grievous behavior it may lead to less of the same in the future. The letter, as follows:

Dear Person A, please do not park in handicap spots. They are not for you unless you have a physical disability that makes traversing a parking lot a painful chore. If you are merely lazy, as I assume you are, since you just walked spryly to your seat, then kindly move your vehicle.

Person B, if you might abstain from your vulgarity and raunch infested ramblings as there are children within earshot. Perhaps like person A, you have the inability to perceive your surroundings, you do not see the child, the one that is six feet from your locale, the one directly in front of you, as obvious as, say, bold blue lines paralleling a vehicle.

Hattiesburg Artist Spence Townsend's epic mural on T'bones' west wall.

Person C, your blue tooth headset is sooooo 2007. And although I have a penchant for nostalgia, 2007 was not a good vintage. Where was I going with this? Oh yeah, quit talking loudly to the air. If you are driving then I am the first to commend your responsible citizenry using your hands-free device, but if you are in a coffee shop, please refrain from this awkward monologue, this one-act play of intermittent pauses and incomplete thoughts that do not segue into other incomplete thoughts. Your volume only serves to emphasize the mundane nature of your half of the conversation. Brevity being the essence of wit, you have far exceeded those parameters, and now, the rest of us can only hope you have forgotten to charge your phone.

Person D, your mom does not work here. Bus your own trash. Or tip accordingly. Yes you did just pay 5 dollars for a very bastardized version of some formerly proud Italian coffee drink, but that does not give you carte blanche to be a slob.

Person E, berating the barista will not give you the satisfaction you are demanding, nor that which you feel you deserve. It will however get your drink spat in on some subsequent visit. That is not a threat, that isn't a promise, that's just payback. Subsequently, please stop acting as if you have experienced some great injustice. There is no conspiracy to make your beverage wrong. Perhaps your finely tuned palate is just too precise for this establishment. All apologies.

Person F, forgive me for breathing your air. For even being seen in your peripheral. If I could be unborn, I would at this moment do so. Needless to say, if ever I am on fire, I would not imposition you to waste a single drop of any of your bodily fluid to ease even my slightest discomfort at being ablaze.

Live music at T-Bones featuring Scott Chism and The Better Half. The voice of an angel mingled with the heart of an outlaw. (photo by Sam Miller of Blue Healer Music)

Person G, no matter how many times you tell your racist joke, it's still not funny, it still reveals the limited scope of your intelligence, your deep-seated insecurities, and your latent fear of all that is not homogenized. I have to this point refrained from any and all judgments on your breeding. That could however change at any moment.

Person H, your description of religion, more like an autopsy, was a lot like talking to an oral hygienist about kissing. While factual, and anatomically precise, it disemboweled any and all romance from the act. Your Greek pronunciations, while endearing with your slow southern drawl, were in fact lost on us, your English-speaking coffee house congregation.

Person I, thank you for the nice tract on the evils of rock and roll. I would be glad to throw it away for you. I'm not sure what is more inane, the fact that you profiled my long hair or the fact that the illustrator of your little comic strip sermon did. If you are the same person, and I'm not saying you are, quit leaving those other tracts around that look like five dollar bills. If you want people to convert, use real 5's and write a scripture on them. Also, if you ever leave a fake five for a tip for the waitress making $2.25 an hour, the one with three kids and a deadbeat old man, God's gonna give you the pox. No, not really, but Imma ask Him to.

Person J, and person K, rent a room. I have seen this reality show. Your public displays of affection are merely cries for help. J, she'll never get your "art". And K, to be honest, there may very well be nothing to get.

Joe Van Zandt, one of my favorite songwriters who along with his lovely wife, is a long time friend of Conspiracy Of Hope.

Person L, loudly talking politics in public, well it's a lot like a bathroom exhaust fan, only in reverse.

Person M, your ringtone is soooooo rad. Nickleback is sooooooooo rad. You should probably just not answer that call and let the rest of us hear the hook one more time...

"Screamin' no!

We're never gonna quit, ain't nothing wrong with it

Just acting like we're animals

No, no matter where we go 'cause everybody knows

We're just a couple animals"

If ever there has been a reason to attack Canada....or 4...

Person N, the perfume you're wearing is really nice. I will think about it later tonight while it's still burning my eyes, still lingering on my taste buds, still clinging to every fiber of my clothes.

Person O, there is a logic, an etiquette, a method to the madness of waiting in line. While understandably nuanced and potentially cumbersome to the unintiated, here are some helpful tips. The following are never ok: 1. Your loud exasperated sighs at the slow speed of the line's movement. If you do not have the time to wait, don't. Or get here earlier, or quit booking your schedule so tight. I know you are important, that the great machine of civilization will grind to a halt without your prompt attention, but since you are so important, maybe you owe it to the rest of us to quit taking so many coffee breaks. 2. You will not move the line quicker by your proximity to the person in front of you. If I can feel your hot breath on my neck...too close. If I can tell what you have in your front pockets without looking...yep, you guessed it, way too close.

More of Spence's incredible art. He has donated generously to Conspiracy Of Hope for our art show fundraisers. He is also a talented musician. Check out he and his brother's band Kookaburra!?

Person P, Q, and R, at first I thought you three were script writers for Desperate Housewives or Jersey Shore, but then I realized you were just viscous gossips. Please refrain from airing the dirty laundry of your friends, family and neighbors. Though by your ecstatic tone it is evident that you live vicariously through their sordid lives, please remember they are somebodies child, parent, or spouse. When and if it happens to you or your loved ones you'll see there really is no "fun" in dysfunction.

Person S, while ingenious, using a fork as a back-scratcher is really quite uncouth. If this were a camp-out or a locker room, high fives would be in order, but there are other people here trying to eat. But if you must persist in scratching your back with your eating utensil, please, for the love of all that is holy, refrain from eating with it afterward.

Person T and U, if you continue with your unfettered use of sugary pet names and syrupy baby talk you're going to send the whole lot of us into a diabetic coma.

Person V, although it may be hard to believe, a human sneeze travels at about 60mph. The fastest sneezes have been recorded at well over 120 mph. I'm no mathmatologist, but the distance from your nose to my face is like 20 feet. That means in like a hundredth of a second....well....just cover yer friggin' nose. Gracias.

Person W, that dry gurgling sound at the end of your straw means your drink is finished. I know it seems like there should be more, but there's not, and there's never gonna be. Just walk away man. Just walk away.

Person X, thank you for being such a willing and amicable ambassador for America. But the person to whom you are speaking is not hard of hearing, nor illiterate. They merely speak another language. Please stop talking loudly in long drawn out monosyllabic sentences. The dumb look on their face is merely one of astonishment and embarrassment and not ignorance as you might suppose.

Person Y, your conspiracy theories of government complicity in covering up alien involvement in fixing major sporting events and of stealing patents, like yours for the perpetual motion machine, is well founded. In fact I am quite sure that the man, let's call him person Z, the one with the shades sitting covertly in the corner, the one snoring loudly, pretending to be asleep, is following you. Yes, that one, with the ominous wristwatch that as we both know is a mind reading device. You should probably leave, quickly. Before you make anymore children cry with your tales of CIA plots to euthanize the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, and Justin Beiber.

And to all, as Groucho Marx once said, I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it. So stop by T-Bones sometime, the coffee's absolutely amazing and the people are just plain lovely. Honest.