silas' very bestest friend...

...at their first meeting, a little under two years ago!

love this e-mail to papa...

dear pop,


today i had a soccer game we lost four to one,and guess what I scored the only goal! but a kid that was named mateo kept on tripping me and a kid named owin kept on teasing us.

but it was still grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreat!


Emmett.

no need to actually answer any questions....

...when you've got a big wide smile, bright eyes looking right into the camera, down home language (includin' endin' every "ing" word with in')...complimentin' us by tellin' us all that in the end Americans are winners (especially those that were feeling unsure about being losers for voting for Bush twice!)  and of course that we shouldn't trust government (gov-nah!) and, of course, pay less taxes...that we shouldn't look backward but forward into a bright energy rich future of 'maveric-dom' or 'reform-hood'...

...and that's about it.

Anyone who has read ANYTHING knows this was an amazing act of nothingness.

The big question now is ...how many Americans were fooled by Palin tonight? (After hearing Pat Buchannan say it was a Palin slam dunk...and the Fox talking heads say she was spectacular I really wonder...) I really hope that's not all it takes? Cutesie and rehearsed stabs and jabs with that shiny smile, wow what a smile...Definitely a case for style over content, if not a bit cloying!!
Full of little lies and big ones (Biden didn't agree with Mc Cain on anything since 2004) but none of the  major embarassing pauses or stumbles we've seen in interviews...but, really, what a lot of fluff.

I thought Biden was clear(!) and presidential(!!) but the Mc Cain camp keeps trying to make the case that the government should be made up of people just like you and me...
...maybe the next time I need surgery I should look for someone with a nice haircut...or if I need a lawyer I should pick the one who can barbecue... and in vice president I certainly don't need anyone engaging in any of that East Coast elite book learnin'...what I really need is a couple of regular ole folksy mavericks .  (I can't believe how much I hate that word now...my apologies to the late James Garner...he doesn't deserve this!)

If I lived in a small town I would be offended and embarassed to be lumped in with the likes of her...her main street is a myth.  And if I lived in NYC I would also feel slammed.  Or San Francisco or LA or Europe or India or Iraq. Or anywhere really.  She is the essence of a "divider" and the idea that she understands diplomacy is...laughable.

the best of Sarah...unbelievable, really...

Her greatest hits...a montage of clips, if you haven't already seen this.
Isn't this an insult to anyone with a brain from a small town. To think that being folksy is really all it takes to be VP.
I know her numbers are falling in the polls but it's sad that it has to be this obviously awful for to people to get it.
I mean, this is really slimy politics...the way this campaign has been run.
At the top of Mc Cains list of lies is Palin...when he said his main criteria for VP was someone who could be president if necessary...when he had only met her once. What a fool.

Brand New Baby Boy!

My brother and his wife Dana had their little baby boy yesterday, Sept. 30th!

His full name is still up in the air but as far as we know we have a little Michael (the 3rd!)

Hopefully this blog post will guilt them into getting us a picture pronto...because they have so much time on their hands now...ha.

Can't wait to meet this little guy. Love to All!

mc cain biographer...who used to admire him...

...well, she doesn't so much anymore! She wrote the book Citizen Mc Cain...the book most responsible for his maverick nickname and his appeal to independents...
check her latest opinion of the man HERE in an article entitled "How John Mc Cain Lost Me".

Hi Nana...Welcome to New York!!

Here we are today thinking of you!
Hug Bebe and Grancops for us!

Worth Reading!!!

...here's a great article in The Sun magazine from many years back that I never forgot that talks about the 'code for corporate citizenship'...a way for corporations to make money within an ethical framework...

REAd this, " 28 Words That Could Change the World" by Robert Hinkley

"the duty of directors henceforth shall be to make money for shareholders, but not at the expense of the environment, human rights, public health and safety, dignity of the employees and the welfare of the communities in which the company operates. Those final 28 words are what I call the code for corporate citizenship."

Robert Hinkley


Good Stuff. (thats me talking)
We have the opportunity to do the right thing, which isn't code for "socialism"...more like capitalism with a conscience!

good morning papa...

even George Will...

McCain Loses His Head
By George F. Will September 23, 2008

“The queen had only one way of settling all difficulties, great or small. ‘Off with his head!’ she said without even looking around.”
– “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”

Under the pressure of the financial crisis, one presidential candidate is behaving like a flustered rookie playing in a league too high. It is not Barack Obama.

Channeling his inner Queen of Hearts, John McCain furiously, and apparently without even looking around at facts, said Chris Cox, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, should be decapitated. This childish reflex provoked the Wall Street Journal to editorialize that “McCain untethered” — disconnected from knowledge and principle — had made a “false and deeply unfair” attack on Cox that was “unpresidential.”..

Conservatives who insist that electing McCain is crucial usually start, and increasingly end, by saying he would make excellent judicial selections.

But the more one sees of his impulsive, intensely personal reactions to people and events, the less confidence one has that he would select judges by calm reflection and clear principles, having neither patience nor aptitude for either.

It is arguable that, because of his inexperience, Obama is not ready for the presidency. It is arguable that McCain, because of his boiling moralism and bottomless reservoir of certitudes, is not suited to the presidency. Unreadiness can be corrected, although perhaps at great cost, by experience.

Can a dismaying temperament be fixed?

Who says NJ isn't beautiful

On my recent trip to New York, I went down to New Jersey near where I was raised to visit Liz, her kids and Joe. I ran down a canal bank to the Delaware River thinking deep thoughts about my 40th and grieving my lost childhood near Holmdel, NJ. Joe was kind enough to send me photos of the area. Who says NJ isn't beautiful?

shark week...

...it's back.

one thing...

...Someone said recently to me that they were afraid if we had a democrat for a president and a democrat congress we might be unbalanced..."we need balance between the republicans and democrats, you know, checks and balances"...as if they are yin and yang. I strongly disagree. This past 8 years are different!! Perhaps now the more liberal democrats are yin and the more conservative democrats are yang....but the republicans are completely off the charts at this point...not simply the opposite balance to the left...

 If the opposite of broccoli is a cookie...the republicans are heroin.

;)

how to fail a test with dignity

You MUST click to enlarge to fully appreciate this.

boo up-date

(yes, someone out there crocheted a boob.)

Slept 9 blissful hours last night. Silas only had one late night snack.
So the total for yesterdays twenty four hours...He nursed twice!!

(last weeks total was more like, hmm, 120 times a day!)

the philosophy that permeates...

from Talking Points Memo...


"INNOVATIVE PRODUCTS
John McCain: "Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation."

Late Update: Obviously, to rejigger that wonderful line, this is not excellent news for John McCain. If the Obama folks are smart -- and they are -- they'll ride this one all the way to the election. But among ourselves let's admit that you could only be surprised by this statement if you were willfully ignorant to what McCain and his key advisors believe. Remember, his top economics advisor is former Sen. Phil Gramm, the legislative architect of the banking and financial services deregulation that led to the current crisis. And his health care proposals are all off-the-rack Heritage Foundation-style initiatives based on the premise that people have too much, not too little insurance. The only thing jarring about the statement is the degree to which it has been overtaken by events as McCain now tries -- a la Palin the Earmark-Killer -- to rebrand himself as a Mr. Wall Street oversight and transparency when he's been pushing deregulation for 25 years."

--Josh Marshall

and if you want to read a good article "the corporate financiers are wrong" by Joe Conason

(he writes "Would they please shut up about the wonders of an unfettered free market. It's the tax payers who pay for their greed.")

just 6 of the many faces of Silas

little devil................................. visionary ...........................charmer

romeo...........................................imp .............................tough-GUY

(Come on, doesn't he remind you of Matt in the "tough-GUY" picture

...and Emmett in the "romeo"?)

eww

I keep thinking...

...considering the financial mess were in...if Bush had succeeded in privatizing social security... Can you imagine what that would mean?

It's funny how the right is considered the safe bet, cautious, frugal...the father who knows best,etc

Well, it's looking pretty RECKLESS, GREEDY and SELF-SERVING with little thought for the future ...just eternally  banking on the hope that the 'economists' know what they are talking about when the say..."the free market will adjust itself and work it all out"...Time to start reading other economists, I say. And time to look at the bigger picture.  

It's just another example of the willingness to sacrifice others futures... (the war being the obvious other example). 

perfect!

since it won't play Cam, here's the link??? hope it works! of course it's on some weird hollywood show...skip the weird intro...