onlookerslowdown

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also a poem from the new, unreleased collection. very possibly my own all-time favourite.

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History is a cycle that we can inturrupt

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“We are at a turning point in our history. There are two paths to choose. One is a path I’ve warned about tonight, the path that leads to fragmentation and self-interest. Down that road lies a mistaken idea of freedom, the right to grasp for ourselves some advantage over others. That path would be one of constant conflict between narrow interests ending in chaos and immobility. It is a certain route to failure.”

— President Carter

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Frida Kahlo: Turning Japanese

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I was once asked if I had any ideas for a really scary reality TV show. I have one reality show that would really make your hair stand on end: ‘C-Students from Yale.’

George W. Bush has gathered around him upper-crust C-students who know no history or geography, plus not-so-closeted white supremacists, aka Christians, and plus, most frighteningly, psychopathic personalities, or PPs, the medical term for smart, personable people who have no consciences.

To say somebody is a PP is to make a perfectly respectable diagnosis, like saying he or she has appendicitis or athlete's foot...

PPs are presentable, they know full well the suffering their actions may cause others, but they do not care. They cannot care because they are nuts. They have a screw loose!...

So many of these heartless PPs now hold big jobs in our federal government, as though they were leaders instead of sick. They have taken charge of communications and the schools, so we might as well be Poland under occupation.

They might have felt that taking our country into an endless war was simply something decisive to do. What has allowed so many PPs to rise so high in corporations, and now in government, is that they are so decisive. They are going to do something every fuckin' day and they are not afraid. Unlike normal people, they are never filled with doubts, for the simple reasons that they don't give a fuck what happens next. Simply can't. Do this! Do that! Mobilize the reserves! Privatize the public schools! Attack Iraq! Cut health care! Tap everybody's telephone! Cut taxes on the rich! Build a trillion-dollar missile shield! Fuck habeas corpus and the Sierra Club and In These Times, and kiss my ass!

There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don't know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president.

― Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without a Country: A Memoir of Life in George W. Bush's America (2005)

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"Give every day the chance to become the most beautiful day of your life." - Mark Twain

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Possibly the Most important thing you'll read this year...

The following is the philosophy of Charles Schulz, the creator of the 'Peanuts' comic strip.

You don't have to actually answer the questions. Just ponder on them. Just read it straight through, and you'll get the point.

1. Name the five wealthiest people in the world.

2. Name the last five Heisman trophy winners.

3. Name the last five winners of the Miss America pageant.

4. Name ten people who have won the Nobel or Pulitzer Prize.

5. Name the last half dozen Academy Award winners for best actor and actress.

6. Name the last decade's worth of World Series winners.

How did you do?

The point is, none of us remember the headliners of yesterday.

These are no second-rate achievers.

They are the best in their fields.

But the applause dies.

Awards tarnish ...

Achievements are forgotten.

Accolades and certificates are buried with their owners.

Here's another quiz. See how you do on this one:

1. List a few teachers who aided your journey through school.

2. Name three friends who have helped you through a difficult time.

3. Name five people who have taught you something worthwhile.

4. Think of a few people who have made you feel appreciated and special.

5. Think of five people you enjoy spending time with.

Easier?

The lesson:

The people who make a difference in your life are not the ones with the most credentials, the most money ... or the most awards. They simply are the ones who care the most.

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every time it rains i think of that raymond carver poem. poetry is like prayer to me methinks. or an incantation

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the whole point of religion is being highly aware that there is a higher power which by default should humble your postition as a creation on this earth so I don’t even understand how people can produce so much arrogance and superiority once they have decided to indulge in religious practices 

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I saw people talking about JK Rowling having black mold, and I thought it was Absurdist Internet Humor, but no, there really does appear to be something akin to black mold in the bg of her new avatar, or what was her new avatar bc she quickly changed it, and I know it's probably not black mold but some wallpaper pattern that resembles mold bc rich people have no fuckin taste anymore, but I'm really taken by the reveal that the room where she tweets from has yellow walls. Nothing connotates mental stability better than locking yourself in a room covered in yellow wallpaper. Can't wait until Jo starts tweeting about how there's a woman in the wallpaper, and she needs to get her out so she can transvestigate her