Life is a State of Mind

We are heading to Las Vegas to watch Mike and Joan tie the knot.

Saturday, Erci and I hosted our third annual men’s division Virginia West chapter meeting in our home. The chapter is a lot smaller now, as it has been split two years in a row because of growth in local Soka Gakkai membership numbers (woo hoo!). Yesterday we went up to Purceville for Potomac Chapter’s annual men’s division meeting hosted by Vijay. It was remarkable how different the two meetings were even though they were nominally focused on the same topics: “the oneness of mentor and disciple” and “building a self-reliant faith.” Both were pulled from the July/August issue of Living Buddhism magazine and from the July 21st issue of the World Tribune.

For the Virginia West chapter the discussion focused on the definition of the mentor and disciple relationship and on speaking from the heart. We talked a lot about how the mentor disciple relationship is disciple initiated, that we each choose our own mentors, and that sometimes our mentors can choose us. We also talked a lot about practicing an engaged and active life, where we take actions on those things closest to our hearts.

In the Potomac chapter there were more experiences given, and they were particularly heart-wrenching and moving. One man talked about his mother’s passing, and another about his fight with alcohol and substance abuse. Potomac men’s discussion focused more on actively establishing great friendships with those around us and staying connected both in faith and in community regardless of faith.

Both meetings were followed by excellent food and fun, and at both there was a reminder that Fall study review is coming, and that the interfaith walk for peace is coming even sooner (SGI-USA is participating).

Here is Jim’s first internet ad:

I hope there are more soon, and that they attack the worst senator on several issues.

So I was poking around on the Fairfax County Democrats website and discovered a list of three ballot questions that would attempt to amend the Virginia Constitution. This is news to me, I have been well aware of the hateful Marshall/Newman Amendment that strips away protections for domestic partners who are not married and writes discrimination into the constitution; but I had never heard of the other two proposed amendments.

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Today was a good day. I went to the Prince William County Democratic Caucus to vote for Sharon Pandak, but arrived to late to get certified to vote, damned traffic along I-66 and PWC Parkway. Sharon Pandak won by a wide margin anyway, all but two districts (Gainesville and Woodbridge went for Gary Friedman). Now Sharon will face off against Corey Stewart in the November election.

There were 211 voting delegates, and probably 220 people in the standing room only auditorium. It was fun seeing so many fellow activists all gathered together. I’d intended to try canvassing with the Commonwealth Coalition, but the caucus continued until 2:00 pm, and the canvassing was scheduled to end then.

Later I hooked up with Erci and we went to the Jeanette Rishell Fundraiser at the Roemmelt’s home. We got to hear Delegate Brian Moran speak. We met Howling Latina, James Martin, and saw Kenton Ngo and Greg Bouchillon again. It was a lot of fun, and the food was awesome. Change is in the wind and it’ll be nice to be in a Virginia that is finally catching up with the 21st century when all these excellent progressives win in November!

If you live in Prince William County, get on the newly re-designed website and find out what is going on.

Prince William County Democrats
The Commonwealth Coalition

Update:
scottnolan.org/elections_2006.html is a information-only, non-partisan guide to the 2006 Virginia Election races.

Wow - exactly what I suspected, but could not bring myself to believe:

The LJ user thisficklemob writes about the timing of the UK liquid bomb scare:
http://community.livejournal.com/liberalrage/348778.html

Remember folks, toothpaste and bottled water are not the threat here.

The more Jeffrey Feldman I read, the more and more I like what he writes. He has an excellent article about why the Lamont victory is so important for American democracy.

It’s not about the war. It’s not about any referendum on President Bush. Please don’t believe the spin that has been accepted by the main stream media.

It’s about participatory politics, the politics of inclusion and participation. Where every American can get involved and have a say in their government. Where the candidate is willing to actually listen to the people he or she plans to represent.

Please take the time to really read Jeffrey’s article: Lamont and the 3 Ps of Progressive Politics (it’s useful knowledge for both progressives and conservatives). An involved public, a public with a stake in the outcome, is a far more powerful force than any top-down hierarchy.

This why I am so excited by the three upsets in Democratic primary elections this year. Tester (MT), Webb (VA), and Lamont (CT). Each represents a grassroots and participatory victory over the official party establishment. Each has exciting possibilities of their own. Lowell over at RaisingKaine has done a better analysis of this than me, so check out his RK diary: Lamont, Tester and Webb.

These are real “underdog” campaigns, so if you like what you see, get involved. Volunteer, contribute, tell your friends you what you like about the campaigns. We have a chance to retake control of our country. The United States has been “by the lobbyists for the corporations and corporate executives” for way too long, let’s get back to “by the people, for the people” again.

Democracy only works if you are involved. If you are eligible to vote, register to vote now! Find out who is running in your area (politics1.com can help) and volunteer in a local congressional or senate race. Get your state board of elections to tell you everything that will be on your ballot well ahead of the election day so you have plenty of time to do a little research and make informed choices.

Less than 5 miles from my house, a horrible hate crime was committed against a gay couple new to the area. It is a shame this has happened, a shame on all Virginians. We are quickly becoming the laughing stock of the nation with our crazy legislature more interested in what happens in your bedroom than in running the schools, keeping the roads open, and the lights on.

I have read a lot of stories lately about gay and lesbian people moving out of Virginia, and I am worried about the future of the state where citizens no longer feel safe or welcome. Please reach out to your neighbors and welcome and embrace them as human beings. It does not matter what color, religion, sexual or political orientation they are. Connect with them. Help them be happy. It’s contagious, in a good way.

Vote NO in November.

Offer to help your neighbors out from time to time.

Last night Erci was finally in the mood for a film, so we sat down to watch Cidade de Deus (aka: City of God) which has been on our to be seen pile from Netflix for months (eeks; not enough time for movies!?). In a word: Wow!

Warning: this film is not for minors in any sense, ever. It is a graphic depiction of life and death in the “Cidade de Deus (City of God).. housing project built in the 1960’s that–in the early 80’s–became one of the most dangerous places in Rio de Janeiro.” (quote from IMDB’s plot summary). Excellent and thought provoking film, but also shocking violence and language.

One quote that kept floating back into my head afterwards, from the documentary that accompanies the film a police officer says: “we (the police) are the only state agency that sets foot in the favelas, the only agency with any presence at all there” - and that, if it is accurate, explains it all. If greater society does not value it’s poor, it’s youth, it’s people; those people will not value themselves. Where is society’s great equalizer: solid public education? The kids growing up in the favelas have no hope because their country does not even invest in them.

The reviewers on IMDB have done a much better job that I can of reviewing this awesome film, but I give it another endorsement and want people to think about the impact of walling themselves off from the poor and forgetting about them. As American’s jump into suburb-enclaves (burbclaves in the language of Neal Stephenson), and try to cut their tax burden by ignoring and cutting off programs for the poor; I wish they would at least think on the possible results of their own selfish actions. One possibility is the kind of violence we see in Cidade de Deus.

I am very excited about the new, fully Aqua enabled, NeoOffice coming soon. This is a Java-free (in other words: it may actually work reliably, use little memory, and be fast) completely open source solution to the ongoing problem of reading proprietary/non-standard file formats (MS Word, MS Excel, MS Powerpoint) that people insist on sending around even though they require expensive crap software from MicroSoft.

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