Her kitchen resembled mine

I saw a news story yesterday – Thanksgiving Day – about a woman in Colorado. She was preparing Thanksgiving dinner for 30 or so strangers. People who responded to her www.craigslist.com ad. She said she didn’t even really know how to cook but wanted to help others because she and her family had recently made it through some rough times.

It was her modest kitchen and her noble intent that made me cry. Her kitchen was small, really no bigger than mine. Cooking for 10 in my kitchen would be a challenge. Three times that seems impossible!

And I’m not a bad cook, but I’d be a nervous wreck cooking for a crowd that size. Not her. She was calm, humble and seemed to be looking forward to it.

In the same weekend when yet another band of terrorists are killing innocents in India, it was so nice to hear about this good woman. An ordinary woman, with a kind heart, doing good for a few folks. We need more of her. God bless you.

Refreshing change of heart

Gannett Co. Inc., media mogul, announced this week that its CEO is taking a pay cut. All the staffers’ pay will be frozen, and Craig Dubow’s cut amounts to only $200,000 of his total annual compensation of $7.5 million with bonus and stock awards.  But still…I find it refreshing and inspiring.

Imagine if all corporations did that now, in even larger amounts. (Dubow’s cut was 17 percent.)  What if all senior level leaders took just a 5 percent pay cut? Wouldn’t that help their operating budgets considerably, and ideally spare the rest of the staff from harm?

I would even go so far as to say that most of us – at any level – would take a pay cut over a job loss in today’s economy. We can all tighten the old belts a bit more, but if your job and income disappear, desperation sets in. Especially now.

I hope more leaders will follow Mr. Dubow’s lead.

http://washington.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2008/11/03/daily38.html?b=1225688400^1727480&ana=e_abd

It’s over

From www.foxnews.com:

“I was born in the civil rights time. To see this happening is unbelievable. We’ve got the first black president. A black president!” said Mike Louis, a 53-year-old black man who got teary-eyed as he watched the election results on a giant video board in Cincinnati’s Fountain Square. “It’s not cured now, but this is a step to curing this country of racism. This is a big, giant step toward getting this country together.” [emphasis added]

Mr. Louis, your optimism seems to point the wrong direction, I believe. I think the election results show that whites are not as racist as blacks want everyone to believe. Americans – black and white – banded together to elect Obama president.

So in another historic moment in America, blacks now need to let go of the perception of racism. This country is not about white against black, and really hasn’t been for quite some time. If you truly believe this is a step in curing racism, please believe that the responsibility now rests largely with blacks. Whites let it go some time ago.

Breast Cancer Awareness Month poem

The color of strength

 

We color you pink to deplete

            the power you only think you have

Suicide bomber,

health terrorist hits

our mothers’ lives, our sisters’ lives, our BFFs’ lives

 

We color you pink to prove you are

spineless and weak

Pink is love, it is hope

it is all that we are

life-carrying, life-nurturing, caretaking us!

 

We color you pink for who we are

            young breasts and old

Pink is breasts cancer-free

it is those who we know

Sheryl and Laurie who whooped your sorry hide, Tani still in the fight, and Donna K. who let you win your ten-year siege

 

We color you pink because we can

take control

Pink penetrates your evil gray

with brighter hope for the day

when you perish, breast cancer.

 

 

© 2008 L.W. McDonald

Say no to the golden handout, Washington

I’m getting nervous here. The brain-iacs in Washington are still trying to increase U.S. taxpayer debt by $700 billion. Yes, billion with a B!!

If that doesn’t scare you, I don’t know what will. In at least the past 20 years this country has had its economic ups and downs. So it occurs to me that through recent history if our government couldn’t control the thieves who run corporations into the ground, how can we believe government can get it right this time!

We can’t believe them and we shouldn’t! It would be far better if our elected officials kept their mouths shut this week, let the market do what the market needs to do. Focus on putting in place stringent laws that prevent any more corporations from such gross mismanagement.

There’s an old adage: if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Most of us know from personal experience that proves to be true.

It is proving to be true now for all those lenders and corporations who thought they could bend the rules to facilitate increased revenues and bigger bonuses for the execs…and never get caught! Ever heard of Ying and Yang? Cause and effect? Action, reaction?

I believe the $700 billion payout has a “too good to be true” feel to it as well. It gives me a stomachache when I think about it, and from my experience, I know that stomachache is my instinct – which is usually right – telling me something is no good.

We need a paradigm shift in the U.S. economy. People need to stop looking for the quick buck. Homebuilders need to stop building brand new homes that people can’t afford, and instead pursue a new business line rehabbing pre-existing homes. Not mansions – homes! That first-time homebuyers and working class families can afford.

Creditors must stop giving money to bad risks. Thankfully it sounds like the skid brakes have come on this week in that regard. Each American citizen has to take responsibility and establish good credit. It takes work, discipline and denial. None of which 21st century Americans are fond of!

Take ownership for yourself, average American. Take responsibility for your mistakes and thievery, corporate executive. Stop the scare tactics elected officials, and take time to create a permanent fix, not a band-aid.

Check, balance and re-check!

What a frightening two weeks it’s been in America! The pile of “financial giant” rubble continues to grow. Here in the land of the free and the home of the brave, our government rides in to the rescue.

I don’t necessarily disagree with that approach because we need to salvage our financial infrastructure; however, it is tiresome that we pick up after corporations while American families struggle to make ends meet. Many fail, and getting ahead seems a thing of the past to most of us.

Case in point: Lehman Brothers. As far as I can tell this was/is a publicly held company. The Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) laws apply, right?

Those are the laws put into place after Enron and its accounting firm, Arthur Andersen, stole millions from employees. Didn’t we learn then that many behemoth corporations and their leaders are not to be trusted? I believed, perhaps naively, that via the SOX act, federal government had done its job to protect Americans and America’s financial infrastructure.

Recent events seem to me to prove the point that we cannot legislate away every problem and potential problem as we are so wont to do in this country.  But once again as Congress and the President execute a plan to salvage Lehman Brothers, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, etc., this is my public plea to every U.S. senator and representative and to the President to put in place impermeable checks and balances that cannot be changed when selfish, greedy corporate leaders come up with new schemes and scams to fatten their collective wallets.

Our country, and its future generations, cannot afford to foot the bill for any more of these piggish scum concerned only with their own opulence. ABC News reported of one such executive who apparently feels entitled to sympathy from the rest of us because he had to give up his private jet.

Really? Gimme a break! We have millions in this country who would be grateful for a reliable car to get to and from a $25-30K job, and maybe an occasional vacation by commercial jet. Go to your room, Mr. Executive, and don’t come out until you fully appreciate the scope of your self-centeredness. Then start donating your excess to others in need.

Patriot Day 2008

Immediately I thought of my husband. A police officer. We lived more than 1,500 miles away but nobody seemed to know exactly was happening.

 

“We’re hearing reports of possible terrorism,” the DJ on my car radio blurted.

 

Terrorism was not a word in my daily vocabulary on Sept. 10. Seven years later, it is a permanent part of my lexicon.

 

This year is the seventh anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. That day in our history changed us all, and the world around us. It is a day we must never forget full of moments we must never forget.

Stop for a moment. I know it’s painful, but recall to your mind’s eye the pictures of planes – jets – flying into those towers. See the burning Pentagon. Think about the hole left in the ground from the crash of United Flight 93. If you’re like me, tears come instantly even after all this time.

We now call September 11 “Patriot Day.” We can and should always be proud of our country, but especially on September 11, let us stand proudly as Americans. Shoulder to shoulder, from coast to coast, border to border. We live in a land defined by freedom and courage that does not crumble when attacked.

 

We stand tall and we fight back. We fight back to be certain our children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren never know less than freedom and blessing in their lives.

 

Still today tens of thousands of brave men and women in uniform fight in the War on Terror for our safety here at home—they are our family members, our co-workers, our neighbors. Hold them in your prayers and thank them any chance you get for the rights and privileges they protect for each one of us.

Let us all be peaceful on this day, at least on this day. We are alive with our families while thousands of others are missing a loved one. They look at pictures taken since 2001 and see a hole where mom or dad or brother or sister used to be. They will never forget this day and neither should the rest of us.

 

Hang your American flag. Wear red, white and blue. Don a flag pin. Promote your patriotism with pride and celebrate the memory of all those we lost that blue-skied, sunny September morning…spoiled so abruptly by black smoke and thick white dust. Be silent for a moment at 8:46 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time, when the first attack occurred. And always remember.

Happy Birthday, America!

 None who have always been free can understand the terrible fascinating power of the hope of freedom to those who are not free.  

— Pearl S. Buck

I am blessed to be among those who have always been free. It didn’t always feel like it growing up…you know, parents’ rules and all that! But I live in a place and a time that abounds with freedom and opportunity.

Freedom to speak or write blogs for the world to see. Freedom to worship how, when and where I choose. Freedom to  pursue any career path I want, regardless of gender or skin color.

It is the battles fought by countless heroes before me that give me those freedoms. Thank you to the United States’ founding fathers, to this country’s leaders at all levels, and to the Susan B. Anthonys, Martin Luther King Jrs. and Rosa Parks of the world. Courageous and inspirational leaders who each of us should exemplify every day.

Happy Independence Day!

News – American made

In Florida in the past two weeks, nearly 400 newspaper and other media outlet employees have lost their jobs. The Miami Herald, Palm Beach Post, Tampa Tribune cut staff, and the Daytona Beach New Journal will be shutting down completely.

This is bigger than just the tough economy. This is a result of the dumbing down of Americans. Newspapers can’t sell their papers – their core product! How can we expect them to stay in business if we’re not buying the product?

Why aren’t we buying? In my opinion, it’s because so many of us are content to read an occasional blog or the FWD: FWD: FWD: e-mail Joe’s best friend’s sister’s nephew wrote. It doesn’t really matter to us if that piece is fact-checked. We’ll take it at face value and consider it news.

As a consumer that frightens me. I don’t always like that journalists are the watch dogs of society – don’t always agree with them – but I know that the large majority of them want to tell both sides of every story to inform the public. There’s no way I can be informed, on my own, about all the issues of our complex society. I rely on them to deliver the information so I can make intelligent choices and decisions.

As we force their employers to reduce staff and close doors, we risk losing something essential to America’s being: past, present and future. I am proud to say that I have been a newspaper subscriber in every city I’ve lived in my adult life, and am currently. I can’t always spend as much time reading it as I like, but I will always subscribe.

I want factual coverage and I want to support American made products. After all, isn’t that what our newspapers really are?

Shame on Starbucks!

I love coffee–hot, fresh coffee. And I love my mocha lattes. I can justify splurging on them because it’s about the only way I drink milk. Lots of my hard earned cash helped you grow, Starbucks.

Now you’re closing 600 stores! You couldn’t rake in money fast enough a year or so ago, and now when times are a little tough, you’re adding to the problem. Not to mention the lack of “green” by abandoning buildings that in many instances you built new.

In the process of all your growth, you ran “mom & pops” out of business across the country. So while I’m disappointed in you, I can’t even say I’ll never buy another Starbucks. You’re the only gig I’ve got close by, right on the way to work. Just the way your business model was designed.

Rethink your decision. Limit hours. Cut back menu items in those places. Do anything but put more people out of work and add more wasted building space to our landscape.