How far down do you need to put a human being before ANYTHING "appears" an improvement.  Green Bay has done it again.  In their fictitious "helping hand" they have moved this family from one bad situation to another.  Possibly this family has high hopes.  As it is... I hate to rain on their parade, but seriously, is this a better neighborhood than the one they "escaped".  Won't it be a slap in the face to these folks when they find out that all they've done is exchange one ideology for another (i.e. west vs. east side or vice-versa).

Check out: Green Bay Press Gazette article.

Sure..  it's a "different" neighborhood, but is it BETTER...?   Who's running the "habitat for humanity" in Green Bay anyway..... some corporate flunky...?    Aren't there any sites available in ALL of Brown County  (for the record, I could name a few) which would have given this family a foothold.....?  A place they could cherish and raise their children knowing that their hard work is meaningful.

Check this out, this is good.  (6 min)  Carl Sagan's "pale blue dot" set to Pink Floyd's "The Turning Away". 

Okay, maybe I'm a day late and a dollar short (maybe two...okay six)  but this is cool.  If you're like me, possibly this event slipped past you also.  What did I miss?  Pangea day.  The Turkish Daily explains:

"Pangea Day helps people see themselves in others by bringing millions of people together in the cities of Cairo, Dharma, Jerusalem, Kigali, London, New York, Ramallah, Rio de Janeiro and Istanbul with a live screening in Sultanahmet Square.

  The entire program will be broadcast in seven languages to millions of people worldwide through the Internet, TV and mobile phones.

  During the four-hour event there will be 24 short-length film screenings titled “24 Short Films by People Around the World for the World.” The event will kick off at 9:00 p.m. and it is free of charge."

Pangea day is broadcast internationally.  SFGate explains it's creation:

Feingold calls them "on the carpet" regarding the Iraq fiasco.  Good work Feingold.  Screw the people who say "we" don't care.  From The Nation:

"So, as a senator, McCain failed the test Tuesday. But which Democrat offered the strongest challenge to the Petraeus-Crocker spin?

Clinton? Obama?

No, Russ Feingold.

The Democratic senator from Wisconsin, who is not running for president but probably should be, continued to take his job as a senator more seriously than any of his colleagues.

Feingold told Petraeus and Crocker: I hope you won't take it personally when I say that I wish we were also hearing today from those who could help us look at Iraq from a broader perspective. The participation at this hearing of those charged with regional and global responsibilities would have given us the chance to discuss how the war in Iraq is undermining our national security. It might have helped us answer the most important question we face – not "are we winning or losing in Iraq?" but "are we winning or losing in the global fight against al Qaeda?"

Spot on. 

Update: "The Wonk Room" from Think Progress examines the text in question and exposes the inaccuracies.  They also provide a link to a "Friends of the Earth" petition directed at the publisher to correct the "misleading" information.  From The Wonk Room:

In the recent “Home & School Connection” newsletter from the Green Bay Area Public Schools dated April 2008 there was an interesting question raised in the Q& A box.

 Quote:  “My son Jimmy gets good grades on tests and quizzes, but his report card had some low marks because of missed or incomplete assignments.  What should I do?

 An interesting question, and “untimely” to say the least.  The question itself raises specific circumstances which may or may not exist.  It presupposes that the child in fact did miss assignments or that they were incomplete.

On another blog someone posted this article by Tim Wise entitled "Jeremiah Wright, Barak Obama and the Unacceptability of Truth -- Of National Lies and Racial America".  It was such an excellent article I thought I would link to it here also.  The full article at Counterpunch.org.  An excerpt:

"But white folks have a hard time hearing these simple truths. We find it almost impossible to listen to an alternative version of reality. Indeed, what seems to bother white people more than anything, whether in the recent episode, or at any other time, is being confronted with the recognition that black people do not, by and large, see the world like we do; that black people, by and large, do not view America as white people view it. We are, in fact, shocked that this should be so, having come to believe, apparently, that the falsehoods to which we cling like a kidney patient clings to a dialysis machine, are equally shared by our darker-skinned compatriots.

This is what James Baldwin was talking about in his classic 1972 work, No Name in the Street, wherein he noted:

I guess there's something about seeing and hearing it with your own eyes and ears that moves us beyond superficiality.  We've all read about war and its atrocities and strategies.  Some of us may have been there.  But when I listened to the stories told by these soldiers during the IVAW  Winter Soldier event it was unnerving.  We knew this bad news was coming and we did hear some of it in bits and pieces throughout the war.   But their voices, telling their stories, one after the other in shaken tones and blunt truths brings the horrific human side of war into clear context.

 The AV booth at Truthout.org.

Sometimes we need to remember who we're fighting.  Hey...comedy entertainment.  It's all true, folks.

With Gen Fallon's retirement there is a greater fear of war with Iran in many peoples minds.  We are already deeply mired in Iraq and a war with Iran would be cataclysmically stupid.  British M.P. George Galloway debates with a caller regarding the matter. (7 min)