... flee from hate, mischief and jealousy...

... I had no intention of starting the year on a heavy note because the outlook for me depends on positive vibrations, but news of the shooting and loss of life in Arizona this weekend touched a long-exposed nerve ... in the U.S.A., a country with so much to offer the world, there are some baffling smoke signals ...

... "life is one big road with lots of signs" ... this 1979 Bob Marley lyric from the strident anthem "Wake Up And Live" goes on to advise ... "flee from hate, mischief and jealousy" ... Bob's focus was on metaphorical signs and scriptural prophecy rather than literal letraset and amateur calligraphy ...















... it's either naive or deliberately negligent to overlook the connection between the election of the first African American to the highest office in the land and the overt vitriol that comes to the fore when progressive energies meet conservative resistance in the current political tug-o-war game ...

... inflamed passion can manifest as insanity in ways stranger than fiction and it gets even more distressing when people (who should know better as citizens of the self-proclaimed leader of the free world) resort to calling for (or alluding to) gruesome deaths for holders of opposition viewpoints ...

















... democracy, as fair a blueprint for governance as humankind has yet devised, needs to see itself as just that, a man-made template that requires periodic updates in the manner of today's state-of-the-art electronics ... other countries have experimented, the time is past-due for U.S.A. Democracy 2.0 ...

... after centuries of not-entirely-proportionate division of assets, the U.S. is now left to deal with a quest for equilibrium ... while it's understood that there'll be disagreement along the way, surely there is nothing to be gained by obstinately defending a right to bear ever-more-destructive firearms instead of voting towards enlightened alternatives ... even compromise would be improvement, but no, we must adapt for hollow-points and Glock semis because founding fathers decreed it for a bygone age ... some floundering fathers continue to decree it, with defensive and offensive rationale, while the walking-dead in America and it's regional slipstream continue to live nine-millimeter lives ...
















... in this part of the world we are able to lean on the democratic cornerstone of Freedom Of Speech but do we really require an M-16 to defend that right in a mall parking-lot or at a tea-party? ...

... it doesn't take deep contemplation to imagine what some people feel at the sight of a confident Michelle Obama, speaking freely as FLOTUS, when simian references recall another lingering archaic notion intended to injure ... elsewhere there's the oblique approach, but the words you twist to make your own today may return to haunt your tomorrow ...
















... I saw a re-run of "Bowling For Columbine" last week ... the shock factor has diminished significantly since first release due to repeated cases of people "going postal" and the hawkish stances staked-out by the paradoxically called "right-wing"...

... Limbaugh disciples and ilk, with clear kneejerk reactions to a wave of first-time-evers in American politics, unquestionably kindle brush-fires that feed on the feeble minded and potentially trigger actions like the barbaric attack on congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and her constituents ... tell it like it is ...





















... despite the proliferation of signage, or maybe because of it, the astounding reality of Palinite sophistry will not have the power to ultimately carry the day, I predict ... common sense tells me so (to reclaim a favoured phrase from the pipsqueek braintrust), but it is also possible that the sign-makers could worsen matters by learning to spell, correctly pronouncing "nuclear," "Iraq" and "Ahmadinejad," while re-loading a full ammo magazine into a semi-automatic weapon before getting shot or subdued ...

... an afterword-to-the-wise of A(mer)ri(ca)zona ... don't shoot that sheriff (Dupnik) ... check his post-event remarks, then resume the Bob lyric ... "riiise, from your sleepless slumber"...