Black churches and pastors have come to the fore recently on the issue of gays and gay marriage. The basis of their opposition to gay marriage is their religion, Christianity and the Bible. This should make us all blink a little in disbelief. Blacks have suffered enormously in the past because of racial discrimination, and [...]
A recent commencement address by Dennis Kucinich: Dear Friend, I want to share with you this Commencement speech I gave this week to 5000 attendees from over 100 countries at American University in Dubai (AUD). Previous AUD Commencement speakers include President Clinton and Secretaries of State Powell, Albright and Baker. In the speech I strive [...]
Langston Hughes wrote a beautiful, impassioned poem about America. Here it is: LET AMERICA BE AMERICA AGAIN Let America be America again. Let it be the dream it used to be. Let it be the pioneer on the plain Seeking a home where he himself is free. (America never was America to me.) Let America [...]
What is GDP, or Gross National Product? Basically, it has to do with the market value of all products and services produced in one year by the residents of a country. Here is what economist John Kenneth Galbraith had to say about our concept of production in his 1958 book, “The Affluent Society”: “Some years [...]
The raging debate over the Obama health care law that is now going before the Supreme Court is both ludicrous and a tragedy. A tragedy because it is ordinary people – the citizens of America – who will be the losers, one way or another. Yes, we need new and revamped health care legislation, and [...]
Our representatives in congress are gridlocked. Politics are gridlocked. The country is gridlocked. America is gridlocked. The America that should be, the dream of America that has been waiting in the wings for eternity, is gridlocked. Politicians are arguing day after day, trying to convince the American people that they are the truer representatives of [...]
The Dream of America is coming to fruition. It is the realm of Eternity, existing right here, right now, in the most mundane affairs that go on day to day. This is the land – America – where we come forth. Myriads of people have waited breathlessly for aeons and aeons, waiting for their blissful [...]
Daisaku Ikeda, president of the SGI, or Soka Gakkai International, a Buddhist lay organization with about 13,000,000 members in 192 countries and territories, presents an annual peace proposal to the United Nations. This year’s proposal focuses on the topic of “Human Security and Sustainability: Sharing Reverence for the Dignity of Life.” All of Mr. Ikeda’s [...]
The times they are a’changing. The contrast is very stark: Authoritarian powers and dupes of leaders are falling like dominoes around the world. Those hanging onto their power through iron-fisted control tremble in the face of something brewing beyond their control. Even in our own supposedly democratic government, there is exposed the most glaring self-centeredness, [...]
“These are the times that try mens’ souls.” These famous words of Thomas Paine from his pamphlet “The Crisis”, written during the American Revolutionary War, stirred the spirit of all Americans of that difficult time. The words might as well have been uttered today. Paine lived and wrote amid two great revolutions: The American Revolution, [...]