SUICIDE PREVENTION MONTH

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D. S. Mitchell

Please Call #988 for help. 

Dangerous To Your Health

September is National Suicide Prevention Month. If you are between 15-35, suicide is the second leading cause of death for your age group.  For all age groups, suicide is responsible for more deaths than murder and natural disasters, combined.  Men take their own lives four times as often as women. Many men sadly would rather be dead than seem ‘weak.’

Not Rare, Or Isolated

As you can see, suicide is not a rare, or an isolated event. Twenty-two vets a day kill themselves. An alarming increase in suicide among law enforcement officers should be of national concern. Approximately 170 officers killed themselves last year. Suicide is permanent. No one comes back. It is very real and definitely a permanent end.

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Senseless Killing: Trophy Hunting

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SENSELESS KILLING                               

By Anna Hessel

The Senseless Death of One Lion

In the summer of 2015, Minnesota dentist Dr. Walter Palmer, having reportedly paid $50,000 in US dollars to hunter-guide Theo Bronkhorst as the price for an innocent lion’s head, shot and killed a majestic creature named Cecil.  Palmer first shot Cecil with bow and arrow, then tracked the wounded king of the jungle for about a 40-hour period, finally killing him with a rifle on July 1st near Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe.

A Song Too Late

Public outrage at this prompted many celebrities and politicians, among others, to publicly condemn the murder of this animal.  Musicians composed songs of tribute in Cecil’s honor, while artists worldwide such as Aaron Blaise, a former animator for Disney, created works to celebrate his life and mourn his death.

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HEROISM

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HEROISM:

It’s Not Just About Your Cape

By D. S. Mitchell

Heroism: Sometimes being a hero is as simple as:

  • Showing up for your child’s school program when it isn’t convenient.
  • Speaking up when you see a person being teased or bullied.
  • Visiting a dying friend, or family member no matter how hard.
  • Donating money to a political candidate who has heart and passion.
  • Adopting a homeless pet, (only to find that adoption, saved your life).
  • Sending a pre-paid phone card to a deployed soldier.
  • Never forget to say, ‘please’ and ‘thank you’. It builds bridges.
  • Stopping to give a hug when you are running late.
  • Recycling and reusing.
  • Donating time for a favorite charity.
  • Putting flowers on the grave of a soldier that you never met.
  • Never being too proud to say you are sorry.
  • Giving up your seat to someone who needs it more than you do.
  • Being forever grateful.

Being a daily hero doesn’t require mammoth effort, but it does need ‘consistent and persistent effort”. I don’t remember who said that, but I think it is true. Consistency and persistence overcomes most obstacles. If you want to be a political hero I suggest you believe in your ability and power to effect change. I challenge you to effect your corner of the world and show your heroism.

 

“Every Heartbeat Hurts”

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“Every Heartbeat Hurts”

By D. S. Mitchell

“Imagine a child trying to describe how trauma physically feels and saying to you, “Every heartbeat hurts.” Our government is tearing children apart and using their pain for political purposes”. Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley (Twitter 9/5/2019).

If you are ignoring the plight of the immigrant children at our border, shame on you.  The manipulation of their immigration tragedy for Trump’s political base is both alarming and  disgusting. There are many days between now and the 2020 presidential election. These kids can’t wait. Call your Senator and demand that these children be released to family members in the United States, or other suitable foster care.

I called. So should you.

 

 

KOCH BROS: Corruption & Hypocrisy

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By Trevor McNeil & D.S. Mitchell

Kernel of Truth

The old adage that “only the good die young” was confirmed with the death of David Koch at the age of 79.  David Koch, and brother Charles, formed the two-headed demon that led one of the most unethical and unprincipled companies in modern memory.  Which is saying something with the likes of Enron as competition. Though, to be fair, like them or hate them, no one at Enron, as far as is known, used their vast fortune to fund and push for extreme hard right libertarian political ideology of small government and anti-regulation to transform U.S. government policy.

The Company We Keep

A group of hard Right, hyper-“patriotic”, pseudo-Christians emerged with the Obama election. These folks identified themselves as the “Tea Party”.  They were a cranky group of hustlers and howlers who seem to think the parable goes “turn the other cheek; and then pull a Glock”. A bit of a turn on the standard evangelical prayer group.

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Trumpism Is Unsustainable

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Calamity face

I am on a mission to make sure that Donald Trump is a one term president. Voter Blue.

Trumpism Is Unsustainable

By D. S. Mitchell

My Personal Mission

Trumpism is unsustainable. Donald Trump has been in office for two and a half years. Since November 9th, 2016 I have made it my personal mission to call out our faux president every chance I get for his scandalous and corrupt behavior. I challenge anyone, Republican or Democrat to name any president in our 200 year plus history that was worse than this guy. Trump is in fact a risk to the country, in every way imaginable.  He is a reckless and hate filled demagogue.

Temperamentally Unfit

Trump’s chaotic thinking and his emotional volatility are, in fact, a danger to the country he administers. In my most wild nightmares, I never imagined the potential of such a soulless narcissist ever being elected to any office in the country, much less the presidency. His behavior over the last week has raised both tempers and eyebrows. The local volunteer Fire Department has had to stop by my house several times to put my ‘hair fire’ out.

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Great Blue Heron

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A Great Blue Heron just hanging out.

I have a friend who lives in a houseboat moored at Sauvie’s Island. Fortunate one. Sauvie’s Island is a beautiful rural island in a channel of the Columbia River.  The rapidly gentrifying little farming enclave is just a few miles outside of Portland, Oregon. Blue Heron’s and other waterfowl can be seen just hanging out enjoying the day.

Editorial: “A Matter Of Time”

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A Look At Gun Control and 2nd Amendment Reform           

By Trevor K. McNeil

Still Echoing

The cycle has come back around again, and gun-control has returned to the sociopolitical forefront. Something that has occurred with increasing regularity since the beginning of the 21st century, starting with the Columbine shooting in 1999. A twenty year old tragedy that still has echos today.

Posting Memes

Both Sandy Hook shooter Adam Lanza and Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz posted memes related to Columbine massacre, before committing their own atrocities. The down time between mass shootings has been reduced from months, to weeks, to hours.  The two most recent shootings in Ohio and Texas occurring on the same day. Something that has never happened before on American soil. It has gotten to the point that in the United States no one is safe anywhere. Not in church, not in school, not at the mall, not at a concert, not at a restaurant.

Efficient Means Of Killing

The main reason this is happening, and will continue to happen, is a lack of political will by law makers to devise meaningful reforms. Finding that ‘will’ seems is apparently hard.  But we must find the will. We must make it more difficult for such crimes to occur by limiting access to guns. Death by gun is one of the most modern and efficient means of killing, on an personal level, ever devised. One such reform would be an extreme overhaul of unlicensed gun shows. Such unregulated gun shows are exactly how the Columbine shooters got the guns they used that fateful day, in April 1999.

Under Age

Despite that both shooters were too young to buy, or own a gun in Colorado, they were able to use a ‘straw buyer’ to get the guns at an unlicensed gun show. In December, 1998 several guns were purchased at an unlicensed gun show by the straw buyer. The buyer later sold the weapons to Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, in spite of the seller knowing the boys were under the legal age. It is clear that if they had tried to buy such weapons in a licensed gun store they would have been turned away.  If they hadn’t gotten the guns a lot of people would be alive today, including the shooters.

Gun Love

The gun love is so strong in some quarters, not even Democrats dare stand against them, even in terms of reasonable measures. Conor Lamb, as such, is a self-described “Pro-Gun Democrat.” It was that distinction that was key in his victory over his Republican opponent in 2018. It is a fact that gun law reform will be necessary if America is to slow the number of gun related deaths. Currently, the United States loses 40,000 people annually to gun violence.  Many of these deaths are not mass shooting events, but rather domestic violence or suicidal actions.

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News That Bites: Try A Little Kindness

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Try A Little Kindness

By David L. Shadrick

Hello and welcome to Calamity Politics and “News That Bites” with David Shadrick and Calamity Clown.  Calamity has stood us up. She sent me a note scribbled on the back of a Nancy Pelosi fund raising letter telling me she intended to spend the afternoon curled up in Bernie Sanders’ lap, while he reads his “Medicare4All” plan aloud. 

It Ain’t Easy

This is probably the hardest article I have ever tried to write.  It shouldn’t be that hard to simply remind everyone that we all need to be a little bit nicer to each other.  As the world around us experiences the chaos that is existence, we need to remember to take a few extra minutes to embrace kindness, as a life choice.

Reserve Your Condemnation

When I do fundraising I often times have to remind volunteers not to become agitated or angry when someone doesn’t make a donation, or worse, is disrespectful.  I remind them that there are so many charities begging for money; and people have limited resources. I know what it’s like to be on a fund raisers platinum mailing list.

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“Killers, Victims or Bystanders”

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Killers, Victims, or Bystanders

By D. S. Mitchell

Indifference Is Seductive

Elie Wiesel, teacher, writer, philosopher and Auschwitz death camp survivor, said in a speech before the US Congress in 1999, “indifference can be tempting-more than that, seductive.  It is much easier to look away from victims.  It is after all, awkward and troublesome to be involved in another person’s pain and despair.”

Three Categories

Furthermore, “to be indifferent to that suffering makes the human being, inhuman.  Indifference is always the friend of the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor-never the victim, whose pain is magnified when he or she feels forgotten.  The political prisoner, the starving children, the homeless refugees-not to respond to their plight, not to relieve their solitude by offering them a spark of hope is to exile them from human memory.  And in denying their humanity, we betray our own.  Indifference, then, is not only a sin, it is a punishment.  Where I came from, society was composed of three simple categories: the killers, the victims, and the bystanders.”

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