Colorful Wares - Who Will Buy? [photos]

all photos by Jude Nagurney Camwell ©

Going Places [photo]

I couldn't help but notice [and capture] an ironic juxtaposition between the sign at the gas pump at which I was standing in the workaday world and the mention of the faith-filled gift implied within the very name of the modest "Gift of Love Ministry" directly across the street.

One sign involves a place where your contribution is welcomed in exchange for the promise of reaching a heavenly destination.

The other sign offers the same. ;)

photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell

Silence Touching Souls [photo]

"See how nature - trees, flowers, grass - grows in silence;
see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence...we need silence to be able to touch souls."
~ Mother Teresa of Calcutta

photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell

Sunset at Lake Norman [photo]

Sunset at Lake Norman N.C.
photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell

Chicks [photo]

Chicks
photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell

Heron Catches a Fish [photo]

This heron seemed to have wanted to show off a fish he'd just caught.
Poor fish! ;)
photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell

Adirondack Photos

Through the Pines






Sunset, Sabattis




Photos by Jude Nagurney Camwell

Of Patriotism and the Army of a King

Just imagine for a moment, if you will, being asked to honor the veterans of a King's private and enriched army in your own country where the ones we've long honored have looked like these men and women.

Photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell

At Frameshop, Jeffrey Feldman speaks out about Blackwater and the telltale signs of President Bush setting up the kind of army that acts as if it is his own. What does "patriotism" mean when you can clearly see the American tradition of constitutional power being turned over, as a farmer treats the fallow soil of his fields, and the seeds of a privatized army loyal only to a President and his particular foreign policy are sown?

To whom and to what do we owe our patriotism? Do we owe it to longstanding American and democratic tradition ... or do we owe it to the army of one man who appears to deem himself king over a land that has adopted freedom through a careful system of checks and balances as its hallmark of continuity?

Excerpt:

Blackwater and its kind are different. They are not just soldiers, not just police. They are lines of loyalty bought, paid for and hidden from public view by the obfuscating jargon of Federal budgets. Their loyalty is sternly vertical, extending through the CEO to the President in a perfect reinvention of vassal obligation.

Blackwater may be 'boots on the ground' in Iraq or Katrina, but in political terms they are an extension of the king's body.

Royal power extends from the king to the people, from top down, but it cannot unfold if the army belongs to the people and not to the king. As Machiavelli described it, mercenaries and auxiliary armies can help extend rule for a short period of time, but for the will of the prince to become the will of the state, the king must make the army 'his own.'

Jeffrey Feldman, Frameshop: The Prince

stray

The apartments where this cat strayed were torn down this summer. I would look for him each time I visited the Morningside apartments in Charlotte. I am haunted....not knowing what became of him. I wish someone would see this very photo of him, by some wild chance, and tell me he's okay...that he has a home.

Hadley, Cheney, & God

Scott Ritter
Photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell, taken in Syracuse 9-29-07



What do National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley, Vice President Dick Cheney, and God have in common? Find out by reading former U.N. Special Commission chief inspector Scott Ritter's opinion piece [available at Truthout]. Excerpt:

The issue of Iran is a national problem which requires a collective debate, discussion and dialogue inclusive of all the facts, and stripped of all ideology and theocracy which would seek to deny reasoned thought conducted within a framework of accepted laws and ideals. It is grossly irresponsible of an American president to invoke the imagery of World War III without first sharing with the American people the framework of thought that produced such a comparison.

Edwards & Gore on Iraq at Current.com (Current comes to Converge South)

Former VP Al Gore and 2008 presidential candidate John Edwards have made videos for Current.com where they've expressed their opinions about the Iraq War.


Related:

Current.com comes to Greensboro, N.C.



Saskia Wilson Brown of Current.com




Current's Brandon Gross (on right) with co-panelist Jason McHugh (CrapTV)


Saskia Wilson-Brown and Brandon Gross of Current.com appeared at the 2007 Converge South conference held at North Carolina A & T University in Greensboro this past weekend. Photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell (Iddybud).



My set of photos from Converge South
Go to the link to see larger versions of the photos below.

ConvergeSouth 2007 Flickr Group
Technorati Results for ConvergeSouth2007
Anthology of Converge South postings [by David Beckwith]
Posted at Current.com by Saskia Wilson-Brown