Wednesday - 2008 Clinton Global Initiative Meeting

Wednesday’s opening plenary session, held in the Metropolitan Ballroom at the Sheraton Towers in Manhattan, included the voices of Lance Armstrong (Founder and Chairman of the Lance Armstrong Foundation), former President Bill Clinton, Queen Rania of Jordan, Bono (who is representing the ONE anti-poverty organization and has been blogging his experiences at FT.com), former US Vice President Al Gore (now Chairman of General Investment Management), and Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, President of the Republic of Liberia.

President Clinton impressed upon everyone, regardless of what part they played in the meeting, that they are important to the success of the CGI, each in their own way. He said, "Everyone who has come to CGI's annual Meeting or is following it online has the power to make a difference. The commitments you will make this year - both at the meeting and on our web-portal MyCommitment.org- come at a time of great uncertainty for the world. This makes our collective ability to touch the lives of others more important than ever. Working together, we can help make a safer and more sustainable future."

Former President George H.W. Bush made a surprise trip to the stage to join with Clinton to announce the creation of the Bush Clinton Coastal Recovery Fund. [see ABC News story]

President Clinton said that the current financial crisis is no excuse to ignore poverty. In his words, "This crisis is not an excuse to walk away from the world's challenges, but a compelling reason to intensify our efforts to meet them, around the corner and around the world."

Bono [of U2 and ONE] who, along with fellow rok singer and activist Bob Geldof have thrown their support behind a European Commission plan to give nearly 1.5 billion US dollars to African farmers, spoke passionately on Wedneday's plenary session panel about his unrealized expectations for his work with and hope for people who live in Africa.

Jasmine Whitbread, chief executive of Save the Children UK, who spent the day here at the Sheraton yesterday, wrote about the potential good that the Clinton Global Initiative has as it is bringing together "non-traditional partners - governments, aid organisations, charities and business." ­She added,

At the opening of the session, U2 singer Bono immediately raised the mood by asking: "If we can spend $700 billion to save Wall Street, why can't we find $25 billion to save the lives of the 25,000 children who die each day?" [Telegraph UK]

Bono spoke of what he called "the extremes," each damaging to humankind, the three extremes being extreme poverty, extreme climate change, and extreme ideologies.

Al Gore gave a fiery talk on climate change, speaking of a need for a new "electronet" as the current grid is in dire need of update. Gore went as far as giving the green light to civil disobedience on behalf of progress on issues surrounding climate change.

College Students Participate in CGI University

College students are participating in the Clinton Global Initiative [http://www.clintonglobalinitiative.org] through CGI University [http://www.cgiu.org].

For those who use Facebook technology (as many of my readers do), there are four separate pages dedicated to the focus-areas of the 2008 Clinton Global Initiative Meeting and these pages represent different aspects of CGI University:

CGI U - Human Rights & Peace:



Although the number of violent conflicts in our world has decreased in recent decades, the international community must still confront serious challenges to the basic human rights of millions of people. Global citizens are taking note and taking action. College students are playing a vital role in these efforts: highlighting the challenges, promoting social justice, giving voice and assistance to the disadvantaged, protecting the rights of children and women, and establishing dialogues and friendships across communities. CGI U panels will explore these and other opportunities to bridge divides, advance human rights, and expand peace in all regions of the world.


CGI U - Global Health



Each year, millions of people around the world die from preventable causes. Millions more suffer from debilitating diseases because they lack access to affordable, quality health care. Working from campuses, students and universities are making significant progress in strengthening health services and improving the health of societies around the world. CGI U panels will explore novel approaches to harnessing the resources of students and universities to save lives and make the world a healthier place.


CGI U - Energy & Climate Change



As the Earth's temperature rises, so too does the urgency to find solutions to our world’s changing climate. More than 17 states, 600 cities, and 300 colleges and universities are taking the lead on fighting global warming and setting ambitious targets to reduce heat-trapping gases. As this leadership around the world continues to grow, venture capital is pouring into clean energy projects in record amounts. Nevertheless, enormous challenges remain: fossil fuel use continues to rise worldwide, hundreds of coal plants remain on the drawing boards, tropical forests continue to disappear at record rates, and international consensus on next steps remains elusive. Urgent action is needed. CGI U Commitments show specific ways students and universities are working to transform these challenges into economic and environmental opportunities, and preserve our planet for generations to come.

CGI U - Poverty Alleviation



Almost half the world’s population lives on less than $2 a day. Many families are unable to put food on the table, send their children to school, or attain the basic necessities they need to thrive. During the last decade, individuals and organizations have formed new partnerships – some with the poor – to address this global crisis. Starting from wherever they may be, students and universities are taking steps to alleviate poverty in innovative ways.



Bill Clinton not only spoke about CGI U this morning at the opening plenary session, but also MyCommitment.org, another CGI opportunity in which anyone and everyone is invited to participate. The CGI website describes the purpose of "My Commitment":

MyCommitment.org aims to provide all people—regardless of age, income or where you live—with the resources to take action and make a real change in their communities and around the world.



MyCommitment.org seeks to:

* Inspire Change. Provide information highlighting some of the world’s biggest challenges, raise awareness and motivate others to take action.
* Build Community. Connect people with others who share the same vision for change and help them create networks to put plans into motion.
* Facilitate Action. Offer tools for visitors to make commitments to act and track their progress and results.
* Strengthen Engagement. Encourage citizen action around America and throughout the world.

MyCommitment.org builds on the success of the Clinton Global Initiative, a project of the Clinton Foundation, which has already inspired more than 1,000 commitments to action from some of the world’s top thinkers and government and business leaders. Learn more about CGI member commitments.

Launched in 2007, MyCommitment.org reflects President Clinton’s dedication to promoting citizen service. Throughout his life, President Clinton has met inspiring individuals and organizations taking innovative and unique approaches to solving some of the world’s biggest challenges. These encounters also led him to write his second book, GIVING: How Each of Us Can Change the World, which was released in September 2007.

http://www.mycommitment.org

Lance Armstrong Will Ride in At Least Three 2009 Races

Lance Armstrong appeared at a press conference this afternoon after having participated in the opening plenary session of the 2008 Clinton Global Initiative meeting. He's decided to return to professional cycling, not only for the purpose of competition, stemming from a true love of the sport, but to increase his presence as a spokesperson for his cause.

NYT: Addressing the opening session of the Clinton Global Initiative in New York on Wednesday, Armstrong said he would convene the first global summit of the Livestrong campaign to raise cancer awareness in Paris after the Tour.

He said, "Carrying this strong message around the world, whether it's on a bicycle or through the media is my number one goal."

Armstrong says he'll race in 2009 with Astana [see NYT story], the first race being in Australia in the Tour Down Under. The only other races he'd confirm taking part in will be Tour de France and the Leadville 100.

Armstrong pointed to Olympic contender Taylor Finney as "the future of American cycling" and said that he hoped that the Live Strong Global campaign adds a development component to a committed team already trying their best to win big events.





In a moment of contemplation about his drive to win (while not knowing how he'll perform in these races), Armstrong credited his mother for his willingness and spirit to never quit.

NYT: Armstrong, a fierce and uncompromising competitor, has kept in reasonably good shape. He has competed in several marathons, finishing them in under three hours. Recently, he has raced in smaller cycling races near the home he is building in Aspen, Colo., finishing second this summer in the Leadville Trail 100, a 100-mile mountain bike race through the Rocky Mountains. He raced for Team Livestrong, which is associated with his cancer foundation.

Armstrong has said the Leadville race, in particular, stoked his desire to return to competitive racing. Just before that race, he rejoined the testing pool run by the United States Anti-Doping Agency. Athletes are required to be in the program for at least six months before participating in elite-level competition.

He called Don Catlin "beyond reproach" in his field as an anti-doping scientist and Armstrong plans to use Catlin for his own personal anti-doping program.


Voicing his his appreciation when one woman shared her personal story about her experience with having had cancer and writing a book about it, Armstrong said that there are those who live in societies today who still cannot talk freely about having the disease because of the stigma that all too often goes along with the risk of being so honest. Being ostracized for having cancer is commonplace in some of these societies and whether it's riding a bike, writing a book, participating in community outreach or whatever one person has the power to do, sharing those experiences help people understand that they're not alone. He urged everyone to do whatever they can to create and perpetuate an open and honest discussion about cancer.

Armstrong is convinced that we'll see the face of health care changing in the U.S. regardless of who wins the upcoming election, albeit more change will be likely "if one party wins over the other." He didn't mention which party he meant. When it comes to cancer, he's convinced that the upcoming change in US health care will have a dramatic impact on those who need it most.





What shocks Lance Armstrong? That was a question asked of him today. Armstrong replied with an answer that will cause anyone who's had a loved one suffer with cancer to hope for something better in the future of cancer research. He said, "I'll tell you what shocks me, I think..in 20 years..we'll look back on chemotherapy and that will shock us....we'll look at that and say, 'I can't believe we did that to a fellow human being.'"

I'm a blogger...not a conventional reporter..and I can tell you that I had a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes, remembering my own mother's four-year battle with the disease, a battle that she lost in 2005. lance Armstrong's description of his own mother teaching him to "never quit" rang true when I thought of my mother's valiant fight. She never gave up.

[Photos by Jude Nagurney Camwell]

Some Thoughts About Why I'm at the 2008 CGI Meeting

The major challenges upon which the participants at this year’s Clinton Global Initiative [CGI] meeting have a shared focus are: Education, Energy & Climate Change, Global Health, and Poverty Alleviation.

As a blogger, some people might ask me why I’m here. I blog political issues and, admittedly, this work the Clinton Foundation is doing has a lot to do with the possibilities that come with political persuasion and vision, but this work does not rely solely upon politics in that it asks business, government, and civil society towork together in harmony for the benefit of humankind.






What change is possible in our world through the endeavors of and commitments to the Clinton Global Initiative? It isn't magical and it involves hard work, financial commitment, and a genuine caring for the lives of others. In truth, my personal interest in this goes beyond all politics. I think, in the end, it’s all about what lies deep in my heart. When it comes to what draws me to the CGI, the arrow directed toward my heart involves faith, spirit, caring, hope .. call the sum of it what you will. Think, just for a moment, about whatever causes you to care about your fellow human being. That’s the ground where I’ll meet you as we talk about what can be accomplished by the CGI and all who make commitments to the organization.

I think of my own friend George Henry Amoah who works hard for his fellow community members as Executive Director at Gye Nyame Charity International in Ghana. His organization believes that the plight of equatorial Africa is a global challenge that cannot be ignored by the developed world. At the Gye Nyame website, it states, “A nation can only improve the education & welfare of its people through internal initiatives based upon local & regional knowledge & practices, supported by global, ethical & accountable investment.” The organization, like many of its kind in Africa today, strives to protect poor women who walk long distances in the harvesting season and work the rest of the day picking fruit, many of them suffering snake, scorpion and other dangerous bites that sometimes result in death. They do all of this for some small amount of money.


On the eve of the opening of the 2008 CGI meeting, George wrote me a note of hope that people out here are listening and taking meaningful action to make a change we want to see in our world:

“Hello, Jude. Good morning and pray that we see a world of peace and devoid of bad corrupt practices this we need many good people coming together and working hard and not with lip services, we need to pull people on board and with faith we shall get there.
~ George”

We may be oceans apart, but the heart of a caring, hard-working, prayerful and hopeful citizen in Ghana has reached the ears of a blogger from a Northeastern sleepy suburban village in the U.S. where hardships seem to melt away when you learn the truth about the daily struggle for survival in a place you once thought was so far away.

“There’s no such place as far away,” as the spiritual writer Richard Bach has written. Today, more than ever, he’s right.

I'll Be Live-Blogging the 2008 Clinton Global Initiative Meeting

Former President Clinton Announces Program for 2008 Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting
Source: www.clintonglobalinitiave




Beginning Wednesday, September 24, I'll be in New York live-blogging the 2008 Clinton Global Initiative Meeting [as I did in 2006]. Watch for updates on my blog and on my Facebook page.



From an email:

On Wednesday, leaders from business, government, philanthropy, and religion will again gather in NYC for the 4th Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting to find innovative solutions to some of the world's most pressing challenges — and you can watch it all unfold, live via webcast on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.

Distinguished guests will include Her Royal Highness Rania Al-Abdullah, Queen of Jordan, President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, Senator Barack Obama, Senator John McCain, Bill Gates, Founder and Co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Gordon Brown, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, President René Preval of the Republic of Haiti, Tony Blair, Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Mayor Michael Bloomberg of the City of New York, John Chambers, CEO of Cisco Systems, Muhammad Yunus, Founder and Managing Director of Grameen Bank, Bono, Lead Singer of U2, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California, Lance Armstrong Foundation, Larry Page, Co-Founder of Google, T. Boone Pickens, Founder and Chairman of BP Capital Management, Rick Warren, Pastor of Saddleback Church, and Tom Brokaw, Special Correspondent for NBC News.

In addition to live webcasts of all the events, you can find schedules, transcripts, and photos at http://www.clintonglobalintiaitive.org during and after the meeting.

Look for our emails each morning over the course of the meeting, previewing the day's activities and recapping events from the day before. There's much work to be done — but at CGI, we're all about action.

Opportunity International

Russia, France Put Aside Woes. The U.S. Snarls.

Russia, France put aside Georgia war differences | International | Reuters
Source: www.reuters.com



SOCHI, Russia (Reuters) - Russia and France put aside disagreements over the August war in Georgia in a move to promote bi-lateral relations, especially in key energy projects. We will conduct with Russia

Excerpt:

"Analysts say the new rift with the West over Georgia have scared investors, adding to Moscow's financial woes in the face of recent global stock market turmoil."

I wonder - - which would the US government deem more of a national risk -- upsetting the world markets while the US is already reeling from Wall Street's troubles....or harping, toothless and snarling, with threats about Russia's recent actions in Georgian territory? I mean, really - is the Bush administration hallucinating? After French negotiations with Russia, not one single project has been put off or suspended between France and Russia. Meanwhile, Dick Cheney's still flapping his gums about his ever-rotting dream of a US-led new world order in Eurasia while offering millions upon millions of dollars that the US taxpayer can hardly bear to pay anymore... and while Sec'y of State Rice is "buying a one-way ticket to insignificance."

India apparently won't wait for the U.S. 123 nuclear agreement between India and the US ... with India deciding to sign a "landmark nuclear framework agreement with France during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Paris later this month." While the Bush administration runs ineffective wars, works at a snail's pace for treaties and agreements, and uses idle threats against other nations, business goes on with those nations that understand what realistic cooperation in the 21st century means.

Heckuva job, Dick and Condi. A change can't come soon enough, and brother McCain sounds more like your twin soul than his own man on this faded brand of foreign policy.

Jim Sciutto Talks About "Against Us"

Eye on Books
Source: www.eyeonbooks.com

Hating America is no longer limited to wild-eyed fringe fanatics in the Arab world, according to veteran journalist Jim Sciutto. In his role as ABC News Senior Foreign correspondent, Sciutto has traversed the Middle East, finding that al Qaeda's view of America is increasingly being adopted by middle-class, well-educated, mainstream Arabs. And frighteningly, Sciutto has concluded that the Iraq war is, indeed, a shockingly fertile breeding ground for enemies of America. His book is called "Against Us."

Listen:

Groovy

The Renewed Mind Is the Key
Source: www.theway.org

Don't ask. Just watch.
*Tip o'the hat to Chris Abraham. ;)

Ray Anderson on Sustainability

Blogging about carpet tiles isn't sexy by any means. Give one listen to Ray Anderson of Interface Inc [the word's largest modular carpet company], though, and you'll begin to see a glimpse of social changes through better business practices that will make room and make a sustainable home for the generations yet to come.

Ray Anderson on Sustainability
Source: www.youtube.com



This video is one businessman's testimony of a private and public evolution toward environmental consciousness and vision. See the book that inspired Mr. Anderson: "The Ecology of Commerce" by Paul Hawken and the poem that inspired Mr. Anderson - "Tomorrow's Child" by Glen Thomas.

"..Tomorrow's Child, my daughter-son,
I'm afraid I've just begun
To think of you and of your good,
Though always having known I should.

Begin I will to weight the cost
Of what I squander; what is lost
I should never forget that you
Will someday come to live here too..."

Obama's New Economic Philosophy

Senator Barack Obama did his best this afternoon to reassure the shaken American public that he had not only a new philosophy on the ways government should better guard the public interest, but also an initial plan to calm the troubled waters on Wall Street with a temporary plan to protect working Americans. [see transcript of Obama's remarks].

Senator Obama recognized that most Americans were "hurting long before Wall Street was hurting." One of the most compelling parts of his talk this afternoon was his stated principle regarding "mutual responsibility and reciprocity." Obama expressed, with an air of calm under the pressure of some horrific news on Wall Street this week, that his philosophy and plan would entail creating a "broad-based prosperity" in the U.S. rather than the kind of prosperity that enriched a few who are reckless as they've "walked away with the golden parachutes while taxpayers have been left holding the bag."

Stating that this crisis is "no accident of history," Obama pointed to government's past failures to act promptly to avoid the kind of unethical business practices that have caused more and more inequality in the U.S. He said that government has all too often "looked the other way until it was too late" and that government needs to provide common-sense regulation and oversight in order to best protect the public interest.

I imagined, after hearing him speak this morning, what it would be like to have the "broad-based prosperity" of which Obama offered as a realistic vision. The more you spread the opportunity, the better a reflection of the will of the people; the heart and soul of the people.

At Huffington Post, Steven G. Brant hopes that "at least some of our business and political leaders are in enough of a shock that they will look for new ideas and new answers" to this crisis.

Ten years ago, Mr. Brant wrote about the "fog" is being (and, for years, has been) created by "the tendency to see globalization from a perspective grounded in our history of living in a world of separate, independent nations."

The world's economy has become one interdependent system, yet we continue to view it through independent eyes.

What's really going on, from a systems perspective, is that a new, single, global system is struggling to be seen for what it is--a system that can prosper only if all of its parts prosper. It is a single system, one that innately knows that either all of it will make it or none of it will. That's the way healthy systems work. The business world will prosper beyond its wildest imagination once it cuts through this fog and stops viewing the future through "past-focused eyes."

Ex-G.O.P. Official Supports Obama for Values Reasons

For Ex-G.O.P. Official, Obama Is
Candidate of Catholic Values
Source: NY Times
Constitutional scholar Douglas Kmiec explains his current stance in "Can a Catholic Support Him? Asking the Big Question about Barack Obama," which will be published in two weeks by Overlook Press.

I believe that this interview, conducted by email with Professor Kmiec, will please neither pro-choice nor pro-life proponents....and I think the grey areas are an important reflection upon the American electorate's general views on the issue. He says,

"Senator Obama is articulating policies that permit faithful Catholics to follow the church’s admonition that we continue to explore ways to give greater protection to human life."

Professor Kmiec does his best to put the controversial abortion issue aside for just a moment to lay out a plethora of other current social and economic issues that bring about his belief that Obama and Biden's experience and campaign promises best reflect his own Catholic values. He cites, as examples, "the payment of a living wage, access to health care, stabilizing the market for shelter, special attention to the needs of the disadvantaged and the importance of community," saying that those issues are "all part of the church’s social justice mission."

Book Ref: "Can a Catholic Support Him?: Asking the Big Question About Barack Obama"
Barnes and Noble

Earth Sings the Ages' Unspoken Wisdom

as we walked the hills
where our mothers and fathers
were laid to rest
t'was mystic
the silent profundity of spirit
the years of unspoken wisdom
springing from the earth


*My own ancestor Isabell, born in 1780 with troubles raging all around in the new country, rests today on a hillside not far from my own home.

From Susan B Anthony to..Sarah Palin?!

Sarah Palin and Women Voters | Newsweek Politics: Campaign 2008
Source: www.newsweek.com

"Odd, yes, but there we are. Still, history suggests issues of policy will ultimately trump the politics of identity."

Excerpts that I found worthy of discussion:

ONE: "Decades of experience, stretching back to the suffrage movement, suggest that the brew of excitement (for Palin), horror (from the Democrats) and drama (who knows how it will end?) is fully in keeping with the tumult of the world the women of Seneca Falls, N.Y., made all those years ago."

TWO: "This was the great revelation of the 1920s: women do not all think the same. They reason, and vote, as individuals, not as a pack. [..] "Since 1980, women have skewed Democratic. And, until fairly recently, women have been loath to vote for other women—particularly stay-at-home mothers and elderly women. But the moose-shooting, defiant Palin may be changing that. Her gender is an asset —particularly in an election where sexism has been the subject of heated exchanges."


THREE: [NAOMI WOLF QUOTE] "She's pressing every single button that says 'working-class white woman'." Women candidates like Hillary Clinton had an "Ivy League gloss." Not Palin.But it's a very superficial button."

Petraeus: Troops Alone Won't Quell Violence in Afghanistan

While stressing the need for economic and political progress in both Iraq and Afghanistan, General David Petraeus told the AP:

"You don't kill or capture your way out of an industrial strength insurgency."

Microlending: Obama's Mother A Founding Force

Dunham is a woman of the people | starbulletin.com
Jamm Aquino / jaquino@starbulletin.com ..

A panel discussion on the life and work of Stanley Ann Dunham was held yesterday at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Alice Dewey reflected on time spent with Dunham, the mother of Senator Barack Obama. ...

Do you know that Barack Obama's mother was a founding force in microlending?


Like many of you, I continue to ask myself where this country is going. I've watched (and written) for eight years while the U.S. was under a Republican President and most of our country's banks and businesses treated people as pure commodities, bringing citizens to their knees with once-unimaginable fuel prices and loss of their homes, with no timely intervention - legislative or moral - from the President or the GOP-led rubber-stamping, road-blocking Congress.

This isn't a sudden revelation for me. I've watched the house of cards that we've called leadership in D.C. - with the cards having been dealt by a misguiding political party with too much power placed in their undeserving hands - fall in small degrees with every passing day until we stand where we who want to find common ground are today - a confused and divided society with little trust in either major political party to turn the U.S. - and the fate of our allies and innocent people in nations where governments are even worse - toward the sunrise of each new day.

I am not a young person by any stretch of the imagination, but as a person who has not lost the spark of passion for our nation's future and knowing our future is tied to the future of all who live with us on the Earth, I can clearly empathize with the youth of this nation in seeking a leader who will help us find common ground with one another.

Microlending is one of the most innovative ways to use the private sector to not only find success for themselves alone, but to ennoble them by enabling them to have a real, lasting, and positive impact on society and the environment.

Where has the leadership been in Washington DC when it comes to being moral leaders rather than hiding behind business-friendly legislation without asking business leaders to consider the society they serve and promoting the terribly uncreative and uninspiring shopping sprees after 9/11? There are too few citizens, including our potential-filled youth and our most promising business leaders, who know or who have even been asked to care about common-sense solutions to ending global poverty.

Knowing that Stanley Anne Dunham was one of the first activists in the ground-effort to find real-world solutions to end meaningless, cruel, and unnecessary poverty and starvation may cause us to better understand the conscience of the young man she raised who was greatly influenced by such wisdom and heart.

In this silly campaign season where the ads are going nuclear with negativity, I'm afraid that many people who may still be making up their minds could wind up making them up for all the wrong reasons.

In the Presidential race between Obama and McCain, we seem to have another evenly-divided American public. What could break that tie? And what silly media soundbite could bring one campaign crashing down? That is the concern of campaigns.

What about the concern for our future..the one that extends well beyond November 4th? Who deserves a chance to help us all find common ground in a world that seems to be burning with misunderstanding and hatred for the American people. Is it the leader of the party, whether or not he calls himself a Maverick, that demeans and mocks the kind of volunteer public service that has shaken our communities out of complacency in order to make them better? Is it a promise of victory in a war we never should've entered into - especially when we know that the General whose advice should be meaningful is saying he'd never use the word 'victory' when he's speaking about Iraq? General David Petraeus said this week, "This is not the sort of struggle where you take a hill, plant the flag and go home to a victory parade... it's not war with a simple slogan." I think we all know that's true and when I hear John McCain's constant use of the word "victory," I tend to wonder if he thinks that American voters can't really take the straight talk that he so often claims he purports to offer.

ABC-reporter Jim Sciutto's new book "Against Us" speaks about hope for America to turn the tide of hate toward us that exists today. A change in U.S. foreign policy needs to be a clear one. A change that will help to rebuild relations with the Arab world and restore confidence in American values will need to be clear.

American politics are complicated and the U.S. media makes a circus out of them....but in the end, this isn't a circus or a reality television show. This is you - in your bed at night - thinking about your future...you son and your daughter...the sons and daughters going to sleep in nations we've never visited or think much about.

The media never talks much about your conscience or your heart. That isn't their responsibility. It's your own responsibility.

I pray that the majority of Americans will be fully awake, in a philosophical sense, when Election Day comes around.

I hope they'll think about the young man whose mother raised him with a solid example of how the future can be molded to benefit us all.

I wish the negative ads would disappear...but then I would be asking for a reprieve from the real world.

Read about Barack's mother. Read up about people like Dr. Muhammad Yunus. Read about the leaders of this nation and this world who are recognizing that life from here on out will be an interdependent one for all humanity and that your living room and your ocean shores are not the end of America's concern.

Think of the hundreds of thousands who crowded the square in Germany for Mr. Obama as more than just a publicity stunt.

He is not the only citizen of this world. We all are.

9/11: There Are No Words

There Are No Words

there are no words there is no song
is there a balm that can heal these wounds that will last a lifetime long
and when the stars have burned to dust
hand in hand we still will stand because we must







in one single hour in one single day
we were changed forever something taken away
and there is no fire that can melt this heavy stone
that can bring back the voices and the spirits of our own




all the brothers, sisters and lovers all the friends that are gone
all the chairs that will be empty in the lives that will go on
can we ever forgive though we never will forget
can we believe in the milk of human goodness yet




we were forged in freedom we were born in liberty
we came here to stop the twisted arrows cast by tyranny
and we won’t bow down we are strong of heart
we are a chain together that won’t be pulled apart






Written 9-11-2001 by Kitty Donohoe, Roheen Music BMI
All rights reserved


HEAR THE SONG AT CSPAN (Fast forward to 58:40)

Not Electrified by VP Who'd Seek to Restrict Key Freedoms

At Facebook: Jude Nagurney Camwell wrote at 2:07pm
Marjorie Dannenfelser of the Susan B. Anthony List, a group that works to elect women who oppose abortion rights said women voters would be “electrified” by VP nominee Sarah Palin. Ms. Dannenfelser said, “Sarah is someone who is in sync with the way real American women think.”

I'm about as real and American a woman as they come. I fail to be electrified by a candidate who would choose to legally restrict a woman from making her own choices about the direction of her own life. I believe, as an American woman, that emotion and religion do not trump freedom. I am an American woman. The spirit and theme of freedom is intrinsically "American."

McCain Hopes Palin Will Capture Disgruntled Hillary Voters?

I have a feeling that Presidential candidate John McCain, having chosen a woman as his VP, is hoping to capture the attention of the small percentage of Hillary voters who, even after the Democratic convention, just couldn't "get over it." Even the smallest percentage could produce a winner in an extremely tight race. The question is: How tight will the race continue to be?

When the phone rings at 3am.......

My latest Facebook status message:

"Jude is wondering if anyone's made the 3am phone call primary ad connection w/the VP announcement at 3am."
Jude Nagurney Camwell at 10:43am August 23

Could this text message at 3am to announce Biden as VP have been a final slam on the Clinton primary season ad...as if to say, "Here's your 3 am experience!" ?