Long Looking LLC

by Rev. John Thomas, the former General Minister and President of the United Church of Christ, now a professor and administrator at Chicago Theological Seminary

May 2, 2013

Americans remain preoccupied with the confusing motivations of the two young men who detonated bombs at the end of the Boston Marathon killing three people and injuring scores more.  Why would these “boys next door” who had never had a significant record of criminal behavior suddenly turn into would be mass murderers? Continue reading →

John D. Podesta – Chair, Center for American Progress Action Fund

Dear William,

The editors of the New York Times and the Washington Post have made some of the most block-headed decisions of all time. They are gutting their coverage of climate change. That’s right: Two of the largest news publications in the country have effectively said that the environment and climate change are a low priority, and have cut staff and shuttered blogs devoted to the topic at a time when we’re experiencing some of the most extreme, global-warming-related weather in recorded history.

If papers across the country are slashing resources, who’s going to cover the most important issue of our time? Who’s going to hold politicians and corporations accountable?

We are.

ThinkProgress is launching a new climate initiative that will bring you innovative and in-depth reporting on one of the most critical issues of our time.

But the only way we can succeed is if progressives come together to support an initiative we so desperately need. Will you be one of the first 100 individuals who get this program off the ground?

Click here to make a contribution today.

We’re committed to not only keeping the public informed, but effecting real change:

• We’ll use our exhaustive investigative reporting techniques to expose the truth about climate change and hold our elected officials accountable for their actions.
• We’ll expose the ties between oil, gas and coal special interests and the decision makers in Washington.
• We’ll increase the scope and depth of critical reporting on national and local issues through technology and crowd-sourcing.

As always, our goal is to bring you hard-hitting news while staying light on our feet: Our rapid response reporting and innovative social media methods will enable us to debunk right-wing misinformation on climate change as it happens, before it gets regurgitated throughout the press. It’s about action and it’s about accountability.

We have committed to get this project off the ground, but we need your help to keep it going.

Click here and start something with us.

Best,

John D. Podesta
Chair, Center for American Progress Action Fund

Stephen Crane

A man said to the universe:

“Sir, I exist!”

“However,” replied the universe,

“The fact has not created in me

A sense of obligation.”

By Rick Warren

Editor’s Note: At Pastors.com and Saddleback Church, we’ve all been in a place of mourning for our Pastor, Rick Warren, his wife Kay and their entire family after the loss of their youngest son, Matthew, who ended his own life last week after a very long battle with mental illness. You can read Pastor Rick’s words to the Saddleback family for yourself. We who are near Pastor Rick have drawn strength from his thirty-plus years of teaching biblical truth, and out of that teaching, we’ve adapted a transcript from a message delivered over a decade ago at Saddleback. Hear Pastor Rick’s words and let them speak to you in your own places of tragedy and loss… Continue reading →

For the person for whom small things are insignificant, the great is not great.

Excellence means when a man or woman asks of himself more than others do.

Rancor is the outpouring of a feeling of inferiority.

Oswald Ortega y Gasset - Man and Crisis (1962)

One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.

A friend should be a master at guessing and keeping still: you must not want to see everything.

When we fight some monster we must take care lest we thereby become a monster.

Friedrich Nietzsche - Basic Writings of Nietzsche, edited by Walter Kaufmann, Peter Gay (2000)

openDemocracy – free thinking for the world – April 2013

The Turkish media’s unjustified attack on Bejan Matur, a Kurdish poet who succinctly showed how fragile the peace process is, is not a contribution to peace. Rather it is a misunderstanding of the peace process. I salute you Bejan and want you to know that I am in solidarity with you.

Demystifying Ocalan’s letter – Ali Gokpinar, Fulbright grantee, concentrates on conflict resolution, peace building, and civil war from his home in Turkey.

This is a historic period. Despite the misunderstanding over a ‘ceasfire’ in the Turkish media and public, the PKK’s jailed leader Ocalan in fact did ask the guerillas to move out of Turkey on March 21, as Kurds celebrated the beginning of the spring, Newroz. His speech’s motto was that it is time for “politics” rather than “armed struggle”. His promising call, read both in Kurdish and Turkish, was slightly puzzling. But three overall points stand out; a call harmony, a rather selective critique of the Kemalist nation state and a request for forgiveness.

Ocalan’s reference to the coexistence between various ethnic and religious communities in Mesopotamia, his emphasis on the brotherhood between the Euphrates and the Tigris Continue reading →