In addition to overeating and putting up with family, it is customary on this day to reflect on the things that we are grateful for.
This year, these are some of the things I am grateful for:
I am grateful that Karl Rove, Donald Rumsfeld, and Alberto Gonzales are no longer getting paid with my tax dollars.
I am grateful that we finally have a Democratic majority back in Congress. It's not enough of a majority to turn things around as much as I'd like them to, but it's a start.
I am grateful that the American people are finally waking themselves out of their six-year coma and realizing that the Bush administration doesn't have their best interests at heart. So now maybe we can increase that Democratic majority with next year's Congressional elections.
I am grateful to all the individuals and organizations who have been working around the clock to save this country as it's been sliding rapidly towards fascism: Air America Radio, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Amnesty International, Sen. Barbara Boxer, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Rep. John Conyers, Sen. Russ Feingold, MoveOn.org, the National Organization for Women (NOW), the National Women's Law Center, Keith Olbermann, People for the American Way, Jon Stewart, the Union of Concerned Scientists, Rep. Henry Waxman, and thousands of other people and groups too numerous to mention.
And I am grateful that we still have freedom of speech, freedom of expression, and freedom of the press, so that I can openly share these sentiments.
Happy Thanksgiving. And may we all have many more things to be grateful for this time next year.
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http://www.maryshawonline.com
Mary Shaw is a Philadelphia-based writer and activist, with a focus on politics, human rights, and social justice. She is a former Philadelphia Area Coordinator for the Nobel-Prize-winning human rights group Amnesty International, and her views appear regularly in a variety of newspapers, magazines, and websites. Note that the ideas expressed here are the author's own, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Amnesty International or any other organization with which she may be associated.
Me Too, I see a domino effect happening in the near future and it's gonna make us dance. Not sure what one thing will set it off But It's gonna happen. I have always said, "The only attitude is gratitude". Naming 50 things a day your grateful for will change your life. It did mine and it came in like a freight train. I dare you all to try it. I''m holding a vision of kindness and compassion, which is after all the majority. Since I live in Scotland we'll be having North Sea prawns and not turkey but damn are we grateful for those prawns.
by
davy (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 241 comments)
on Thursday, November 22, 2007 at 10:40:27 AM
Thankful that a 'Crash' rather than the 'Nuke' will end war.
Mary, you suggested that, "I am grateful that we finally have a Democratic majority back in Congress. It's not enough of a majority to turn things around as much as I'd like them to, but it's a start."
I find myself a bit less optimistic about an eventual solution to our escalating war in the Middle East being provided by any current or future Democratic Party deus ex machina.
In my humble judgement the Dems will sure as hell not end this Empire's oil-war trajectory toward nuclear conflagration, but the coming economic crash could well motivate via pain enough Americans to stop this madness ---- and that would be something to really give thanks for.
Afterall, this global corporatist Empire hiding behind the facade of 'Vichy America' seems more than capable of fooling most of the people most of the time, and plying them with consumer goodies, that this imperialist war disaster will only be aborted when enough of us suffer enough pain to overcome the inertia of the two phony parties and the 'happy talk' media.
I figure, better if that motivation of shared pain comes from an economic crash than if we just let the Dems play-out the clock and wait for the pain to come from the crash of nuclear bombs.
So count me as a contrarian. I will finish this Thanksgiving envisioning giving thanks for a nice big Christmas toy of a very painful and very motivating economic crash (which I believe is already being gift wrapped as we speak), and hope and pray that that gift will be delivered well before, and instead of the other, even more painful gift, of a nuclear war in the Middle East to end this GD Empire.
by
Alan MacDonald (10 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 50 comments)
on Friday, November 23, 2007 at 6:27:21 PM
