Rob Kall is executive editor, publisher and site architect of OpEdNews.com, Host of the Rob Kall Bottom Up Radio Show (WNJC 1360 AM), President of Futurehealth, Inc, inventor . He is also published regularly on the Huffingtonpost.com

With his experience as architect and founder of a technorati top 100 blog, he is also a new media / social media consultant and trainer for corporations, non-profits, entrepreneurs and authors.

Rob is a frequent Speaker on the bottom up revolution, politics, The art, science and power of story, heroes and the hero's journey, Positive Psychology, Stress, Biofeedback and a wide range of subjects. He is a campaign consultant specializing in tapping the power of stories for issue positioning, stump speeches and debates, and optimizing tapping the power of new media. He recently retired as organizer of several conferences, including StoryCon, the Summit Meeting on the Art, Science and Application of Story and The Winter Brain Meeting on neurofeedback, biofeedback, Optimal Functioning and Positive Psychology. See more of his articles here and, older ones, here.

Sheila Samples is an Oklahoma writer and a former civilian US Army Public Information Officer. She is a Managing Editor for OpEd News, and a regular contributor for a variety of Internet sites.

Dr. John Moffett is a Managing Editor at OpEdNews.com, and is an active research neuroscientist in the Washington, DC area. Dr. Moffett has published numerous scientific articles on the nervous and immune systems. Dr. Moffett's main area of research focuses on the brain metabolite N-acetylaspartate, and an associated genetic disorder known as Canavan disease.

Mikhail Lyubansky, Ph.D., is a managing editor at OpEdNews and a member of the teaching faculty in the Department of Psychology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where he teaches Psychology of Race and Ethnicity and Theories of Psychotherapy.

His research and writing interests focus on race relations and restorative justice. He is a regular contributor to edited volumes on popular culture, including Harry Potter, Twilight, and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, published by BenBella and recently co-authored a book on the Russian-Jewish diaspora: Building a diaspora: Russian Jews in Israel, Germany, and the United States. An autobiographical essay of his interests in race relations and basketball is available here. His Psychology Today blog about race is called Between the Lines.

All material on this site published under his byline remains the property of Mikhail Lyubansky, copyright 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011. Permission is granted to repost and distribute, with proper attribution.

Follow Mikhail on Twitter.

PhD. Virginia Tech '93. Retired research ethnographer, she now resides in Georgia. US Army Veteran.

Walter Brasch is an award-winning journalist and professor of journalism emeritus. His current books are Before the First Snow: Stories from the Revolution , America's Unpatriotic Acts: The Federal Government's Violation of Constitutional and Civil Rights, and 'Unacceptable': The Federal response to Hurricane Katrina, available at amazon.com, borders.com and most major on-line bookstores. BEFORE THE FIRST SNOW is also available at www.greeleyandstone.com (20 discount)

Election Integrity Editor

Joan Brunwasser is a co-founder of Citizens for Election Reform (CER) which since 2005 existed for the sole purpose of raising the public awareness of the critical need for election reform. Our goal: to restore fair, accurate, transparent, secure elections where votes are cast in private and counted in public. Because the problems with electronic (computerized) voting systems include a lack of transparency and the ability to accurately check and authenticate the vote cast, these systems can alter election results and therefore are simply antithetical to democratic principles and functioning.


Since the pivotal 2004 Presidential election, Joan has come to see the connection between a broken election system, a dysfunctional, corporate media and a total lack of campaign finance reform. This has led her to enlarge the parameters of her writing to include interviews with whistle-blowers and articulate others who give a view quite different from that presented by the mainstream media. She also turns the spotlight on activists and ordinary folks who are striving to make a difference, to clean up and improve their corner of the world. By focusing on these intrepid individuals, she gives hope and inspiration to those who might otherwise be turned off and alienated. She also interviews people in the arts in all their variations - authors, journalists, filmmakers, actors, playwrights, and artists. Why? The bottom line: without art and inspiration, we lose one of the best parts of ourselves. And we're all in this together. If Joan can keep even one of her fellow citizens going another day, she considers her job well done.

Joan has been Election Integrity Editor for OpEdNews since December, 2005. Her articles also appear at Huffington Post, RepublicMedia.TV and Scoop.co.nz.

Josh Mitteldorf, a senior editor at OpEdNews, was educated to be an astrophysicist, and has branched out from there to mathematical modeling in a variety of areas. He has taught mathematics, statistics, and physics at several universities. He is an avid amateur pianist, and father of two adopted Chinese girls. This year, his affiliation is with the University of Arizona, where he studies the evolution of aging.

I have been an advertising executive most of my career with a long-time interest in progressive politics and journalism. I was a progressive Democratic candidate for the Pennsylvania House of Representatives an 2010, and I serve on the Board of Healthcare4ALLPA, an organization that works for the passage of universal, single-payer healthcare in Pennsylvania. I write about politics, healthcare, and the JFK assassination. My work has been published In The New York Times; The Village Voice; The Realist; The Washington Star; New Times, three book anthologies, et al.

Scott Baker is a Senior Editor and Writer at Op Ed News, a Writer for Daily Kos and Huffington Post, and is the author of Neitherworld - a two-volume novel blending Native American myth, archaeological detail, government conspiracy, with a sci-fi flair.
He has a blog: http://newthinking.blogspot.com/
He is President of Common Ground-NYC, a Geoist group focusing on achieving social justice and economic growth by untaxing production and taxing the abuse and use of the natural resources of the commons.
He is also NY State Coordinator for the Public Banking institute, which seeks to promote Public Banking, along the lines of the best-known American example, the Bank of North Dakota. The PBI is chaired by another OEN blogger, Ellen Brown.

Scott has several progressive petitions on Change.org:
A new form of capitalism: Geonomics
http://www.change.org/actions/view/a_new_form_of_capitalism_geonomics
and
Let NY fund its budget gap with a State Bank - change.org/actions/view/close_the_gap_2
www.change.org/petitions/view/let_the_empire_state_finance_its_own_budget_gap

Scott was an I.T. Manager for New York University for over two decades, where he initiated computing, developed databases, established networks for two major departments and earned a Certificate for Frontline Leadership. He had a video game published in Compute! Magazine.

Scott now chooses to use his computer for the greater good.
He is a graduate and advanced student of the Henry George School of Social Science in New York City and has published articles in the Georgist newsletter - Groundswell - put out by Common Ground.

Scott is a modern-day Renaissance Man with interests in economics, astronomy, history, natural sciences, psychology, philosophy, Native American culture, and all future-forward topics; he has been called an adept syncretist by Kirkus Discoveries for his novel, NeitherWorld.

Scott grew up in New York City and Pennsylvania. He graduated with honors and a Bachelor's degree in Psychology from Pennsylvania State University and was a member of the Psychology honor society PSI CHI.

Today he is an avid bicyclist and is active in several Green and Progressive organizations.
Scott is a strong proponent of the Georgist Single Tax: "Tax the use (and abuse) of natural resources, not wages or capital," which would dramatically reduce use of finite resources - which, rightfully, belong to all of us, and increase productivity in Earth-saving ways, while virtually eliminating unproductive Speculation (by taxing away the fuel for it) and decrease poverty and Social Injustice.
Technorati code: a72h4zxgud

I am a retired criminal defense attorney who has also held many different positions from carpenter, teacher, short order cook, land-man, and corporate attorney. 

Anti-war activist, mother of three combat tour US marine; member of the national steering committee for the "World Can't Wait" www.worldcantwait.net and member of Military Families Speak Out (my opinions do not reflect the national position of MFSO).

Rick Wise is an industrial psychologist and retired management consultant. For 15 years, he was managing director of ValueNet International, Inc.

Before starting ValueNet, Rick was director, corporate training and, later, director, corporate strategy for Travelers Corp., an international insurance and financial services firm. He lost six friends in the World Trade Center on 9/11. Rick was a Vietnam-era Navy Hospital Corpsman.

Rick holds PhD and M.Ed. degrees from Penn State. His BS is from West Chester University. He completed post-doctoral work at Rensselaer, Northwestern, Colorado, and Harvard. A native of Pennsylvania, Rick now lives in New England.

Multimedia, audio/video specialist

Benjamin Kall is a Freelance Audio Engineer/ Digital Media Producer. Mainly working as a audio engineer and sound mixer on independent films in the Philadelphia area. Ben works with all sorts of media whether it be audio, video or images. For opednews.com Ben has created photo mash-ups for writers and added and updated photos, videos, and podcasts to create more visual and creative entries. If you would like to add media to your article or blog entry send me an email and I will see what I can do to help you.

Meryl Ann Butler is an artist, author, educator and OEN Editor who has been actively engaged in utilizing the arts as stepping-stones toward joy-filled wellbeing for over 25 years. She studied art with Harold Ransom Stevenson in Sea Cliff NY for seven years before opening her own art school. Stevenson had been a student of Norman Rockwell.
Her art in a wide variety of media can be seen on her YouTube video, "Visionary Artist Meryl Ann Butler on Creativity and Joy" at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcGs2r_66QE

A NYC native, her response to 9-11 was to pen an invitation to healing through creativity, entitled, "90-Minute Quilts: 15+ Projects You Can Stitch in an Afternoon" (Krause 2006), which is a bestseller in the craft field. The sequel, MORE 90-Minute Quilts: 20+ Quick and Easy Projects With Triangles and Squares was released in April, 2011. Her popular video, How to Stitch a Quilt in 90 Minutes with Meryl Ann Butler can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrShGOQaJQ8

She has been active in a number of international, arts-related projects as a citizen diplomat, and was arts advisor to Baltimore's CIUSSR (Center for Improving US-Soviet Relations), 1987-89. She made two trips to the former USSR in 1987 and 1988 to speak to artists, craftpersons and fashion designers on the topic of utilizing the arts as a tool for global wellbeing. She created the historical "First US-Soviet Children's Peace Quilt Exchange Project" in 1987-88, which was the first time a reciprocal quilt was given to the US form the former USSR.

Her artwork is in collections across the globe.

Meryl Ann is a founding member of The Labyrinth Society and has been building labyrinths since 1992.

She has written over 130 articles for OEN since 2004. Archived articles www.opednews.com/author/author1820.html
Older archived articles, from before May 2005 are here.,

Kathlyn Stone is a Minnesota-based writer covering science and medicine, health care and related policies.�She publishes www.fleshandstone.net, a health and science news site.

I'm a college English teacher working on my dissertation. I am an anime junkie and a Shakespeare scholar, a voracious reader and a political rebel.

I am a student of history, religion, exoteric and esoteric, the Humanities in general and a tempered advocate for the ultimate manifestation of peace, justice and the unity of humankind through self-realization and mutual respect, although I am not a pacifist, nor do I believe in peace at any price, which is no peace at all but only delays inevitable conflict. There are times when the world must act. Planetary consciousness is evolving, but there are many retrograde forces that would drag us back down.

I have also written one book, a combination of poetry, photography and essays entitled "Post Katrina Blues", my reflections on the Gulf Coast and New Orleans two years after Katrina struck. Go to the store at http://sanfranciscobaypress.com/ to purchase. And I also have a blog called Plutonian Mac.

Paul Roden is a long time activist DFA & PDA member working for progressive change in America. I am also the point of organizer for PDA, the Progressive Democrats of America in Lower Bucks County. I am a "Neighborhood Leader" or "Victory Precinct Captain" or "VP" for the Democratic Party for the past election cycle in Lower Makefield Township, in Bucks County. I am running in the 2010 Democratic Primary for Committee Person in the South S7th Precinct in Lower Makefield Township, Bucks County PA. I am also a member of the Coalition for Peace Action of Bucks and Montgomery County. I have been trained in nonviolent direct action campaigns, including civil disobedience by George Lakey, George Willoughby and the late William Moyer(not the PBS guy). These three men amoung others who have trained me, worked with Dr. King in the civil rights, anti-Vietnam War, Peace and nuclear disarmament movements. I have been arrested twice at the Limerick Nuclear Power Plant in Montgomery County PA. I believe in democracy and nonviolent action for a more sustainable, just and cooperative world.

(OpEdNews Contributing Editor since October 2006) Inner city schoolteacher from New York, mostly covering media manipulation. I put election/finance reform ahead of all issues but also advocate for fiscal conservatism, ethics in journalism and curbing overpopulation. I enjoy open debate, history, the arts and hope to adopt a third child. Gustav Wynn is a pseudonym, but you knew that.
=--> Users may repost my articles, provided it links to the original.

Richard W. Overfield is an artist/writer currently based in New Mexico after living in Vancouver, Canada for 20 years.His paintings are represented in over 300 public & private collections in the U.S., Canada, Switzerland, France, England, Japan & who knows where else. Paintings have a habit of migrating to strange places. He has done numerous murals in New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, California & Kansas. He is currently on the Board of Directors of the Northern New Mexico Regional Art Center in Española, New Mexico.

Whistleblower Editor

James J. Murtagh, Jr. is a doctor of pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine, and the Medical Director of several sleep laboratories in Southern Ohio. Dr. Murtagh extensively writes on medical ethics. Dr. Murtagh is the founder of a new company launched August 3, 2011 to promote innovative methods to treat sleep disorders. Dr. Murtagh maintains a consulting service with Georgians for Justice to advocate for dignity and respect for all healthcare workers and patients, and to protect electronic privacy.

I am a lifelong progressive activist working for a better future. This has included work to create head of household green jobs, strengthening education, from pre-K to Higher Education, enactment of a single payer health insurance system, and modern transportation systems and infrastructure.

Growing up in Canoe Country of Northern Minnesota has given me a deeply embedded love of wilderness, not to mention nearly five thousand canoeing miles. I am an outdoor enthusiast, enjoying rock climbing, mountain biking, hiking, and of course wilderness canoeing.

I am a graduate of Hamline University in St. Paul, MN with a degree in International Relations, majoring in Political Science.

Kevin Gosztola is a writer and curator of Firedoglake's blog The Dissenter, a blog covering civil liberties in the age of technology. He is an editor for OpEdNews.com and a former intern and videographer for The Nation Magazine.And, he's the producer of a weekly podcast "This Week in WikiLeaks" that has been tweeted by WikiLeaks to their more than 900, 000 followers (which he continues to post at The Dissenter each weekend).

Brian is a featured internet radio host on b
Blogtalkradio.com. He was also a founding member of the Free World Radio Network where he and his 5 fellow progressive hosts produce and host a variety of shows each week.
Brian is a champion for free speech and reminding our elected representative's that they work for us, not the other way around. WE THE PEOPLE.

1/20/09

Mother of two adult children, freelance artist with fine works in private collections in 20 US states, 7 European countries, Africa, China, and Japan, concerned citizen of the US.

Overreaching corporate controls of food, housing, clothing, medicine, transportation, information, and education have been a serious concern of mine for decades. Consequently I've spent a great deal of time studying and practicing self-sufficiency/ removal from "the grid".

I no longer have credit cards, I raise my own vegetables and chickens, am an herbalist, a reiki master, a shiatsu practitioner who's worked with people with serious illnesses for more than a decade, as well as an ordained minister [I call myself a shamanist because it's the closest description of what I do, not because I'm from Tibet].

I've worked in construction for many years, and I've spent some time beating dead horses on the subject of independance from corporate control and learning to live a life of value as opposed to one of dehumanization.

My message to surburbanites: rototill your front lawn, grow vegetables, put up solar panels, stay home more often, make things for yourself, and cut up your credit cards.

Live your life as if truth, honor, and love were the most important things.

The corporate culture would have us believe that we owe someone rent for the privilege of being on the planet, that some pigs are more equal than others, that it's important to be royalty- as opposed to noble- and that happiness is available for purchase.

I spend a lot of time trying to figure out the truth of things.

Eric Nelson is freelance writer, an editor at OpEdNews, and a spiritual progressive from Minnesota who has become more politically active. The reasons for this should be obvious to most; rising poverty, a broken health care system, and a growing global environmental crisis. Eric's writings are as "fair and balanced" as those of FOX news. Eric is also a web informatics expert, former intelligence analyst, and biathlon olympian.

DFA organizer, Democratic Precinct Committee Officer, writer, and programmer. My op-ed pieces have appeared in the Seattle Times, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and elsewhere. See http://WALiberals.org and http://TruthSite.org for my writing, my musical creations, and my animations.

A long time grassroots organizer and political activist, Arun Prabhakaran served as an Assistant Education Director at the Kensington Welfare Rights Union during its heyday. He developed popular education projects on issues of gentrification and drugs, including the Drug War Reality Tour, which looked at the impact of the global drug crisis on Philadelphia's poor and was the subject of the Guerrilla News Network documentary, "Drug War Reality Tour." He is also a member of the National Staff of the Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign.

For six years, Arun worked at the Youth Health Empowerment Project developing a harm reduction drop-in center for youth in Philadelphia providing a variety of services, including case management, therapy, and basic health care. Prabhakaran is currently employed at Solutions for Progress, a public policy consulting firm which innovates and creates new public and private partnerships that benefit all involved utilizing technology, research, analysis and practical applications to improve the quality of life of their clients.

Arun graduated from Kent State University with a degree in Chemistry. He lives in West Philadelphia with his wife, Carrie and their two children, Kamal and Nina.

Tawanda Kanhema is an investigative journalist studying political science and communication at Truman State University. Kanhema is involved in independent due diligence research and production of news documentaries on a wide range of subjects including money laundering and mineral smuggling throughout southern and central Africa. Editor of Investigative Africa.

A retired counselor from Texas now living in Romania.

JOAN WILE -- author of newly-published book,
GRANDMOTHERS AGAINST THE WAR: GETTING OFF OUR FANNIES AND STANDING UP FOR PEACE (Citadel Press, May 2008 -- available at amazon.com and in book stores), which is an account of her founding of the anti-war group, Grandmothers Against the War, who famously were arrested and jailed when they tried to enlist in the military at the Times Square recruitment center. She is a lyricist-composer-singer-musician for TV, cabaret, jingles, theatre,
recordings, concerts, movie film scores. Winner, ASCAP POPULAR AWARD, and WESTPORT-WESTON ARTS COUNCIL AWARD FOR MOST PROMISING NEW MUSICAL. Runner-up AMERICAN SONG FESTIVAL AWARD. She's had 5 musicals produced off- and off-off-Broadway. Joan has received numerous civic awards for her work with the grannies and is listed in Who's Who in America and all its various spin-offs. She is a grandmother of five.

In 1995, Frank Paynter launched his first web site and joined the web publishing revolution. By the end of 2001 he was blogging on a daily basis across a range of topics from progressive politics to environmental concern to critical theory and postmodernism. In those early days, a lot of his writing was a meta narrative: blogging about bloggers and blogging. The navel gazing didn't last long. Soon he was blogging about what bloggers were blogging about.

In the 1960s he was thoroughly alienated by the Vietnam War and rampant race and gender discrimination. He dropped out of his PhD program and left Madison, Wisconsin for the San Francisco Bay Area. In San Francisco he worked for the Bank of America and became an expert in the fields of data networking and information technology. He also wrote for "underground" newspapers, alt weeklies as they're called today. He accepted the contradictions of corporate work and life in the counter-culture. Those contradictions remain unresolved today.

Paynter is a progressive, a pacifist, and a fan of government regulation of big business. He would rather see a military draft than an all volunteer army augmented by mercenaries. A supporter of Barack Obama from the earliest days of his candidacy, Paynter worries today that the President is squandering the mandate for peace that we gave him in November 2008.

In 1990, realizing his expertise was portable and that distances had been destroyed by public and private networks, he returned to the Madison area, bought a small farm from the Nature Conservancy, and went into the Information Technology consulting business.

Married, a farmer, and the father of two grown sons, Paynter's activist interests include organic agriculture, land use planning, energy alternatives to fossil fuels and other combustibles and addressing racial disparities in justice administration. His educational background includes a BA in English, an MBA, and telecommunications engineering course work at Berkeley and MIT. In 2007, he received an honorary fellowship in Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he studied the drivers that influence racial disparities in criminal justice administration, issues in public policy formation around this concern, and how these disparities affect us culturally and personally.

"Secularists are often wrongly accused of trying to purge religious ideals from public discourse. We simply want to deny them public sponsorship." -- Wendy Kaminer

All material offered here is the property of Frank Paynter, copyright 2009. Permission is granted to repost, with proper attribution including the original link.

First and foremost, I encourage you to learn about this fellow as your potential future president, and skip my bio if that's what it takes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocky_Anderson

My family and I lived off the grid in an earth-sheltered, solar powered underground house, for 15 years, starting in the early '80s, proving, at least to myself, the feasibility of solar power. Such a feat should be much easier with off-the-shelf materials available now.

I wrote a book on earth-sheltered solar greenhouses that has many good ideas, but should be condensed from 400 down to 50 pages, with new info from living off the grid. It's on my "to do" list.

I am 63 with a 21 year old heart--literally, as it was transplanted in 2005 (a virus, they think). This is why I strongly encourage you and everyone else to be an organ donor.

I may be the only tenured teacher you'll meet who got fired with a perfect teaching record. I spent seven years in court fighting that, only to find out that little guys always lose (http://www.opednews.com/articles/Letter-to-NEA-Leadership--by-Daniel-Geery-101027-833.html; recommended reading if you happen to be a parent, teacher, or concerned citizen).

I managed to get another teaching job, working in a multi-cultural elementary school for ten years (we had well over 20 native tongues when I left, proving to me that we don't need war to get along--no one even got killed there!).

I spent a few thousand hours working on upward-gliding airships, after reading The Deltoid Pumpkin Seed by John McPhee. But I did my modelling in the water, so it took only two years and 5,000 models to get a shape that worked. You can Google "aquaglider" to learn more about these. As far as I know, this invention represents the first alteration of Archimedes'principle, spelled out 2,500 years ago.

"Airside," the water toys evolved into more of a cigar shape, as this was easier to engineer. Also, solar panels now come as thin as half a manila folder, making it possible for airships to be solar powered. You can see one of the four I made in action by Googling "hyperblimp"(along with many related, advanced versions).

Along with others, I was recently honored to receive a Charles Lindbergh Foundation Award, to use these airships to study right whales off Argentina. Now we just have to make it happen!

More on that in a podcast, should you be so inclined:
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/upr/local-upr-936106.mp3 (followed by Rosalie Winard, bird photographer and friend of Terry Tempest Williams, and a bit on why you should be an organ donor).

I recently married a beautiful woman who is an excellent writer and editor, in addition to being a gourmet cook, gardener, kind, gentle, warm, funny, spiritual, and extremely loving. We met via "Plenty-of-Fish" and a number of seemingly cosmic connections.

I get blitzed reading the news damn near every day, and wonder why I do it, especially when it's the same old shit recycled, just more of it. In spite of Barbara Ehrenreich and reality, I'm a sucker for positive thinking; I recently finished reading Positivity, by Barbara Fredrickson, and recommend it, in the interest of your own sanity.

I like OpEd and think Rob Kall has done some wonderful things, but if someone could help out with the graphics and kinks in the system here, I'd really appreciate it.

Roberta Seldon is the blogger at Security and Sustainability Forum, a website that provides free online seminars and useful information related to corporate sustainability, national security and climate change. Roberta Seldon is also a volunteer editor at OpEdNews.com.

Michael Bonanno is an associate editor for OpEdNews.

He is also a published poet, essayist and musician who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Bonanno is a political progressive, not a Democratic Party apologist. He believes it's government's job to help the needy and that leaving the people's well being to the so called "private sector" is social suicide.

Judy White of Leeds, Alabama, is the wife of former Republican Jefferson County Commissioner Gary White and is dedicated to the pursuit of justice in his case, as well as other political prosecutions. She is devoted to their children and family, which includes a number of "furry children." A long-time community and political volunteer, former member of the Alabama and Jefferson County Republican Executive Committees and former congressional district director, Ms. White is currently the administrator of a small Birmingham law firm, and a licensed real estate broker.

I am an 'older' progressive; a holdover from the hippie generation. I have raised 3 children, am a proud grandmother, and an outspoken political junkie. I have worked in the healthcare field for 30 years, both for insurance companies and for the other side, so I know my way around the health care industry. I have forgotten more than anyone should ever know about our health care system. Bad enough that my memory loss is insufficient to erase all of the dishonest policies of the insurance industry, I even have memories of fraud on the provider side as well.

I was a whistleblower in the mid-90's, reporting illegal denial of necessary medical care to patients.

To the best of my recollection, I do not believe that I have ever voted for a Republican. I have ethics and a sense of fair play, therefore the Republican party does not qualify as a choice for me.

Richard Girard is an increasingly radical representative of the disabled and disenfranchised members of America's downtrodden, who suffers from bipolar disorder (type II or type III, the professionals do not agree). He has put together a team to prosecute Bush, Cheney, et al., but has given up waiting for his credentials, and fully expects either the United Nations or Spain to beat him to it. An autodidact, he has read more than 3000 books over the last 35 years, on subjects including history, mathematics, political science, economics, sociology, anthropology, psychology, philosophy, women's studies, physics, martial arts, science fiction, and art. He is still editing Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, trying to make it comprehensible to someone who is not a Rhodes Scholar. It surprisingly calms the worst effects of his bipolar disorder, acting both as a sleep aid, and helping to keep him out of the funny farm.

I am just a concerned citizen living in the heart of Dixie a political wasteland for sure.

An activist since the Edmund Pettis Bridge March, and the Chicago Police Riot of 1968 when Pigasus was Nominated.

Recently a founding member of Miami for Peace, Richard has produced and edited the (www.miamiforpeace.net) website which has carried information to thousands of activists across south Florida. Working with Miamiforpeace and other local anti-war organizations, like Miami's Women in Black (Men's Auxiliary), Broward Anti-War and Peace South Florida to organize rallies and teach-ins in both Dade and Broward
Palm Beach and Martin County.

He has also worked with the Broward Bill of Rights Defense Committee and with associates from Amnesty International and Dade and Broward ACLU and many other organizations founded the South Florida Bill of Rights Defense Coalition which has been working on a USA Patriot Act related resolution to be
brought before the Miami Dade County Commission. He also writes, produces and publishes the South Florida the Shock & Awe Cartoonarium at the miamiforpeace.net web site.
( www.miamiforpeace.net/cartoon-m4p.htm )

Having joined the board of the Treasure Coast Chapter of the ACLU of Florida. Richard continues the efforts to protect the Bill of Rights and respect for the rights guaranteed in the Constitution.

solidarity & peace
Richard W. Spisak Jr.

Born in Long Island public school year in Sweden as exchange student, went to Harvard one year, Cooper Union in NYC as Art student. Have two children, one of whom is rock mogul, the other has three daughters, one of whom has two daughters, making me a great grandmother at 68, very proud. For twenty years I operated a private primary school, Orchard School, in Santa Cruz CA. Still going strong but I'm retired and write much of the time. Strong believer in the space program and our subconscious quest as a species to prevent celestial onslaughts of one kind and another, for which it is my conviction that we have developed nuclear power, though we've had to use false wars to do so; in the end I believe we'll redeem ourselves in this way, which is why I find the abandonment of the shuttle program so sad. The Russians will do the honors with the next menace from Heaven, or have said that they will. In any case, nothing matters much if we don't, not the debt ceiling, pollution, nothing. All moot.

I was born in the Republic of Panama and lived there until I was 16. Most of the time we lived in a small community in Cocle Province in central Panama. Our farm was about 1/2 mile from the Pacific Ocean and the most beautiful beach in the world. However, my parents made sure that we had an excellent education (better than anything available in the US anywhere. My older brother scored a 1600 on his SAT's and had his choice of schools. I have to admit that I had a jock mentality and would rather be doing anything but studying but still scored 1420.
My parents introduced me to the first families of Panama who had resort houses in the community. I interacted with them and found them to be just like the indigenous people or the mestizos who I interacted more with. I wouldn't tell them that, because these are the rabbiblancos that I often refer to. Many have blond hair and blue eyes. They strictly controlled their genetic bloodlines to within a tight conquistador heritage and also kept the overwhelming majority of the people of the country very poor and very oppressed. The strict controls on recognition of legitimate children was important to them, even though papa frequently left little mestizos all over the country, illegitimately. By and large, they were nice people one on one and total asshats when it came to their treatment of their fellow Panamanians, the indigenous and the mestizos.
As a result of being born in Panama, Panama considers me a Panamanian citizen. The US doesn't recognize dual citizenship, but who cares? Panama does and if I get too disgusted with the US, I can always go reclaim my Panamanian citizenship. When my parents repatriated to the US, we settled in the Charleston, SC area. I graduated from a local university with degrees in Political Science and History. I was an airline pilot for over 20 years until I developed Type II Diabetes. I tend to be preach now on the subjects of listening to your doctor, going to the doctor regularly and doing EVERYTHING your doctor says, no matter how much you don't want to. As a result of the diabetes, I was unable to keep my wirlinr level medical authorization. Ironicaly, now that the FAA allows airline pilots with controlled Type II diabetes to maintain their medical certificate, I am disabled due to the collateral effects of diabetes.
Thus, late in life, I went to Law School and was admitted to the Bar. I have been practicing as a legal aid attorney working primarily with agricultural workers. I am fluent in Spanish and since most agricultural workers are Hispanic anymore, Spanish is nearly mandatory. I loved this work and was heavily involved with it until my collateral diabetic diseases forced me into retirement. I am unapologetic liberal and a pacifist. I cannot conceive of a situation that justifies the killing of another human being. If others seek to do violence to me, I will resist with all my ability (such as it is) but will not use deadly force. I couldn't live with myself if I killed another human being. Hell, killing the bugs that are eating my tomatoes bothers me. I try to live by The Golden Rule and often fail. I do like to laugh, especially at myself. My life is constant material for any stand up comic. I truly wish that before I leave this world, everyone has stopped hating others and there is no such thing as deadly violence anymore. See? I told you my life is good for laughs.

Chaz Valenza is writer and small business owner in New Jersey. He earned his MBA from New York University's Stern School of Business. His current feature film project is "Single Point Failure" an insider's account of how the Reagan Administration caused the greatest tragedy of the space age based on Richard C. Cook's book "Challenger Revealed." He is a former Director of Public Information for Planned Parenthood of NYC. His website is: www.WordsWillNever.com

Artist, writer, working to promote a clean healthy planet, society and economy.

The author spent his formative years growing up in Australia, Ghana, the Bahamas and Alaska.He also traveled extensively through out the developing world in the era before globalization.His experiences have shaped him into a World Citizen who sees American domestic politics and foreign policy as the epicenter for many changes that directly affect the world and its population.Brett is a passionate reader and social commentator who believes the world needs a new perspective putting the issues of the people of the world first and is dedicated to writing about it.For fun Brett is also a Master Brewer who has worked in several countries; a song writer; and a Collegiate Water Polo Referee in the USA and Canada.He lives in the Southern California area with his wife of 23 years and two wolves.

I am a 63 year old American child and adolescent psychiatrist and political refugee in New Zealand. I have just published a young adult novel THE BATTLE FOR TOMORROW (which won a NABE Pinnacle Achievement Award) about a 16 year old girl who participates in the blockade and occupation of the US Capitol. I also have a new non-fiction ebook REVOLUTIONARY CHANGE and a 2010 memoir, THE MOST REVOLUTIONARY ACT: MEMOIR OF AN AMERICAN REFUGEE describing the circumstances that led me to leave the US in 2002 to start a new life in New Zealand. My memoir won an Allbooks Review Editor's Choice Award. I have a political commentary blog at my website.

I am a disabled public school Speech/Language Pathologist from Minnesota. I live in a small town north of Duluth on the shores of Lake Superior. I grew up listening to and reading Dylan. I was an activist during the late 60's and early 70's. I worked for 31 years helping handicapped children ages birth to 21 in the area of communication disorders, including deaf and hearing impaired, autism. Cerebral palsy, and a myriad of speech and language deficits. I have been fighting for the rights of the less fortunate against those who wish only to give it to the entitled. I love nature, children and dogs. I believe the WASPS have ruined the World and we need to give the women of the earth a chance at saving the lives they have brought forth-both male and female. A different perspective is long overdue.

The author is the chairman of a liberal Democratic club that is working to move the Democratic Party towards it's true base, the people. She has organized major political events and helped elect some of the most liberal politicians in America. Her career has included work as a criminal defense attorney, a licensed private investigator, an educator and a writer.

Like this country's founders, I believe that the widest political empowerment under the rule of law is the surest way of having its resources work for the long term best interests of us all. The longer I live, the more I see that supports that belief.

I also see that at this time we are moving in the opposite direction. Unlike many "liberals", I don't blame this situation on the majority of citizens. It is hard to defend one's enfranchisement or keep a broad perspective while being miseducated by corporatist media. It gets even harder while being expected to own an attractive house in like-new condition, to avoid being considered a "loser" undeserving of any respect.

I still root for humanity, and hope the next era of enlightenment comes in time to prevent us from sterilizing the planet.

I am an over aged starry eyed idealist. Traded life in the L.A. basin as a young adult in the mid 80's for the serene glory that is the Pacific Northwest where I have since made my home. There are many ways to define one self and silly things we take to saying, all and all as much as we are, we are in the process. As part of my process, I act as an engaged parent of three and spouse to a patient bear of a soul who chooses to favor of all things, me and my wishy, washy, whacky, wobbly wobbin ways. That's far from summing who I am up, but it's an okay start.

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