Liam may have thrown out Barack's back

We went down to Youngstown to hear Barack speak today and got to grant Liam's months-long wish to hug Barack... and may have thrown the poor man's back out since Barack didn't just hug him, he picked him up! And Reuter's got the picture, nonetheless. It was a long drive and annoying with getting detoured in both directions (I90 was a parking lot getting there then missed the exit for I80 on the way back) and Del wasn't entirely impressed (he cried and then fell asleep toward the end of Barack's speech, so didn't get to meet him and Garvin was too far to take pictures of Liam and me and Barack, so I had to take the pictures myself from sitting in the borrowed wheelchair from church - sciatica is acting up really bad again). I'm copying and pasting the picture here in case the link doesn't last but the link is included here too.

Top News Photo | Reuters.com



"Democratic presidential candidate Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) strains to lift William Yeung, age 3, of Cleveland, Ohio during Obama's "Keeping America's Promise" rally at Youngstown State University in Youngstown, Ohio February 18, 2008. REUTERS/David DeNoma (UNITED STATES) US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION CAMPAIGN 2008 (USA)"

Clare's blessingway

Today I hosted a Blessingway for my bestmama-friend Clare. It went well, and since folks seemed to like it I've posted the text of the script I wrote for it here - all of the text was written by me except for the part that everyone had assigned parts, that part was written by Clare. It was sacred and secular at the same time, and seemed to go over well with all who attended. I'm fine with folks borrowing bits of it to host a Blessingway for another expectant mother, I'd like to know that you borrowed from me for it tho.

Barack sweeps the Patomac Primaries

Well, Barack has won DC, Maryland, and Virginia all by at least 60% from the look of things. From the pundits doing the math, it appears that he now has more than a 100 delegate lead over Hillary, even when the superdelgates are included. Even more interestingly, even if you count in the popular votes she got in Florida and Michigan (remembering he wasn't even on the ballot in Michigan and didn't campaign in Florida even tho she did a little), he STILL leads in the popular vote!

I just think it's fantastic that this happened on Abraham Lincoln's 199th birthday. So we joined the "money bomb" and Garvin and I both donated $5.01 to the campaign (since Lincoln appears on the $5 bill and the penny).



Here's hoping we'll celebrate Lincoln's 200th birthday just after celebrating the inauguration of President Barack Obama!

Feminists switching their support from Hillary to Barack

ouch.

Breast milk contains stem cells (ScienceAlert)

Breast milk contains stem cells (ScienceAlert): "team cultured cells from human breast milk and found a population that tested positive for the stem cell marker, nestin. Further analysis showed that a side population of the stem cells were of multiple lineages with the potential to differentiate into multiple cell types. This means the cells could potentially be “reprogrammed” to form many types of human tissue."

Obama speaking about Atheists and the role of religion in politics

Link

I'm not sure but I think this must be an earlier speech - he's showing his college professor roots here, not the rally-sermon style he does now. Really good to listen to tho.

And really, another reason I'm so pro-Obama... I could see him imitating FDR's "fireside chats" with a weekly podcast, and that would be so damn cool. ;)

Romney suspends his campaign, I play with Photoshop

7 Reasons the 21st Century is Making You Miserable | Cracked.com

7 Reasons the 21st Century is Making You Miserable | Cracked.com

excellent irreverent article... wonder if i can get my ministers to read it and maybe *gasp* realize the implications it has on the worship format they've been using. *sigh*

More like Mother's Milk with DHA and ARA... and... oops...neurotoxins... and life-threatening diarrhea...

Shesh, at what cost are these "good for the economy" corporations making their profits?

Link to full article on Ibfan

Here's the fun excerpts:
"When I worked in the hos

pital´s neonatal ward, the nurses all called it ´the diarrhea formula´," says Sam Heather Doak, LPN, IBCLC, from Marietta, Ohio. "We´ve seen infants, tiny little humans, with diarrhea that just wouldn´t stop after being given this formula." For infants, virulent and long-term diarrhea is considered a serious and life-threatening medical episode.

...

But laboratory-produced DHASCO and ARASCO (Martek´s names for their proprietary oils) are materially different from the fats found in a mother´s breast milk. Martek´s products are extracted from fermented algae and fungus, with the use of the synthetic solvent hexane, a neurotoxic chemical. They contain only 40 to 50% DHA and ARA, with the balance being sunflower oil, diglycerides, and nonsaponifiable materials. Some of these components are not found in human breast milk, and the triglycerides carrying DHA and ARA are not identical to those found in human breast milk—and have never been part of the diet for human infants. [bold added]

No, Mr. Romney... there's no need to ban the bags.... just let them keep advertising to people at one of the most vulnerable times in their lives. Corporate interests must be protected, especially once we achieve universal health care in the USA. [end snark]

Oh the irony, the delicious sweet irony

So now, MoveOn.org, the progressive group that formed during the Clinton impeachment trials to encourage congress to just "move on" to the work of the people, then to censure and move on (and which I've been a member of from very early on, as a disclaimer) has now officially endorsed Barack Obama for president. I love the irony, an organization specifically started to oppose the treatment Bill Clinton was receiving by our then-Republican-majority congress, is now overwhelmingly endorsing Obama. In order to endorse either candidate, they required a 2/3rds majority of their members who voted to support one candidate over the other. Barack got more than 70% of the vote.

Here's his response (which came in so quickly that they got it before they finished writing up their announcement to the membership, making me guess that he was hoping/anticipating the endorsement and had it pre-written):
"In just a few years, the members of MoveOn have once again demonstrated that real change comes not from the top-down, but from the bottom-up. From their principled opposition to the Iraq war—a war I also opposed from the start—to their strong support for a number of progressive causes, MoveOn shows what Americans can achieve when we come together in a grassroots movement for change. I thank them for their support and look forward to working with their members in the weeks and months ahead."


GObama GObama GO!

Obama Super Tuesday shirts

So the Obama Store now has a bunch of t-shirts with the names of the states participating in Super Tuesday on them (one each, would have been more fun to do one shirt with all of them to me, but whatever - here's the link) . Makes me happy to be an Ohioan, our shirts will be so friendly ;)


Here's my take on it:

and it looks like they're starting to get restocked on things, may need me a long-sleeve Obama t-shirt... we don't have may long-sleeve t-shirts in this house... lalalalalala...