Down's syndrome

I just listened to a young lady on Radio Eireann.

She said that when she was in company with her parents strangers would look at her parents, and talk to them, but they would not talk to her, nor look at her.

What right do we have to decide whom we will look at, or speak to? How can we be so arrogant that we decide others are not worth while addressing? Do we ever speculate, from within our own personally created ivory towers, how others see us?

She concluded. Speak to me, look me in the eye. I am just as much a human being as are you. I don't have your advantages, but that is not my fault.

Milk

A litre of milk costs Euro 1.20 in the supermarket,or as much as 1.60 in a convenience store, while the farmer is paid 20 cents.
I listened to a farmer's wife on the radio the other morning. She said it cost her husband 36 cents to produce the milk, and I do not believe that included his labour. She spoke about previously, when they used take the children out every Sunday for some kind of a treat, while now it is more like every two months, and just a visit to a public park.
I started thnking about the minimum hourly wage which is either Euro 8.50 0r 8.60 an hour. That is not fair. Every employee beyond the farmer is protected financially, but not the person who provides for the cow's welfare, and finds himself, apparently, without anyone who is prepared to look after him.

People

When I first went out to wok, it was amongst young fellows my own age, and those first years were a high-point in my life. We seemed to have everything in common, and we spent a good bit of our leisure time together. That feeling, of community, persisted for some years.

I gradually came to understand, as I joined other groups, that my fellow-employees and I did not really constitute a community. It may have been that I was unfortunate in my experience, although I do not think so. My opinion is that for many, if not most, life is a competitive affair.

There are some who, consciously, or unconsciously, try to work according to standards, whatever they may be: the common good of the group, the interests of their employer, the rights of weaker associates, or whatever else they may be. Then there are others, who do not accept rules or standards, in trying to achieve the maximum they can for themselves, whether recognition or material rewards.

I think of myself, and I wonder if my opinion of others has changed during my life. I think the answer may be 'No'. I think in the beginning we did not really know who we were, nor how we would develop. What did we really know? Gradually we learned who we were, and what the options were: some chose one way, while others chose different paths.

We lost touch physically, we grew older, we met others, and we compared them with those we had known, and, in my case, I thought they were not as nice. I did not realise, of course, that we had all changed.

Senator Kennedy

The passing of Senator Kennedy saddens me, as does the death of anyone; but his death touches me especially, because I think he overcame much tragedy in his life, while his work and accomplishments are intimately linked in my mind with great social events.

A few short years before his brother, John F., became president, the Supreme Court ruled that separate, but equal, social facilities, were anything but equal, and were illegal. This judgment was responsible for the unleashing of a popular groundswell to make the judgment a fact of life. Citizens lost their lives directly because of these efforts, and who is to say whether the assassinations of John F. and Robert F. Kennedy, as well as of Martin Luther King, were not linked to their work for social equality.

Senator Edward Kennedy's eforts were embedded in a notably successful, life-long Senate career devoted to the well-being of society, and especially of those within it who were unable to make their voices and needs known.

When President Kennedy, and everyone else working for justice has died during my lifetime, I have been saddened, not only for the loss of them personally, but because they had not accomplished their goals. It is only now, when I see President Obama in a position to carry the work of all of his predecessors forward, that I realise none of them have failed. The process is an ongoing one, and I thnk we are making remarkable progress, because of the standards these men have set before us.

Afghanistan

I listened yesterday to news reporting on the Afghanistan presidential elections, and I thought of the national structures there which appear to me to be corrupt, to a greater or lesser extent. It made me think of an article, written by a Frenchman, I think, three or four years ago, which seemed to me to make a lot of sense, in which he suggested that the effort in Aghanistan should be geared to promoting traditional agriculture.

He explained that the country's true economic base is agriculture. The problem is that Afghanistan also has the capacity to grow enormous quantities of 'recreational' drugs, ninety percent of the demand for cocaine and heroine, I think. The war-lords need the drug money in order to maintain their private armies, and there are no doubt many others who profit handsomely from the drug proceeds. The British were, once upon a time, smart enough to know where the value of force ended, and The Russians, very recently, admitted defeat in Afghanistan. Now America is spearheading a war effort costing billions, and many innocent lives, even with their recent history in Iraq and Vietnam

Is it impossible to conceive of an attempt to introduce an agricultural alternative to cultivating drugs? It would have to be piecemeal, I understand, and would require military protection. The concept makes sense to me.

Hooray for Obama!

There is an intriguing battle being waged in America just now. There are no bodies in the streets, nor are there cities blighted by bombing. President Obama is fighting to provide health care for everyone in the United States, where 50 million people do not have such protection, although there is a similar amount of money spent each year on medical care as Great Britain's total annual gross national product. The amazing thing is that the President is already fighting other major wars, some, such as his determination to bring peace to the Middle East,which others have quietly stepped around, just as they have with health care.

The problem is essentially very simple. Many of the people who have health care protection do not want to help others acquire it, because they will have to contribute to the cost. As the President points out; neither he, nor members of Congress need a national plan: they already have an exceptionally good plan. The people who do not have protection are those whom President Obama has championed as his special constituency: those who are too poor to make their voices known, but to whom the President is striving to give a voice.

The people who will decide whether there is a plan, and what it will be, are the members of congress, representatives and senators. Representative have to seek re-election every two years, and senators every six years, so that all the members of the House will be up for re-election next year, as well as one third of the senators. Elections in America are expensive, and one source of funds is the lobbyists who represent clients with an axe to grind, and there are many who feel that Presiedent Obama's plan will mean that they make less money. The representatives and senators do not represent homogeneous districts. Some representatives come from affluent districts, whose voters worry about laws which will cost them more money. Even senators have such problems, if they represent states which do not have significant percentages of under-priviledged voters.

My hat goes off to this man who could have had a very comfortable and successful life, but chose to fight for the opportunity to help, not just in one area, but everywhere he thought he might make a difference.

Reaching Out

I understand President Obama's perception that Washington comprises a powerful elite whose aspirations and objectives are not always consistent with those of the citizens who elected its members, and which may be stimulated by financial power completely unrelated to electoral representation. My thouht was that we would have to help him: we would have to be his eyes and ears, his foot soldiers.

This morning I read that President Obama held a town meeting in Fort Myers Florida yesterday. Why Fort Myers? Because there have been proportionately more home repossessions there than anywhere else in the country. What genius! You don't get sucked into the rules of the game the other guy wants to play by, pretending that Washington is the only place that counts. You leave Washington and you go visit the heart of the problem, knowing that the media will follow you. You remake the rules.

Next stop is Peoria, Illinois, on Thursday. Peoria lost 24,000 jobs last month. I like this president!

Supporting President Obama

Some weeks before Christmas, I read that the State of South Carolina was planning to eliminate, or modify, an aspect of their social welfare programme. It was calculated to save approximately $185 millions: the kicker was that the state would, as a result, forfeit approximately $550 million in subsidies from the Federal Government. I thought the action was unfair and discriminatory.

Recently I happened to learn that another state was reviewing its budget for 2009, including the level of financial support for the state college system. I suspect every authority in America is involved in a similar process. Suddenly my mind, apparently all on its own, put all of this together and presented its conclusions.

Every budget exercise with which I have been involved follows a pattern. An edict is given that spending will be cut by a certain percentage. The first to feel the weight of the instruction are those who do not have a voice, and the next are those who do not realise that you have to fight for what you believe.

When President Obama says he needs our help, he means exactly what he says. He cannot be at our elbow, prompting us what we should do. We must take what he has taught us from his own efforts as a social organiser in south Chicago, and in registering 150,000 voters, and use it to accomplish similar achievements in our own backyard.

When I was in Charleston, I should have approached the local state representatives and told them the concerns I had for the poor people, who would lose $4 in benefits, because the state wanted to save $1. I should have written the newspapers with my concerns. We must all raise our voices, when we believe that our representatives need to be reminded of the demands of equity, and our responsibility for the future of our young people.

We are President Obama's eyes, ears, and hands. We know exactly what he is trying to achieve, so we have no excuses for holding back.

President Obama

I have recently finished reading the President's Audacity of Hope, and we now have the evidence of how quickly he has moved, since his inauguration,to begin implementing his promises. Especially important, in my view, is his appointment of Messrs Mitchell and Holbrooke as peace envoys to the Middle East and Afghanistan/Pakistan. I believe that this President has the capacity and commitment to fulfill a large part of the world community's expectations of the United States, but there are caveats.

We must, all of us, wherever we are, whatever our beliefs, and expectations, consciously accept his leadership, and respond positively to his requests of us. We must pray for him daily, for those he leads, and for their objectives, that God will endow them with the grace, the wisdom, and the strength that they will need. May God protect them from all dangers.