consanguineous: {kon-san(g)-GWIN-ee-us}, adjective;
1. Of the same blood; related by birth; descended from the same parent or ancestor.
2. Related
Origin:
Consanguineous is from Latin consanguineous, from com-, con-, "with, together" + sanguine us, from sanguis, sanguin-, "blood." The noun form is consanguinity, "relationship by blood, or close relation or connection."
Synonyms: agnate, akin, cognate, connate, consanguine, consanguineal, kin, kindred
Synonyms:
affiliated, born with, congenital, consanguine, consanguineous, familial, genealogical, in the family, inborn, inbred, inherited, innate, lineal, maternal, old, past, paternal, running in the family, totemic, tribal
(The information above was shamelessly copied and adapted from Dictionary.com's Word of the day)
This Mom is a great fan!
Dictionary.com is one of the best things about the Amazing Internet!
On this Thanksgiving day, I have been thankful to be alive. Time and again, my thoughts have rested with the One who has changed my life. In this life, I have been blessed with so much ~ and this night my thoughts are filled with gratitude for all I have been given, not the least of which has been the ability to feel grateful.
While trying to find the words to write a letter of thanks, I came across three quotations I felt were especially meaningful for me. They are listed below. Do you have any thoughts that moved you today?
"We can only be said to be alive
in those moments when our hearts
are conscious of our treasures."
~Thornton Wilder
"Gratitude is the memory of the heart."
~ Jean Baptiste Massieu
"I would maintain that thanks
are the highest form of thought,
and that gratitude is happiness
doubled by wonder."
~ G.K. Chesterton
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
If you are interested in other people, other ways, and other cultures, and want sometimes to take an unflinchingly look at who we are, what we do, and where we have been, take a look at the various programs broadcast on LinkTV.
I love this station. It's a one of a kind kind of station. It stands alone. It takes a look at things others don't. While watching LinkTV, the viewer usually has to actually pay attention. Things are not always in English and if you are scattered, and like me, often trying to do two things or more at the same time, it is easy to miss the whole point of the program.
This publicly funded Channel needs our support. Tonight's programing was absolutely excellent. I especially liked Breaking The Silence, Beating The Drum. The video below is good, but to watch the whole program, you have to link here.
Oh, and by the way, Listen to this from The Oyster Band UK
Well, it seems like its a pretty impressive list!
Check out What The Heck Has Obama Done So Far.
Here is a just a few:
Provided the Department of Veterans Affairs with more than $1.4 billion to improve services to America's Veterans.
Require health insurance plans to disclose how much of the premium actually goes to patient care.
Eliminated subsidies to private lender middlemen of student loans and protect student borrowers.
Signed the Children's Health Insurance Reauthorization Act, which provides health care to 11 million kids -- 4 million of whom were previously uninsured.
Signed the Weapons Systems Acquisition Reform Act to stop fraud and wasteful spending in the defense procurement and contracting system.
Provided travel expenses to families of fallen soldiers to be on hand when the body arrives at Dover AFB.
Established Credit Card Bill of Rights, preventing credit card companies from imposing arbitrary rate increases on customers.
Signed financial reform law prohibiting banks from engaging in proprietary trading (trading the bank's own money to turn a profit, often in conflict with their customers' interests).
Health Care Reform Bill, preventing insurance companies from denying insurance because of a pre-existing condition.
Tax cuts for up to 3.5 million small businesses to help pay for employee health care coverage.
Cut prescription drug cost for medicare recipients by 50%.
Signed financial reform law establishing a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to look out for the interests of everyday Americans.
Created more private sector jobs in 2010 than during entire Bush years.
Promoted social responsibility through creation of serve.gov, a national database of volunteer opportunities.
Voluntary disclosure of White House visitors for the first time in US history.
Signed financial reform law allowing shareholders of publicly traded companies to vote on executive pay.
Signed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, giving the FDA the authority to regulate the manufacturing, marketing, and sale of tobacco for the first time.
Signed New START Treaty - nuclear arms reduction pact with Russia.
Increased average fuel economy standards from 27.5mpg to 35.5mpg, starting in 2016.
Signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, restoring basic protections against pay discrimination for women and other workers.
Reversed the policy of barring media coverage during the return of fallen soldiers to Dover Air Force Base.
Launched recovery.gov to track spending from the Recovery Act, providing transparency and allowing the public to report fraud, waste, or abuse.
Signed the Christopher and Dana Reeve Paralysis Act, the first piece of comprehensive legislation aimed at improving the lives of Americans living with paralysis.
Developed stimulus package, which includes approx. $18 billion for nondefense scientific research and development.
Increased funding for national parks and forests by 10%.
And, considering how fast technology is changing to keep on top of it all; Appointed nation's first Chief Technology Officer.
Not to mention all the bills to protect the civil rights of many of our fellow citizens.
Sadly to say, by the time I linked back to the Sister and Brother sites, the Right wing had co-opted the name and set up their own Anti-Obama sites. Beware!
This made me laugh. Warning. This video contains an impolite word.
I'm with the Moon. I think we should Fall Back and just stay there.
You Prefer To Live in the Future.
Time is a funny thing. Personally, I wish we would fall back and just stay there. Over the years, I've heard a lot of stories about how we came to this crazy practice of changing the time twice a year, but I've never heard the reason given by the young man in the video above.
When Pete traveled to China and Tibet earlier this year, he traveled through four time zones. For some reason the Chinese Government decided that the clocks around the whole country should be set at the same time, Beijing time. China is a big country and I can only guess that this edict must have brought about some challenging situations. I still don't understand know how they manage this feat, and can't help but wonder if they actually keep two set of time keepers. One that is set on Beijing time, and the other set on real time. People, especially children, need the sun during some of their waking hours.
It seems to me that the Republican's biggest fear is that someone will learn who exactly is bankrolling them. Why else did they fight so hard to defeat The Disclose Act?
Here is the roll call.
Fifty-Seven Senators voted Yea. Forty-One Senators Voted Nay.
Someone will have to explain to me exactly why a majority is not enough.
Surely we should know just who is paying the bills.
Letter to the Head of MSNBC
BRING BACK KEITH OLBERMANN!!!
I have no idea why you have a rule that your newscasters cannot privately donate to a political campaign, but you must have a reason. However, I do know that Keith Olbermann is an American Citizen and should have a right to privately support any legitimate candidate for office in the US.
I know that MSNBC is part of the Corporate Media whose main mission is to make money. Nevertheless, I had hoped that you might have realized that there is a very large segment of the population that tunes in your channel simply because every other media company is biased toward the right wing.
I guess it is true that now all of our airways has been bought and paid for by the Multinational Corporations who have only one goal in mind. To insure their profits by controlling what we see and hear.
Is it any wonder that our President has such a hard time getting his message across? It is not due to his failure to provide leadership. It is because he has no way to control the greed of Corporations that own our country.
Shame on you, Mr Griffin.
Dear President Obama,
It was certainly disheartening to learn of the Democratic losses in this week’s election, but I wanted to let you know that I still have faith in your leadership and I am still proud of you.
I am glad we have an adult in the White House who is willing to listen to other viewpoints and has hope of reaching a consensus between opposing parties. However, now I think it is time for us to stiffen our spines and accept the fact that, at least for the time being, the Republicans have no intention to work with you and the rest of us to solve any of our major problems. Their only interest is to thwart any of our efforts and get themselves reelected.
I don’t think that we can count on these hypocrites to work with us to accomplish anything. I think we now have to fight. In my opinion, I think we must now do our best to move forward and try to solve the big problems without them. We should rally our forces and at least attempt to use the lame duck congress and pass needed legislation. We must pass laws to protect our environment. We should continue to pass consumer protection laws, and sensible regulation of the banking, power, mining, and insurance industries. We should fund investment in green energy and other industries that will fuel our economy in the future. And, yes, It is time to end the Bush Tax Cuts for the very rich.
As a citizen, I intend to contact members of the Congress and the Senate to do just that. I don’t think we have anything to lose by standing by our ideals. Let us make the Republicans stand up and vote against the people. Let us find ways to bypass the Corporate Media and get our voices heard.
One thing I know is that Anger feeds Anger, and Hate feeds Hate and the Republicans have made very good use of this tactic. We cannot let them continue on this path or we all lose. It is past time to stand up to the bullies. I promise to do my best to help.
Sincerely yours, Judi Pusateri
Kudos To San Pedro High School's Government Classes!
I came home feeling pretty low last night. I'd run out of steam long before the polls closed at 8:00 PM, but kept on calling till it was unlikely that anyone I reached, who hadn't yet voted, could possibly get to the polls.
Our work at the Democratic Action Center was completely centered on getting out the vote in our district for Jerry Brown, Barbara Boxer and the rest of the Democrats on the ticket in California. Our job was to get out the California Vote, no matter what was happening in other states.
In order to focus, no TV's were set up and running during the last crucial days and hours, but of course, by the time it got close the Witching Hour, some of the volunteers were aware of the results coming in across the country.
Nevertheless, the kids who had come out from the high school down the road persevered in their efforts to get the last voter they could reach to the polls. Just before eight, the young lady working next to me called her mom asking to be picked up. Earlier, when she took a short break to eat a piece of donated pizza, she told me about her High School Government class and how just how she came to be there.
The students from the Government Classes at SPHS were asked to choose from a list of activities from which they could get some hands on experience in how our system worked. Two of their choices was to either go to a court house and follow a serious case in progress, or volunteer to work for a party or a candidate of their choice in a local election. There were probably other choices, but these were the two this young lady decided to choose from.
I'm sure that the kids were as tired as I was, but the students who had come to join the effort on election day, continued calling to the very last moment.
I left the headquarters before the wrap party, dispirited and exhausted. By the time I left, election results from around the country were already being broadcast on local stations.
It was only today that I learned that all the people we were backing actually won the election. The efforts in California bucked the trend ~~ and we prevailed. As strange as it sounds, we even reelected our State Senator who had suddenly passed away a couple of weeks before the election ~~ insuring that we would have another chance to vote for our new State Senator in a special election.
I know for sure that we were able to get people to the polls who may not have gotten there had we not called. There was a whole contingent of volunteers, who between calls, were just waiting to drive voters who asked for rides to the polls
Since we were working from a list of people who had, at one time, let us know that they intended to vote Democratic, most of the people we reached were friendly voters who happy to hear from us. Not only did our calls reveal the need for rides, we found out that some of the newly registered voters were unsure exactly how to vote ~ I mean the process, not who to vote for.
We received requests for help from a few newly registered voters who just needed someone to explain the process to them or to help them find a poll worker who would assist them. There were volunteers who were ready to meet them. In fact, after I received such a request, my dear husband Pete met a woman who had asked for someone meet her at her polling place at 6:00 PM just to show her how to vote in her first election.
It took a few calls back and forth, but this lady looked for a man with graying hair who was wearing a gray shirt and jeans. She described her self as rather short and with brown hair. I think they exchanged phone numbers or something like that, but in the end, both she and Pete met and she voted in her first election.
As I mentioned earlier, by the time I left, we knew that the Party of No had captured many seats around the country. Today, we learned that here in California we mostly stood our ground. At least, in my district, we prevailed.
I hope the students who helped out feel the pride they deserve to feel. These were really good kids. In my book, they are all champions, and I hope they realize that they can make a difference in the world in many ways. So, tired and a bit sad at this moment, I am feeling uplifted by the faith of these kids still had. I am so happy I had a chance to work beside them.
"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
Nothing is going to get better. It's not."
Before you go to vote and the rest of the stuff you do, or maybe after ... Take a moment to visit at a very neat Dr. Seuss Website here. It really is very cool.
If you are still with me ~~
Please answer this question:
What is your favorite Dr Seuss book?
Mine is Green Eggs and Ham
Have you noticed how all the prognosticators are predicting that the thing is already lost for the Democrats? Who pays the wages of the people who are spreading this news? Yes, you guessed it, it is the for profit media. Are we going to let them do it? I hope not.
That is the reason I decided last night that even at this late date, I could volunteer to do something. That is why if you had been looking for me today, you would have found me down at the Democratic Headquarters in Torrance making calls to get out the vote. I spoke to hundreds of people this afternoon and evening and it doesn’t sound so grim to me.
True, today we were only calling Democrats and Decline to State voters. And, on the day before the election, with the exception of two people, everyone I spoke to had either voted Democratic by mail or were going to vote Democratic tomorrow at the polls.
Tonight, a whole contingent of young people from San Pedro High came down to make calls with me.
No doubt, these students were probably getting some kind of school credit for their volunteer efforts and I have no doubt that some of their fellow students were busy working on calling for the other side.
Nevertheless, the kids I met tonight seemed to be there because they really cared about what would happen in this election, and wanted to be part of the process. Though most of these student were not yet of an age that made them eligible to vote, they were willing and more than able to get the message across. I was impressed.
I hope they come back tomorrow. I hope they keep their enthusiasm, and continue to be involved. If they do, and if we’re lucky, we don’t have to worry about the next generation. There really are some amazing youngsters who still have faith in this country, and they will soon be adults. If these young people continue to actively work to pursue their commitment to their ideals, we will be in good hands.
Yes, I will go back tomorrow to make more calls. How I wished that I had done more before. Maybe, just maybe, despite all the predictions, we will prevail. I can just hear my grandmother saying; “From your lips to God’s ears.” And; “God Willing!” Keep your fingers crossed.
Today is the first day of November.
How is that possible?
It was just New Years Eve a couple of moments ago.
I've done practically nothing except to remain alive.
Seventy years and a few days of breathing,
moving, and being in my mind.
But there were moments when
things were much clearer and I was in touch
with something that was much deeper.
Those are the moments that have mattered.