The wrath of Sandy

Like many people, I was struck this week by the images of hurricane Sandy tearing through America's East Coast. There was a grim fascination to the sight of such iconic and familiar locations battered by winds and flood. Of course, we've seen several of them face destruction before on the big screen, not least in films like The Day After Tomorrow, but to see such disaster strike in real life was shocking.

Of course, its not just Hollywood blockbusters that have threatened New York with destruction by flooding. Al Gore's seminal documentary An Inconvenient Truth also highlighted the Big Apple's vulnerability to extreme weather. Indeed, one of the iconic images of Gore's presentation - the flooding of Ground Zero - came to pass thanks to hurricane Sandy.

Of course, Gore's point was to shock Americans into taking climate change seriously, to make the perils of climate change tangible to US consumers. Many will be hoping that after this tragic storm, more will take the threat seriously and change their behaviours accordingly. I certainly do.

Well played, sir. Well played.

In the final weeks of presidential elections, words often get heated. This week, a right-wing American pundit referred to President Obama as a retard. The use of such a word by a prominent individual is fairly shocking, but all the more surprising is this brilliant, grace-filled response that the pundit received from American Paralympian, John Franklin Stephens:

"I’m a 30 year old man with Down syndrome who has struggled with the public’s perception that an intellectual disability means that I am dumb and shallow. I am not either of those things, but I do process information more slowly than the rest of you. In fact it has taken me all day to figure out how to respond to your use of the R-word last night. 

I thought first of asking whether you meant to describe the President as someone who was bullied as a child by people like you, but rose above it to find a way to succeed in life as many of my fellow Special Olympians have. 

Then I wondered if you meant to describe him as someone who has to struggle to be thoughtful about everything he says, as everyone else races from one snarkey sound bite to the next. 

Finally, I wondered if you meant to degrade him as someone who is likely to receive bad health care, live in low grade housing with very little income and still manages to see life as a wonderful gift. 

Because, Ms. Coulter, that is who we are – and much, much more.

After I saw your tweet, I realized you just wanted to belittle the President by linking him to people like me.  You assumed that people would understand and accept that being linked to someone like me is an insult and you assumed you could get away with it and still appear on TV.
I have to wonder if you considered other hateful words but recoiled from the backlash.

Well, Ms. Coulter, you, and society, need to learn that being compared to people like me should be considered a badge of honor.

No one overcomes more than we do and still loves life so much. 

Come join us someday at Special Olympics.  See if you can walk away with your heart unchanged. 

A friend you haven’t made yet, 

John Franklin Stephens
Global Messenger
Special Olympics Virginia"

What better way to confront hate and prejudice than with this? Were that we all be known for speaking with such grace and truth in the face of injustice.

Shared from the Justice Matters Facebook Page

The counterfeit bailout

"We spent hundreds of billions of dollars to save the richest companies and people in America, offering them a safety net that we had long since decided not to grant the poorest Americans - lest they 'take advantage' of it... What the banks were supposed to do with our money was to start lending again - which they had stopped doing - to credit-worthy businesses and homeowners for whom critical capital had dried up.

The American people were asked to trust the smart people who knew best and to count on the banks to restore the credit flow to individuals and small businesses that needed it. But some banks bought up (with our money) stocks, bonds, and other assets at rock-bottom prices and then made a killing in profits as the stock market stabilised and began to rise again. Then, to congratulate themselves for seizing this opportunity for making a profit, they gave out record compensation bonuses to themselves whilst wages for the rest of the country continued to fall and more and more people found themselves without a job at all.

It was amorality play almost too unbelievably bad to be true ; yet that is exactly what happened."

From Rediscovering Values by Jim Wallis, 2010 (Hardcover, p220)