Seriously, enough is enough - with all the stuff I've been reading about lately: the "furor" over Obama's speech to the school kids; Wilson's (R-S.C.) pathetic display of disrespect at Obama's health care speech; etc. -  I'd go on, but it would only depress/anger/(fill in the blank) me more. 

(And we're in L.A., heading to NZ on Wednesday and I'd really rather keep the happy as long as I can.)

A few facts about this film: Creation (UK title)

1. Co-written by Randal Keynes, Charles Darwin's great-great grandson - author and conservationist
2. Cast includes: Paul Bettany, Jennifer Connelly (Bettany's wife, for those of you who didn't know:), Toby Jones, Jeremy Northam
3. Produced by Jeremy Thomas, who won an Oscar for The Last Emperor

btw, for those of you in the US, currently, the nearest place you can go see this movie is Canada - as for me,  i'll  definitely be seeing it when it comes out in New Zealand

before the article, here's the trailer, which i actually watched several weeks ago...

Christian Groups Block Showing of Darwin Movie in U.S.?

By Tana Ganeva, AlterNet
Posted on September 14, 2009, Printed on September 15, 2009
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/www.alternet.org/142619/

This is the kind of thing that makes it really easy to rant about brainwashed Christians like an angsty high schooler, or snottily proclaim that Americans are stupid and you're moving to another country: a movie about Charles Darwin shown almost all over the world won't play in the U.S. because the film has been turned down by American distributors. Yes, a movie about a 19th century  scientist who developed a theory uniformly accepted in the scientific community has been deemed too controversial for distribution in the U.S.

According to the Telegraph UK:

US distributors have resolutely passed on a film which will prove hugely divisive in a country where, according to a Gallup poll conducted in February, only 39 per cent of Americans believe in the theory of evolution.

Movieguide.org, an influential site which reviews films from a Christian perspective, described Darwin as the father of eugenics and denounced him as "a racist, a bigot and an 1800s naturalist whose legacy is mass murder". His "half-baked theory" directly influenced Adolf Hitler and led to "atrocities, crimes against humanity, cloning and genetic engineering", the site stated.

The film has sparked fierce debate on US Christian websites, with a typical comment dismissing evolution as "a silly theory with a serious lack of evidence to support it despite over a century of trying".

Jeremy Thomas, the Oscar-winning producer of Creation, said he was astonished that such attitudes exist 150 years after On The Origin of Species was published.

"That's what we're up against. In 2009. It's amazing," he said.

"The film has no distributor in America. It has got a deal everywhere else in the world but in the US, and it's because of what the film is about. People have been saying this is the best film they've seen all year, yet nobody in the US has picked it up.

To be fair, we probably can't entirely blame Christians. While the Christian media outrage machine is pretty formidable, it's doubtful the U.S. movie industry has been cowed by some ranting on Christian comment boards, or the prospect of a boycott (that's why Hollywood still produces slightly more movies with sex and violence, rather than Jesus, as their major themes). 

Probably a bit of cost benefit analysis going on: despite the free publicity generated by riled-up Christians, people will hardly flock to a British-y movie about a 19th century scientist -- at least not enough to outweigh the branding headaches created by screaming, sign-wielding Christians. So, this is your fault too. Or, perhaps the savvy BBC producers are playing up the controversy to trick you into going to a smart movie about history and science. Let's hope for the latter.

(several of the comments to both articles are worth reading as well)

August 30, 2009

Until Medical Bills Do Us Part

Critics fret that health care reform would undermine American family values, not least by convening somber death panels to wheel away Grandma as if she were Old Yeller.

But peel away the emotions and fearmongering, and in fact it is the existing system that unnecessarily takes lives and breaks apart families.

My friend M. — you’ll understand in a moment why she’s terrified of my using her name — had to make a searing decision a year ago. She was married to a sweet, gentle man whom she loved, but who had become increasingly absent-minded. Finally, he was diagnosed with early-onset dementia.

The disease is degenerative, and he will become steadily less able to care for himself. At some point, as his medical needs multiply, he will probably need to be institutionalized.

The hospital arranged a conference call with a social worker, who outlined how the dementia and its financial toll on the family would progress, and then added, out of the blue: “Maybe you should divorce.”

“I was blown away,” M. told me. But, she said, the hospital staff members explained that they had seen it all before, many times. If M.’s husband required long-term care, the costs would be catastrophic even for a middle-class family with savings.

- read the entire article at
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/30/opinion/30kristof.html)

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Health Care Fit for Animals

Opponents suggest that a “government takeover” of health care will be a milestone on the road to “socialized medicine,” and when he hears those terms, Wendell Potter cringes. He’s embarrassed that opponents are using a playbook that he helped devise.

“Over the years I helped craft this messaging and deliver it,” he noted.

Mr. Potter was an executive in the health insurance industry for nearly 20 years before his conscience got the better of him. He served as head of corporate communications for Humana and then for Cigna.

He flew in corporate jets to industry meetings to plan how to block health reform, he says. He rode in limousines to confabs to concoct messaging to scare the public about reform. But in his heart, he began to have doubts as the business model for insurance evolved in recent years from spreading risk to dumping the risky.

Then in 2007 Mr. Potter attended a premiere of “Sicko,” Michael Moore’s excoriating film about the American health care system. Mr. Potter was taking notes so that he could prepare a propaganda counterblast — but he found himself agreeing with a great deal of the film.

A month later, Mr. Potter was back home in Tennessee, visiting his parents, and dropped in on a three-day charity program at a county fairgrounds to provide medical care for patients who could not afford doctors. Long lines of people were waiting in the rain, and patients were being examined and treated in public in stalls intended for livestock.

“It was a life-changing event to witness that,” he remembered. Increasingly, he found himself despising himself for helping block health reforms. “It sounds hokey, but I would look in the mirror and think, how did I get into this?”

- read the entire article at
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/27/opinion/27kristof.html

Steven and me walking up to Castle Neuschwanstein - Germany (Bavaria) - a few weeks ago

Germany - Neuschwanstein - Aug '09 - Steven and Me

thanks to Snowy, who steered me to this particularly revealing John Stewart segment, we can really observe the hypocrisy in the US health care "debate".

this health care reform thing in the US is DRIVING ME UP A FREAKIN WALL - and I DON'T EVEN LIVE THERE ANY MORE!!!

(for those of you who don't know, since Aug 2002, i've been living under a socialized health care system in New Zealand that has been working quite well for me - and i have chronic things wrong with me - like IBS -  and asthma - and allergies - so i'm one of those people who would really know - i never had to worry about going uninsured and without health care - US style - ever again)

p.s. hello everybody - yes, we're still in Switzerland - back to NZ on Sept. 18th

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http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/finance-committee-to-drop-end-of-life-provision-2009-08-13.html

Finance Committee to drop end-of-life provision

The Finance Committee is the only congressional committee not to report out a preliminary healthcare bill before the August congressional recess, but is expected to unveil its proposal shortly after Labor Day.

Grassley said that bill would hold up better compared to proposals crafted in the House, which he asserted were "poorly cobbled together."

"The bill passed by the House committees is so poorly cobbled together that it will have all kinds of unintended consequences, including making taxpayers fund healthcare subsidies for illegal immigrants," Grassley said. The veteran Iowa lawmaker said the end-of-life provision in those bills would pay physicians to "advise patients about end-of-life care and rate physician quality of care based on the creation of and adherence to orders for end-of-life care.

"Maybe others can defend a bill like the Pelosi bill that leaves major issues open to interpretation, but I can't," Grassley added.

--------------------------------------

while some fellow GOP members had managed to stay sane on this issue...

http://www.alternet.org/healthwellness/141906/gop_senator_calls_sarah_palin%27s_%27death_panel%27_remarks_%27nuts%27/

GOP Senator Calls Sarah Palin's 'Death Panel' Remarks 'Nuts'

By John Byrne, Raw Story
Posted on August 11, 2009, Printed on August 14, 2009

Georgia’s junior Republican senator has something to say about Sarah Palin’s interpretation of US healthcare reform.

It’s “nuts.”

The Republican lawmaker, Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA), made the comments in an interview with Washington Post columnist Ezra Klein Monday. His remarks may underscore how far Palin has strayed from the Republican base. Isakson co-sponsored a measure a measure in 2007 aimed at educating Medicare patients about their options for end-of-life care.

“Is this bill going to euthanize my grandmother?” Klein asked Isakson, referring to former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s comments that Democrats’ healthcare proposal would create “death panels.” “What are we talking about here?”

“In the health-care debate mark-up, one of the things I talked about was that the most money spent on anyone is spent usually in the last 60 days of life and that’s because an individual is not in a capacity to make decisions for themselves,” Isakson said. “So rather than getting into a situation where the government makes those decisions, if everyone had an end-of-life directive or what we call in Georgia ‘durable power of attorney,’ you could instruct at a time of sound mind and body what you want to happen in an event where you were in difficult circumstances where you’re unable to make those decisions.”

“How did this become a question of euthanasia?” Klein asked.

“I have no idea,” the senator replied. “I understand — and you have to check this out — I just had a phone call where someone said Sarah Palin’s web site had talked about the House bill having death panels on it where people would be euthanized. How someone could take an end of life directive or a living will as that is nuts. You’re putting the authority in the individual rather than the government. I don’t know how that got so mixed up.”

The senator noted that all fifty states — including Palin’s Alaska — have some power of attorney or end-of-life directives aimed at protecting guardians from having to make life-or-death decisions.

“All 50 states now have either durable powers of attorney or end-of-life directives and it’s to protect children or a spouse from being put into a situation where they have to make a terrible decision as well as physicians from being put into a position where they have to practice defensive medicine because of the trial lawyers,” Isakson said.

hey all - well, it's been a hectic travel schedule, but we've had fun - back from Venice2 and Spain1 (where we visited Sevilla, Cadiz & Granada) - we leave tomorrow for Spain again - we start out in France (Biarritz - only for one night) - then to Spain - San Sebastian (where we meet up with our friends who just got married in L.A. at the end of last month - yes, we were just there, too!) and we all head to Cadaques, and finally Barcelona

when we get back, i finally get a few weeks to get some of OUR pics up on VOX before we shift from this apt to Zurich city where we'll be staying in a smaller apt till we leave for New Zealand in September - we wanted some time within closer walking distance of Zurich city again before we left - Switzerland is so beautiful and we definitely want to take some short trips, like to Lucerne - and then of course, we need to gather our stuff together and get it all to NZ somehow! - i've accumulated more stuffed animals and books - and you know, it's been a year! - which went awfully fast!

hope you guys are doing well:)

Biarritz, France

San Sebastian, Spain

Cadaques, Spain

Barcelona

not what i wanted to post in-between trips

just needed to mark the day
with
a pic, a song, a video
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Thriller - Michael Jackson

Billie Jean - Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson