Why trouble oneself with independent thought when God will sort out the winners and losers? Study and experimentation - science, in other words - require gobs of money. Despite their vanity charities, the rich and powerful would rather not smarten up the chumps. It's working for them. "Live and let live" presumes one's opponents uphold the same credo. The devout instead demand "convert or die" and see life as a game of maximizing the number of lives "saved." A bearded white Peeping Tom grandpa in the sky keeps score. When belief is the teensiest bit challenged, the Golden Rule is reflexively discarded for "if you're not for us, you're against us." No, Satan can't fool the heaven-bound! The end justifies the means. Belief covers everything, like flowers upon a mass grave . Centuries after Gallileo risked his life with a telescope to refute the Catholic Church's willful blindless, we stare agape at a United States of
I spent a beautiful sunny day in San Jose with four 90 year old men yesterday: three siblings (including my father in law) and their cousin, all Chinese Americans born to immigrants. Some served in WWII and some in Korea. The closest we got to talking about the military was their visits to the VA. I missed another opportunity to ask about their experience, to apologize, or to thank them for fighting for the future of an empire that withheld rights from Asian Americans and immigrants for centuries. My father was drafted to serve in Vietnam and enrolled in officer’s school. He had the good fortune of being stationed in Georgia in a unit that must have been set aside for kids with connections. They spent their days marching in the woods and destroying tanks. Therefore, I exist. A few years ago, my daughter's choir group sang at a Memorial Day ceremony at the military cemetery in Colma where it is foggy every morning between May and September. Vets in the audience were asked to stan