DES MOINES, IA—The Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence (ICADV) website links to an admission statement:

The Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence, which is a coalition made up of domestic violence programs in Iowa, admits that it is a primarily white coalition dominated by white women. We recognized that the combination of racial prejudice and the power that enforces that prejudice exits in all facets of ICADV on an individual, as well as an institutional level. We know that European Americans benefit from privileges that are not available to people of color. We acknowledge that the voices of women of color have not been heard. The institutionalization of white feminist thinking and values creates and maintains an environment within the Coalition that prevents full participation of women of color as leaders, advocates, and women seeking services.

DES MOINES, IA—The Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence (ICADV) website links to an admission statement:

The Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence, which is a coalition made up of domestic violence programs in Iowa, admits that it is a primarily white coalition dominated by white women. We recognized that the combination of racial prejudice and the power that enforces that prejudice exits in all facets of ICADV on an individual, as well as an institutional level. We know that European Americans benefit from privileges that are not available to people of color. We acknowledge that the voices of women of color have not been heard. The institutionalization of white feminist thinking and values creates and maintains an environment within the Coalition that prevents full participation of women of color as leaders, advocates, and women seeking services.

Senator Obama is *finally* getting serious about winning. He's tapping into the last solid voter bloc Senator Clinton has: gay and lesbian voters.

From Politico.com

Obama’s rally in Beaumont today was the highest-energy of this Texas swing, with a crowd that was about three-quarters black cheering at almost every turn.

An interesting moment came when he was asked a question about LGBT rights and delivered an answer that seemed to suit the questioner, listing the various attributes—race, gender, etc.—that shouldn’t trigger discrimination, to successive cheers. When he came to saying that gays and lesbians deserve equality, though, the crowd fell silent.

So he took a different tack:

“Now I’m a Christian, and I praise Jesus every Sunday,” he said, to a sudden wave of noisy applause and cheers. “I hear people saying things that I don’t think are very Christian with respect to people who are gay and lesbian,” he said, and the crowd seemed to come along with him this time.

Check out the McSame As Bush:

As I was working in the library a few months ago, I ran across the book, Schulz and Me by David Michaelis, a biography of Charles Schulz. Its cover is yellow with a black zig zag, like Charlie Brown’s famous shirt. I haven’t had the chance to read it yet, but I skimmed a few pages and think it looks good. I don’t know much about the man, but his comic strip Peanuts had a profound effect upon my childhood. I spent countless hours drawing Charlie Brown and Snoopy, and this comic strip, more than anything else, inspired me to become an artist.

Barack Obama is not a Muslim. You'd never know it from a tour around extremist websites and blogs or by listening to some talk radio.

But, let's be clear about the facts of Obama's religion -- and this is not about supporting/endorsing him or any other candidate, this is about being true to the facts, about living in reality. This is also not about bashing people who do adhere to the canons of Islam. This is about Obama and the faith that is his...

In reference to John Pyle's letter. You are right, John Pyle. There is trouble here. And that "T" does rhyme with "P," but I don't think it stands for prayer. I think it stands for "paranoiac diatribe."

How an editorial stance on a club's vote to allow prayer turns into vitriolic diatribe on the "homosexual agenda" is difficult for me to understand. And when one is going to blast gays, one must include the "bestiality movement" in the same breath; I think the small-minded must think this is necessary to try and dehumanize the gay population of our fellow human beings. Personally, I think tying the two together is pathetic and moronic. Just my opinion.

That being said, I've decided to use my visit with readers here to provide a public service to them. I took it upon myself to research the "gay agenda" and the "bestiality movement."

I called a friend of mine, who happens to be a lesbian, and asked, "What's your agenda?"

It's the American Dream that if you work hard you get ahead. But with the high cost of living these days, that isn't always the case. Sometimes families run short of cash and turn to payday loans.

Millions of families use these loans when they are short of cash, but the high cost outweighs the convenience. Interest rates start at 400 percent APR and can surpass 1,000 percent, and it is typical for a worker to pay $180 in interest on a 10-day, $700 loan. More often than not, the individual is unable to repay the full amount within the short repayment period, and the debt balloons. In fact, most payday lending volume comes from individuals forced by the cost of the original loan to take out another and another. We’ve seen the devastating impact of subprime lending on the economy. (Center for Public Policy Priorities)

Not long ago I received a report from the Center for Public Policy Priorities in Austin, Texas. If you don't know CPPP, you need to, especially if you care about the challenges facing marginalized, low-income individuals and communities.

Recently I read a biography on Dorothy Day, and in reading about her newspaper, the Catholic Worker, I discovered the name of an artist, Fritz Eichenberg. He contributed woodcut art to her paper and as I looked up his name in the internet I found an interview that he did for the Archives of the Smithsonian American Art here. He said:

"It's always a kind of dialogue between two people as you have when you read the novel, too. When you read Dostoyevsky you have a dialogue between the two individuals- you and the author. No matter what. If you read the Bible you have the same kind of thing."

He may have been condescending, a little pompous, and perhaps too erudite for his own good, but William F. Buckley, Jr. defined a new generation of Republicans - the conservative Republican.

Buckley's work took nearly 30 years to pay off with the inauguration of the "Reagan Revolution" in 1980, but many of the ideas and themes of his work are evident today.

So, if you are a liberal, progressive, or just plain ol' Democrat, the message is pretty clear - don't worry, your time will come.

Everybody knows that Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee were the big winners in the Kansas caucuses last week, but there were some other winners and losers.

Big losers were citizens of Kansas who were denied the opportunity to vote in a primary. Secretary of State Ron Thornburg estimated that 800,000 would have voted in a primary. That's 20 times that number that took part in the caucuses. The projected cost to taxpayers was a measly $2 million.

Looking at the caucus data shows that Democrats may have been big winners and Republicans big losers..

Patrick Lowry's column was a solid and necessary critique of local Rotary practice and attitudes. It will, of course, infuriate militant fundamentalists who'd like the U.S. to become an official theocracy rather than a government of, for and by the people -- respecting their increasingly diverse spiritual proclivities (or lack thereof).

Why is it some self-proclaimed Christians think they have a lock on morals? My own suspicion is such a claim to certainty is often evidence of insecurity -- and particularly so when it becomes angrily judgmental of those who may hold commendable social values but do not hold the same theological convictions.

Wasn't it Jesus Christ who advised followers not to pray for public effect, but to retire to their private closets where honesty before God plays better than ceremony?

As I watched the Clinton-Obama debate tonight, I heard the bell-like ring of my phone...a text message.

"You have been sent a picture." Figuring it was just another cheesy forward, I went ahead and opened it.

Much to my unexpected surprise and delight, I saw this...

When I was in college I checked out from the library a book by Hedley Donovan, a renowned political reporter, entitled Roosevelt to Reagan. It was written in the 1980s, and it described his experiences with 9 Presidents. Based on that experience, Donovan made a list of 32 qualities that he looked for in a person that was running for the Oval Office. I photocopied that part of the book and kept it all these years, looking at it in every Presidential election since 1988, a useful guide to judging the candidates during the primaries. As a liberal Democrat, I’ve always gone for the Democratic candidate during the general elections, but I’ve learned about political leadership qualities that I admire even from Republican Presidents whom I strongly disagreed with. Like Donovan, I would like to reflect upon the qualities that make my favorite Presidents.

Wise comments from Dave Osler, a British leftist who spent time in Cuba last year:

Stay in one of the five star hotels, and Cuba is a fabulous place for a holiday. Sit down by that swimming pool and bask in the Caribbean sunshine, light up a cigar from beyond the wilder shores of Freudian symbolism and knock back cocktails blended from the finest rum on earth. And if it’s nightlife you want, there’s hot jazz and salsa clubs that stay open until four am. That’s on the weeknights. Convertible pesos only, of course.

But for most ordinary Cubans, life is pretty damn grim. I saw that for myself two years ago, when I spent four weeks in an ordinary home in Havana while studying Spanish. Even such basic foodstuffs as rice are rationed. Water supplies are sporadic, and power cuts regular occurrences. The housing stock is badly run down. Many everyday items are simply unobtainable.

Yes, of course the US blockade and the economic effects of the collapse of the USSR are part - although by no means all - of the explanation. But there is no getting away from the conclusion that Cuban society is deeply polarized.

Beyond a layer of older people who lived through the revolution in the late fifties, there are few strong supporters of the government. The younger a person is - and the darker the colour of their skin - the more likely they are to be hostile. Many of those at the sharp end of the multiple hardships would rather be living in Miami, and don’t think twice about saying that to a foreign journalist.

Diet and nutrition continue to be incredible challenges for people who don't have much money. On the one hand, access to affordable and healthy food products remains very limited in many inner city neighborhoods simply because there are almost no full-service grocery markets. On the other, the food products that prove to be affordable and available usually turn out to be very unhealthy.

My local Congresswoman, who is about to be in a battle for her seat seriously stepped up to the plate.

Often, I think our elected officials have a hard time leading when its so easy to just follow where people are going or float which way the wind blows. Boyda has been both a Representative and a leader to all of us here in Kansas.

Republicans are battling the leadership like mad trying to claim that Congress is trying to kill Americans or bring terrorists into the country. Continuing the same fearmongering and scare tactics we've seen for the last 8 years. Well, I for one am sick of it. And I think Americans are too.

ELLINGTON, MO—Last fall, Zack and I traveled from state to state for several large Christian conferences (Catalyst, the Mission America Annual Conference, and the Christian Community Development Association Annual Conference).

The booths at these conferences were amazing—everything from church marketing to anti-slavery campaigns. There’s so much to tell about the many innovative programs we saw, but it would take forever, so I’m just going to highlight a few here...

Recently, I received a report on our summer lunch and reading program. We call it "Nurture, Knowledge and Nutrition."

We were provided a break down of the percentage of children in each area served who qualify for the free and reduced lunch program offered in our public schools.

Even though I thought I pretty well knew the ins and outs of this initiative, the report I received shocked me.

Looking for something on my desk (really, it's an excavation, requiring a major grant for archaeological research from the federal government...) I came upon a quote I had saved from, of all places, Publisher's Weekly. Herbert Kohl, a teacher and education writer, was interviewed about his new book, Painting Chinese, which describes his experience taking a Chinese landscape painting class as a 60-year-old surrounded by kindergarteners:

It's wonderful accepting that your goals will never be completed if they're big enough, and that it's worth making them so big that you leave some unfinished so that other people can pick them up after you.