A Heartfelt Letter to My Government

Do you ever wish that you could have an hour or two of your own private time to talk directly with your leaders?
I do-quite often. I want it to be real though, the way a heart to heart discussion should be. No suits and ties, no written agenda, nothing so formal as all that. I want this meeting to be by a campfire near a quiet lake. While we enjoyed a late supper of grilled burgers, chips, baked beans and Iowa sweet corn, I could explain where I am coming from, you know?
It would go a long way toward improving our political discourse in this country if politicians would stop addressing us and give us an honest chance to address them! You and I both know, however, that Barack Obama is not going to meet with me. He is certainly not coming out to the lake, although missing the sweet corn is his sad loss.
I believe it is more prudent then to simply post an open letter here, not only to the President but to all 535 members of Congress, as well. Mind you, this is a rough draft but it goes something like this:

Dear Mr. President and distinguished members of Congress,
I had every intention of inviting you to my campsite by the lake. I thought supper and a marshmallow roast could only get us off on the right foot. I realize, however, that your schedules are busy(mostly raising campaign funds) and that a Secret Service entourage of that size would require more hookers than have ever worked in the state of Iowa. God forbid, they might even want to form a union!
So, this is the next best thing-a letter telling you how more than a few of my fellow Americans and myself are feeling about certain issues.
First of all, we think you HAVE "issues"! Let's look at the "war on terror", for example. This term, coined by the Bush administration(along with "bring it on") has become outdated, even in light of the recent bombings in Boston. It is overused. The fact of the matter is that while we acknowledge there are those who might wish us harm, we are not "terrified". On 9/11, millions of women were experiencing PMS but we did not declare a war on it! I feel  the same way about pimples.
Terror, on the other hand, got its own war. You began with the Patriot Act and since then, this "war" has been never ending and it has cost millions overseas their lives, not to mention thousands of our own dead and wounded soldiers. That has been largely ignored by you, though three deaths in Boston made you even call in the U.S. military to capture/kill two people.
Speaking of the military, someone must have forgotten to tell you. Pay attention! Sadam is dead! Iraq has been reduced to rubble. Afghanistan is controlled by drug dealing war lords, as has been the case for a very long time. You have changed nothing for the better there. Last I heard, Bin Laden had not snorkeled to the surface yet. Most importantly, Americans(who have any brains) are no longer afraid! Who's terrified name are you fighting this war in? It seems to me that it is time to bring our troops home. NOW! Suicides currently outnumber combat deaths among these soldiers. That is not acceptable.
You can also tell the TSA they no longer need to grope the breasts and diaper covered crotches of ninety year old ladies in wheelchairs. Just keep the knives and box cutters off the planes, huh? Oh-and that fellow in the turban really does not freak us out, either. More people have complained lately about mothers breastfeeding their babies at the airport than about the Muslims praying there!
At this point, Allen West and Peter King would like to jump up and argue with me about the threat of "radical Islam" to national security. You gentlemen(and I use that term loosely) need to Google the Christian Identity Movement and then we can talk about radicals.
Now, about our bloated defense budget, what the hell are you thinking?? We spend more money on "defense" (which is actually offense) than over 200 other nations COMBINED every year! You are all jittery about China building one aircraft carrier when we have eleven of them! You want us to believe that Iran is about to destroy Israel with a nuclear weapon, when Israel has hundreds of them-not that they will admit it or allow them to be inspected. We have not imposed sanctions on THEM, now have we?? What about our OWN five thousand warheads? We, the only country to have ever used a nuclear weapon on a populated city-two of them, actually- have no room to talk. North Korea has tried and failed numerous times to launch a long range missile. They fall in to the ocean every damn time! They are not too scary, either.
Think of how many homeless veterans could be housed, how many children we could bring up out of poverty, the roads and schools we could repair, the jobs we could create, if we cut that defense budget in half! Maybe "sequester" is a term we would not be hearing now.
Maybe you need to also rethink that annual package of aid you give to Israel. You KNOW what they are doing with it and you KNOW that violates our own laws about arms sales.
For the icing on the cake, do you think you could get the FBI to quit spying on Americans, especially MUSLIM Americans?? Much money could be saved there too-obviously, Boston proves the spy game is not keeping us safe, anyway. The CIA blacksites have to go,too. I know you all enjoy the show "24" and how it helps you live with the fact that you are torturing people. But torture is wrong, immoral, and sinful. You guys love to say "God bless America", yet fail to realize that these are children of that same God, which you are torturing and killing. Shame on you!
I could go on but I think that is enough for you to chew on at this point. It is just plain common sense and down home values that drive most of us-could you give it a try for a change? I heard that even Dick Cheney has a heart now-nothing is impossible.

Signing off from the lake....

A Woman in America

New Flavors and Family

Our newest family member, Houcine, is cooking lunch for us today, a Moroccan dish. I am not sure of all his secret ingredients, but I know he is using fresh rosemary, Turkish bay leaves and other herbs, as well as onion and tomato. Put all of it together with, sirloin steak and peas, and it smells like a piece of heaven!

Having a fairly devout Muslim in the family has been interesting. We eat beef hot dogs now, for one! Houcine eats a good amount of bread, which has suited me fine, though not suited my waistline. I do love bread, though!
He has his own semi-private room. Remember, we live in a two bedroom apartment with a six year old, and my two teenage sons visit on weekends. It is a little crowded and noisy at times, but Houcine takes it in stride.

I have noticed something about most Muslims-they are incredibly patient people. Now, I say "Muslims" as if I were not one, because I have not been very good at it. I converted from Christianity to Islam in September of 2010. I have not, however, been devout. This is probably why I am not among the patient ones! Those who are born in to this faith, or convert to it with all their heart and soul, have a peace about them that I sometimes envy. That is truly what drew me toward it in the first place. But, I have always struggled with spiritual matters and organized religion, specifically. I have never seemed able to fit any mold I tried, always the square peg in the round hole.

That being said, what I have learned is that every faith has something good to offer us. I still rely very much on the teachings of Jesus/Isa(peace be upon him), those I learned all my life in the traditional Four Gospels. I have tried to live my life by the Ten Commandments, handed down to Moses/Moussa(pbuh). I am still trying to learn more about the prophet Muhammad(pbuh) but what I know of his teachings has confirmed what the previous prophets taught.

There is, especially in the West, a wariness about Muslims. The attacks of 9/11 seemed to grip us with a fear of an entire religion, based on the rantings of a few unstable people. That is truly unfortunate, for I have found that if we look at any religion, we find a handful of these characters within each of them. If you are not sure about that, I will be providing several links for you to check out. They may shock you, but they are more than reliable.

My husband and I were having a discussion a few days ago about world population growth. It is mind boggling to think that in just the last eighty years, it has gone from two billion to seven billion people! If the current rate of growth continues, our planet will have over fifteen billion people on it by the end of this century. The total carrying capacity of the earth is only a little over twelve billion. Carrying capacity refers to how many people can actually survive on a planet, given its resources.

One has to step back a moment and think, why do we fight over something such as religion, when we are slowly(or maybe quickly) driving ourselves to the brink of extinction? Do we honestly have the luxury of using resources to make weapons of war and hate? I do not believe so. My opinion is that we all better  learn to savor new flavors, enjoy one another as family members and in doing so, we may survive.

As always, from America, you have all my love....

Resources:
http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-report  (Southern Poverty Law Center)

http://www.religioustolerance.org/cr_ident.htm  (Religious Tolerance)

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/the-racist-entity-that-is-taking-over-israel-must-be-toppled-1.345929  (Regarding, "The King's Torah")

http://www.veteransforpeace.org/  (Veterans For Peace Homepage)