" Priviledged semi-famous people really sukk sometimes. They deal with fans who want want want their time, autographs, photo opportunities, and all sorts of odd requests. Some of us don't want any of that from them at all, we just think they are very interesting people who happen to be well-known for doing what they do.

What happens frequently to fans is that the quasi-celebrity will show interest in them, but forget them 10 minutes later. Understandable, as they travel all over and deal with thousands of admiring fans. I have some common interests with the semi-famous that I know and felt like I was more friend than fan. Turns out I was wrong.

At a recent event I was thankfully blessed with free tickets, but even though I was in contact before the event and told we could sit and discuss ideas we both hold an interest in, I was ignored and blown-off like the throngs of attention-grabbing fans. Ouch. It would have been completely understandable if I was told "Sorry, just don't have the time".

So today, the first of November, I'm sorting out who my true friends are. A Spring Cleaning of my associates, so to speak. To my true friends out there, I love you all. You know who you are. "

" Sorry, random.
We've all known people like that in our lives, most of them not at all famous, just preoccupied with other aspects of their lives.
Stop giving so much of yourself to someone who is incapable of returning the attention. That's not a friendship. Don't allow yourself to be used at someone else's convenience, if you get nothing in return. And don't give of yourself that which is not wanted, either; it's awkward for both of you. Move on to your other friends and interests--that and time will heal your bruised ego. Make something of your own. Live your own best life with real friends and personal accomplishments. Soon this person will be insignificant to you.
Take it from someone who was young and hurt and who now is older and wiser.

http://mwkworks.com/desiderata.html "

" I've mentioned this before, but I am taking an anthropology class as part of my general education at Chico called "Magic, Witchcraft, and Religion." We've studied everything from the Azande in the Sudan to the Paiute in Mason City, Nevada. Today, we learned about the Koran and Illam, and in light of the demonization of Islam and Muslims in the news, I thought I'd share some of it:

First - "jihad" literally means "struggle for God." A jihad can be converting others to Islam, making an honest living, or even simply proclaiming that there is one and only one God. "Jihadists," as we now refer to Muslim terrorists, are no more following the Koran than the members of Fred Phelps' church follow the Bible. The Koran specifically prohibits suicide (Koran 4:29) and allows for holy wars ONLY when non-Muslims rule a Muslim country, or when Muslims are oppressed or threatened. It also makes it very clear that women and children are not to be killed, nor are fellow Muslims to be harmed. The concept of "72 virgins" is also much-debated by Muslim scholars.

Terrorists may happen to be Muslim, but committing acts of terror does not qualify them as jihadists - they do not commit these acts in the name of God, and should they claim to do so, they go against their religion by killing themselves. As a matter of fact, Muslim terrorists (suicide bombers especially) are no more a part of mainstream Islam than the Westboro Baptist Church is a part of mainstream Christianity.

It's sad that a religion which is not only closely related to Christianity but has incomparable beauty and culture is much maligned because of the actions of a few. "

" pharper - all I can say is: Good on you!

Bravo - a young mind that begins to understand how GWB and his cabal misunderstood bad actors. Or maybe they understood all too well.

Muslim faith is no different than Catholic or Jewish faith.

Murderers s@ck. "

" I see a new $130 Million pipe mill opened in Pittsburg, CA.

"local and state officials worked to get the factory permitted and built in relatively short order"

Too bad our local and state officials didn't put that kind of effort into keeping the pipe mill we had here...

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/02/BUTN1AE427.DTL#ixzz0VqZChMS8 "

" WHY must CalTrans close 2 miles of northbound 29 through Napa at 8:30 AM on a workday to trim oleanders? The backup this morning was unreal.
Does no one in county gov't have any clout at all with CalTrans as to scheduling times?
Even waiting til 9:15 would have aided the dozens waiting in line to get to school or work and saved them some gas money to boot! "

" In light of the budget cuts to the CSU system, the director for my play has decided that a portion of our set will be painted simply black and then spray-painted to say "10% less," to symbolize the fact that furloughs afford us 10% less education in a semester. Originally, they wanted to have one character naked and wearing the sign (10% less costuming) but that was, unfortunately, not possible.

I think it's pretty funny. :) "

" pharper-
We learned about that last year... the jihadists (and Muslims in general) we're ORIGINALLY peaceful. Originally. The term peaceful no longer applies to the Islamofascists that you see in the news. The original Muslim Faith has been tainted and corrupted by power and the need for power. I really don't see how you brought Bush into this, as the MODERN JIHADISTS (yes, they call themselves this) are evil terrorists. They HATE non-muslims, and therefore the vast majority of the US of A. "

" Wow Cadence - that what the deal on 29 was? I saw it going the other direction. Ugly. "

" I'm sorry, diehard4edver, but you're characterizing a religion of one and a half BILLION people by the actions of a few. The VAST majority of Muslims ARE peaceful and DO follow the stipulations of their religion. The "Muslim faith" has not been tainted by power. Certain Muslims in certain areas (Saddam Hussein, Osama Bin Laden, and their followers) have been tainted by power. Not their religion.

It's a lot like, for example, the perpetrators of the Spanish Inquisition. Their thirst for power and absolute control by the Catholic Church didn't taint Catholicism, did it? We don't see Catholics as bad people. But those people who tortured and maimed and killed and used God as a front for it? Those were bad people. The "Islamofascists" (a made-up word now being used to describe all Muslims) are no more members of MAINSTREAM, common Islam than any nutcase member of the Westboro Baptist Church is a part of Christianity, or than those members of La Familia were really "Christians."

Islam is NOT a violent religion; there are those with whom we are at war who ARE violent, but it doesn't have anythign to do with their religion. You're right: peaceful does not apply to the terrorists in the news but that's political, not religious. The fact that they happen to be Muslim is not a deciding factor that makes them want to kill all Americans. It's political and monetary, not religious, and nowadays those things seem to get confused. It's like classifying all Germans as Nazis or all Catholic priests as pedophiles. "

" Also....I didn't bring Bush into this. Read what I wrote. "

" Silverado Trail has TWO delays going this week. I appreciate the fixing of the huge chunks taken out of the road by trucks, but it is a pain to get to work w/ this mid-day road work. I thought they were paid a little extra to do night work. "

" pharper-

Communism sounds good on paper too. Given the violent 14 Century existence of Islam, a lot more homework needs to be done on the subject.

Ask you instructor to explain Dhimmitude,the status of minorities under Islamic rule to the class. Check out jihadwatch.org to learn about what you are not learning about.
Additionally, check out MEMRI, Middle East Media Research Institute.
Before you lavish too much praise, learn what they teach their young and show on their television.

While you believe they are a religion of peace, find out how they grew so fast over the last 14 centuries and what techniques they used to conquer other countries. "

" sickothis-

Comparing Jews and Catholics to Islam!

Funny, I do not remember Jews hijacking airlines, strapping bomb to themselves and blowing up market places. I do not remember Jews honor killing their children. I do not remember my Torah teaching me it was okay to kill an infadel. My Torah never taught me hate.

You have totally lost all ability to reason after that remark "

" is it just me, or does it seem to take an extra long time to load NVR pages lately? Seems like the ads and video links take forever to load. "

" Jews and Catholics and Muslims all have something very important in common - they worship the same god. Allah, God the Almighty, and Yahweh or Jehovah are all the same god from the Hebrew scriptures (known to Christians as the Old Testament, Jews as the Torah, and Muslims as the Koran). In fact, Muslims even believe in Jesus as a prophet.

And, gee, dhimmitude sounds just about EXACTLY like what the United States did to the Native American populations. TO THE LETTER. What, it's okay for us to conquer a native people and force them (sometimes violently) to adhere to our standards, laws, and cultural norms, but not them? We're the only ones allowed to colonize? Seems like a double standard, doesn't it? Unless you denounce the United States' method of becoming a nation, I don't see how you can denounce the Caliphate way of doing so.

You gave me some things to look up, now I'll give you one: Clifford Geertz. Perhaps if someone (the US, maybe) had listened to him decades ago, the unrest in the Middle East wouldn't be so severe.

And maybe you didn't read what I said: the actions of a FEW, acting in a POLITICAL capacity for their own COUNTRY do not constitute a measure of the entire religion. Are you really so willing to believe that a terrorist working for a government or terrorist organization is doing so because s/he believes they'll get 72 virgins when they die? Those people work for political gain and then hide behind a religious mantle which causes people like you to claim that the entire religion is violent and detestable. 1.5 billion people practice Islam. You want to tell me they're all terrorists? "

" seems a bit sluggish, yes... "

" Murderers who HAPPEN to be Islamic do not represent the faith on the whole. If that were true, then every Muslim in Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan would be bound by their religion to take up arms against the US, and is that happening? No.

By the way, here's an interesting nugget of information: you know what the word "talib" means in Arabic? It means student. "Taliban" is multiple students. Guess what else? The schools where the Taliban studied and trained were funded by US dollars. Think about that. Look it up if you don't believe me: the relationship between Jimmy Carter, Reagan, the ISI and the CIA.

The problem could have been prevented. Look at Morocco and Indonesia. As soon as the foreign invaders were expelled from these predominantly Muslim countries, they once more became peaceful. The US could have prevented any unrest in the United States (and to a great extent, Britain, which drew the arbitrary lines delineating the countries of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and others). "

" I don't know why the NVR allows sickothis to slander Catholics and Jews by comparing them to Muslms.

Catholics and Jews are not trying to take over the world and they don't kill or enslave "infidels"... "

" Oh, really, Kevin?

What about the Crusades? What about the Inquisition? Throughout CENTURIES of history the Catholic Church has sought to make itself the ONLY church. Such a thing wouldn't be tolerated now, but for hundreds and hundreds of years, Christianity has punished, tortured, killed, and virtually wiped out millions of people all over the world all for the sake of making it the one and only religion.

Muslims aren't trying to take over the world; they have the numbers to at least put up a darn good fight if they tried and yet they haven't. Instead, of 1.5 billion members of the religion, fewer than a single per cent have been terrorists or "jihadists," and mostly only in recent years as the United States gets more and more involved in the politics of their nations. Are you so naive as to believe that if the United States, Britain, and other colonial nation had not gotten involved in the Middle East in the first place, there would never have been any conflict with the Muslim religion? France, England, Britain, the US, and others contributed to the unrest in the Middle East by exploiting the countries, attempting takeovers, and the splitting them into "countries" across tribal lines and forcing people who wanted nothing to do with one another to live in the same space. Those regions were at peace until the hands of capitalism and industrialization interfered.

WE were the ones who could have prevented the spread of "militant" Islam. "

" kevin tell that the jews of spain who were given a choice of being expelled, converting or being burned at the stake during the 15th century....tell that to the Cathars of southern France, subject of a crusade by Pope Innocent III in 1209.

Though the 'Crusades' were fought mainly against Muslims, although campaigns were also waged against pagan Slavs, Jews, Russian and Greek Orthodox Christians, Mongols, Cathars, Hussites, Waldensians, Old Prussians,...and let us not forget the witch burnings of the 16th and 17th century, whose victims were primarily women, with between 40,000 to 100,000 (depending upon the source) executed .....so tell us again how pure the hands of the Christians were "

" pharper-

"WE were the ones who could have prevented the spread of "militant" Islam. "

On what basis? By the way, the U.S. has never established colonies in the middle east or anywhere for that matter. Your marxist based theories show that the far left has taught your cultural anthropolgy course.

Did they teach you that the Arab world brought us architecture, mathematics, and the english alphabet? Did they teach that when Islam came into being that all that culture ended? did they teach you that most of the Palestinian are illiterate and kept that way on purpose? Did you watch any of the video on the MEMRI web site so you can see what is being taught to their children.

Even if it only 10% of Islam that is radical, that is 1.5 million people. Do you realize that no matter how much you relate to them, they want you to submit to Islam? While you chastise the west for the 1000 + years of the church and it's human side, you deny Islam real history.

Read the Qu'ran, I dide on September 12, 2001. "

" pharper-


one more thing, yes Islam does want to take over the world. You are keeping up with current events! "

" Catholics, Jews, Muslims, whomever... They all can't be correct, they all can't be wrong.

I don't worship in any structure. I don't claim any religion. I don't preach religion to others. And I'm not even an athiest.

I don't tell lies, I do forgive those who need it, and try and help others when I can. And you know what?

I am at peace. "

" freeport .... Liberia was founded as a US colony....

"Did they teach that when Islam came into being that all that culture ended.."

freeport, it was under islam that Arab culture reached its zenith...the Arab universities in Egypt, Damascus and Spain were the finest in the world at their time and drew students from all cultures to study....I put the same question you asked pharper, didn't they teach you that in your world history? many argue the decline of Arab culture came more from a refusal to join the industrialization age as the west did and an desire to isolate themselves from things non-Arabic. "

" actual unemployment rate is 16%. "

" Freeport, if 1.5 million people truly wanted to take over the United States, they'd be able to put up a lot better effort. But that's not true, because if it were, we'd be in a lot more trouble. See, the fact of it is that Muslims DON'T want to take over the world any more than Christians or Jews do (and I'd argue that Christians are a lot more apt to try than Muslims).

My theories aren't marxist, they're fact. It started in 1979 when Jimmy Carter gave money to the ISI in Pakistan to "help" the poor Aghanis (who didn't really exist; there were numerous different tribes and factions in what had become "Afghanistan," and none of them wanted to be associated in any way with the others). Throughout the '80s, the US gave over $700 million to the ISI and to Afghanistan, which was used to create schools (schools that later trained the Taliban) and to buy weapons like AK-47s (it got to the point that hospitals had signs like the no smoking signs in ours, only with AK-47s in them).

I wish I could explain this a little better; I have it in my notes but it's hard to explain everything I have written without going into like an essay. But I'm sure you can look it up. "

" Liberia, the part you left was founded, not as a U.S. colony Raven. It was founded as a place that African Americans could relocate back to Africa.

It was a racist attempt to remove AA from the U.S., it failed too. Now it is a thrid world dictatorship. "

" "Did they teach you that the Arab world brought us architecture, mathematics, and the english alphabet? Did they teach that when Islam came into being that all that culture ended? did they teach you that most of the Palestinian are illiterate and kept that way on purpose?"

Wow! What breath taking ignorance.

All those advances happened AFTER Islam was introduced. (actually, the Indians - with some justification - claim that they taught the Arabs all of that, the Chinese claim they taught the Indians.)

The Palestinians were considered to be among the best educated Arab populations prior to the years of the intifada. Israel's blockade and oppression hasn't helped.

You know, in another thread you were complaining about how someone's insults were undermining their credibility. Read your responses to PHarper and tell us how you are any different. "

" Founded as a colony by the American Colonization Society in 1821-22, it was created as a place for slaves freed in the United States to emigrate to in Africa, on the premise they would have greater freedom and equality there. (Wiki) "