Reflections at the CRBCM

Doing the right thing no matter what because you have a conscience to live with, and because the joy of winning through politics are generally short lived, the truth will catch up with you soon enough.  You will have to cave in.  Acting in the wrong direction because you can, you will have a day of reckoning because you will not know when to stop.   You will cross the line one day and get burned. When you win because you can is not enough, you will continue to believe the wrong is right until you hit the wall, and you will end up backtracking and have to apologize or disappear in disgrace.  If your aim is to profiteer no matter what, do realize that if you choose a cynical way of winning, you lose control of the nature of the outcome and its consequences.  That is when the truth will come to claim its place, you may end up in a harder place than when you first started gambling.  Remember real life is not to be lived like a poker game where you have to win no matter what, life is to be lived with as much closeness to the truth as possible because you have a conscience, and because we all have to account soon or later!

Reminder as needs still huge: Border Women Strike for Visibility

By Ambreen Ali Nov. 16, 2010 – 10:46 a.m.

The Obamas had visitors waiting for them when they returned from their Asia trip this week.
Eight women from El Paso, Texas, have been holding daily vigils outside the White House since Nov. 8 in an effort to get government funding for their community.
They have also been on a hunger strike since that date, relying on water and a mixture of water, sugar and salt to restore electrolytes.
It’s a drastic step for what they say is a desperate situation — unemployment and poverty levels that are among the highest in the country.

“We’re basically invisible,” Lorena Andrade, one of the activists. “We had to come here to make ourselves visible.”
The group called La Mujer Obrera, or The Working Woman, wants Congress and the White House to fund a commission that would direct development funds to the border community.
One model could be the Appalachian Regional Commission, set up by President John F. Kennedy in 1964. The women hope President Barack Obama or the first lady will consider a trip to the region such as the one that inspired Kennedy to create the panel.
They delivered a letter to Michelle Obama on Monday, appealing to her woman to woman.
“We are not victims,” they wrote. “We are rebuilding our communities with dignified courage. As women, we know we have and are exercising, the right to determine our own destiny.”
El Paso’s Rep. Silvestre Reyes, a Democrat, helped set up a government commission for the region’s development, but it remains unfunded.
La Mujer Obrera has three demands: for the government to organize a summit of federal agencies to discuss border needs, set aside money for the border commission, and promise to include local women in the decision making.
They have already laid out those demands in meetings with the Departments of Agriculture, Treasury, and Housing and Urban Development. They expect to meet with the State Department later this week.
The women say they want to be home for Thanksgiving, but they are willing to stay if their demands are not met.
“We get a lot of support and acknowledgment but we want something in writing,” Rubi Orozco, a spokeswoman for the group, said. “We have left before with that kind of pat on the head, and it doesn’t materialize into anything.”
Orozco said there was an irony in border residents having such few resources when so much money is spent on border security.
“The region gets loads of money but it goes to the fence and security,” she said, adding that the jobs for those projects rarely go to locals.
Many of the women active with the group are former garment workers who lost their jobs when the factories in their area moved to Mexico.
Today, they have refurbished those factories into day care centers and shops to sell imported artisan handiwork from Mexico.
“This is another definition to border security,” Cindy Alford, also with the group, said. “Genuine border security has to include sustainable communities.”http://www.congress.org/news/border-women-strike-for-visibility/