Re: PA Libraries Need Your Help!

Found this today and was shocked.
It's funny how clueless I am when it concerns local politics. . . need to work on that shit.

"PaLA Call-In Week continues today through Friday, fortunate timing in the wake of Tuesday’s vote in the PA House of Representatives. The House, in a bipartisan vote of 150-49, did NOT agree with the Senate-amended H.B. 1416 that slashed library programs 55%. Please contact both your local state representatives and senators, as well as Gov. Ed Rendell in support of your library! The following list gives you some points to bring up with them:

1. Thank your Senator, Representative and the Governor for her/his past support of public libraries.

2. Tell her/him that public libraries are a lifeline for the unemployed, not a luxury. All across Pennsylvania, we’re busier than ever during this recession serving those looking for work, many without Internet access at home, and hundreds more of their constituents and families who need the library open more hours not fewer. (If you can, offer some specifics about just how much the library means to you in these tough times.)

3. Because their constituents need more library services now, urge her/him to support library funding as one of the priorities for level funding in the negotiations for a new state budget. . ."

More here.

Podcast Page Revamped

I just updated my podcast page with a paypal donation button on the right hand side, new text configurations, new background image, and a different color scheme.

Check it out:

imaginalRoots

A new podcast: OpenSource

Today I successfully installed RSSOwl onto my computer and am really finding its features useful. While searching and scrolling through RSSOwl's default categories I came across a new podcast called Open Source which has dozens of interesting speakers interviewed on a wide variety of subjects. All relating to. . . you guessed it.

The following smidgen of text is an excerpt from an interview with Alfred Gusenbauer discussing sociopolitical environments and job scarcity,

"We are just at the beginning of real consequences for real people. I see two vulnerable groups: Those that are older than 50. Most of the old jobs and the old qualifications are gone. The huge danger is that people over 50 losing their jobs right now won’t be able to enter the market again… The second group is the youngsters, because with this enormous increase of unemployment that we are facing right now, all those that are leaving nowadays universities, grammar schools, technical education schemes, they will enter the labor market and find closed doors. And we cannot predict what this might mean for their social and political behavior… In Greece last year, among university students… this went quite far in terms of public violence and in terms of challenging the state authority. So nobody can predict right now which social and political effects a longer duration of the crisis might have upon different groups. This will be the real challenge for European democracy and for the European welfare state, to hold the social fabric together in times when it is fundamentally challenged…"

Listen Here

on Soma and its origins. . .

Original Link @ sacred-texts.com














"In the verses descriptive and songs in praise of Soma, the actual juice, and the god supposed to dwell in and manifested by it, are not at all distinct. All the gods drink of it; and Soma, the god in the juice, is said to clothe the naked and heal the sick. Many divine attributes are ascribed to him. He is "addressed as a god in the highest strains of adulation and veneration. All powers belong to him; all blessings are besought of him, as his to bestow." He is said to be divine, immortal, and also to confer immortality on gods and men. "In a passage where the joys of paradise are more distinctly anticipated and more fervently implored than in most other parts of the Rig-Veda, Soma is addressed as the god from whom the gift of future felicity is expected. Thus it is there said, "Place me, O purified god, in that everlasting and imperishable world, where there is eternal light and glory. O Indu (Soma), flow for Indra! Make me immortal in the world where Vaivasvata lives, where is the universal sphere of the sky, where those great waters flow." 1

"From the hymns addressed to this [soma] deity it is evident that at one time it was considered right for the Hindus to use intoxicants. Now as a rule they are forbidden. Amongst the members of one branch of the worshippers of Kāli they are commonly indulged in, but with almost this single exception, the people do not touch them, and Soma, in his Vedic character has ceased to be worshipped."

"In later years the name Soma was, and still is, given to the moon. How and why this change took place is not known; but in the later of the Vedic hymns there is some evidence of the transition. In the following passage Soma seems to he used in both senses—as god of the intoxicating juice, and as the moon ruling through the night. " By Soma the Ādityas are strong; by Soma the earth is great; and Soma is placed in the midst of the stars. When they crush the plant, he who drinks regards it as Soma. Of him whom the priests regard as Soma (the moon) no one drinks." * In another passage this prayer is found: "May the god Soma, he whom they call the Moon, free me." Again, "Soma is the moon, the food of the gods." "The sun has the nature of Agni, the moon of Soma."