No On Syria Bombing–No To Further Militarization Of Everyday Life

I’m opposed to the proposed United States bombing of Syria.

At the same time, there sure seems to be a lot of hypocrisy from the right as conservatives line up to oppose President Obama on this question.

Please consider these views at my new blog All People Have Value. 

The new blog is part of my new website NeilAquino.com.

Tip Well Over Labor Day Weekend & Use The Soft Power Of Kindness To Help Overturn Our Corrupt Political/ Corporate Order—NeilAquino.com

Below is the entirety of the most recent blog post at my new blog All People Have Value—

“Please consider tipping well over the Labor Day weekend and please recall that Labor Day is a holiday and service workers merit a tip at 150% of what you normally tip. This is just as you’d expect time-and-a-half for working a holiday.

If you go to a store or business place where tipping is not expected, you can hand out a $1 scratch-off lottery ticket to the person helps you. At the least, you can thank people for working a holiday meant to give working folks a rest.

Let’s use the soft power of our own example and leadership to create a climate where progress is possible and anticipated.”

At All People Have Value—which is part of the full site NeilAquino.com—I’m working on the themes of the value of every day life, the role of metaphor in existence & the soft power of kindness and connection with others.

These things will with time provide the foundation for a radical change away from the corrupt and ethically dead current political and corporate power structure of our nation.

New Post About Russian Icebreaker Ship At NeilAquino.com—Please Consider Visiting NeilAquino.com

Post #6 at my blog All People Have Value is about the metaphoric value of a new Russian icebreaker ship.

The Baltika has a new-shaped hull that cuts through a wider path of ice for shipping. At the same time, the ship is at greater risk for capsizing in stormy seas due to the shape of the hull. These are the trade-offs for moving in a new direction.

The fact of metaphor in every day life is a main theme of NeilAquino.com. Please check out the new blog and the full site.

I’m Donating 25 Cents to Amnesty International For Every Negative E-Mail From Houston Mayoral Candidates Ben Hall And Annise Parker

My latest post on my new blog All People Have Value is about how I will be donating 25 cents to Amnesty International for every negative e-mail I get from Ben Hall and Annise Parker in the ongoing campaign for Mayor of Houston.

We don’t need to accept a big money negative campaign from these two candidates. There are real issues of poverty and basic social justice that need to be discussed in our Great City of Houston.

All People Have Value is found on my new website NeilAquino.com. 

Please check out the new blog and the new site. Please feel free to offer your opinions and suggestions for the new site.

Thank you.

NeilAquino.Com Has Been Posted And Your Viewpoints Would Be Helpful

I’ve published my new website.

It is called NeilAquino.com.

Please click here to see the new project.

It would be great to know what you think of the new site.

I’m open to any suggestions. I intend to update the site often.

There is a new blog on the site called All People Have Value.

I’ve only made one post at the new shop so far, but there will be many more to come.

I appreciate all the good folks who helped make Texas Liberal a success.

I’d ask please that you take a look at the site and leave a comment here or on All People Have Value with your ideas and thoughts about new effort. It is at this point very much a work in progress.

Thank you.

Still Staying The Course—NeilAquino.Com Will Be Up And Running In July

While I’ve not made a new post on the blog of late, I’m still here.

I am working on my new project that will be called NeilAquino.com. I plan to have it up and running next month. I’ll be offering more details about the project soon here on Texas Liberal. I will be having a new blog at my new site.

It has been nice to take a break from blogging over the past few months. It is good to take a break from something you have been doing for a long time and thinking about new ways to move ahead.

Thanks to folks who have been checking the blog from-to-time to see if I’m still around.

Above is a picture of a ship that I took while in Galveston recently.

Just like this ship in the picture, I am staying the course. I hope you are doing the same.

This Place Is A Pit—I’m Still Here

Above you see a picture of a mining pit of one kind or another that I saw from the airplane when I was flying back home to Houston from Los Angeles last week.

Here are recent articles about mining from the great British newspaper The Guardian.

I’ve not been posting much on Texas Liberal of late, but I am working on a new project.

I’m working on a new website that I plan to have up and running soon. This new website will have a photo essay of a kind, a metaphoric universe and solar system, some poems, and a blog about the 2013 City of Houston elections.

The new website will be called NeilAquino.com.

Thanks to everybody still checking out the blog from time-to-time and thanks to folks visiting the blog for the first time. I’ll still be posting on Texas Liberal off and on until the new site is published.

If You Have The Chance To Ride The Pacific Coast Highway, You Should Avail Yourself Of That Chance

Here is a picture from earlier this week of along the way on the Pacific Coast Highway.

If you have the chance to ride along the Pacific Coast Highway, you should avail yourself of that chance.

Los Angeles National Cemetery

Here is a picture of the Los Angeles National Cemetery that I took earlier this week.

I often try to go to a veterans cemetery when I’m on the road.

This Street Looks Like How One Might Imagine Beverly Hills

Here is a street in Beverly Hills, California that I drove on earlier this week.

Lined with tall palm trees, this street seemed to at least fit a conception of what Beverly Hills might look like.

LAPD Helicopter Flying Over Santa Monica Beach

Here is a picture of an LAPD helicopter flying over Santa Monica beach today.

It was a nice sunny day in Southern California today.

Texas Progressive Alliance Round-Up—The Work Of Freedom Is Up To Each Of Us

Below is the most recent Texas Progressive Alliance round-up. The TPA is a confederation of the best political bloggers in Texas. TPA members are citizen-bloggers working for a better Texas.

As I say each time I post the round-up—Every Texan and every American has the ability to attend a public meeting, attend or organize a protest, write or call an elected official, talk to friends and family, start a blog, donate money, write a letter to the editor, volunteer for candidates and causes, engage in acts of civil disobedience, and to run for public office.

We can also seek to impact society by consistently acting in a way that reflects our best values. Or by working on an artistic or creative effort that expands the range of thought and imagination we have in our society.

I repeat these thoughts so often on the blog because there is nothing more important I can say.

Here is the round-up along with some bonus posts from other top Texas bloggers—

Off the Kuff looks at how the 2012 election results differed from 2008 in State Senate and SBOEdistricts.

DosCentavos‘ Fidencio Leija reports on the work of HOPE in the End of Course testing debate.

There is a troll hiding in plain sight on the United States Supreme Court, and PDiddie at Brains and Eggs says it’s going to take a lot of willpower not to feed it.

Over at TexasKaos, Lightseeker reports on the charter school money grab, aided by the usual suspect. Check it out – Charter Schools Make Play for Huge Increase in Public Funding.  

CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme wants you to know that a couple of our Supreme Court Justices don’t appreciate racism. Lets hope that number rises to at least five for the Voting Rights Act.

The problem for our state’s “leaders” is that they’ve been telling us for so long that we have a spending problem, they have no answer when it becomes obvious that we don’t have a spending problem. That’s why WCNews at Eye on Williamson says we have a lack of spending problem in Texas.

Neil at Texas Liberal did not post so much this past week. However, Neil remains at work on a new website to be published this April to be called NeilAquino.com. This website will have a photo essay extolling the intellectual virtues of everyday life , a metaphorical history of existence, some poems and a blog about the 2013 City of Houston elections. For the TPA round-up this week, Neil has submitted a popular Texas Liberal post about the famous Dogs Playing Poker paintings.

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And here are some more interesting posts from Texas blogs.

See creationism opponent Zack Kopplin on the Bill Moyers show, via Creationist Vouchers.

Brewed and Never Battered and Open The Taps give an update on the legislative effort to improve the lot of Texas microbreweries and brewpubs.

Testing Testing Testing

I’ll be in Los Angeles soon on vacation. I’d like to make some posts from Los Angeles with the WordPress app on my phone. It has been a few months since I used this app and this post is a test.

The picture is of Houston Mayor Annise Parker from the monthly blogger lunch today.

Thanks for reading Texas Liberal.

Fall Of Man Into Tusks Of Evil Laughing Wolly Mammoth

Above is a picture I took last week at the Morian Hall of Paleontology at the Houston Museum of Natural Science.

In this picture it appears that a person is falling into the tusks of an evil laughing Woolly Mammoth.

I’m not certain that this image was the intent of the folks who desgined the exhibit, but I have to commend the result in any event.

I’d Sit Out The Alvarado-Garcia Texas Senate District 6 Race Because It Offers No Hopeful Options—Should We Cast A Ballot For Mayor Of Houston In 2013?

As far as I recall, I’ve voted in every election since I turned 18. But I would sit it out if I could vote in the Texas State Senate district 6 runoff between Democrats Carol Alvarado and Sylvia Garcia. This is a Houston-based district.

(Above–A picture I took of Sylvia Garcia at a function late last year.)

There is little ideological or policy difference between the two, both campaigns are captive to special interest money, the campaign has been relentlessly negative, and turnout will be so low as to delegitimize the process. While ultimate responsibility lies with the electorate, it is also so that what voting will accomplish in this case is to legitimize a process that offers no real options.

As I think out my new blog on 2013 Houston city politics, one question I want to explore is why should people vote in 2013?  What potentially more hopeful and useful actions can we take to help direct the course of our city?

While I suppose I’ll find at least one race that compels me to vote for whatever reason, I did in fact leave my ballot blank for Mayor of Houston in 2011.

Even with the understanding that I am just one person of 2.1 million in Houston and that I can’t always have my way, no candidate came even approximately close to my views and Mayor Parker had no credible opposition in any case.

Turnout in 2011 was something like 14%. The process has no relevance to most people. Our political leaders and the big donors who direct them are just fine with this fact.

If Ben Hall and Mayor Parker-Both Democrats-pander to the right, practice identity politics to the exclusion of substance, ignore the needs of the poor, and offer no new vision–Then why should we care who wins?

The work of freedom is up to each of us. It is past time that we take up this obligation in a serious and more imaginative way.

(My comrade Perry Dorrell has been writing about this race at his great blog Brains & Eggs. Here is the most recent post on the SD 6 race by Charles Kuffner at Off The Kuff. And here is the most recent Garcia-Alvarado post by Stace Medellin at Dos Cantavos.)