Posts By Donna Schoenkopf
Sunday, February 19, 2012 / 4:23 pm
FUCK YOU! ! ! !
Why I love cussing.
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: cussing | freedom of speech | mario savio
I taught my children, by example and by lecture, that cussing was the way to keep one's freedom of speech.
I never cussed when I taught. I was afraid of getting fired. Actually, I may have said “hell” or “damn” once or twice as I was just getting ready to retire. So I understand your reticence of taking up the banner of Freedom of Speech. You could lose your job!
Anyway, back in the 60s, when I was a lass, I fell in love with freedom of speech. And cussing to me is an expression of that. And every time I say fuck you, I feel free all over.
I am still in love with Mario Savio. Look him up. He's dead now. Died unknown and unloved. But he is my hero. He stood on car roofs with a bull horn and blasted “FUCK YOU ! ! ” out over the world and I loved him til my I felt the way I feel after an orgasm. All spent and satisfied.
So FUCK YOU ALL and FUCK EVERYTHING.
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Wednesday, February 15, 2012 / 2:56 pm
Venting My Spleen: Election Day
My adventure in voting after a long, long day.
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: venting my spleen | Voting | Voter ID | Polling Places
I had worked all day (ten hours, to be exact) and was tired, hungry, and crabby.
The drive home down Killer Highway 177 was long. I couldn't wait to see my happy dogs and get something in my starving self.
But as I was nearing my turnoff I realized that it was election day. There was a County Commissioner race and a School Board race.
I have never missed an election but as I pulled into my driveway I actually considered skipping this one. I climbed out of my car, dogs hopping happily all around me, and walked into the house.
And knew I wasn't going to skip this one either.
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Monday, February 13, 2012 / 5:00 am
Rural Life: Report From Chigger Lake
Life (and death) in the country.
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: environmental | affordable house | dogs | laundry | good diet | concrete floors | outdoor shower | compost pile | drought
I'm living on thirteen beautiful, hilly acres in Oklahoma. I live in an affordable ($50,000), environmental (simple rectangle, southern wall a row of 6 sliding glass doors looking down my hill, passive solar in the winter, breezy in the summer) house of glass and steel and concrete that I designed and helped build. I've been here for four years. I am a 68 year old retired school teacher who wants to learn how to do all kinds of things—building, fixing, planting—by myself. I like to experiment just to see what will happen.
I don't have a lot of money. And I do want to keep everything here as natural as I can because I am, above anything else, striving to live lightly on the earth.
Here's what's been going on.
The Fabulous Outdoor Shower
My outdoor shower is going through an awkward period. It had been lush and glorious because it was surrounded by waist high grass and sunflowers that were taller than the house. Then I mowed. That left it naked and kinda ugly.
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Saturday, February 11, 2012 / 12:10 pm
Bureaucrat of the Week: Lisa Jackson of the EPA
She’s making environmental history despite the Koch Brothers!
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: bureaucrat of the week | EPA | Koch Brothers | environment | Lisa Jackson
You know why all those Republicans deny climate change, don't you?
And you know why they also hate the EPA, right?
The Koch Brothers, that's why.
The brothers who own the second largest corporate conglomeration in the United States of America have all their vested interests in things that rape the earth.
Oil and gas, Georgia Pacific lumber, a slew of toxic chemicals. I could go on and on but you get the idea.
Republicans didn't just come up with the idea that climate change didn't exist. Nor did they have some sort of revelation from on high. They got spoon fed these ideas by their funders, the Koch Brothers, who want to protect their vested interests and make that known to their lackies, the Republicans who take their filthy lucre.
But We the People have Lisa Jackson! Ta Dah!!
She is the most effective Environmental Protector we've ever had. She's dealt with mercury and auto emissions, two biggies that have been fought for years and years by corporate interests.
Her core concerns are air, water, and toxic contamination. She focuses on children, the elderly, and low income neighborhoods.
She's done more in her three years on the job than the EPA has done in its history.
She's an adopted child, a math genius, a chemical engineer, and has a fistful of magna cum laudes from prestigious places of learning.
Here's to Lisa Jackson, our Bureaucrat of the Week!
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Tuesday, February 7, 2012 / 3:39 pm
Right Wing Evangelical Talk Radio
Relentless, ruthless, and not at all Christian.
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: right wing | evangelical | talk radio | Nelson Mandela
Yesterday my television went out.
This was a serious predicament because I live out in the boonies, and the only human contact I have for days on end is the telly. I rise early, anywhere from 4:30 am on and the first thing I do is turn on my teevee and have a delicious cup of coffee.
I watch MSNBC unless Joe Scarborough gets under my skin with his hogging of the microphone and his pronouncements from on high but I usually weather the storm. When I absolutely can't take it anymore, I turn on CSPAN and if that isn't doing the trick I might succumb to a couple of minutes of HGTV or Fox just to see what mischief they're up to..
But yesterday! The teevee went out! Completely!
I called DISH and got an appointment for the next afternoon. But that meant I would have to survive on EVANGELICAL RIGHT WING TALK RADIO for a whole day.
(No, reading doesn't replace the human voice. I tried. And music irritates me in a few minutes. And sports? Fuggedaboudit.)
In my case, it was AFR (American Family Radio) or nothing. It's the only talk station I can get out here. It originates in Ada, Oklahoma, population 16,907. Ada is over the hill and down Killer Highway 177 for thirty-seven miles.
Here's a little of what I was listening to for those endless hours.
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Monday, February 6, 2012 / 6:14 am
Venting My Spleen: The Koch Brothers and the EPA
More scary stuff about how they are everywhere.
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: EPA | venting my spleen | Koch Brothers | Congressman James Lankford | Senators Inhofe and Coburn | environment
A couple of years ago I was standing outside the Gordon Cooper Technology Center in Shawnee, Oklahoma waiting for our brand new Republican Congressman James Lankford to arrive for his Town Hall Meeting.
I was standing with a bunch of feisty Democrats who were holding signs of protest. (Mine was pink and said “Tax the Rich.” I was, as usual, ahead of my time.)
People who were supporters of Lankford began streaming in and eyed us with suspicion and/or amusement as they walked through the door.
One old geezer guy stopped to have a conversation. He kept saying that the EPA should be abolished.
I hadn't been tuning in to the right wing talk radio shows for a while so I had no idea why he was so vehement about it. But he was. In spades.
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Wednesday, February 1, 2012 / 10:07 am
Bureaucrat of the Week: Michele Flournoy
She’s made the Defense Department smarter and faster.
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: bureaucrat of the week | national defense | Michelle Flournoy
She's tall and pretty. Probably in her late forties. Has a pleasant Irish face and smile. And she's really, really smart.
She graduated from Beverly Hills High School, Harvard, and Oxford.
She is the Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, and when appointed, was the highest ranking woman in the Pentagon. She was appointed by President Obama. And she is a graceful powerhouse.
I caught her on CSPAN.
(You guys really MUST turn on CSPAN once in a while. It's really the only way to keep up with what goes on in Washington, and if you do turn it on, I think you will have a lot more respect for the people who slog it out in the trenches there. That's why I write these regular pieces on my choice for Bureaucrat of the Week.)
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Monday, January 30, 2012 / 6:00 am
Elder Housing the Citizen Potawatomi Way
State-of-the-art solar and geothermal save the planet and their tribal members’ money.
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: solar power | Citizen Potawatomi | elder housing | geothermal
This is the story of a world renowned Native American tribe, the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, integrating communal values and environmental knowhow in all the building they do.
And it’s quite a lot of building. They are now the largest employer in Pottawatomie County, Oklahoma. Their holdings include a bank, casinos, grocery stores, a rural water district, and a whole lot of other things.
The Chairman of the tribe is Rocky Barrett. He’s smart. Really smart. And he knows how to do well by doing good.
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Tuesday, January 24, 2012 / 9:09 am
Earth Justice: Ann Calhoun On Duty
Cloth bags vs. plastic: did you think about germs?
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: recycling | Ann Calhoun | paper vs. plastic | earth justice
Ann Calhoun, vigilant citizen, wordsmith and smart ass has a blog that reports the various goings on in her hometown of Los Osos, California and its environs, which include San Luis Obispo.
Does she get mad? You BET she does. Can she rant like nobody else? Uh huh!
This time she takes on the insidious forces that put profit before the health of our planet. And, boy, does she make mincemeat out of the liars and fakes who are on the wrong side of this issue.
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Friday, January 20, 2012 / 4:29 pm
You Need a Little of This
He’s so in love with you.
by Donna Schoenkopf
Tags: Barack Obama
You've had a hard day.
Now you're home, in front of your computer and have stumbled onto these very words. You're looking for a little something to wind down the day.
A little something sweet and good and groovy.
