Sponsor Our Marathon, Doctors Without Borders

Hi Friends and Family,

As some of you already know Allison and I are training to run in our first marathon on Whidbey Island on April 13. Many people have been asking us why we want to do this to ourselves and thus far our only real answer has been for health (although our knees may argue with this logic) and a physical challenge we've both wanted to attempt for some time now. Then I came across a friend of mine who turned me onto a good idea that I'm going to steal in hopes that we might do more than stroke our physical egos this April.

What we're asking of you is to help us use this run to benefit some people in desperate situations by pledging to donate a certain chunk of change for each mile we run in April (Note: marathons are 26.2 miles). All of the money will go directly to the organization Doctors Without Borders. This is an organization of committed doctors worldwide providing vaccinations, check-ups, medical care and community support in war-torn areas and poverty-ridden parts of the world where people are dying of very curable illnesses that we haven't experienced in western society for a long time. Many of these places don't get reported about in the news and don't get the yearly runs cross-country to fund research. What they are dying from is not something waiting on a medical breakthrough, they just need willing people, money, and resources--all of which we have plenty of in our culture. If you'd like to read more on what this organization is doing you can go to www.doctorswithoutborders.org

If this sounds like something you'd like to be a part of please click on the link below and contribute directly to DWB to help us reach our goal before April 13. A big thanks to all of those who have already contributed! It has been overwhelming how fast and how generously our friends and family have responded to this cause. Please pass the word.


Love,
Jeff and Allison

Is Religion Causing More Harm Than Good?

I'd like to tread lightly here so that you will keep reading and not skip to the next blog thinking this is the ranting of a crazy left-wing nut job who hates religious people. However, I do want to raise a legitimate question about what the pros and cons are of modern day religion in America. Barack Obama brought up a great point, I thought, last night in the South Carolina debate when he suggested that Americans who have stopped going to church and stopped participating in religious culture because their churches don't accept their gay friends and push conservative views on their families, are conceding this cultural ground to the Republicans who think they have a monopoly on Christian values. These are the same people, mind you, who want to build a giant wall across our southern boarder to keep out Mexicans rather than coming up with a rational modern approach to helping these people who are fleeing to our country to make a little money to send back home. These are the same people who fully supported and re-elected George W. Bush even after he started an unfounded war that we will never get out of in an efficient manner and that will certainly come back to haunt our children. The same people who haven't uttered a word in their debates concerning the still present racial tensions and gender boundaries that keep brown and black people of our country and women making less for doing the same jobs as white men. The same people who constantly fight for personal freedoms and state rights to uphold some of the most unhealthy behaviors and attitudes imaginable instead of letting the government step in and do what governments should do, in my opinion, which is educate (and if necessary regulate) its citizen's actions that are causing societal dissonance.

Obama's point was that the things taught in Christian faiths and by Jesus Christ (supposedly) are very much in-sync with democratic values--social justice, health care for everyone, affordable housing and education, environmental values, etc. are all things that liberals can uphold as being every bit as valid Christian values as the Republican's lip-service on family values and pro-life (Funny how they think every baby should have a chance, but once they're out of the womb they couldn't care less about the issues that provide these babies a life worth living). But this still isn't the question I want to raise.

All of the politics of religion aside, I'd like to know if I'm the only person who isn't constantly thinking, "What the hell is going on with religion in the world?" There is absolutely NO empirical evidence that has ever been shown or proven in any way that a God exists. Science consistently throughout history has come up with very logical, rational and often times proven data that explains so-called religious happenings. I have read studies that Jesus most likely existed and had some historical relevance during his time period, but no where close to that of other people who were alive at the same time and whose names show up in various types of literature from that same time. Jesus was the historical equivalent of Dennis Kucinich, just some bleeding heart carpenter's son rebelling against the harshness of society. And he died at thirty-three and really only did anything of significance from age thirty until he was arrested and put to death. I'm twenty-eight, so basically it would be like me deciding to become a social revolutionary and gathering together my cult of followers and riling up trouble with the government in between doing some social work for the poor and homeless and hanging out with my prostitute friend, than getting arrested three years later and killed after all my flaky followers bail on me and pawn me off as a crazy person.

Okay, this is not to say that I don't agree with a lot of what Jesus had to say (after all I am myself a bleeding heart liberal committed to helping the less fortunate), but the fact that our entire world will still put more faith in this old folk tale over the scientists and great thinkers of a modern day society is absolutely beyond me. Jesus, by and by, was NOT the first person to say these things. A lot of his message came from people such as Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle (among others) who were around long before anyone knew what the hell "Away in a Manger" meant. So, why can't we put this behind us? Why can't we keep the message (it's not all that sophisticated or hard to understand--don't be an asshole, make what you need, help out the people who can't help themselves, etc. etc.) and lose this mystical sob story that's causing such a rift between people in the world. If anything, why don't we all go to continuing education classes on Sunday morning and have people with PhDs in science and business and humanities talk to us about how to fix worldly problems in a real and tangible way, instead of being led through some watered-down pagan ritual in an expensive church where we can show off our B.S. happy families and newest wears from Old Navy.

I guess this is stemming from Allison studying psychology and counseling families right now and my studying science and helping with patients in the physical rehab clinic at the hospital. Both of us constantly get to learn about and see the reality of what's happening with people in the world. She gets to hear what people really think and feel and want out of life and what causes human suffering emotionally and psychologically. I get to see what people do and don't do that brings them to the hospital with missing limbs and broken bones and cancer of every imaginable part of the body. Between science and psychology we've (western culture) pretty much narrowed down the problems that make the average person suffer in life, yet when people are suffering they don't come to the people with answers. Instead they turn to religion and put faith in people and ideas that have not been proven or studied to have any basis in reality. It's an interesting study in itself why people seem to enjoy their suffering and focus on the pain and "poor me" story instead of the preventions or solutions for overcoming pain so they can enjoy life. So this is what troubles me. I think religion brings fuzzy, simple-minded, based-in-nothing, feel good answers to hard and fast, preventable, fixable problems that a good education and a life of learning and exploration could remedy. So is the little bit of comfort people receive for an hour a week better than letting those people have an all out break down that they could learn from and build a new, sustainable life based in reality? I really have to wonder. Would we be able to solve our worldly problems if people put as much effort into supporting academics, science and social science as they do faith-based initiatives and people whose hearts are in the right place but don't have a clue as to what's really causing problems in the world and how to best fix them? I have to wonder. I'm starting to think that maybe the answer is to educate the religious leaders and have them teach the people. They seem to get a better response than the doctors and scientists.

'Tis the Season

It's finally here! After eight LONG years of the worst president in the history of the United States the voting is finally underway for a new leader. Obama and Huckabee winners in Iowa, Clinton and McCain took New Hampshire, we're down to three candidates on the Democratic side (and poor Dennis Kucinich who may be forever doomed to have the best ideas in the country and no shot at ever winning because he's short and has big ears. *Reminder to those who've already forgotten four years ago, the policies that the front runners are proposing this time around are the exact same ideas Dennis proposed in 2004 and everyone called him a radical left-wing nut job. More evidence that Americans care more about a pretty face than a substantial message), and the Republican side down to four who actually have a shot at this point. Here's some sites to follow on the stats and polls:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/national.html
http://rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/latest_results_from_rasmussen_markets

According to these records there's only one combination that looks possible for the Republicans and that's John McCain vs. Hillary Clinton. Any other combination and the election is going to the Dems (Thank GOD! Not that this can't change as it gets closer). There's actually a tie if the general election is between Obama and McCain, which either way it goes could be bad for the country. Another dead heat, wait three days and still have a large enough margin of error that the election could be construed as being "stolen" would not be good for our divided nation. However, with how intensely we are divided over our values I don't see how it could go any other way. Conservatives, from my humble perspective, want to continue scaring the shit out of Americans and then substituting religion and "faith" in unknowns for facts and reality and realistic plans for overcoming worldly problems, while liberals want to live in a more educated, healthy, intelligent and sophisticated society that actually leaves the country once in awhile and explores the planet instead of sitting at home eating junk food and watching their bank accounts grow. The Republican debates sound like/ are a bunch of pissed off white guys who can't stand that they might live in a nation where they actually have to learn a second language to communicate, learn something about science and logic and be forced to partake in healthy, open-minded behaviors that allow all human beings an equal chance to be treated like human beings (save John McCain whom I often disagree with, but genuinely respect because he fiercely sticks to the facts and minimizes his pandering to the right-wing nuts). The Democrats look like the future--a woman, a black man, a Hispanic man, a non-Christian (Kucinich), and an old ranting man all on the same stage and providing viable insights into how we can treat our country as a whole. They sound informed, they sound strong, they actually, for once, sound inspiring like they may actually do something to bring our liberal values to fruition.

I personally won't be happy until I live in a country more like Canada and western Europe where I don't have to expend energy thinking about how I'm going to pay for things should I become suddenly ill, how I'm going to get my kids through school because it's so expensive that life becomes this cycle of borrowing to get through it and then working like a dog to pay it back and never enjoying the profits of your hard work, where I can travel in the world and be just another Joe from a country where people are frequently seen out in the world community (as opposed to some obtrusive fat-ass that comes to their country on a tour bus and demands to be treated like an American), and where I can feel safe sending my kids into the world to travel and learn without worrying that they'll be abducted over the actions of our leaders. I'll be happy when the right looks more like the left does now and the left can actually be progressive enough to make a difference (if you look at western European politics, this is the case. Even the conservatives are more liberal than the most liberal of our democrats) and where religion is minimized to something people openly debate and rail against and figure out what about it is any different than sitting around talking about wizardry and magic that can somehow break all natural laws of science and logic to bring about mystical happenings in the world. Maybe even live in a world where good people can sit in a pub and have a few drinks after a hard day--of something that isn't watered-down piss with a ridiculous alcohol content--and maybe hear some music and throw a game of darts and have an intelligent conversation without it being a depressing place full of grown frat boy children getting hammered and talking about their high score on Halo. Not that I'm trying to crap on what people think is fun, but there's a point at which grown men should stop playing video games and actually participate in society. Guess I'm just strange like that.

Anyway, Super Tuesday is coming up next month and by the end of February we should know who our candidates are. Please, please--I'm begging you--please don't listen to the mud-slinging emails and the vamped up pundits during this election. Try going to www.npr.org and listening to the live stream of your local public radio. They'll give you only the facts, they ask intelligent questions and try to get at the truth of the situation without getting hostile and starting pissing contests. You'll help both your blood-pressure and your intellect. Check your facts (by the way Snopes.com is NOT really a valid way of doing this. I guess they're better than nothing, but it's just two people who own some kind of folk-society organization in southern California running checks on emails and urban legends. They aren't really anymore qualified than the people sending this stuff around), stay informed and vote wisely. And by wisely I mean vote for Barack Obama ;) There's my plug. Take care.