hey folks!
First, some contest news.
I've agreed to feature the winner of
Abandoned Places, a contest being hosted by ~
otsego-amigo and *
Karakuji. The deadline for this contest is November 11, so get your urbex-loving asses over there and submit a photo!
Also I will be a judge in the
Big Cats contest being hosted by ~
leocbrito. The deadline is November 7 and there are some very nice entries already. What are you waiting for?
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Ok here's my soapbox issue today... and please remember I'm not trying to piss anyone off.
I've been watching with great interest the election campaign in the United States. My interest stems from the fact that the rest of the free world looks to America for solid leadership on global issues... not always because they are morally or even ideologically correct... but because they have the biggest gun... and
used to have the fattest wallet (they apparently still have the biggest credit card).
My main issue? ... Global warming.
I was greatly appalled by something I heard during the vice-presidential debate the other night. Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska and Republican running mate of John McCain, managed to (between her cutesy winks and scripted lines) utter some of the most incredibly ignorant rhetoric ever to leave the mouth of a politician.
When asked about global warming and its causes she denied that man was playing a significant role. She went on to blame the cyclical effect of planetary climate swings.
Well I thought she had just blown it right there. Game over. But then as the news organizations replayed the debate, they showed a room full of Republicans actually BOOING Joe Biden (Palin's opponent) when he stated flat out that the problem was man-caused.
...eyes wide shut.
So my question is this:
If one doesn't believe that global warming is caused by man, then what is one's rationale or motivation for trying to curb emissions and take the world down the green path?In other words, does the Republican ticket take global warming seriously? Do they believe it can be solved? Do they even want to TRY to solve it!?
Maybe all they offer is lip service.
Food for thought, my American friends (at least those of you who care about solving global warming), to consider when you walk into the polling booth in November.
For more on this issue please check out this interesting and informative journal my dear friend =
jocarra wrote back in April:
A few notes on global warming...end rant.</sub>
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Well it sure is nice to be back and able to spend more time here at deviantART. I just want to say a HUGE thanks to all the people who have supported my photography, bought my prints, and added me to their watch lately.
Love Y'all!
Skinner
~~~~~
'A Gift of Seasons - 2009'a brand new calendar featuring some of my better landscape-format prints suitable for the seasons. I hope you will consider it as a gift for a loved one perhaps... a gift of seasons. 
.
`anmari has been spreading her infectious positivity throughout our community for over 6 years. Throughout this time Ana has been at the core of all things devious, passionately developing an eclectic gallery, helping organise devmeets, participating in chat events and also recently completed dedicating her time as a Community Volunteer. We are absolutely delighted to bestow the Deviousness Award for May 2013 to `anmari, congratulations! Read More
Sta.sh
!!!! 
But of course there are always the rules......
Please please please fave the journal!
Make another journal about this giveaway and provide a link of that journal in the comments (this will help spread the word about this giveaway)
this journal 
Rules
Should be about School Times!
, comment and watch!
oints:
The Gay issue is more than a moral debate. it so one of life and death.
I liken that situation to this... Not too long ago it was"immoral" for interracial couple to date, and marry. The were persecuted, harassed, and worse. People were killed for dating the wrong race. You would think that between the times with all we have learned we would evolve.
but low and behold a political party of the elite says it is okay, tolerable, and moral to treat people like scum because they date (and wish to marry) people of the same gender. Why should any care (Republican or otherwise) if two men or two women want to go through all the hardships that a marriage entails?
We are supposed to be a nation of Freedoms, who cares who sleeps with whom? Personally i feel people should mind their won business when it comes to such things. Or at least stop lying about how "free" they want to be, or that they even are.
oh and if we are talking morals, By the way, statistically, straight couples do tend to divorce more, and have more extra marital affairs and other immoral things. than gay couples, So why do elite republicans use Straight Domestic Ideology as a reason that gay couples shouldn't marry? It goes back to what I have been saying all along. Money.
The difference between McCain and Ghandi is that McCain is a man with resources at his disposal who has decided (on many occasions - not single handedly of course, but still had a hand in it) the disastrous course that this nation has been taking for quite some time. Ghandi Was a poor man, who saw something wrong, and tried to change it through non violence. Even while violence was visited upon him. I doubt the Senator would be so kind as to turn the other cheek.
But that is off the subject and past the point, I agree With you in one area, Skinner's work is amazing. he has a talent and an ability to see things in nature that I only wish I had. His work makes me see what is out there that I want to protect. And I totally feel that he is right, and in his opinion, i stand with him.
Find me a republican leader who is not self centered, tunnel visioned and all about his class and those like him with the means to control everything. find me on who can argue the points of his party and make me see ways he could be right without spouting drivel that any thinking person could slap down, and I will listen. but for now , I see Washington, Wall Street and main Street. I know where I am and from where i stand I don't like the view.
So therefor, as someone trying to stay objective, I am left with the idea that neither extreme side is 100% correct. This leads me back to the reason I brought up Ghandi and the others. You point out the difference, but I would like to highlight the main simillarity, that we all suffer from the same condition of being human. We beleive what we beleive and act on that, despite the fact that we can be wrong on some of those things. And again until a person comes to the realization that they might be wrong about an issue, there is no way in the world someone can have a real debate with them.
Thusly, I will not get into a debate about gay rights or any other such hot topic with ANYONE here until they conceed the point that it is POSSIBLE that their assumptions are incorrect.
To me, it shouldn't matter one way or another, we need to be working towards new forms of energy anyways. They'll be cheaper, less impacting, and generate new jobs and economic wealth. If we contribute that much to global warming and what not, great, now we've solved it with 'green' energy. If it isn't, well then we'll know for sure.
Look, the thing is that in political races this has all but ceased to be a true issue and is rather a way of garnering extra votes. It's a tacked on issue that will sway a percentage of the voting populace that believe strongly one way or another. Fact of the matter is we should be doing research in this field no matter who gets elected. We should have been doing it while Bush was in office, we should have been doing it when Clinton was in office, we should have been doing it for a hell-uv-a long time before now.
My big beef is, why wait for someone to get elected to president before pushing for these things. Don't senators have power? Don't mayors and other elected officials have political sway? This is not one person's fault, it is the fault of many, from what I can see.
Thus it might pay off sometime in the future but could make the elected official in question very unpopular in the short term. And guess what: In politics, short term trumps long term 9 times out of 10.
Sorry I haven't been looking at/commenting on your work, I've been extremely busy! T_T
America is a place where the haves Have and the have nots don't and won't. The amount of people that live below the poverty line is more than all of our population in Canada. The Haves run the country and won't let anything happen to themselves.