United Stakes of America

Our union is at stake. What's left of it. Perceived freedom and peace, citizen health and survival; democracy in America, is at stake. We are caught in a perpetually pivotal downward spiral. It isn't going to get better until, and unless, we free our minds from the muck they've fed us through the media and policy our entire lives. We have been divided, conquered within and conquered by them. The greedy glutton is rewarded while for the rest of us, our labor, freedoms, ecology & environment is stolen and/or degraded. Our bodies and minds poisoned, our mental health weakened, declining. Basic human needs and rights taken for the benefit of those without needs. The audacity, the corruption rampant. Our current options for 2024 are not adequate choices considering the deficit  in character, ability or motivation for serving this country that exists among those we currently have to choose from. They are all corrupted. Neither side is the best case scenario. I believe we might actually be better served with a diverse committee, rather than a president. Diverse in priority, diverse in qualifications, diverse in age or generation. United in service, united in purpose, freedoms and perception. 

Would you you associate this with 9/11

I doodled this in 1990 when I was 20 years old. 9/11 happened 11 years later. 

More tax... that will fix it! Thanks Salem!

Salem wants to tax people that work in the city of Salem to pay for police and fire. They are calling it Safe Salem Fund 2023  They're starting with a need for $19.4 million annually.  That's interesting because the Oregon Lottery profited 900M last year, and 900M the year before.  Oregon Lottery Reports Its Highest Profit Ever .

I understand that the Lottery is state wide and the Salem Safe Fund is for the needs of Salem alone but they shouldn't be taking from people who barely make it check to check - especially when you factor the higher than state average rents, higher property taxes here and lower wages here than Portland. I believe the machines that contribute to crime and homelessness should pay for police and shelters, etc. They pay for parks. Which is a hoot because they locked up all the park restrooms because of the homeless problem. The city has to hire vendors to do the camp clean ups in the parks, meanwhile the lottery office is sitting over there in a building made of granite. I paid a hefty income tax last year and they told me I still owe more at the end of it, and now they want to take more from us. What about people that don't live in Salem? A lot of the people that work at the hospital commute to work here and if this thing passes, will have the privilege of paying even more so Salem can fund the police in a town they are not a resident. The website has an option to use "Balancing act" to do a budget simulation and submit the results, but it doesn't actually allow you to do anything. It6 certainly doesn't allow you to pull money from the lottery. 

oregon-officials-see-unprecedented-video-lottery-sales-in-2021

Roof Dogs

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTRSskWos/?k=1

Dear America - quit allowing yourself be divided from your people. "DIVIDE AND CONQUER" it's a simple tactic, if we are fighting against each other then they win. There are more of us than them and if we stop hating each other for a minute we might realize that those taking our hard earned money and dictating our lives, and poisoning our food, stealing our land, aren't divided among themselves - they have one clear objective and it's motivated purely on power and greed. We aren't born liberals or conservatives - there isn't a red & blue or left & right, not until they told you there was - and "both sides" are too busy hating the supposed other side to see the raping, pillaging and debauchery that is happening to ALL sides, including the planet. Quit seeing only blue and red - we are all the same where it matters - we are connected by life itself and what a waste of such a short time we have - to spend it hating because your self appointed political classification crafted by selfish entities, tells you to. UNITED WE STAND - DIVIDED WE FALL!

Hooray for Marriage Equality!

Hooray for american humans being allowed to marry each other regardless of their individual genders. Why the hell has it taken so long to let everybody enter into the most seemingly binding contracts made with one another yet the promise most broken ? It's ironic that the people fighting it say it goes against the Bible - which may or may not be God's own words written down by some guys a couple thousand years ago, when their opposition and fight is NOT what Jesus would do. There is no quote in the Bible from Jesus saying homosexuality is a sin or an abomination - in any context. 

Humans are notorious for lying and fiction writing and the chains of command on the Bible are questionable - all those people that contributed to it are long gone. And isn't odd to these people that God supposedly hasn't had anything worth writing down since then? The bottom line in is, it doesn't hurt anybody to let people love who they love, and make promises behind that love to each other legally. It's one contract in this country that is easily broken. That has done the most damage - to the children they make and then break up the family before they have finished raising them. That's what people should fight against. It's OK to hurt each other - cause instability to our most fragile and dependent humans - but don't marry someone with matching genitals? Come on, really? Wake up. 

Hooray American Justices - for putting an end to a debate that should never have been one in the first place. 

That first second thought...

I hate you. I mean that from the bottom of my dark and empty heart…my numb and apathetic soul and, with every inch of this pit of wasted space in which my breath, and these words, echo. With every distant memory of desire and affection. With every wasted "tick-tick" running out the clock on my fleeting youth – my fading life.

I see you – the loud and hungry vacuum that sucked out – flushed away – and have now completely forgotten – every fleck, glimmer, beam and ray of light that shined in me when we met... now I shine – no more. It’s dark in this barren cave you give me for all I've lost to you.

I know your narcissistic soul, shallow heart and narrow mind, and… I hate you.

I hate the air you breathe… the ground you walk on; the space you waste; your ever-growing collection of junk and garbage, and the actual dirt and filth you spread onto everything. (Ev-er-y thing? EV-ER-Y thing!)  I hate your lies and how they’re told. I hate the head games you play, as well as each and every one of your many always changing personalities. I hate the lie that you are.  I hate your look; your sound; your smell; your taste; I hate your tone, your hue, your height, your weight, your dreams, your fears, your jokes, your laugh, your ass…. And yes, even your face.

It was as if I had slit my own wrists, slowly bleeding out, since the moment I gave you that first, second thought.

Melinda Marinko

1/25/2015 6:39 AM PST

Salem, OR 

for TAB

The Barking Roof Dogs - explained

When I was 17 and pregnant I lived in "Highgrove" Riverside County, California.  Our studio apartment was on Iowa Avenue and between  4:00 - 6:00 PM every weekday it was gridlocked. 
Up the road at the main intersection there was a row of homes. Flats, really. One story flat roofed homes. One of the homes had a lot of junk and rusty cars all around it. A pair of mid to large sized dogs had climbed the piles of junk onto the roof and they stood there barking - incessantly - at the traffic waiting on the light. I realized later they did this every day. 
Those dogs just standing there atop their house of what looked like worthless junk  barking (bitching and moaning) at people on their own paths, doing something, going somewhere, became a metaphor for so many people that stand on their own pile of crap spending their energy barking at and about other's that are mostly inconsequential to them but unfortunately close enough to be noticed by them. We've all been a roof dog at one time or another, some briefly, some incessantly. 

Barking to biting?

Is the U.S. the worst kind of roof dog? 

This translated from a Russian news website: B View/Reservation for Kerry :

Damascus agreed to call Moscow and Washington to transfer all of its chemical weapons under international control. Earlier, U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry said that in this case, Syria could avoid the bombing. Reservation Kerry suddenly caught Moscow, and then supported and London. However, experts believe that for Syria, and for the United States is nothing more than a rhetorical device designed to maintain a reputation.

Our government barks... and bites. Should we strike down Syrians for striking down Syrians? 

Does that make sense? Not to me.  

Isolated

I'm imploding in this isolation. 

Being isolated while ALONE is one thing;

But isolation in the presence of another...

It is a deafening hollow.

                                                            

EVERY RELIGION is TRUE and also sometimes wrong

In my opinion (which comes from my reality and I believe to be fact):

The only thing that a lot of the many different religions are wrong  or should I say, mistaken about is each's assumptions/doctrines/teachings that all other religions are wrong and the imposition of limitation on the human mind and soul through this divisive narrative, scripture ... dogma. That which is allegedly incontrovertible. 

I chose this example only because I am familiar with it:

"If you don't accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savoir, you will not be accepted in the kingdom of Heaven and therefore will burn in hell"   

So all the non Christians burn in hell? 

Don't get me wrong, I believe in Jesus - talk to him all the time. He is, and was, and will always be the way and the light (yet not exclusively)  The healer - a teacher - the son of god ... as we are all his children.
But maybe he is not a necessary middle-man to God because I was born a "sinner".... and no less of the lord because my god hears me and knows me with AND without Jesus.

...to be continued... 

BloodLetting

blood·let·ting n.

1. Bloodshed.

2. The removal of blood, usually by opening a vein.

Bare-blackened feet and a waiting spoon

Drops of water and a smirking moon

Fit my world in a flat balloon

August until the second June

Wasting time and I’m bloodletting

Refuse to see; it’s too upsetting

Loopdeeloo now I’m forgetting

Honest a lie and no regretting

Until it’s time to break more skin

Please let me hit that once again

Chase my tail, and watch me spin

Promise to die and do me in

Leave my soul out in the yard

Can you see where I am scarred?

Now my doorways must be barred

I fall down hard… I fall down hard

I must have lost my Vulcan mind

Threw away rose merry time

Desperate for just one more dime

Now it’s calling …this…

this life of mine

© Melinda Marinko 2010

Bye Bye Baby Kitty.wmv

Toxic Lady - Riverside General, 1994

THE SMELL OF INTRIGUE DEPARTMENT -

Fumes at Woman's Death still Mystery After 10 Years

RIVERSIDE, Calif. - The source of noxious fumes that sickened
emergency room staff as they worked to save a woman's life remains a
mystery a decade after her death at Riverside General Hospital.

Gloria Ramirez, 31, suffered from ovarian cancer when an ambulance
crew brought her to the hospital with chest pains 10 years ago this
week.

While doctors and nurses tried to save her life, they began getting
ill. Some passed out. Others were nauseous. Fumes overwhelmed them,
and the emergency room was evacuated.

"It was very, very chaotic," recalled Joan Breeding Letbetter, a
fire department spokeswoman who was there while hospital staff became
victims themselves. "It made it a very unreal experience."

No one has ever determined the source of the fumes. An autopsy
conducted under a tent of protective sheeting determined that Ramirez
died of kidney failure brought on by the cancer.

"The situation was a fluke and it was unexplainable," said Mary
Dilley, the county's risk manager. "That is the mystery and it
probably will remain a mystery forever and ever."

The case led fire officials to rethink how they handle hazardous
materials cases, and it highlighted the need for a new coroner's
facility where autopsies could be performed without jeopardizing the
health of workers.

The coroner's office has since abandoned its old Riverside offices
and now operates from new quarters in Perris.

The hospital was later bulldozed to make room for a shopping center
and the county opened Riverside County Regional Medical Center in
Moreno Valley four years after Ramirez's death.

Dr. Tim Nesper, the hospital's emergency department director, said
the hospital has a large decontamination center outside its emergency
department, and it now has trained its staff in how to better handle
patients contaminated with chemicals.

In the months following Ramirez's death, several theories emerged to
explain the source of the fumes, including that she drank a pesticide
in a suicide attempt; that she used a solvent as a home cancer
remedy; and that the hospital's plumbing emitted a noxious gas.

Maggie R. Garcia still believes her sister wasn't the source of the
mysterious ammonia-like fumes. She notes that no one in the ambulance
that brought Ramirez to the hospital got sick.

"I've always believed the source of fumes was within the hospital,"
Garcia said.

The family sued the county for medical malpractice and for general
damages stemming from the coroner's autopsy. The cases eventually
were settled for $800,000, without the county admitting any
wrongdoing.

Most of the money went to buy annuities for Ramirez' two children:
Evelyn Arciniega, now a 22-year-old student at Riverside Community
College, and Buddy Angel Arciniega, 19, who is serving a 12-year
prison sentence for voluntary manslaughter.

Source: AP Wire & The Mercury News
Conspiracy Journal

Joke

Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and George Washington are on a sinking ship.

As the boat sinks, George Washington heroically shouts, "Save the women!"

George W. Bush hysterically hollers, "Screw the women!"

Bill Clinton's asks excitedly, "Do we have time?"

A letter to the guy who stole my black book with poems in

Michael James Elstad,
SID# 5978390
Marion County Corrections Facility
4000 Aumsville Hwy SE
Salem, OR 97317

Dear Michael James Elstad,
You should remember me. We met in 2005 a few days before Thanksgiving. At Big Shots in Salem. I misplaced my keys and you pretended to care… gave me cigarettes, helped me break into my brother’s car to look for my keys. While the entire time you had them in your pocket. Or at least at some point, you found them and failed to mention it to me.
Regardless, this letter isn’t about that. You admitted it to the Police and, from what I understand; you did your time for the theft of my Brother’s car. This is about my Poems.
I’m not sure if you were aware that all of my personal belongings were in that car when you took it. I did not own much at that time. Still - Everything that I owned was in that car. Just stuff a person would keep in their bedroom and bathroom was all that I had packed in that car. Ironically, the few scattered things that returned with car, and were not ruined were shit I couldn’t wear or didn’t want anymore.
The clothes and shoes, make up, etc, were eventually replaceable but, the one thing that that was not and is still not replaceable, (the thing I could leave in my will, which was all I had to leave as a legacy), was that Binder of my original poetry, writing and drawings. It was a Black notebook binder. I left it on the floor behind the driver’s seat. There was a sketch I drew in 1990 in the cover. A very prophetic sketch of 9/11 that I had drawn eleven years before the fact.
The collection was titled: “Notions of Emotions – Soul Purpose Poetry”
By Melinda Lantz-Theissen Marinko
Do you remember it?
I remember so clearly that night when I finally locked up the car and decided it was too cold to stay with it, (temp. got down into the 20’s that night), and I stared at that binder before shutting the door. I almost took it with me. I didn’t because I didn’t want to risk losing it. It was all I had of my original works dating almost 20 years back. I stupidly thought it was safer inside the car. That no one would steal the car under the surveillance cameras and across the street from the cop shop.
Once the car was returned and you were in jail, I didn’t seize the opportunity I might have had to contact you to ask where that binder ended up. If you even knew or remembered. I regret this. I know that even then, you probably didn’t remember or most likely, it was in a dumpster somewhere. Still I didn’t even try because I blamed myself for being so gullible and naïve that night and for stopping at the damn bar to gamble my only and last $5.00. Regardless, I didn’t think contacting you would help me get the binder back.
The loss of everything at the worst possible time as it were, put me into a deep depression for quite a while. I only had the clothes on my back and no way to replace everything for a very long time to come. My family was in no position to help me. I come from poverty. I was so distraught over it all that I didn’t even take the time when they sent the paperwork to claim my losses with the court so any money you might earn would have payments taken out as reimbursement. Also, the only thing I really wanted back was that notebook and I couldn’t put a monetary worth on it.
(And, knowing what I know about how hard it is to get ahead or even stay afloat financially in Oregon, garnishments would make it very hard to get back on your feet. It would put you in the position to have to steal again, maybe. I thought you were destitute like me and that’s why you took the car.)
So now I ask you, do you know where that binder is? Did it end up in a dumpster? I know you don’t care what losing everything I owned at such a low point in my life did to me - still - I wonder if you were conscious of that binder, what you had done with it.
When I try to remember my poems and write them down, I have found most times my memory starts to fade after a few lines in. I have remembered many, however. Still less than half completely. And definitely, the original sketches in that binder can’t be re-done. They were prophetic, automatic psychic drawings by me and I can’t otherwise draw.
I saw your name on Salem’s inmate roster and I thought I would take my last chance to ask you about it. My last chance to tell you what a terrible effect you stealing that car that night had on me. Again, I know you probably don’t care but, on the slight chance, you found Jesus in there, you would feel bad enough to think before you steal again.

Your victim of theft,
Melinda

Bush Chimps

DEMOCRATS ARE SEXY.

WHOEVER HEARD OF A GOOD PIECE OF ELEPHANT?

From All Thoughts Everywhere

(THE FOLLOWING IS WHERE I WENT OFF ON ANOTHER TANGENT :) sorry
My son Turned 18 last month. This is his last year in high school. He listens to music with positive messages and always looking for more.He is going to be a pastor. This was his idea. (He used to get his little sister up on Sunday mornings when he was around 7/8yrs and She-5/6 to go to church 3 or 4 blocks away. I didn’t take him and didn’t tell him. He just did it. He starts Immersion Discipleship Next year then the year after that leadership-training institute and to the University in LA to get his Masters. He told me that for the first time in his life he just "knows" it is what he is meant to do. It's scary for him nonetheless, especially the thought of being in a position where everything he does is scrutinized. I know that God put him here. There is no reason that boy should have ever existed. This is another long story that I need to remind myself of more often. Because I am part of something that I would have a hard time believing if I hadn't lived it. (No, he was NOT an "immaculate" conception) I'm not going to go into it now but I will tell you this. For a year PRIOR to David's conception I had reoccurring dreams with down-to-detail-REAL. (like houses, places being EXACTLY as they are in life... not the usual distorted funky dream versions) of long journeys or obstacle courses, so to speak, just to get to my baby (a baby I was not having - definitely not planning and certainly not ready for... I was 17...but these were just dreams. Right) Every time I always made it to him, he had these beautiful blue eyes, and when I picked him up he hugged me and I would wake up feeling a love that was unconditional - indescribable. Familiar. I'm lacking a better analogy now but it was like being away from home for a few months and when you get into your own bed the first time- again- you realize you had forgotten how comfortable it was and you appreciate it ... even if you never had before. Kind of Like that ... but way more intense. When he was born his face and eyes were already so familiar I had to remind myself that it was actually the first time we met. But he looked up at me and my mom and I both will never forget how his "expression" (yes newborn - 30 seconds minutes old) was as if he had just walked from NY to So Cal in the winter and kick in a few doors once he got there to get to me and he knew I was going through it too but isn’t life grand we can relax now?! He didn't cry much. He was more interested in checking everything out than nursing. It is just beyond my ability to fully grasp the depth of this experience therefore I am unable to explain it myself.
And I'm sorry I really was NOT going to get long winded on you again. Thanks for letting me spill on your screen here. It's been a long time since I thought about these things and it's been important to get to where I'm going so I need to remember where I've been......? Is that cliché, or what? Don't even ask me where that came from.

Yes I done fucked up again.

Boys Will Be Boys

Today my nephews are going somewhere with their Mom and step-dad. Finding clean boxers and socks or un-wrinkled clothes seems to be an incredible challenge. One that cannot be overcome.
"when they start dating they'll take better care of their clothes"
They are 11 and 13.
My fear is that when that time comes they will wonder why they aren't getting any dates, rather than changing their hygiene habits.

Love

Loving for a payback?
What is love? So many people have turned this into a "4 letter word", using it only to create a reaction. Love is said too much for the purpose of selfish gratification. Not because it is genuine. So many seem to forget that real love, pure love is, well, God-like love. It is unconditional. Accepting ... boring.
To have compassion seems to be harder for some people than working an 80 hour work week.

"A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it."

-- Oscar Wilde

When you sling mud, you lose ground.

-- Adlai Stevenson

On Air

Implications everywhere
around me on the floor.

Breathe me in 'cause I'm on air
and dripping down your door.

Inspiration melts in me
and blends into my core.

With powers from the blessed be
bleeding into more.

Melinda Marinko