World Homeless Day

Yes sir, today is World Homeless Day. From today's New York Times:

Started in 2010, the day seeks to bring attention to homelessness, a problem that affects tens of millions of people worldwide, according to the United Nations.

In the U.S., more than a half-million people live on the streets or in shelters for temporary stays.

But national statistics show that homelessness is declining. And Salt Lake City has been held up as a model.

The city’s approach is simple: Before tackling the problems that led someone to become homeless, those in need first receive a place to live. The program is credited with reducing the number of chronically homeless people across the state by 91 percent since 2005.

Lloyd Pendleton, who leads Utah’s homeless task force, initially doubted the plan. “I get probably two to five calls a week now,” he said in an interview last year, “wanting to know how we did it.”

For information on how you can help, the National Alliance to End Homelessnessand the National Coalition for the Homeless offer resources.

Notes on a Kansas City Weekend

Things noticed over the weekend;

1)  Prairie Village seems to want to become either Kansas City, Missouri or just more like them.  If you've driven 75th Street headed West lately, you know what I mean.  I don't think any one Kansas City street has ever had any more construction plates on the road than that city (town?) does now;

2)  Meanwhile, in nearby Mission, Kansas, holy cow, people. Johnson drive is a God-awful, bumpy, crowded, narrow, nearly dangerous mess. I suppose that's the only way it can be repaired but what a driving nightmare.  As an additional note, I can't imagine how the businesses on the South side of that street are able to continue. I don't know how long it's been torn up but it's clear it won't be done any time soon;

3) And speaking of Mission, how about that mall, eh?  Seems only two questions come up:  First, will that thing ever be redone? And second, wouldn't it be terrific if they just hadn't torn down the old one?

And finally,

4)  What on Earth would get someone--anyone--who's sane, anyway, to move 1/2 way across the country---all the way to Virginia, for pity's sake---but to STILL, after all these years, focus on our city, Kansas City, and whether or not we build light rail?  What sick, twisted disease must be running around your body or mind to make you fixate like that? It has to be a combination of outrageous egotism and OCD, don't you think?

And I refuse to mention that person's name in any way here, ever, but the surname rhymes with *ss-stain.

America, don't tell me you give a damn about senseless shootings

Every Columbine and every Tuscon, Arizona and every Aurora, Colorado makes it that much easier to point out the ignorance of America's gun laws and the deaths from our far-too-many guns.

Does it change anything or will it?

Heck no, unfortunately. Americans will continue to do nothing or--worse--they will fight to keep our semi-automatic and automatic weapons.

We're just not that bright.

So please, don't pretend America gives a damn about the 12 people killed yesterday and the 59 shot and wounded or the crippling and near-killing of Representative Gabby Gifford and the six killed and 13 wounded then and there in Tuscon last year or the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007 that killed 32 people and wounded 17 others or, finally--at least here, now, today--the Columbine shooting, in which 13 people were killed and 21 were injured.

America, Americans, don't pretend you give a damn--not one bit--about the people who were killed this week in Aurora, Colorado. You feign concern and/or sympathy like someone who posts "I'm so sorry" on Facebook.

It's a an empty gesture.

A very empty gesture.

If you gave a damn, you'd make sure this madness would at least decrease greatly, if not end as completely as possible.

Instead, you do nothing.

As it is, there will be another Columbine, another Tuscon, yet another Virginia Tech, one more Aurora, Colorado.

And the reactions and results will be just the same.

The National Rifle Association thanks you.

Think about it

An adult male in San Francisco, of all places, who dresses up like an elderly nanny, so he can be close to his kids?

Homelessness: Understanding it/Judging it

--Who of us can understand homelessness unless you've been out there and lived it? --Who can understand how that feels? --Who can understand how they got there? Truly. --Who can understand what it's like to not be sure where you're going to sleep that night? --Who of us can understand what it's like to not know where your next meal is coming from? --Who of us understands what it's like to not quite be sure if you're going to be safe, wherever you're going--where you have to go? --Who of us understands what it's like to not be sure if some young person or group is going to beat you up just because you're homeless? --Who of us understands the hostility so many people in society feel toward homelessness and the homeless--and that some of us outwardly show? It seems a lot of us--most?--at least have opinions about homelessness if we don't out-and-out judge it and/or judge the homeless and too frequently we end up with both strong and negative views of both the homeless and homelessness. This thought occurred to me today at a local Quik Trip as there was a homeless person there. It made me think.