Ray Turner's Comments

The Changes We Need by Wayne P.

Jun 7, 2008 | rating: 9.5 | comments: 13

Ray Turner Jun 10, 2008, 1:17am EDT

Wayne...you ask "what are you going to do?" The discussion would proceed more productively, I think, if you told us, first, what you are going to do. Your rant is provocative, but abstract. What SPECIFIC actions will you take, Wayne?

IS THE UNITED STATES THE GREATEST NATION ON EARTH???........ by ''The One & Only BERF" ..

Jun 2, 2008 | comments: 56

Ray Turner Jun 10, 2008, 1:09am EDT

Why is being the greatest nation on earth important to us? The need to consider the question at all points to its answer, I think.

Rate the Clinton concession speech by Chris W.

Jun 7, 2008 | rating: 9.2 | comments: 28

Ray Turner Jun 10, 2008, 1:01am EDT

If Hillary had been as generous throughout her campaign as she was giving this speech, she would have won. Bravo, Hillary! I didn't think a Clinton could be this skillful and this human at the same time....R3W

A Photo by Erica Hidvegi

Dec 22, 2007 | rating: 9.3 | comments: 14

Ray Turner May 14, 2008, 2:51am EDT

There's truth in this picture.

BANNING CELL PHONES, NOT THE SOLUTION by Pen4Me !.

Apr 8, 2008 | comments: 4

Ray Turner Apr 13, 2008, 2:16am EDT

Those of us who walk (who are, granted, a minority) know intimately how much the cell phone driver is distracted. They may, with effort, notice the cars around them and the white stripes on the road. They do not notice pedestrians...or the animals walking with them. I won't even start with how cyclists are routinely in danger.

Thanks for your post. I live in Texas where banning anything encroaches on someones right to kill the rest of us with his foolishness. This is the wild west and I guess I'm really more concerned with my neighbors packing heat.

R3W

WOULD YOU BE INTERESTED IN JOINING THIS KIND OF A GROUP???....... by ''The One & Only BERF" ..

Apr 4, 2008 | comments: 97

Ray Turner Apr 8, 2008, 1:55am EDT

Count me in, Berf. You'll never find people more interested in religion than atheists...so count my godless soul among the chosen...R3W

Re: TELL ME ABOUT DEPRESSION............. by hannah w.

Apr 1, 2008 | rating: 10 | comments: 32

Ray Turner Apr 1, 2008, 4:48pm EDT

...obviously, I cannot speak to your larger disorder. I am happy you can. R3W

Re: TELL ME ABOUT DEPRESSION............. by hannah w.

Apr 1, 2008 | rating: 10 | comments: 32

Ray Turner Apr 1, 2008, 4:46pm EDT

Thank you, Hannah, for opening your life to help others. All the men and most of the women in my family suffer depression. Several generations struggled without medication. No more.

I am glad to read you recognize your depression as a real, physical, treatable condition. Enough of this psychological handwringing. This is a physical disease with disastrous consequences. I am glad you, my mother, my sons and I have the help of those little pills.

I don't share your faith; I do share your will to do whatever it takes to be a genuine, generous and happy human.

R3W

Forbidden Words: Advice for Writers by Aaron Lazar, (author of LeGarde Mysteries)

Mar 22, 2008 | rating: 9.7 | comments: 29

Ray Turner Apr 1, 2008, 3:10am EDT

Thank you, Aaron, for summarizing these admonitions and providing such clear examples. My writing students thank you and I, the person who reads their strangled prose, thanks you.

How I get points by Sandy (Minipin Pixels)

Mar 31, 2008 | rating: 9.9 | comments: 57

Ray Turner Apr 1, 2008, 2:31am EDT

Thanks, Sandy. This is especially helpful for those of us who just joined.

WHAT DOES CHANGE MEAN? by Lenin ....

Mar 24, 2008 | rating: 10 | comments: 4

Ray Turner Mar 30, 2008, 3:01am EDT

"Change will only happen when we make it."

Thank you for your insights, Lenin, from one who is not frightened away by your name. Your perspective works for me, but...

You write, "Real change will only occur when the people rise up and claim their rights as free citizens of a true democracy." How will claiming our rights effect change? This reads more like a here-I-stand slogan than a direction or a plan. You exhort, "You just have to listen to radical voices like Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. They saw change as a revolution in the ability of people to govern themselves." How is this more specific, or even much different, from the exhortations of the candidates?

Your "historic turning point" paragraph asks a series of seemingly rhetorical questions, the same sort of questions the candidates use to whip up their crowds. Yes...I want decent, affordable health care for all, I'd like to renew the meaning of justice and reform our economic dinosaur, but...what's next? How do we get from here to there?

The candidates forward proposals (proposals admittedly compromised and prettified for the election), but they do propose certain actions to take as a nation to address critical problems. Running for office, holding office, putting your body out there for ridicule and abuse, sacrificing real family, leaving behind all privacy, a few people try to help it work. They are not all on the payroll of big oil. They aren't all in it for the acclaim and the inevitable huge book contract. They pay a price and some do so with integrity.

If we criticize their ideas and call for a new revolution more meaningful than their department-store-democracy, we at least owe them acknowledgement. We at least owe them a look at our plans.

When I was young, i thought as a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child. Now...I have put away childish things.

I respect and agree with most of your thoughts, Lenin. I appreciate the energy of your ideas. Now...can we put some meat on those bones?

R3W

I received this in an email by hannah w.

Mar 28, 2008 | rating: 10 | comments: 26

Ray Turner Mar 30, 2008, 1:24am EDT

If all you write is true, Tom (and do not cede these points automatically), what would you do about the invasion you describe? Your current tactics (publishing generalized attacks on latinos, shouting inflammatory language, claiming facts you don't support) won't do much to address the problems you lament.

What, Tom, would you do about this hit on the American people? I can agree that as soon as we stop wasting our wealth in the middle east we need to bolster security at the border (including the removal of armed vigilantes), but what about the invasion force of 20 million? Put them all on trains to internment camps until we can ship them back? Pull them off the farms and construction sites and Walmarts and see the economies of half a dozen states implode? Yank young latino citizens from their sinister undocumented parents and find them good homes in the suburbs?

What practical, humane, American approach would you propose, Tom? Or would you use criteria other than practical, humane and American to judge possible solutions to this problem?

R3W

(My solutions were summarized nicely last year in Senate bill 1348, but, as I'm sure you know, this eminently pragmatic and fair measure was shouted down by the forces of righteousness.)

Living With Bulimia by Samantha V.

Mar 28, 2008 | rating: 9.9 | comments: 89

Ray Turner Mar 29, 2008, 3:24am EDT

Thank you, Samantha, for spreading your life across the page to benefit our understanding. I won't pray for you, Samantha, because I can read the strength in your words and know your humanity and generosity will guide you through this. Winning this battle will not be about divine intervention; it will be about your courage and self-awareness overcoming the obstacles to your success. I will think of you as you work on this challenge and move to the next one...R3W

Story of a Child by Rony J.

Mar 27, 2008 | rating: 9.8 | comments: 19

Ray Turner Mar 29, 2008, 3:15am EDT

Nice work, Rony.

Your closing imagery......

As I open my eyes

stars are waiting...waiting

for my smile to announce

a message of no surrender.....

...might have more punch without losing any of its tenderness if it were your eyes that did the announcing....perhaps something like this......

I open my eyes

to announce

a message of no surrender.....

Opening your eyes would capture the sense of rejecting the terrors of the night you darkly explore above. Using your smile, both here and earlier, feels like an unnecessary layer of meaning.

Forgive me if any of my observations give offence. Obviously your work struck me powerfully, otherwise I would have made no comment.

Your friend.....R3W

I received this in an email by hannah w.

Mar 28, 2008 | rating: 10 | comments: 26

Ray Turner Mar 29, 2008, 2:58am EDT

True Americans do not need to turn the flag into a holy relic to exercise their patriotism. The flag-as-national-fetish movement is blind with rage over the latest wave of immigrants. Before they wanted to send the Mexicans home, they wanted to send the Puerto Ricans home and before that they wanted to send the Poles home, and earlier the Irish and Italians and all Catholics, of course, and earlier still they wanted to banish Germans from immigrating into the USA. The English wanted to throw the French out and the Dutch, good Calvinists all, rejected anyone not Dutch.

Somehow, through all the anger and forgotten history, our nation has grown great and prospered. Immigrants will always want to come here as they have in wave after wave; and our country will enrich itself as it has for so long.

Confusing our flag with our nation is dangerous. Every people who have have joined us for over 200 years were reviled for not being respectful Americans who look like we who were here before. I'll bet some of the loudest comments here are descendents of immigrants who have forgotten the blessings of an open society.

My good wishes to you all and to the teenagers at this school, who, like us, have much to learn about being an American patriot...R3W