an internationally known AIDS researcher from UNC.



The historians, doctors, preachers, lawyers, raging grannies, students and others gathered around the second-floor fountain inside the Legislative Building and belted out “This Little Light of Mine” and other songs.

They were diverse in age and backgrounds but united in voice as part of a protest movement gaining numbers in recent weeks.

<snip>

The dissenters plan to gather weekly at the state legislature for “Moral Mondays” – a series of demonstrations that have resulted in 50 arrests so far. They acknowledge that their concerns might be tuned out by the supermajority against them. But the protesters hope to persuade others to rise up with them and raise their voices to a future that might bring a political shift in 2014.

Thirty demonstrators were taken to the Wake County jail on Monday after capital police cited them for trespassing and disorderly conduct. A week before that, 17 people were arrested at the demonstration organized by the North Carolina chapter of the NAACP.

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/05/10/2883118/nc-protesters-willing-to-risk.html#storylink=cpy



I posted another thread yesterday with the opinion piece detailing the protests/arrests written by two NC Historians (Professors at Duke and UNC) that appeared in yesterday's N & O. http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251304297

Nice to see that this movement is gaining steam. NC is one of 12 states with no recall process so the first opportunity to reverse
the trend of all this regressive legislation will come with the election of 2014.

The disaster that has been unfolding in NC as the Repub Governor and Repub controlled State house
have been at work turning the clock back and dismantling every type of progressive program or policy
they could think of has been shared--in dismay--with members of DU.

How refreshing to open the local Raleigh paper this a.m. to see an opinion piece written by two
leading historian/educators in NC who got themselves arrested protesting!



This week, we were arrested at the General Assembly. We chose the path of civil disobedience – along with 29 others – as a means of calling attention to the headlong assault on our state’s history by the governor and the state legislature.

We are not radicals. Each of us has been president of the Organization of American Historians, the leading professional organization of all American historians. We cherish the history we have spent our lives studying. Yet now we see a new generation in Raleigh threatening to destroy the very history we have spent our lives celebrating.

During the last half century, North Carolinians helped pave the way for racial justice, educational leadership and fairness for all citizens.

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/05/08/2880510/an-nc-history-worth-preserving.html#storylink=cpy

to do a research project in Berlin, Germany for the 2013-14 academic year!

Hubby and I plan to visit him...hopefully both in the fall and next spring.

This is my son with a vision impairment due to a juvenile genetic disease
that causes macular degeneration. He is legally blind--and has been since
he had major vision loss when he was nine. He never let his disability
prevent him from anything he wanted to do. He sees with his peripheral vision.

He was a double major in college: German and Comparative Lit.
Studied abroad in Berlin for summer session prior to his senior year.

We're just so proud of him!

at the Rainbow Bridge.

They weren't really brothers, but born to two separate litters in the same home.
I answered an ad for 'free kittens' in early December 1995 in Lincoln, NE.
When I got to the house, a little old lady opened the door and invited me in.
There were cats everywhere! Resting on a chair was the biggest cat I'd ever
seen--must have been more than 20 pounds--and probably the father of
both Mouse and Simba. The litters had been born 5 days apart, but the
little old cat lady had paired the two kitties up because they seemed to like each other.

I took them both home. Tanya, the dog we'd adopted from the pound about 6 months earlier,
accepted them both. Mouse adored Tanya and would always come lie down next to her.
We often wondered if he thought Tanya was his mother as she was black and he was
a black/gray tabby.

They did the job for which they'd been hired--the 'mice' we'd been hearing soon moved
out of our house.

When we moved to Chapel Hill in 2000 all the pets came with us. Tanya rode in hubby's car;
Mouse and Simba each had a carrier and rode together in the back seat of my car.

We used to put them outside at night. Simba got so that he really didn't want to go out;
he would hide under the baby grand piano. Often I had to crawl under it to get him so
he could go outside.

Being outside is probably what saved both kitties the night our house burned down
in 2007. There was no time to look for kitties that might have been hiding. Tanya
came out of the house with us. The day after the fire, I came over to the house,
calling for both of them. Simba peeked his head out of an opening a firefighter
had chopped where there had been a window in order to gain access on the lower level.
No Mouse. The next day I came over several times, calling for Mouse. He finally came
out from underneath an elevated walkway--where he'd been hiding--and let me pick him
up. He was really scared...and so happy to see Simba!

After Mouse died in 2009, Simba would go around to all the hiding places that Mouse
had made for himself in our new house. He was clearly missing Mousie and looking for him. One time,
when hubby and I were talking about Mouse, Simba came over to my chair, looked
up at me, as though he were understanding every word we were saying. Both my
husband and I were convinced that Simba knew we were talking about Mouse--
and wanted to join the conversation. It was a really eerie moment.

So, now the kitty boys are together again. RIP Simba and Mouse.

was wearing: Naeem Khan
http://mrs-o.com/

Here are both:

I sent a LTTE of the Raleigh N&O two days ago highlighting precisely these actions.
Waiting to see if it's published.

But this graphic is terrific. Really says it all.



on fb: https://www.facebook.com/TheBlueStreetJournal?group_id=0


and the blog for The Blue Street Journal http://bluestreetjournal.com/

North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R) today signed a law that imposes severe cuts to his state’s unemployment insurance program, a change that will also cost jobless workers in the state access to the federal unemployment compensation program.

McCrory’s signature earned him a rebuke from the National Employment Law Project, which said in a release that the law will result in “the most severe cuts to both state and federal unemployment insurance of any state in the nation”:

These heartless cuts, in the state with the fifth-highest jobless rate in the nation, at 9.2 percent, show a shocking disregard for 400,000 unemployed North Carolinians and their families, many of whom will now go from struggling to barely make ends meet to outright struggling to survive. The immediate pain of these cuts will fall on North Carolinians unfortunate enough to lose work through no fault of their own in a weak economy where jobs are scarce. But the entire state will take a hit from the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars in spending at local businesses that would’ve boosted the local and state economies.

The law reduces the maximum benefit allowed from $535 a week to $350 while cutting the number of weeks an unemployed worker is eligible for the program from 26 to 20. As a result, 170,000 jobless North Carolinians will also lose access to $780 million in federal unemployment funds. The average unemployed worker in the United States has been off the job for 35 weeks, meaning many jobless workers will now face the prospect of searching for a new job without access to a safety net program.

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2013/02/19/1610571/north-carolina-unemployment-cuts/


This is from a Governor, who, first thing he did, was RAISE the salaries for his cabinet. Why? Because he claimed
they couldn't live on $121,807./year.

http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/01/10/2598132/gov-pat-mccrory-gives-his-cabinet.html

It is going to be a VERY long four years here in NC.

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

Here is what they looked like from our deck in Chapel Hill a couple of hours ago.

the Republican attempt to re-district him out of office.


Two tensely watched political races got a little closer to the finish line Friday night. Results show that Democrat Mike McIntyre will return for a ninth term in Congress, barring a recount that changes the outcome.

<snip>

Complete, unofficial results show McIntyre defeated Rouzer by 655 votes out of more than 336,000 cast in 12 counties, including Johnston, Brunswick, Cumberland and New Hanover.

The margin is within the 1 percent needed for Rouzer to ask for a recount. Election results become official when the State Board of Elections certifies them.

<snip>

Both Rouzer and McIntyre have been in Washington, D.C., this week. McIntyre’s camp said he was returning to work. Rouzer was taking part in congressional orientation and was part of a photo shoot for congressional freshmen.

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2012/11/16/2488787/mcintyre-declares-victory-as-final.html#storylink=cpy