Remember

Before the sunny day,
Before the beer and play,
Before you light the cooking coals:
Remember.
José M. Caldas, May 2014

"Back"
They ask me where I've been,
And what I've done and seen.
But what can I reply
Who know it wasn't I,
But someone just like me,
Who went across the sea
And with my head and hands
Killed men in foreign lands...
Though I must bear the blame,
Because he bore my name.
Philip Larkin (1922-1985)

A different kind of candidate...

"As a Fortune 500 CEO, David led the impressive expansion of Dollar General, creating thousands of quality jobs and adding billions to the value of the company."
perduesenate.com

"In 2006, three years into Perdue's four-plus years as Dollar General's CEO, federal investigators at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission found that female store managers who worked for the company he ran "were discriminated against," and "generally were paid less than similarly situated male managers performing duties requiring equal skill, effort, and responsibility. A year later, separate from that investigation, thousands of female managers who were paid less than their male counterparts joined a class action suit against the company—which Dollar General eventually settled, paying the women more than $15 million.
...
Dollar General faced another significant lawsuit under Perdue, brought by some 2,000 current and former employees who in 2006 claimed that the company had made them managers in name only so it could deny them overtime they would have earned as store clerks. In 2013, Dollar General agreed in mediation to pay the ex-employees up to $8.5 million. That settlement awaits court approval.
...
In another case, a district court forced Dollar General to pay nearly $74,000 to Martha Bryant, a diabetic employee it fired in 2004 for taking time off under the Family Medical Leave Act. Dollar General argued that the law does not prohibit retaliation against employees who take FMLA leave. Dollar General appealed to the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, which upheld the district court's judgment against Dollar General."
Mother Jones, May 2014

There's Nothing Wrong With Manual Labor.

"Republican Kentucky state Sen. Paul Hornback, who started worked in tobacco fields when he was 10 and now farms about 100 acres of tobacco in Shelby County, Kentucky, said he adheres to federal regulations to keep his workers safe but doesn’t believe further restrictions are needed.
...
A report released Wednesday by Human Rights Watch claims that children as young as 7 are sometimes working long hours in fields harvesting nicotine- and pesticide-laced tobacco leaves under sometimes hazardous conditions. Most of what the group documented is legal, but it wants cigarette makers to push for safety on farms from which they buy tobacco."

The Associated Press, Thursday, May 15, 2014

The Will Of My Constituents.

"(Michael) Boggs was questioned repeatedly about his support for anti-abortion measures, his vote opposing the removal of the Confederate battle emblem from the state flag and his support for an amendment banning same-sex marriage while a state legislator in the early 2000s."

AJC, May 13, 2014

But what do YOU really believe?

 "Progressive Democrats, including her opponents in the Democratic Primary and their campaigns, have criticized Nunn for supporting the Keystone XL Pipeline; for supporting the once-proposed U.S. Invasion of Syria; for opposing same-sex marriage as a matter of policy; and for opposing the timely implementation of the Affordable Care Act."

Atlanta Progressive News, March 14, 2014

Personal Responsibility

Marco Rubio: "I Don't Believe Humans Are Causing Climate Change."

Gallitos

Yesterday, I caught the scent of carob as I walked on Confederate Avenue. I was momentarily transported to my childhood in Santurce, to my school's playground, and the many games of gallitos I played with my friends. Gallitos means little roosters. To play gallitos you need an algarrobo seed and a length of string. Algarrobo is the Arabic origin Spanish word for carob. You climb the Algarrobo tree, get a carob pod and break it open to extract the seeds. The seeds are cushioned in a cottony, sweetly pungent mass. Careful not to crack the seed, you drill a hole through the middle of it, and pass a length of kite string through the hole, knotting the string at one end. The length of the string must provide a balance between leverage and control. To play the game, two players face off each with their favorite gallito. The players flip a coin to see which one will strike first. The loser of the coin toss lays his gallito on the ground. The winner of the toss then swings his gallito to strike his opponent's. If he hits it, he gets to strike again. If he misses it, he and his opponent reverse positions. The game ends when one the gallitos is broken. The owner of the surviving gallito is declared the winner and faces the next challenger. If you break your opponent's string you get to keep his gallito. Some kids were masters at this game, their battle scarred gallitos much feared in the playground. I was pretty bad at it, being of average strength, poor vision and worse coordination. Only my foolish optimism and fantasies of becoming the playground gallito king kept me at it. Alas, gallito apotheosis was not to be, and soon I moved on to collecting baseball card and building model aircraft and ships.

José M. Caldas, May 7, 2014.