Still waiting Jelly!
mike
"Doubt is not a pleasant mental state but certainty is a ridiculous one." --Voltaire
Posts by mike
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85AMERICA'S REVENGE HAS STARTED!
by nicolaou inreports are coming in (bbc) of tracer fire and explosions in kabul, afghanistan.. this is of course wher osama bin laden is holed up - have the fbi/cia managed to successfully pin this atrocity on him already?.
nic'
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Just one true story among thousands........
by mike inericka's lonely hunt for paul .
by andrea peyser .
september 14, 2001 -- i am staring into the mouth of the devil, searching for one small, little man.
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mike
ERICKA'S LONELY HUNT FOR PAUL
By ANDREA PEYSER
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------September 14, 2001 -- I AM staring into the mouth of the devil, searching for one small, little man.
His name is Paul Ortiz, and he is 21 years old. I try not to think of him in the past tense.Paul is a computer technician by trade. But at heart, he is a father, a son and a husband.
This man is loved. And needed. We must do everything humanly possible to bring him home.
I am standing just feet from the World Trade Center, what's left of it, with Paul's sister-in-law, Ericka Sanchez. We are cloaked in masks and surgical scrubs, which do nothing to shield us from the horrible, choking, burning odor. No clothing can cushion the sight before us: two skyscrapers, felled like tissue paper. Twisted and pancaked and brought to their knees, smoking. Men stand atop the wreckage, passing down buckets full of rubble, one by one, in a process that is numbingly slow.
It is beyond me how this beautiful, young man could still be alive.
Yet we must not give up. For when hope is extinguished, Paul will be dead for sure.
"If you don't want to see this, I'll understand," Ericka tells me kindly, as she hunts for a makeshift morgue where his body may be.
Ericka has faced the devil head-on since this evil was unleashed Tuesday morning. The morning of the attacks, she was supposed to be inside the Trade Center at a meeting. Instead, she switched her schedule at the last minute to attend a meeting at a building next-door.
Since Tuesday, she has worked around the clock. A trained rescue worker, she pitched in to help survivors. She also has searched hospitals, triage centers, the wreckage itself, for any sign of Paul. At night, she goes home to comfort Paul's wife, her sister.
If she can take it, then I must, too.
Ericka's sister, Estradita - everyone calls her Star - was too distraught to come with us, to see what those bastards have done to her love. Star, a delicate beauty of 21, stayed at home in Bushwick, Brooklyn, looking after their 9-month-old daughter, Rebecca.
Rebecca. When I visited her in the morning, Star told me she's certain the child knows what's going on. Last week, the baby said "Mama" and "Dada."
But now, all she says is "Dada." Over and over and over until Star's heart feels like it will break in two. The baby looks exactly like her dada. Except now, her smile has gone.
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I traveled with Ericka from Bushwick to Manhattan. Our first stop was NYU Downtown Hospital. It was strangely empty.
"Yesterday, you couldn't even get in," Ericka says.
A young man scans a list of patients.
"I'm sorry," he says.
The staff looks at us sympathetically, and hands us gowns and masks. We are going to the morgue.
"You have to be prepared for what you will see," Ericka says.
We walk down streets deserted but for men in military garb, to face the awfulness. At once, Ericka grows mute.
"I can just see how they died," she whispers. "How can anyone live through this?"
Star and Paul met two years ago when they were students at Katherine Gibbs business school. Their love came immediately, and fiercely.
But there was a bump in the road. Paul is a Jehovah's Witness and Star attends an evangelical church. When they were engaged, and Star became pregnant, Paul's church friends shunned him.
"It was hard," she said. "They wouldn't talk to him."
In November 2000, Paul and Star married at City Hall. Afterward, Paul's parents and brother, and Star's parents and her brother and sister, joined the couple in a dinner at Windows on the World.
A week later, Rebecca was born. A few months later, Paul's church welcomed him back.
*
Tuesday morning, Paul kissed Star gently at 7 a.m. She was still asleep as he set out for work at Windows on the World, the place where they celebrated their marriage.
Employed by Bloomberg, he was setting up computers for a conference in the restaurant on the 106th floor when the first plane hit the building.
He immediately phoned his dad by cell phone to say he was OK. "It's nothing big. I'm going to continue working," he reassured him. He did not call Star, so as not to worry her, his wife believes.
The night before, they'd had a rare disagreement. Paul told Star his company wanted to send him to Arizona for a week. She disapproved, and that memory haunts her.
"I want to tell him I'm sorry I was so upset. It's just that I didn't want him leaving me alone for a whole week," Star says.
"I love him so much," she says. "I need him."
*
Ericka and I enter Brooks Brothers. But all we see in the shattered store are socks and pants, price tags still attached, strewn on the floor. They've moved the morgue. And no one knows where.
Traveling uptown, we hear on the radio that men have been pulled from the wreckage alive.
"I just hope he has the strength to wait until rescuers come," says Ericka.
Star is trying to cling to hope.
"I thought this was forever," she says.
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. http://www.nypost.com/commentary/32535.htm -
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mike
Amen!
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85
AMERICA'S REVENGE HAS STARTED!
by nicolaou inreports are coming in (bbc) of tracer fire and explosions in kabul, afghanistan.. this is of course wher osama bin laden is holed up - have the fbi/cia managed to successfully pin this atrocity on him already?.
nic'
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mike
jelly,
I don't say that you're not making several reasonable points, you are. I was simply making an attempt to show that under the skin the drives, attitudes, intolerances, fears and pride of people are basically the same.Mainstream Christians, JW's, Muslims, Hindus, Jews and atheists. We all have the same failings and virtues.
Muslims are in danger of being demonised now but that is just not reasonable. I live in a country (UK) that was subjected to 30 years of terrorist death and destruction at the hands of the IRA.
Would it be fair of me to make assumptions based on my experiences that all Irishmen are terrorists? Of course not!Wanting to go and make a 'glass car park' out of Afganhistan is understandable for those who've suffered terrible loss but let's face it, we all know that such violence will reap a sure and violent reward.
Punishment MUST be meted out but an indiscriminate slaughter of Muslim civilians will surely raise up 10,000 more 'Osama bin Ladens'.
..............
btw
If I shouldn't have used quotation marks that was merely a technical mistake, I stated quite clearly.....The following is one of Jelly's posts adapted
to read as if presented by one of Tuesday's terrorist aggressors. See how little editing is required then re-read some of the posts in this thread."Doubt is not a pleasant mental state but certainty is a ridiculous one." --Voltaire
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85
AMERICA'S REVENGE HAS STARTED!
by nicolaou inreports are coming in (bbc) of tracer fire and explosions in kabul, afghanistan.. this is of course wher osama bin laden is holed up - have the fbi/cia managed to successfully pin this atrocity on him already?.
nic'
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mike
Just dragging this to the new page...I'm going to stick my neck out here and ask if we can all TRY to see things from a larger perspective.
The following is one of Jelly's posts adapted to read as if presented by one of Tuesday's terrorist aggressors. See how little editing is required then re-read some of the posts in this thread. Sad.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------"Simply put this is war.
We cannot be concerned about the other side’s civilian population. The only way to end American sponsored terrorism and the spread of Western influence is to reduce the countries that support it to the level that they are no longer able to support those activities with money, transportation, equipment, and intelligence......................Where would the world be now if Churchill, Stalin, and Roosevelt had been too concerned with the innocent Germans (and many were) to effectively fight a war. So it is with the loss of a few thousand innocent Americans. My point being that WWII proved that, unfortunately, sometimes violence is the only appropriate answer.
In order for us to maintain our way of life as faithful Muslims, the threat of Western and, in particular, American imperialism and capitalism must end and we must be the ones to end it.
I hope everyone understands I hate writing this. The necessary violence we inflicted on Tuesday sickens me and the thought of war makes my stomach turn. I don’t write these things because ‘I want vengeance’ or because I get a thrill out of watching a war on CNN. I write these things because I see this as the only realistic and honest solution."
XXXXXXXXX
Allah be praised.
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P.S I've assumed the aggressors to be Islamic but that is only an assumption."Doubt is not a pleasant mental state but certainty is a ridiculous one." --Voltaire
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85
AMERICA'S REVENGE HAS STARTED!
by nicolaou inreports are coming in (bbc) of tracer fire and explosions in kabul, afghanistan.. this is of course wher osama bin laden is holed up - have the fbi/cia managed to successfully pin this atrocity on him already?.
nic'
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mike
I'm going to stick my neck out here and ask if we can all TRY to see things from a larger perspective.
The following is one of Jelly's posts adapted to read as if presented by one of Tuesday's terrorist aggressors. See how little editing is required then re-read some of the posts in this thread. Sad.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------"Simply put this is war.
We cannot be concerned about the other side’s civilian population. The only way to end American sponsored terrorism and the spread of Western influence is to reduce the countries that support it to the level that they are no longer able to support those activities with money, transportation, equipment, and intelligence......................Where would the world be now if Churchill, Stalin, and Roosevelt had been too concerned with the innocent Germans (and many were) to effectively fight a war. So it is with the loss of a few thousand innocent Americans. My point being that WWII proved that, unfortunately, sometimes violence is the only appropriate answer.
In order for us to maintain our way of life as faithful Muslims, the threat of Western and, in particular, American imperialism and capitalism must end and we must be the ones to end it.
I hope everyone understands I hate writing this. The necessary violence we inflicted on Tuesday sickens me and the thought of war makes my stomach turn. I don’t write these things because ‘I want vengeance’ or because I get a thrill out of watching a war on CNN. I write these things because I see this as the only realistic and honest solution."
XXXXXXXXX
Allah be praised.
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P.S I've assumed the aggressors to be Islamic but that is only an assumption.Mike
"Doubt is not a pleasant mental state but certainty is a ridiculous one." --Voltaire
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166
BRITS v YANKS
by nicolaou inbrits v yanks.
this is just for laughs, but let's be honest us brits are most definately ahead of our 'cousins' across the water in the credibility stakes.. i'll kick us off and see where we go;.
[1] the beautiful game.. it's called football.
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mike
The following quotes from members of the German team were all taken before the match.
Sweet reading, altogether now 5-1 we beat the scum 5-1 repeat to fade
FRANZ BECKENBAUER
"I am very sure that we are going to win this game. We are as good as, if not better than, Sven Goran Eriksson's side. I am sure that we are better prepared for this match than England. We will beat England."CARSTEN JANCKER
"We don't have to worry about single players such as Michael Owen or Emile Heskey. We have a stronger team and that is what counts."SEPP MAIER
"David Seaman is past his best. Even I would have saved that shot and I don't play football any more. I don't think Seaman has the same standing in the game as our keeper Oliver Kahn, who is better."STEFFEN EFFENBERG [on being asked how he rates Steven Gerrard]
"Steven who? I don't know him. I am not interested in England, or who is in their squad. I don't have time. I have better things to do."PIERRE LITTBARSKI
"In Germany we are not as stuck in the past as the English. We have always kept our nerve and gone on to beat them when it mattered most. They [England] put too much pressure on themselves and they have too much respect. I believe that Germany will win in the end, let's say 2-0."SEBASTIAN DEISLER
"I am glad that David Beckham will be fit. Now England will have no
excuses when we beat them."ULI HOENESS
"How are England going to win in Germany? It hasn't happened for 100 years. "I have no doubts whatsoever that Germany will quite clearly thrash England.. They will easily qualify for the World Cup with this match."ULI STIELICKE
"Judging from his potential Deisler is a better player than Beckham. He is perfect technically, his crosses are precise, he is dangerous in front of goal, has excellent vision and he is quicker than Beckham."
.............................................................................."Doubt is not a pleasant mental state but certainty is a ridiculous one." --Voltaire
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mike
bwaaaaahh!!
I nearly wet my pants!thanx for the laugh!!
mike
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Whenever it is that they are saying...............
by nicolaou in"peace and security"
freak a dub out - send them this link!.
http://www.un.org/peace/index.html.
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mike
8 or 9 months ago this information would have truly excited me! I really looked for 'signs' like this which proved beyond doubt that we are living at the very end of the last days.
In a way, I kind of miss that enthusiasm. The thought that the Paradise really was perhaps just months away was so exciting!
I know consider myself to be a little better informed (I hope!) but that has made me jaded too.
Still, all in all, I guess it's better not to live in ignorance. Shame it has to be so dull in comparison though."Doubt is not a pleasant mental state but certainty is a ridiculous one." --Voltaire
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Why going 'door to door' this week felt so good!
by nicolaou inyes that's right, i actually went door to door this week!!.
well okay, not trolling for new dubs but as a collector for the national kidney research fund.. earlier this year i'd done the same thing for marie curie cancer research.. let me share a few things i've learned.. most people were genuinely pleased to see me at their doorstep - can you imagine how alien that felt?.
they were pleasant, willing to chat and, with few exceptions, donated to what they could see were worthwhile causes.. i would return home after collecting with a feeling that i had actually accomplished something.. someone, somewhere at some point in time might actually benefit from the time that i, and many other volunteers, put into this charitable work.
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mike
ladonna said "it is a real shock to be welcome isn't it???"
When I started going out in service in the early seventies people were still quite welcoming on the whole.
I think that the young publishers and pioneers of the 80's and 90's have only ever known apathy and indifference, but it wasn't always that way.It's not necessarily the Jw's fault, people simply became switched off to sprituality though it seems to have been reborn under the 'New Age' guise.
"Doubt is not a pleasant mental state but certainty is a ridiculous one." --Voltaire