It's ironic that we are so concerned about buying our kids nice presents today but, apparently, so much less serious about providing them with a sustainable environment for tomorrow.

Yo' Doggies, giddy' on to a sustainable world now!

To paraphrase Bob Kelso -- People are like crows, they like shiny things.

What seperates us?
Isnt that a loaded question?
the recent drama series on Masterpiece Theater Contemporary talked of a british id card based on genetics.

"My shit stinks much better than yours....."
SOAD

Love
Zero

At least a stampede is usually driven by self preservation.

'What we can achieve is limited only by what we can dream!!'

somehow -- one can't help but notice that this "event" - sums up the "idea" that america has become ==

BIGNESS , "always number one", MORE of ANYTHING, CONSUME until you burst, ACCUMULATE, Gather as much you can to yourself....and its effects from top to the least able to "survive" or cope --

IS america.

it's hard to detach it, the CORPORATE STATE of america and the ideology behind it :

capitalism.

what an UGLy, UGLY thing it is.

there is so much trouble in the world, countries have to cope with their own problems -- one can only hope the EXPORTATION of this "thing" meets the resistance it deserves at some point in other cultures, because as it is shown in so many other ways - the nation that has less than 5 % of the world's population somehow has gotten away with consuming over 25 % of its resources...and wants more...BUT deep within its own core -- it has become reduced to a consumption society that can't even REALLY afford what it consumes -- and THEN , led by the corporations to the "trough" of consumption --

reverts to primitive behavior you should only find among starving animals....and even among those -- some have been known to sacrifice themselves for the survival of members of their groups....

Everyday Marks

Head smashed in Wal-Mart jump
Blessed are those that stampede with a contrite heart
for consumption is a nuanced art
staying home is for the faint of heart
the market rush
a stampede for us
for..
the Wal-Mart marks are us

Whenever I hear someone admonish a heinous criminal for acting like an animal, I think, "Um...no."

A stampede at Mal-Wart? That's not animalism, that's rank stupidity. If they can identify any of those people, the first thing they should do is revoke their right to vote...forever! Next, forced sterilization. Or maybe vise-versa.

"All Nature's difference keeps all Nature's peace." Alexander Pope

Nah, dogs still look up to us; cats, however, know they are superior.

I am all for personal responsibility. What about the responsibility of those "corporate personhoods", as we are falsely made to deal with them due to an old faulty summarization of the law, who continuously shilled, blared, and greedily and jadedly set up the 5 am cattle call, which they KNEW would be a mess? What about them putting needy workers into the front lines of the known mess, when the bigwigs are home asleep or upstairs in their carpeted offices, drinking their lattes? What about the responsibility of those "personhoods" on Wall Street and Madison Avenue who have scammed and shilled us into the worst economy in 70 years, where people (real ones) are working 3 jobs and still can't pay the rent? These real people have real children who don't understand and aren't responsible for these messes, and whom these real people still want to give a happy Christmas in any way they can, because they love them. Love, there's a concept. So they show up at 5 am to get them that special toy in the only way and time they can. And they still have to get to work.
Now, here's a completely different view of the tragedy -- who exactly are you going to blame? The people who were pushing unrelentingly and caused the death very probably came from the back of the crowd - the people who couldn't see what was going on and were the MOST anxious about getting in and then out with what they came for. Yes, they have personal responsibility, because their behavior was awful, if programmed in by advertising and the economy. But WHO are they? The people in the front get caught in the "wave" and can do nothing but get smushed forward themselves. And they are frantically trying to protect and save themselves by staying upright and not falling underneath the stampede. We KNOW this happens from many past stampedes - like the concert stampede in Cincinnati that killed 4 people and made pavillion seating outlawed.
And you're telling me that the greedy store that set this up couldn't foresee this? And shouldn't be held primarily responsible for this?

Another essay overlooking the real, underlying causes of our lunatic consumerism, which is, of course, being hammered by the same message, dozens of times per hour, 4-5 hours per day, 7 days a week, from the time you're born to adulthood.

The problem isn't a few nutty pundits and ranters - it's the delivery system.

Of course, speak the word "brainwashing" and you're suddenly a tinfoil hat-wearing conspiracy crackpot. But that's what it is, pure and simple. Need proof? Just take a look at people and/or cultures not subjected to the "buy buy buy" message hundreds of millions of times - do ya see the Amish storming the Wal Mart gates ever?

Imagine if, say, you absorbed the "word of God" dozens of times per day, 4-5 hours per day, 7 days per week, for 18 straight years. Still think you'd be inexplicably depressed because your 52 incher isn't as big as that 60 incher?

Read "Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television," J. Mander, 1978. Especially Chapter 3: Effects of Television on the Human Being.

2000 people pushed up against one opening door. When I was a teenager I was at the front of the line at a mall waiting to buy concert tickets inside when they opened one door to roughly 500 people. I was lucky to make it through the door. All I could do was curse at that stupid-looking security guard who opened the damned thing. I too would have stepped on that Wal-Mart employee. I wouldn't have had a choice. Wal-Mart has a lawsuit on its hands.

Put the blame on Wal-Mart for not having enough employees for security. A person interviewed said there had been a problem the year before and the store ignored the disaster waiting to happen. People in the back of the line, I realized immediately, could not see what was happening in the front. I am delighted that there are no Wal-Mart stores in NYC. We don't want them. They kill small stores. I reject an argument that blames the shoppers without blaming the bigger culprit Wal-Mart, who also had too few items at the "throw away" prices as well as poor security. Don't feel sorry for the biggest employer in the US, with a track record of horrible wages, lack of health care for workers (encouraging folks to get it via low income eligibility in states like California, so the taxpayer pays for it).

Note: the store was in Valley Stream, out on Long Island, in NYS not near NYC.

In my old home town, the small shopping district and mall have closed – unable to compete with the Wal-Mart. If Wal-Mart were not engaged in its ruthless monopolistic behavior, ruthless herds of empty-headed, magazine-reading, TV-watching hominids would not be stampeding its employees. The inability of Wal-Mart to provide facilities to cope with the situation it has created, thousands – tens of thousands – hundreds of thousands of shoppers per outlet, is part and parcel of its ability to undercut other providers.

Where I live in the intermountain western US, firearm and ammo purchasing accelerated on the day the US Senate voted in favor of the carte blanche bailout of the financial industry (one month prior to Obomber's Nov. 4 victory).

With both McClone and Obomber supporting the bailout with great zeal, anybody with a three digit IQ realized that throwing taxpayers' money at the wealthy financial industry crooks with no strings attached, it won't be long before people in the US will start killing each other for rice and beans, not just flat screen TVs.

Let's cut the mumbo jumbo. It's materialism and stupidity run rampant. Nothing more than that.

I agree with those who believe animals to have a dignity and purity that we “higher” primates rarely attain.

And if you've ever had a dog, you know how true that is.