It is the inchoate fear of the increasingly virulent language and actions of the right-wing that led to this "senseless" shooting in Arizona today of the Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, the killing of half-a-dozen people, including an aide and Judge Roll, along with injuring more than a dozen others. After listening to Limbaugh, Palin, and their arch-conservative cohorts, it has been clear to me they have encouraged hate, fear, and violence in their attacks against the President, with lies, distortions, a total ignorance of the U.S. Constitution, all with a crucifix around her neck.  I want our Democratic leaders and our President to call this for what it is:  Fear of how the world is changing, and how it must change, how it was destined to change.  In the next days, you will hear about the "senseless" killer(s).  Not true.  Everything is connected -- and the fearmongerers in this country who are making millions for their lies and hypocrisy need...

Back in the late eighties, when most of the Dream Act Activists weren't yet born, and their parents were on the way to the baile to meet each other, the middle and upper-class in Dallas was sloshy with Christmas money.  I saw the Dreamer's parents everywhere: landscapers; roofers; the coolest restaurants; carwashes; nannies in the park;  janitors; and if you were up and around in the early morning, you could see packed cars leaving the warehouses, a working-class flood of brown people -- all over Dallas where they'd just completed a late-night shift in some kind of assembly work. I 'm glad, painful as it is for me to say this -- that the Dream Act failed.   Now these beautiful, idealistic, dreamers, are awake to the powerful interests in this country.  Now they will see beyond the hip-hop, Shakiraness of brown commercials to their destiny.  And what is that?  To lead this country, to educate our community, and to teach all of us to vote as never before....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKj5njkUhdg&feature=player_embedded Last night at the offices of our Senator, Kay Bailey Hutchison, over a dozen starving college students (20 days now without eating), were arrested, along with former City Councilwoman and spiritual leader Maria Antonietta Berriozabal, and labor scholar and activist Dr. Antonia Castaneda. I am frankly dismayed at the lack of courage from our political leadership -- where are they?  Should I name names?  (Congressmen Ciro Rodriguez and Charlie Gonzalez, Mayor Julian Castro). But the political leaders want to win elections (though Congressman Rodriguez lost his due to his pandering for independents instead of hell-with-the-consequences truth-telling ).  So they wait, and they mollify, and they hope the tide will change.  It's gonna get alot worse before it gets better, and no thanks to the ambitions of those who live for what they think matters, instead of getting on the train to destiny.   ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKPwedfalXc He's from San Antonio's southside, and he's the real thing.  I've watched him handle three big dogs at once, and at his camp, he's got 16 dogs, many who were abandoned.  On this day, he made a friend of "Donkey," who's been chained up all his three years.  Donkey mauled my dog months ago, but now he's my buddy, thanks to Andres, who helped me learn to understand what dogs want. With 100,000 stray dogs in San Antonio, it's good to know that Andres can help people with their pets, and also find a way to reach people who have forgotten what it is to love a dog on the streets. To reach him, email him at fourkninekamp@yahoo.com

I found her this morning.  La Perra was lying besides one of the creek's pillars under San Jacinto.  I don't think she had been dead too long  because her body was not very cold. The men at the Picnic tienda where I fed her last Sunday across the street tell me that she's been going down for a month.  I know that she starved to death, and that is the worst death of all. Last Sunday I wanted to take her to the dog shelter here in San Anto, but they're closed on Sunday. I have two dogs in my tiny yard, and I was afraid to keep her with me.  On Monday I had to deal with my 91 year-old father's pre-funeral wishes in Raymondville, four hours away, and I was afraid to delay his wishes.  La Perra ate a little barbacoa on Sunday morning and I left food with the men, who promised to feed her.  I looked for her on Monday night, Tuesday, Wednesday, all week.  She must have been alive, just waiting to die.  I should have pressed Juanillo the homeless...

I've been looking for La Perra since Tuesday.  The men who hang out at the Picnic on San Jacinto and Martin told me she had died.  That the owner had poisoned her.  That she was lying in the creek that runs under the Picnic where I first saw her. Today, a small miracle. At dark, I drove by again, and stopped.  I stepped out a bag of dogfood in my hand.  A homeless man came up to me, said "don't you remember me?" He's one of the men who sleeps under the street, at the creek where La Perra walks.  Told me that she'd slept with him last night, that he tried to feed her but she refused to eat. The owner bred her for puppies and then dumped her, he said, that he is a cruel man.  The homeless man's name is Juanillo, and he sleeps on a mattress with some blankets, and yes, I remember him now. I gave him some food for La Perra, a leash, and my cell number.  And some money for him, too, he said that he works as a custodian for the store.  He say...