please watch these three videos.

Leçon 1: Salut la francophonie!

It is a tad cliché to say that French is the "language of love." It may be the the language of Molière, but it is also the language in which which I get my oil changed and have spats with my wife, and millions of other people from Canada to the Congo perceive and engage with the world around them every day.

In this leçon [lesson] we will learn where people speak French all over the world, and how to appropriately greet them.

Granny Doc's diary on Bell Curve's inspired me to do a general survey on the education levels of our fellow Kossacks.

a white child!

All we ever see anymore are white parents with black childen.  This became an even more popular thing to do after the hit series Diff'rent Strokes came on TV in 1978.

But, we've moved well beyond that today and the Obamas could use their national spotlight to rebuff the myth that African-American families are not stable homes for adoption.

Because all these diaries about the New Yorker cover are just getting a little silly.

Attention: Le monde nous regarde.

somewhere in America.  

My daughter is a budding 12-year old who has taken an interest in softball this summer.  I've had a few conversations with a couple of you about her coach not giving them enough practice and letting them learn everything the hard way.  It's all been pretty frustrating, but we remember that it's all part of the process.

We are the Jaguars.  Our claws are not that sharp and our teeth are not that pointy.  Generally, we lose every game 12-0, but my daughter never complains.  A few parents have taken their kids off the team because they don't want to be "associated with losers."  

Now my daughter, she's a pretty big kid--powerful but as slow as a tortoise.  She always hits the ball, but often has trouble getting to the bag before the ball.  She can catch real well so she plays first base.  The rest of the kids have a lot of trouble keeping it in thier mittens.  Of course, there are some tiny ones on there who have trouble hitting the ball too.  It's all a bit scary for them.

Follow the ball over the pitching mound...

No, not really.  

But, it is very, very calm around here.

Due to the lack of excitement, I thought I would open up my diary to a discussion of things that ail us.

I have eczema...it's very annoying.  It starts out as a little bump and then oozes this nasty liquid that burns up your skin and makes you scratch until you have a foot long pustulating open wound that you have to give a name.

This just in over at Huffington Post.  Another memoir is out which skewers the administration and gives even more insight into how the Bush cabal has been running this whole clusterfuck of an occupation in Iraq.

Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, former commander of U.S. troops in Iraq, has published a, "scathing assessment" that the Bush administration "led America into a strategic blunder of historic proportions."

Like many of you, I've been glued to my TV all day watching the events play out at the DNC meeting.  We heard the voices of reason, moderation, and frankly utter lunacy.

I applaud the efforts of the Rules and Bylaws committee who made a special effort to accept compromise and call for party unity.  Nevertheless, the one person that stands out the most, to me, was the appeal by Rep. Robert Wexler.  Unlike Clinton's supporters, Wexler actually brought facts and he pointed out quite correctly that Obama was acting in a spirit of generosity, rather than divisiveness.

After reading Frank Costello's diary, it appears that many of the people lucky enough to be accepted as Obama Organizing Fellows will have some financial difficulty since these are unpaid positions.

It would be great if you could share your ideas about how we at Dkos could encourage this important endeavor.

Just listen to Hillary's soothing voice and all of your frustrations will subside.

So easy to relax and obey.

Today is a day to think of the re-birth of life in our gardens even as we remember the flowers that grow in Flanders fields above the brave lads whose blood fertilized so much of the ground there.

Leave your poems and photos of flowers and butterflies in memoriam and for all here so that we may together contemplate the beauty, the fragility, and the transience of Nature and the lives we live among her.

Here are a couple of poems from two men writing about flowers--both men gave their lives on some foreign battlefield created by the folly of others.  

How many more poems did these men have to write that we will never be able to read?

Now they are the flowers and the butterflies, and so too will we all shall be.

(Note: This is a slinkerwink initiative, please tip her jar in this diary).

CNN is reporting that Obama and Clinton are currently in negotiations to put  Hillary on the ticket.

The two Democratic campaigns are talking about ways for Clinton, from New York, to drop her bid for president that may include joining the Illinois senator's ticket, CNN reported. Talks are in a ``very preliminary'' stage and are described as ``difficult,'' the network said.

For those of you who may have missed it.  Hillary just threw down the gauntlet in her Kentucky victory speech.  She clearly and unambiguously stated that this battle is going to the convention.

From Politico.com (Thanks to Terre):

Still, Clinton made it clear during her victory speech in Louisville, Ky., that she intended to stay in the race through the last primaries on June 3 and "until we have a nominee, whoever she may be."

Later, she told several hundred supporters in Maysville, Ky., "None of us is gong to have the number of delegates we’re going to need to get to the nomination, although I understand my opponent and his supporters are going to claim that."

Again, she vowed to push on "until we have a nominee." But she declared, "We’re not going to have one today, and we’re not going to have one tomorrow, and we’re not going to have one the next day."

George W. Bush's speech in the Israeli Parliament (The Knesset) yesterday was simply despicable.  He used a solemn occasion marking the 60th Anniversery of the foundation of the Israeli State to launch a political attack against Barack Obama and the Democratic party, insinuating that they are akin to "Nazi appeasers."

Never in the history of this nation has a sitting President so pointedly denounced other Americans while speaking on foreign soil.

It is our duty, as progressive Democrats, to send a message to our representatives in the Senate that this President has, once again, gone too far.  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has now come out to say that these comments were "beneath the dignity of the office."  Senator Joe Biden has bluntly stated it is "bullshit."

Thus, I call on each of you to send a letter to your member of the Senate asking them to immediately put forward a motion to censure President Bush.