Our daughter Sarah, son Joseph and myself went to a Public Hearing tonight on a zoning variance for the addition of a cremation machine at the funeral home around the corner. The hearing room was full. Neighborhood people were concerned about the mercury emissions. Seems when people are creamated who have mercury fillings in their teeth (which is a whole lot of people), the mercury is emitted through a smoke stack and deposits, well, wherever the wind is blowing, or not blowing… A professor from Case Western Reserve University, Kathleen Fagan, MD, said mercury causes damage to the developing brains of unborn children and babies less than one year old. “Health effects can range from decreases in IQ and developmental delays to muscle weakness, seizures and mental retardation.” During the question and answer period, our Sarah stood and said she has spent a good deal of time with two autistic children. And if there is any possibility the mercury could cause this type of condition (or others), then why would anybody want to risk it? Good question… A representative from the cremation machine company said the EPA assures people that the mercury release from crematoriums is minimal and well within it’s standards for safe emissions. Shortly after, a man rose and said during the Vietnam War the government told military people that handling “agent orange” wasn’t cancer causing. Yet they found out later that it was. The man wondered: Do we want to find out the same thing about mercury emissions — after the fact? Good point. Note: During one juncture in the hearing on the cremation machine, the moderator asked if there was any: “burning questions.” No pun intended, but I had to laugh.
1/20/09
I hate to be a party pooper, but… I was talking to a political science professor over the weekend who said that $24 million had been raised just the Inaugural Ball activity, etc. What’s more, some five million people have come to D.C. to, simply put: be part of this week’s party. They will spend billions on plane flights, lodging, food… During one of our campaign tours several years ago, I interviewed a woman in Cortez, Colorado, who was recently back from a missions trip to Uganda. She said emaciated children slept atop burlap bags on the dirt floors of huts as their parents, and many of them, died of starvation and AIDS. We also stopped at Habitat for Humanity headquarters in Americus, Georgia, where we learned millions of families living in the abject poverty of Third World slums could be put in Habitat Homes for prices ranging from $2,000 to $4,000 a home. Question: How far could the billions of dollars being spent on all the ‘party goers’ in D.C. this week go toward building these homes and helping these starving children? Our priorities are getting so out of whack.
1/19/09
In honor of Martin Luther King Jr. Day today, we read the kids some passages from the book: Let My People Go, which is about slavery in early America… During our campaign tours we have retraced the Civil Rights March from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, and followed an Underground Railroad Route from Georgia to Ohio. On another Martin Luther King Jr. Day during Campaign 2004, I told the Range News in Arizona that even though we’ve made significant strides in civil rights for Blacks, there are still many Blacks (Hispanics, Asians, Whites…) who are ‘slaves’ to things like transgenerational poverty loops in metropolitan and rural America — not to mention around the world.
1/16/09
An Ashtabula Star Beacon story about our 2012 campaign for president ran today. Lifestyle Editor Carl Feather wrote that there would be no gas guzzling motorcade to our inaugaration, we’d bicycle. He noted that during the speech I would include a slide show of pictures of aborted babies and a plea for America to stop the Holocaust. There would be no gala balls, just a simple rice and beans dinner for a few — in solidarity with the poor. “Joe would direct the folks who sponsor those soirees to use that money to feed people in a Third World country.” At the end of this part of the story, Mr. Feathers wrote: “We’re talking real change here…” Note: To view the entire story: http://www.starbeacon.com/archivesearch/local_story_014191755.html
1/12/09
I was interviewed by reporter Carl Feathers from the Ashtabula Star Beacon today. During the interview, I mentioned that National Public Radio last night carried a piece saying the Israelis would probably end their incursion into Gaza just before Obama took office next week. The rationale, the NPR reporter said, was that Obama would probably be more opposed to the Israeli action than President Bush is. And they wouldn’t want to get off on the wrong foot with the Obama Administration, especially because they are so reliant on the U.S. for arms, etc. I posed this to Mr. Feathers: If Barack Obama is indeed opposed to the extent of this Israeli action, why doesn’t he do something about it: now? Reports are that more than 1,000 Palestinians have now been killed in Gaza, a good number of them innocent men, women and children. If you wanted this to stop, wouldn’t you — as “president-elect” — go to Gaza and, in solidarity, move in with a Palestinian family right in the middle of the war zone? The bet is, this would end that war. Instead, Mr. Obama was staying at a $7 million beach house and playing golf at a country club in Hawaii. He is now in D.C., in part, readying for a series of lavish Inaugaral Balls. Meanwhile children cower in terror, others are having their arms and legs blown off with shrapnel from bombs… I told Mr. Feathers that if I was “president-elect,” I’d already be in that home in Palestine, not working on my golf swing.
1/9/09
We’re back in Cleveland for part of the winter and Liz and I coached in an indoor soccer league at the neighborhood Rec. Center. The kids, as usual, were spirited, competetive and several of them we’re awful good to boot (pun intended). The latter are youth referred to as: “the Africans.” They are recently here from Burundi by way of refugee camps in Tanzania, where they fled from the fighting. A boy on my team continually talks about a brother who is still in harms way in Burundi. Another boy said the poverty is so pervasive in Burundi the kids would often practice soccer with — an orange. Yet we think nothing here of buying the top of the line soccer balls (shin pads, goalie gloves, expensive soccer clothes…) for our kids. Wouldn’t it make sense, common sense, for many us in America to halve our expenses on these items — and so many others — and send the savings to Burundi where the fighting is primarily about people not having the minimum in adequate food, housing, medicine… not to mention soccer balls for the kids. Note: If we want world peace, we have to do stuff to significantly impact what’s causing the discord.
12/31/08
New Year’s Eve: Bombs fall on the Gaza Strip. As I write this, reports indicate there are already some 400 Palestinians dead, 1,400 injured. A picture in our Plain Dealer newspaper showed a bomb exploding in a building just beyond one, of many, refugee camps in Gaza. Meanwhile, we sit back comfortably in America and watch this unfold in an antiseptic way on the nightly news. Bombs exploding, innocent civilians (Moms, Dads, little children) being killed, maimed, cowering in darkened hallways as more jets zoom overhead… And even with all this, few Americans really care. Or they’d show it. That simple. They’d enter into solidarity with the innocent poor and oppressed in Palestine, for instance, and sacrifice all over the place to generate all kinds of funds to get those people in Gaza out of the slum conditions of the refugee camps, for one. The overeating we’ll do New Year’s Day alone tomorrow — all the non-nutritional junk food and beverages we spoil ourselves with — while people live in terror, in squalor, is absolutely unconscienable. If I were president… I’d adamantly confront the American public about this and challenge them to sacrifice intensely for a massive fundraising drive to get as much humanitarian help to Palestine as possible. Common sense says that by easing some of the poverty, you’d significantly ease some of the tension over there. This would be a component of my ‘Road Map for Peace’ between Israel and Palestine. Peace often comes with a price. But is the American public really willing to pay it? Or are we going to go on forever supreflously lamenting about it — at half time of the Bowl games? Meanwhile Barrack Obama plays golf at a country club in Hawaii. The greens fee alone for one round, I imagine, would be enough to get, say, 10 families out of a refugee camp in Gaza. What kind of example is this for the nation? Note: We are readying for our first tour of Campaign 2012 to get our message of peace, social justice, Life… out to as many more as possible. And we need donations to do that. If you can help, please consider it. Thanks. Schriner Presidential Election Committee, 2100 W. 38th St., Cleveland, Ohio 44113.
12/26/08
While walking over a high expansion bridge into Cleveland yesterday, my wife saw a man huddled under several dirty, old blankets on some beams under an adjacent bridge. His home… Meanwhile the horrific genocide in the Congo continues, with each person having gotten the equivalent of a mere $9.20 in humanitarian aid from the world during this extremely protracted and bloody struggle… Yet many of us were celebrating Jesus’s birth yesterday by, primarily, giving each other gifts we don’t really need. Are we absolutely nuts? Note: And while all this is going on, our president-elect and his family are renting a $7 million vacation house in Hawaii for the week. HELLO!
11/12/08
A couple supporters have recently e-mailed asking about our campaign strategies for Election 2012. (By the way, I’ve already declared for 2012. Listen to the short declaration speech at the top of our home page.) In regard to donating to the campaign, one man wrote: “People tend to want to ‘invest’ their money wisely and usually wait until they are confident enough that a candidate has a legitimate chance of winning.” The answer to this is two-fold. First: People need to ‘invest’ in us now so we can advertise and do all the other things campaigns do to raise their profiles. And people need to invest in us now to help keep us in motion so we can continue touring, stumping and getting our message out to as many people on the street and in as much media as possible. (This is the kind of synergy that will make the campaign a national story with staying power — especially because of the tremendous amount of time and effort we’ve already put into this to date! As opposed to it being a ’15-minutes of fame’ phenomena.) Also, when this becomes a prominent national story, we will have a much better chance of catching on with an established Third Party. This is key because it is the best chance we have of gaining ballot access from state to state across the country. Having said that… Second: When we’re on the road touring, we get a significantly different message out. It is a message that is helping change the country now, one town at a time. As an example, I recently gave a strong pro-Life talk at a church in centeral Ohio. Afterward, the pastor stood up and was actually in tears. He apologized to the congregation for not being “bold enough” in his witness to stop abortion and vowed to be so in the future. And then this pastor and congregation members influence other pastors and congregation members. And then these pastors and congregation members… And as a result, we get part of policy enacted long before ever getting to D.C… A front page article in the Athens (OH) Post recently noted that our family has set aside a “Christ Room” for homeless people in our small place in Cleveland. So then someone in Athens sets aside a Christ Room, then someone in Louisville, Kentucky, sets aside a Christ Room, then someone in Holbrook, Arizona, sets aside a Christ Room… And before you know it, homelessness is down significantly in America and those setting up the Christ Rooms are much more advanced in their faith witness. And part of our policy on poverty gets enacted as well… A ‘winning’ candidate? We’ve been ‘winning’ every day we’ve been on the campaign trail the past nine years and 83,000 miles. But (and really think about this), what if a president turned the Lincoln Bedroom into a Christ Room? How much more of a witness would that be to the country? …While traveling the 83,000 miles campaigning, parts of our message have gottten out in some 2,000 newspaper articles, close to 200 regional network TV news shows, hundreds of radio shows, many church talks, college talks… In other words, we’re exhaustively doing our part. But we need help. Note: The time for cautious consideration around “investing” in our 2012 campaign run — our last — is over. We ask people help now in as full a fashion as we are undertaking it. Because I believe it will take this kind of all out effort if there is to be any real hope of getting to the White House. Ps… If you missed our DONATION LINK on this post… Also, have I mentioned we need VOLUNTEERS? Some references: “I experience Joe Schriner as a fervent pro-Life candidate willing to make great sacrifices for the moral betterment of our nation and the transformation of our society. He was an inpsiration to our students.” — Fr. Michael Scanlan, former president of Franciscan University. And… “Joe’s talk during (Sunday) Worship was spirit-led and reflected his and his family’s concern for plantet earth — as our addiction to fossil fuels pushes us ever nearer extinction. We need to hear his voice and God’s call.” –Rev. Lea Mahan, First United Methodist Church, Wellington, Ohio. And… more references…
11/7/08
I went to hear Carl Anderson at St. Charles Borromeo High School in Columbus, Ohio, yesterday. He is the “Supreme Knight” for the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic benevolent organization. Mr. Anderson has recently written the book Civilization of Love. During the talk, he referenced the 9/11 New York firemen who he said demonstrated tremendous ‘love’ by sacrificing their lives to help the people in those burning towers. During a question and answer period, a man noted that with the incoming Obama presidential administration, many more lives would be in jeopardy because of possible, stepped-up levels of abortion. I then stood and said we’ve had a number of Republican administrations as well (since 1973) and we were still approaching 50 million abortions in America. I also said for this to change, pro-Life people should have “the guts” to go to the streets, day in and day out, in bold, non-violent protest — emulating what happened in the South to finally end the horrendous practice of Segregation. It’s not just going to a pro-Life march in D.C. once a year, and then think we’ve done our bit for the cause, I said. It actually takes more courage (and would be that much more effective) to regularly protest in one’s neighborhood. To view Mr. Anderson’s talk (my comment comes up at about the 29 minute mark) see… Note: A recent bumper sticker sighting in Mansfield, Ohio: “Call me an extremist, but I think dismembering unborn babies is wrong.” Note 2: The website Vox-Nova has posted an open letter to president elect Barack Obama about abortion that is worth reading..