Many years ago I stumbled onto the delights of murder mysteries and, inevitably, became hooked. I believe it was Jewish writer Harry Kemelman and his remarkable amateur sleuth, Rabbi David Small, who administered the addictive drug. Then came the descent into the depths of detection: Agatha Christie, Rex Stout, Erle Stanley Gardner – purveyors of fascinating schemes and characters that irresistibly draw one into layered webs of intrigue. The desperate reader feels compelled to solve the burning question:  Who done it?

A good mystery always entertains, often informs, and, at the highest level, engages one’s moral faculties in serious thought. For instance, Agatha Christie’s brilliant drama, Murder on the Orient Express, confronts us with a troubling problem: is it ever right for us to execute justice as we see fit, when the usual legal machinery has failed? For victims of crime – like the parents of a brutally murdered child – this is no mere academic discussion. The recent PBS TV version of Orient Express elevates this issue to yet a higher plane. Do we honor God by accepting justice as fallible or may we lend him a hand in punishing evil?

Generally, mysteries are pretty clean. One can find hundreds – yea thousands – with practically no profanity nor graphic sex. This is important to me. I don’t want to ingest that kind of content.  However, subtexts need not rely on straight pornography to insinuate a pornographic message. One must watch out for subversive writers with personal agendas.

Which brings me to a book, which I’ll call Sandville.

In Sandville, no one is married. Glenn, the chief suspect has been married and divorced twice. The deceased victim, Felicia, was also married and divorced twice. The amateur sleuth, Claire, is a middle age single woman who fondly recalls her recent affair with a young college student. Kiki, also single and middle-aged, has two one-night stands in the course of a week. Lark, a divorcee, is always on the prowl, though not particularly successful.

Larry, the homicide detective, appears to be married to his wife, but – wouldn’t you know it? – he eventually confides to Claire that the marriage is virtually over. In his words, “We decided to split. We had a long heart-to-heart talk, and, without rancor, decided we could never realize our dreams with each other. Both she and I are free to find love elsewhere.”

In Sandville, near the end of the book, a highly emphasized “marriage” ceremony does actually take place. Grant, in his fifties, “weds” Kane, in his twenties, as the cast of characters utters sweet blessings. Grant “professed to Kane his deep love and promised to stay with him forever, ‘come what may through thick and thin.’” Kane thanked Grant for “a happiness I had never thought possible.”

In the universe of Sandville, normal marriage is always a disaster. Adultery is somewhat pleasant and liberating. But same-sex union . . . that’s the ticket! Only the deviant know fulfilling, lasting, joyous relationship.

This celebratory propaganda, without any graphic description, nevertheless is a form of pornography, perhaps more insidious than the outright blatant stuff. It seeks to undermine the sanctity of marriage. The writer wants to poison our minds and enlist us in destroying the chief cornerstone of our civilization.

The wisdom of Genesis has never been refuted. In that narrative God observes, “It is not good for the man to be alone.” God then goes to work “to make a suitable helper.” He does not make another man. He makes a woman, a magnificent woman suitable for an equally splendid man and brings her to him. The two quickly become husband and wife.

That was and is the Plan. It cannot be improved on. It enables humanity to flourish. Thus, we’re left with a real life mystery. Why do so many today try to murder marriage?

By Gary Hardaway

A friend of mine recalls growing up in a well-organized home where the four children each had many assigned chores every day. On one occasion his parents took in a foster boy of about three years old. In the evening, as the kids and their mom systematically went about preparing for supper, this little tyke, who was closely watching all this activity, suddenly burst into tears. Banging his spoon on the table, he proclaimed, “I want job! I want job!” They quickly gave him something to do.

There’s an inborn impulse inside the human heart that longs to do something useful. We need to work; we need to contribute. We feel unfulfilled if we don’t produce something of value.

But this innate drive can be snuffed out.

Many years ago, when I was a juvenile probation officer, a young man almost eighteen was arrested for burglary, and I got the case. I soon learned that he was recently married. He had gotten his girlfriend pregnant, and, in his mind, was manfully trying to take care of her and the expected child.

Hoping to help, I decided to steer him toward getting a job. But when I broached the subject, the blood visibly drained from his face.  Ashen – and quivering – he literally could not visualize himself working. He and his wife had been on welfare all their lives, as had their parents. The possibility of earning a living had been absolutely extinguished from this young man’s consciousness.

Some would label this guy a lazy bum. But what I saw was not laziness but terror – panic. He felt totally incompetent to function in the real world. He had been neutered of initiative, conditioned to believe he had no talent, no ability or potential.

This summer, my 14 year-old grandson, Evan, has his first real job. For five weeks, four hours a day, Monday through Saturday, he’s working in our local raspberry harvest.  He’d like to work more, but state law limits fourteen year-olds to four hours a day. However, there’s an upside to the limit. It enables the farm to hire twice as many young people, 450 kids total, for either the morning or afternoon shifts.

Evan is grateful for the chance to make some money. And, in so doing, he’s growing up now, leaving childhood behind, journeying toward adulthood at a faster pace.

For the first time in several years, he’ll miss attending basketball camp. He had to make a choice. Unlike Yogi Berra, when we come to a fork in the road, we’ve got to choose. It’s a valuable lesson for a 14 year-old.  That’s the way life is.

Seventy years ago, President Roosevelt assured us that everyone has a “right” to a job – a dazzling example of wishful thinking. Jobs don’t appear by magic. They emerge through somebody’s vision, energy, and creativity.  A job is a privilege, gained because somebody else invested a lot of blood, sweat, toil, and tears in an enterprise.

In this dreary era, we hear politicians constantly promising “Jobs, Jobs,” as if the government has a magic wand. In May a paltry 41,000 jobs were created in the private sector. Business thrives only when government deliberately encourages entrepreneurial vision, investment, and risk-taking. Business dies when saddled with high taxes, costly regulations, and complicated bureaucratic red tape.

Government then compounds the problem by doling out endless unemployment benefits. A certain percentage of able-bodied citizens decide to quit seeking work in favor of perpetual “free lunch,” (paid for by the rest of us).

There’s no easy solution, but a rule from the early Christian Scriptures still makes good sense: “If a man will not work, he shall not eat.” Hunger is a powerful motivator!

Evan is pretty lucky. He has what many millions of Americans desperately wish they had – a real job, with a real paycheck. But he’s also going to experience the satisfaction of helping to bring 50 million tons of delicious fruit to market. That sense of accomplishment is priceless.

That’s one reason I’ll be driving a truck, hauling some of those tons from the field to the refrigeration plant.  Old guys still need to feel useful too.

By Jim Hightower

Here’s some free advice: Never buy shares in a goldmine from a guy operating out of a house trailer.

Likewise, never buy a story from the Pentagon about an incredible discovery of gold in Afghanistan.

From out of nowhere, a recent news report excitedly tells us that a Pentagon taskforce has discovered an astonishing trillion dollars’ worth of untapped mineral deposits in that war-ravaged, impoverished country. Gold! Copper! Iron! And more!

“An economic boon is seen,” declares a newspaper headline. “There is stunning potential here,” exclaimed General David Petraeus, the top commander of America’s war operations in Afghanistan.

Hmmm… not so fast, Slick. Isn’t it at least curious that this “discovery” comes when the war is going so badly for us and both the public and Congress are questioning why we’re there? Suddenly, the Pentagon gives us a trillion reasons to keep spending American lives and tax dollars: There’s money in them thar hills.

Unmentioned in the Pentagon’s economic assessment is the fact that Afghans have known about these mineral deposits for centuries and have long been mining many of them, albeit on a small scale. The Soviets even mapped the extensive deposits in the 1980s during their occupation of Afghanistan, and our own geologists have known about the mining potential at least since 2004.

Still, even if the Pentagon has hyped up this story to prolong America’s commitment to the war, it actually could have the opposite effect. We’ve been told again and again how poor that nation is, with a total GDP of only $12 billion and its chief product being opium, so our commitment of 90,000 troops is essential to help impoverished Afghans building a modern economy and a stable government. But if they’re now a fabulously wealthy nation, they don’t need us. So…let’s leave.

By Ben Lilliston

Would you like some antibiotic-resistant bacteria with your grilled chicken at your backyard barbeque? Of course not. But that likelihood continues to grow unless the government makes industry change the way most American farm animals are raised.

American industrial animal production has fed our farm animals a steady diet of antibiotics for decades. Now, the bacteria are fighting back and we’re all paying the price.

An estimated 70 percent of all antibiotics (about 24.6 million pounds a year) consumed in this country are used non-therapeutically to help promote growth in our pigs, chickens, and cattle in overcrowded pens known as “confined animal feeding operations” (CAFOs). Without antibiotics added to their feed, disease would rapidly infect these animals.

In these factory farms, bacteria are exposed to low levels of antibiotics for long periods of time. That provides ideal conditions for the creation of bacterial resistance. Many of the antibiotics used to raise factory-farmed animals are the same prescription drugs that doctors use to treat sick humans. Now, antibiotic resistance developed in CAFOs is becoming a public health problem for us all.

The medical community has taken strong steps to reduce the over-prescription of antibiotics to humans to slow the development of these superbugs. But we can’t win this battle without a similar effort by meat and poultry companies.

Antibiotic resistance is already proving costly–at least $4 to $5 billion a year in health costs alone, according to an estimate from The National Academy of Sciences. With few new antibiotics on the horizon, protecting what we have is essential.

After dragging its feet for years, the government has finally taken the first timid steps to address this crisis. The Food and Drug Administration published in June a draft of new guidelines for the meat and poultry industry. The agency outlined a set of principles calling for the use of antibiotics to be limited to treating animal disease and to include veterinary oversight. FDA officials said these voluntary guidelines laid the groundwork for possible future regulations. Unfortunately, the agency sets no timeline for future regulations, which could be years, even decades, in the making.

To protect America’s health, Congress must accelerate action to protect antibiotics. More than 80 of the nation’s public health organizations, including the American Medical Association and the American Public Health Association, have endorsed a bill that would halt of the overuse of antibiotics in raising food animals. The bill, introduced by the only microbiologist in Congress, Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-NY), would phase out the non-therapeutic use of seven classes of antibiotics in animals–unless the FDA determines the drugs do not contribute to antibiotic resistance affecting humans. The modest bill would still allow farmers to treat sick animals and it only covers antibiotics also used to treat humans.

But the big drug and meat companies represent a powerful lobby in Washington, and have thus far blocked the bill and FDA action. Why are they expending such effort to prevent this major public health initiative? As usual, it has to do with the bottom line. Banning antibiotics for healthy animals raised in extremely crowded conditions would mean that chicken, cattle, and pigs would require more room. The cost of producing beef, pork, and chicken would likely rise–although it would be nothing compared to the health costs linked to antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

The good news is that it doesn’t have to be this way. We can raise enough animals for food and still protect the effectiveness of antibiotics. Denmark, the world’s largest pork exporter, banned antibiotic feed additives in 1998. Producers improved animal husbandry and hygiene, and the overall use of antibiotics in agriculture dropped by over 50 percent. A similar ban is now in place in the rest of Europe. And of course many American farmers in the U.S. already use these more sustainable practices, producing pork, chicken and livestock without antibiotics.

Nearly all of us have needed antibiotics at some point in our lives. If we want antibiotics to work for us and our children in the future, we have to get smarter about how we use them. We need to find the political will to act.

By Karen Dolan

Fifteen million Americans are currently unemployed, and nearly half of that number has been actively and fruitlessly seeking employment for longer than six months. The depth and breadth of our labor market crisis is the greatest in over 50 years.

Though the unemployment rate dropped slightly in June from 9.7 percent to 9.5 percent, this is deceiving.

As noted economist Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research explains, joblessness receded slightly only because 652,000 Americans left the labor force in June. Additionally, the number of employed workers fell by over 300,000 and the “establishment survey” of businesses, used by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, shows that average hourly wages and workweek hours are declining.

Thank goodness for unemployment insurance, which helps cushion us from abject poverty in the face of such a dearth of jobs. At least Congress consistently does one thing right. Historically, both sides of the aisle have been able to agree that when unemployed workers are unable to find jobs due to no fault of their own, a decent society provides a cushion so that they can weather the storm until able once again to contribute to rebuilding our economy.

Wait…Goodness is telling me that it has no reason to be thanked–Congress hasn’t consulted it. In fact, Republicans and deficit-hawk Democrats have not only turned their backs on goodness, but on the nation’s 15 million unemployed people, and the children and families who depend upon them.

Even though economists of all stripes and allegiances understand that unemployment benefits are among our most effective tools in a job crisis and the current recession, lawmakers are betting that fanning the flames of deficit hysteria will get them re-elected in the fall. Despite attempts to extend critically needed, but expiring, unemployment benefits, the Senate has once again let us down. Republicans filibustered attempts to help American workers. Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, a Democrat, joined them, leaving Senate Dems one short of staving off a bit of suffering to millions of us before leaving town to enjoy their own sumptuous Fourth of July picnics.

Then there’s Sharron Angle, the GOP nominee vying for Majority Leader Harry Reid’s Nevada Senate seat. She sparked uproar akin to Rep. Joe Barton’s disgraceful apology to BP when she suggested that the unemployed in our country are spoiled. Following a barrage of criticism, she attempted trying to rewrite these comments with this puzzler as to what she really meant: “What has happened is the system of entitlement has caused us to have spoilage with our ability to go out and get a job…There are some jobs out there that are available. Because they have to enter at a lower grade and they cannot keep their unemployment, they have to make a choice now.”

As reported by the National Employment Law Project, the Economic Policy Institute, and the Department of Labor, there are nearly five workers actively vying for every one available job.

So, c’mon. We may be jobless, we may be angry and frustrated that jobs have disappeared and there is seemingly no political will to create more through a second stimulus, we may be plunging increasingly into poverty through no fault of our own. We may be dismayed that goodness has been abandoned by many on Capitol Hill. But we aren’t stupid. And we aren’t spoiled, and our children don’t deserve the long-term effects of poverty that Congress is foisting upon them in bids for votes in the fall elections.

Angle and the filibustering Republicans-plus- Nelson are out of touch and playing a dangerous game. Though they may ultimately lose office, the most immediate and devastated losers in their game are millions of Americans and their families who have been kicked to the curb, as their unemployment benefits expire.

As a co-founder and the current creative director of the Rancho La Puerta fitness resort and Golden Door spas, Deborah Szekely has long been known as a pioneer in health and wellness. She’s now focusing on a new target audience: our nation’s children. Together with Dr. David Kessler, former FDA commissioner and now a professor of pediatrics, epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of California, San Francisco, she’s promoting a pilot program they hope will help educate schoolchildren on the importance of healthy lifestyles. It’s called the “living skills fifth grade semester.” It targets fifth graders because they believe children at that age still respect their teachers, parents, and friends, yet are old enough to understand lessons on healthy choices and tasks like food preparation, gardening, shopping, and budgeting. This makes them good candidates to be enthusiastic about learning how healthy food and exercise will make their bodies work best, and makes them likely to be excited to share what they are learning at school with their families at home. As Szekely says, “We believe these children will become proselytizers to their family, much as past generations did when confronting their parents about smoking.” How would this semester-long intervention work? Szekely and Kessler envision the program this way: “What if fifth-grade American children receive an entire semester in which all classes in math, science, geography, language, history, and the environment integrated existing fifth-grade educational requirements with studies of how the body functions, its nutritional and physical needs, and proper sources and preparation of healthy, fresh, nutritious foods?” Proven programs are already being funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture through land-grant universities and colleges that could serve as models. These include a program at Rutgers University in New Jersey that offers children the chance to work on a farm; a University of Massachusetts program that’s tailored to low-income, culturally diverse adolescents; and a Louisiana State University Agriculture Center program that brings a traveling exhibit on the importance of healthy eating and exercise to schools across the state. The living skills fifth grade semester would build on successful ideas like these and bring similar kinds of lessons right into the classroom. In the sample curriculum, assignments might include learning about the different tactics advertisers use to try to influence people’s food choices; creating recipes for healthy holiday gifts; studying how different Native American cultures used the land; learning about the different parts of the digestive system; planning and planting a class garden; researching heart-healthy activities and foods while celebrating Valentine’s Day; designing a nutritious “child-friendly” restaurant menu; studying how the immune system works; calculating how much energy it would take to burn off the calories in favorite snack foods; and developing a sample family food budget. The program would have goals of teaching children how their bodies work, the causes of disease, and the importance of prevention–the “living skills” needed “for a long, healthy, and happy life.” At a time when more and more experts are sounding the alarm about the threat rising child obesity levels pose to our nation’s future health and productivity, parents, schools, communities, and experts all have a role to play in finding solutions to this crisis. Here’s another crucial proposal to add to the list. As Szekely and Dr. Kessler say: “What if we don’t let our children lead the way to their—and our—healthier lives? Then, as current trends continue, an appalling 86% of Americans could be overweight within two decades. Obesity-related medical bills will amount to almost $1 trillion. The solution is prevention via education, and it must start now.” I hope our leaders and citizens willhear and heed them.

Pretty much everyone (outside of the nutty “he’s the Antichrist” coalition) thinks President Barack Obama did the right thing in firing his Afghanistan commander, Gen. Stanley McChrystal. Unfortunately, he did it for the wrong reasons.

McChrystal got fired for shooting his mouth off about his disdain for our president, his civilian staff, and our allies within earshot of a Rolling Stone reporter. (Generals and high officials get so used to kid-glove treatment from the mainstream press that they’re often shocked when a real reporter shows up and actually reports.)

Obama had to get rid of the guy lest he, Obama, be labeled a wimp and lose his already slippery standing with the military and our allies. He immediately won points, however, for naming Gen. David Petraeus as McChrystal’s successor.

This, Obama assured us, would mean a seamless continuation of the strategy we’ve been following in Afghanistan.

You know times are hard when keeping our Afghanistan War strategy is considered good news.

I don’t know if you’ve noticed (with the World Cup and all, times are busy) but we’re not winning the war in Afghanistan; we’re not even tying. The strategy, whatever it is, isn’t working.

There’s a reason for this: Strategies that depend on invading and pacifying Afghanistan, thereby bending it to the invader’s will, never work. Never.

It didn’t work for Alexander the Great, for the Mongols, for the British Empire or for the Soviet Union, all of which considered themselves experts at invading and pacifying. They all came into the country with flags flying, and all left sadder but wiser–mostly sadder. It’s what Afghanistan does to invaders.

Now it’s our turn.

Whenever critics of the war bring up its parallels to the Vietnam Folly, supporters sternly admonish them with: “Afghanistan is not Vietnam.”

Really? Let’s review:

We’re trying to suppress an indigenous insurgency–albeit one augmented with troops, weapons and support from outside sources–in a faraway land of which we know little.

We’re bombing the hell out of them, using $500,000 missiles and multi-million-dollar drones to destroy mud huts, and in the process killing innocent people and converting indifferent bystanders into angry, hate-filled militants. It is a policy of destroying villages in order to save them.

In this effort, which is increasingly ours alone, we’re dependent for legitimacy on a corrupt, feckless Afghan government that lacks the support of its people.

And, lastly, our success depends almost totally not merely on being able to reform that government, but on our ability to transform its largely unmotivated and illiterate army into a modern fighting force so that we can turn things over to them and desert the battlefield without seeming to.

Sounds like Vietnam to me. And, like Vietnam, it will end badly.

Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan’s president, knows that. That wily man is already negotiating with the Taliban and its Pakistani sponsors. He knows we’re not long for this war.

The Republicans would have it otherwise. Led by military geniuses like John McCain and Dick Cheney, they’re incensed that Obama has set 2011 as the sell-by date of this war. Apparently, they’re willing to keep fighting it forever.

And when we do leave, they’ll blame the Democrats for “losing Afghanistan,” much as they used to blame Democrats for losing China.

We’re not going to lose Afghanistan, for the same reason we didn’t lose China. We never owned it.

The Bush-Cheney bunch had their shot at taming Afghanistan. They didn’t do it. Whatever their strategy, it didn’t work. If they get another try at it, it won’t work again.

A Taliban spokesman recently said this of his country: “Before Gen. McChrystal, many strong military generals suffered defeat. The Americans know that Afghanistan is the Graveyard of Empires but even so, they invaded this country.”

The reporter was reminded of a Taliban saying:

“The Americans have the watches, but we’ve got the time.”

As this summer’s temperatures climb, pressure on Iran is heating up. For years now, Iran has claimed that its nuclear program is peaceful and only designed to generate electricity. But the international community has been skeptical.

The United Nations, the European Union, and the United States, all worried about the possibility of Iran developing a nuclear weapon, recently took steps to prevent this from happening. But there’s one important route to solving the impasse with Iran that has yet to be seriously pursued: frank diplomatic negotiations at the highest level.

The scenario looks like this: Iran developed a nuclear energy program with United States ‘support over 50 years ago. Their nuclear program isn’t new and hasn’t always been so controversial. But recently, Iran has failed to fully cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), an international regulatory body to which Iran had agreed to provide complete and open inspection access to verify the peaceful nature of their nuclear program. When Iran stopped fully cooperating, hiding activities that could be steps towards the development of a nuclear weapon, alarm bells started ringing the world over.

While nobody knows for sure exactly what Iran is up to, nations have been taking action to prevent Iran from acquiring the necessary materials for building a nuclear weapon and to punish them for breaking the rules and hiding things from the IAEA.

The UN Security Council, the EU, and the United States all have recently passed sanctions against Iran, banning sales of industrial items that could be used to build a bomb, freezing bank accounts belonging to people and companies known to be engaging in illegal activities, and preventing foreign investment in industries that could be crucial to building an Iranian nuclear bomb, like mining, oil, and gas.

These sanctions will be a speed bump on Iran’s path towards a nuclear weapon, but what we really need to do is convince them to return to exclusively peaceful nuclear energy usage and cooperation with the international community. Iran was once in good standing with the rest of the world. We need to convince them to stop behaving badly and regain the respect and trust of the rest of the world.

This is where diplomacy plays an important role. All is not lost in the situation with Iran. What’s needed now is a series of long, frank discussions between Iran’s leaders and other key global players.

International leaders–including Iran’s neighbors as well as powerful nations such as the United States, Russia, and China–should make it clear to Iran that there are economic benefits that would follow cooperating with the IAEA and allowing full access of their nuclear facilities to inspectors. Negotiators should join the discussions and be willing to offer Iran concrete advantages in exchange for full cooperation, such as business investment, the lifting of economic sanctions, and money for social programs.

Negotiations would make the stark choice clear to Iran: cooperate, and enjoy the benefits of economic investment and friendly relationships with other nations, or continue to engage in shady behavior and lose investment opportunities and struggle to do business with the rest of the world. Negotiations would make it explicitly clear just how damaging economic isolation would be for Iran.

High-level diplomatic engagement with Iran would benefit both the international community and Iran itself, thwarting a dangerous and destabilizing nuclear weapons program while also providing opportunities for economic growth and investment. High-level diplomatic engagement is the last, best hope for emerging from the current crisis with Iran on the right path, towards greater global peace and security.

Olivia Bouler. Have you heard of her? Does her name ring a bell? Probably not. Her name was a mystery to me. She’s not a recognized movie star, or, prominent sports figure. But I feel that I know her. Know her well. Her name has been etched on my mind. I first heard her story, and continued to reflect on it. Over and over I rehearsed it in my mind.

But I need to tell it again. Let it grasp you as it did me. What a story of human ingenuity and creativity. I can’t bottle it up inside any longer. Allow it to slip through the cracks. Olivia’s story will amaze you. Shock you. Excite you. Draw you like the pull of a powerful magnet. You’ll want to throw your arms around her and give Olivia a generous outpouring of your appreciation and love.

My introduction to Olivia came through the media news sources that surrounded the Gulf Coast oil spill. Do you remember that horrendous day? Who can possibly forget it? Blot it out of the mind? Put it behind you? Media sources unveiled it. Sent it through the airwaves. Placed it on the tube. Described it on the written page. The disaster broke my heart. Crushed me. Sent me into a downward spiral. Instilled a sense of fright. It made me aware that my planet faces a crippling catastrophe. Serious dangers lie ahead, if not outright destruction.

Like a host of other mud slingers, or should I say, oil slingers, I joined the chorus of noisy critics. I cried. Wept. Paced the floor. Screamed inside. I wanted to give BP a long drawn out tongue lashing. A biting and bitter piece of my mind. Dethrone them. Close their business operation. Remove them from the planet. Snowballing questions rose inside me like: Why was this allowed to happen? Who was responsible for it happening? Isn’t there a way BP can shut down this horror picture show? If they can’t, who can enable us to avert the dangers that lie ahead?

We are intelligent people. Scientifically alert. In possession of knowledge and skill. Boast creative inventions that boggle the mind. With all of our knowledge and insight, certainly something can be done. Immediately. Without further delay.

Here is where Olivia arrives on the scene. Not as a critical voice. Nor with mean-spirited and brash utterances. Hateful resentment. But as a positive voice. A caring voice. An empathetic voice. For Olivia has put in place a counter movement to the tragedy. Not a movement to slam BP like myself and others have done. She’s painting a new smiling picture on the horizon of the mounting suffering and uncertainty that confronts humanity.

Olivia is an eleven year old fifth grader who lives with her parents in Islip, New York. She loves birds. Adores them. Cares deeply about them. Seeks their welfare. Contributes her abilities to support and protect them. Her love for these feathery creatures has enlarged into something phenomenal. Colossal. Stupendous.

When Olivia heard about the devastating effects the oil spill had on wildlife, she moved into high gear. Without waiting. Immediately. She contacted the Audubon Society to offer her services. Why? The Gulf Coast was very special to Olivia. She had grown up vacationing here with her parents, Jim and Nadine. She had fallen in love with the area. Literally. Thus, she couldn’t set idly by and allow this immense suffering to continue without doing something. Thus, Olivia offered her talents. She was committed to making a difference. She wanted to help in the rescue of her feathery friends.

But how could an eleven year old grade school girl help? Make a significant difference? Turn things around? Good questions. I wondered the same thing.

Yet, Olivia was not restricted by such questions. Not at all. She had confidence in her abilities. She knew what needed to be done. For you see, Olivia is an artist. A developing artist. A gifted artist. So, she wanted to sketch and paint pictures of birds, then offer the proceeds from her artwork to finance the rescue.

A dumb idea? A little girls fanciful dream? Something that will never take shape? Become effective? You must read the rest of Olivia’s story.

Those who gave donations to one of five different organizations, the Audubon Society  included, would be sent an original piece of her artwork. One hundred and thirty drawings have been sent to donors at this writing. And sixty thousand dollars has been raised.

America Online has also become involved in Olivia’s project. They have unveiled a gallery of her work. Additionally, they have donated twenty-five thousand dollars to the Audubon Society in Olivia’s name.

Does this story confound you like it does me? Touch your heart strings? Shake your inner world? Make you aware of a child’s uncanny ability? That a child can make a difference? Lead the way? Leave one breathless and agog? People everywhere are inspired. Singing Olivia’s praises. Lauding and clapping for her. Cheering her on. Enjoying the contribution, she’s making to humanity.

As I reflected on Olivia’s story, Scripture suddenly leaped out at me. For the disciples of Jesus were overly concerned with who would be greatest in His kingdom. Without hesitation Jesus called for a small child to sit among them. He then taught the following: “ … whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (see Matthew 18:4).

What did Jesus mean? In what way are children “humble?” Children are selfless. Unoccupied with me, myself and I. With being great. On the other hand, the disciples are selfish and self-absorbed. Thus, a little child is able to lead them? Why? Because they live in an unselfish manner.

Olivia fits well into the scriptural phrase, “… a little child shall lead them” (Isaiah 11:6). For her selfless actions on behalf of the Gulf Coast were directed outward toward the welfare of God’s creation. She reached beyond herself and saw the needs of others.

“Let me ask you, Olivia, why did you do it?”

“It’s very time consuming,” she said, “but everything’s for the birds.”

There’s no crying in baseball, as Tom Hanks so famously said in “A League of Their Own.”

But all that changed on June 2 when Detroit Tigers pitcher Armando Galarraga tossed a perfect game, was robbed of it by a bad call at first base by umpire Jim Joyce, and the unfolding events turned into one of the most inspiring sports stories to come along in years.

In an age of whiners and self-professed victims, when so many want to blame their own shortcomings or failures on others (or on the world at large), this was more than just a teachable moment.  It was a revelation.

With two outs in the ninth inning, and having retired the first 26 batters without allowing any base runners, Galarraga fielded a throw from Miguel Cabrera which beat the runner by a full half-step.  Galarraga was about to celebrate, but then he looked back at Joyce with his arms spread wide, giving the safe sign.

What should have been only the 21st perfect game in all of Major League baseball was wiped off the books with that one horrendous call.

Galarraga’s response?  A sweet smile.  Then he walked back to the mound and got the next guy out.

No screaming, no cursing, no whining.  Not a peep.  And for a journeyman pitcher who had never even recorded a complete game, much less come anywhere near a perfect one, that’s saying a lot.

In the meantime, the videotape of the first-base play was shown in the stadium and it was clear to everyone, including Joyce, that he had blown the call.  Cabrera had to be physically restrained from Joyce.  Meanwhile, Detroit manager Jim Leyland, one of the toughest guys in baseball, unleashed a red-faced verbal assault against the ump.

Joyce’s response?  He stood and listened to every last word of Leyland’s tirade, without batting an eye.  Umpires don’t normally take two seconds of that kind of abuse, nor do they typically admit their errors or apologize for them.  But Joyce did all of the above.

“It was the biggest call of my career, and I [blew] it,” he acknowledged after leaving the field.

No excuses, no finger-pointing, no passing the buck.

With tears in his eyes, he simply sought out Galarraga and apologized profusely to the young pitcher.

Galarraga’s response?  He accepted Joyce’s apology on the spot.  Then he hugged him.  Twice.

“Nobody’s perfect,” Galarraga told reporters in the clubhouse minutes later.

Ironically enough, Galarraga was perfect that night.  So the fact that he found it so easy to extend grace to someone who had scratched his name from the history books was even more astounding.

That transformed the entire situation and turned it into something that transcended sports.  It became a lesson in the power of grace.  Next thing you knew, Leyland was extending grace to Joyce, as were the Tigers players, and even the fans.

When the umpires took the field in Detroit the next day, Joyce fully expected to be showered with boos.  Instead, he was cheered.  And in yet another gesture of grace, it was Galarraga who brought the Tigers’ line-up card out to Joyce and his fellow umpires.  Galarraga then shook Joyce’s hand with that same sweet smile on his face.  Joyce was so overcome with emotion that all he could do was slap Galarraga on the back and give a salute to the Tigers dugout.

As Peggy Noonan wrote in the Wall Street Journal, the lesson to parents and children alike was:  “This is how it’s done.”  Indeed, it was a glorious demonstration of the biblical tenet to “love mercy and walk humbly” (Micah 6:8).

In the end, Galarraga pitched an even more perfect game than any other pitcher in baseball.  He is, and probably always will be, the only pitcher to throw a 28-out perfect game.  Even if the record book doesn’t show it.

That’s something no one can ever take away from him.