Archive - June 14, 2009

When I joined the Peace Corps, I was an alienated, troubled young man   I was almost thrown out during training and I arrived in Nepal in 1964 looking for adventure, not looking to help humanity.  I was posted in a tiny village in the eastern hills two days from a road.  And there I began to think of something other than myself.  I learned to help people and reach out to the world with a helping hand, and I became a man I had never been.  In Nepal the mountains are high but the human spirit is higher, and I took in that spirit and I returned to the United States a new man. I have lived on the residue of that spirit for my entire life.  But a few years ago it ran out, and I have felt spiritually bereft.  I have felt terrible empty. For the few months . . .

A friend sent me the following early this Sunday morning…See, I’m not the only one awake and on the computer!  [John: Senator McCollum released this Friday afternoon. Every little bit helps. It could be either to deflect criticism/disappointment–hey, I tried to help; to claim some of the credit– hey, I was there for the PC ; or, most likely because she is doing her bit to help grow the PC. Whatever, calls to both offices would help. So would a personal note to her DC fax 202.225.1968. Her DC Office # is 202.225.6631. Her local # is: 651.224.9191] From McCollum’s Office, June 12, 2009  Washington, DC – Congresswoman Betty McCollum (MN-04) sent a letter to the Chair of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on State Foreign Operations yesterday requesting the inclusion of $450 million for the Peace Corps in the upcoming mark up of the FY10 spending bill. “As our nation works to restore our standing in the world, . . .

A piece this Sunday morning in the Washington Post by Staff Writer Yamiche Alcindor says it all: “Dozens Gather.” Okay, to rephrase Edgar Allan Poe, “During the whole of a dull, dark, and rainy afternoon in the early summer of the year a few hundred (not dozens!) gathered in Washington, D.C., to campaign for a “bold” (new phrase) New Peace Corps.” Here’s the early morning report this Sunday, June 14, 2009, from Yamiche Alcindor. Dozens of Peace Corps volunteers rallied downtown yesterday, urging Congress and the Obama administration to expand the program. “We want to help the president adhere to his vision,” said Harris Wofford, a former Democratic senator from Pennsylvania who helped launch the Peace Corps in 1961. Organizers said they hoped to prod President Obama to make good on his promise to double the number of Peace Corps volunteers and allot $450 million to the volunteer program, up from about $373 million the administration . . .