THE ANTIDOTE TO DEPRESSION IS GENEROSITY

A good heart is better than all the heads in the world. - Edward Bulwer-Lytton

How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in life you will have been all of these. - George Washington Carver

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We are in Breaking: Yahoo News as WXB102 announces international syndication of our Las Vegas radio program, the award-winning Basham and Cornell Show. In the audio archives of you can listen to over 150 interviews with movers, shakers, political leaders, celebrities, bestselling authors and pundits — but below I've posted the Mp3 links to a few of our recent interviews with John Edwards, Bill Press, Pulitzer Prize winner Charlie Savage, Pat Buchanan, Valerie Bertinelli...

Fri May 23, 3:01 AM ET

Lydia Cornell Interviews World Leaders, Presidential Candidates, And Pulitzer Prize Winners for New Radio Show Co-hosts new Las Vegas radio show about politics and celebrity, signs with renowned literary agency for upcoming books.
Read more at... Yahoo! News

The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 am Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern) on KLAV 1230 AM Radio live in Las Vegas. Again, all shows are simulcast worldwide on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at Basham and Cornell Radio If you've missed our show, check out the audio archives.

You can click on these MP3s to listen to a few of our recent shows, or download the podcasts:

Lydia Cornell - John Edwards interview:
John Edwards Interview

Pat Buchanan interview:
Pat Buchanan Interview

NBC Tel Aviv Bureau Chief Martin Fletcher interview:
NBC Tel Aviv Bureau Chief Martin Fletcher Interview

Bill Press interview:
Bill Press Interview

Valerie Bertinelli interview:
Valerie Bertinelli Interview

Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Charlie Savage:
Charlie Savage Interview Charlie’s new book is titled, “Takeover: The Return of the Imperial Presidency and the Subversion of American Democracy.”

Dennis and Elizabeth Kucinich interview:
Dennis and Elizabeth Kucinich Interview

Georgetown University Jacques Berlinerblau interview:
Jacques Berlinerblau Interview

UPCOMING GUESTS: Senators Arlen Specter, Tom Daschle and Lincoln Chaffee. If you live in Vegas you can tune in Live or go to our website and listen in the audio archives.

The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 am Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern) on KLAV 1230 AM Radio live in Las Vegas. Again, all shows are simulcast worldwide on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at Basham and Cornell Radio If you've missed our show, check out the audio archives. We have interviewed John & Elizabeth Edwards, Dennis & Elizabeth Kucinich, Norman Soloman, John Dean, Pat Buchanan, NBC Bureau Chief in Tel Aviv Martin Fletcher, Pulitzer Prize winner Charlie Savage, Congressman Charlie Rangel,Valerie Plame, Christine Pelosi, Dahr Jamail, Senator Mike Gravel; Senator Byron Dorgan; bestselling authors Greg Palast, Paul Krugman, Greg Anrig.
Our MySpace Page
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Let's get Obama and Clinton together! An unbeatable ticket...

MEMORIAL DAY 2008 * GOD BLESS OUR TROOPS
Since the beginning of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, California has lost 492 of its sons, daughters, fathers and mothers. Their median age was 23 and they left behind 205 widows, 3 widowers, and more than 300 children." From the Los Angeles Sunday Times May 25, 2008

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The "War on Terror" sounds like The War on an Abstract Noun". And Appeasement? Let's talk about appeasement. Fifteen of the 9/11 hijackers were SAUDIS, yet Bush has made a deal to give the Saudis over 2 billion in high-tech weapons. Bush also gave into Osama Bin Laden's demands to remove our largest airforce base in Saudi Arabia. That is appeasement.

When someone hates you, send them love. It works like a charm. You make your enemies stronger by fighting them. WE MUST TALK TO OUR ENEMIES. In fact, the minute we stop seeing them as enemies, we heal the rift.

It's easy to fight those who hurt you; the higher law calls on us to love those who hate us and seek to hurt us. Then we will see miracles begin to happen in human relationships.

As Einstein said, "No problem can be solved on the same level it was created on." You must go to a higher level — to a diplomatic or spiritual solution. To retaliate on the level of engaging in fear-based obsession and magnifying the enemy, only makes the "enemy" larger. This is a spiritual law. Violence against innocents on the hopes of killing militants, is always wrong. There are much more clever and thoughtful ways of annihiating an enemy and it starts in your thought about them. They diminish when the nations of world unite to reduce their power. Not by creating more violence! We are feeding the violence by fighting it. We are giving it more power.

There are 1.5 billion Muslims. They want to raise their children in peace. Only fundamentalist extremists (in all religions) preach intolerance. To those who do so, look in the mirror.

We have to try to understand others. Why do people blow themselves up to kill Americans? Is it because they 'hate us for our freedoms' -- or could it be that our footprint is on their holy land raping their oil, killing their children and stealing their natural resources. "Seek first to understand rather than be understood...You get more flies with honey than with vinegar...Keep your friends close and your enemies closer."

McCain is wrong and even going against his prior behavior. If we're trying to spread democracy across the world, we at least have to set an example and talk to the leaders that were voted into power by the democratic process -- as Hamas was in the Palestinian territories! Even in our country we voted in the corrupt Bush-Cheney regime and we call ourselves a Democracy that must be reckoned with.

If we actually stopped making the enemy so powerful with our obsessive focus on him, and go about the business of creating a beautiful, clean, proserous safe world for our children -- focusing on our own challenges at HOME, the "enemy" would never have any power over us. It's our attention to him that makes him bigger, for what you focus on grows.

These simple principles are the absolute answer to all the strife in the world and in our personal lives.

McCain and the Republicans call it "strength" -- that is their code word for war and military might. They think everything can be solved with bombs.
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Take a moment to appreciate beauty. For weeks I've been awestruck by the gorgeous fuscia color of this bougainvillea in our backyard. I also have Rosemary and it really perks up your mood to breathe the delicious scent. This photo, taken with my phone yesterday, does not do it justice. A week ago, the color was too vibrant to be true. As I appreciate more and more of the beauty in life, it seems to "play" and interact with me. More and more beauty becomes apparent. A French couple stopped their car to marvel at this color the other day, and on Thursday a woman -- whom I swear was an angel — stopped, and at the right moment said the exact words I was thinking: "Nature is the greatest painter." God has given us such beautiful vistas and playful creatures with which to enjoy in this life.

There is an old saying that goes: "Worry is often the cause of illness." The perceived weakening of the economy, too, may have its beginnings in the mind. Many of our problems are problems of perception. The way to be happy is to stop, look up, look around, breathe deeply and realize the sky is not falling. Take a moment to appreciate the smallest things. Think of how you can help someone else who may not have as much as you do. That will increase the wealth in your life a hundred fold. Just watch.

Of course, then there's this.... a portrait of someone who is sorely misguided and believes war is the answer to all our problems... John McCain is aligned with "Pastor" Hagee who actually believes Hitler had a high calling from God to eliminate the Jewish People to force them to establish the nation of Israel -- for a perverted, surrealistic "Armageddon" theory that will force all Jews to be in Israel in order for Christ to come back.. and kill the Jews who did not convert to Christianity!!

God Bless Uncle Lou and Aunt Annie. Keep him alive and off the ventilator.. God Bless all the victims of recent catastophes from the earthquake in China, the cycone in Burma, the wildfires in Florida, and the tornadoes in Oklahoma and Missouri. And our hearts and prayers go out to Katherine Wolf, the beautiful 26-year old mother from our church who suffered a major brain hemorrhage on April 21st, and her faithful family has been at the hospital round the clock ever since. Katherine has made some great strides, but it's still going to be some time before she goes home... God Bless Katherine, Jay and their baby.
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Did you hear Senator Lieberman joking around with Bill Bennett about Hillary Clinton on his right-wing radio show?

BENNETT: And Joe, you know, this is my style. This is a girl who puts on her pearls, goes down, throws down a shot of liquor and bombs Iran, you know. This is…lookout Mrs. Bennett, this is my kind of girl.

LIEBERMAN: Hehehe, it does have an appeal to it." BOMBING IRAN HAS AN APPEAL TO IT? Senator Lieberman and Mr. Bennett you should be ashamed of yourselves. (Apparently Hillary never said this anyway.)

MORE ABOUT DIPLOMACY...
Anyway, it's hard but every single time I think hateful thoughts about terrorists, or George Bush or intolerant neocons, I turn my thoughts to love. The hardest people to do this with are ex-friends and family. It works, even if you can only do it 9 times out of 10. It changes everything.

Our enemies can also be our thoughts about ourselves, including our fears of financial insecurity, suspicion, bigorty, intolerance, worry, accidents, disease, terrorism and all sorts of fears of losing what we have or not getting what we want.

Also, to allow the terrorists to define our lives for us, to "hop" to their commands and live in fear of their threats, is to give them too much power.

Thoughts rule the world. We can lift our consciousness above what the material senses tell us. Then we will see heaven on earth.

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HUMILITY
Nothing is set in stone. We are all redeemable, even the "bad guys" in government and politics, even our leaders. I heard a humble young Israeli at a recovery meeting day say that he 'to become humble' is everything. It's the only way to attain peace. He made a list of his character defects and then made a list of each of their "opposites." To overcome depression, think of others first. To overcome selfishness, give to others. To overcome arrogance, learn humility.

Humility is one of the greatest virtues. When I think of how I can "give" instead of "get" the whole day goes better. When I think of how to "understand" rather than be "understood" or force my will and my opinions on others, I attract love.

Love is circular. Let's all be thinking of how we can help others. Human kindness is really all that matters.
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WOMEN WE LOVE AND ADMIRE:

Drew Gilpin Faust, first female president of Harvard, and author of This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War, Knopf

Catharine Drew Gilpin Faust (born September 18, 1947) is an American historian, college administrator and the first female president of Harvard University. Faust, the former Dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, is also Harvard's first president since 1672 without an undergraduate or graduate degree from Harvard.

I also adore Raven-Symoné, 22, the youngest Cosby kid and star of THAT’S SO RAVEN! She is a wonderful role model for young girls.
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House Subpoenas Karl Rove! FINALLY
by Lara Jakes Jordan

The House Judiciary Committee has subpoenaed former White House adviser Karl Rove as part of its inquiry into whether the Bush administration politically meddled at the Justice Department.
Accusations of politics governing decisions at the agency led to the resignation of former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

The subpoena issued Thursday orders Rove to testify before the House panel on July 10. He is expected to face questions about the White House’s role in firing nine U.S. attorneys in 2006 and the prosecution of former Gov. Don Siegelman of Alabama, a Democrat. House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers had negotiated with Rove’s attorneys for more than a year over whether the former top political adviser to President Bush would testify voluntarily.

© 2008 Associated Press

valerie bertinelli

FOCUS ON THE GOOD

Is JOHN McCAIN showing his age? (unretouched photo)

Interesting tidbit: In every U.S. presidential election, the taller candidate has always won — except in the case of George Bush and John Kerry... but in that case, Bush didn't win, AL GORE did.

THE CORRUPTION OF A CAREER POLITICIAN

Independents beware: McCain, when he thought it would help him politically, tried desperately to jump ship and leave the Republican party when he ran against George Bush for the nomination in 2000. He would have done anything to become a Democrat. Then when Republicans gained favor by hook and by crook, McCain began to curry favor with the most bizarre cast of characters, from Falwell to Hagee to the devil himself. He even switched his stance on torture, embracing it — because he knew it would win him the nomination. Remember, this is a man who had an affair while married to his first wife — only when he saw the opportunity to snare a woman of great wealth who could put him back into power in Arizona. Then, in the Keating scandal, McCain proved his corruption. Make no mistake about it: McCain is only looking out for McCain.

Take care of your mother
And remember to be kind,
when the pain of another will serve to remind..
That there are those who feel themselves exiled,
On whom the fortunes never smiled,
And upon whose life the heartache has been piled…
Jackson Browne, "The Only Child"

Obama’s luster may seem to have worn off temporarily, but the truth is often in the spaces — in the time between.

IT'S ALL GOOD
We may not be talking to the leaders of Middle Eastern Countries, but at least we’re talking to each other ABOUT talking to the leaders of other countries. We’re having a national psychology session for the whole world to sit in on. The media repeats every flaw, foible — and embarrassingly racist, misogynistic, nationalistic, patriarchical, fear-based, greedy thought we have. And we let the whole world listen in on our national pathology. And at least we’re thinking out loud and letting every racist fear be known. It’s like free therapy for all Americans.

In any event, it’s all good. Communicating about how racist we are and how bad the media is, can’t be bad.

But does America seem narcissistic? Our arrogance makes us assume we are the most important country on the planet. Do we hear everything going on in France? Does France and the rest of the world listen in on all this bickering between the parties — and all these sex scandals?

Last week in Santa Monica with my wonderful mom and sister.

Stop watching the news. Stop listening to the pundits tell us we are defeating ourselves. There is no reason to fear or believe McCain can ever win the upcoming presidential election. He is proving to be a clone of Bush and Cheney — and more about his character is being revealed. In June, the entire matter of the Democratic candidate will be decided and the nominee will have plenty of time to make the case for truth, hope and goodwill in front of the People. In the presence of truth, anything unlike truth, has to come up for healing. The process involves purging the old and brining in the new.

SPRING is a rebirth — and with spring, comes new life. My son and I were hiking at my mom's house yesterday, and a rabbit with a white tail hopped across our path. It must have been the Easter bunny. Bel Air Pres had a beautiful service at the Hollywood Bowl. On Saturday we went to a reenactment of the Resurrection at Vasquez Rocks — a spectacular natural park where they once filmed Star Trek. The rock formations are out of this world.


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SNOOP GATE: SECURITY BREACH ON OBAMA'S INFO

SHOCKING! On three separate occasions, three separate State Department contractors illegally accessed Obama's private records -- including his Social Security number, his travel itineraries, passport number and passport history. The breach was leaked to the Washington Times, a highly partisan Moonie-owned, Bush-backing newspaper. The Inspector General did not seem to know about this until today (!!) Who's idea was it to keep it secret, and why was there no investigation? And when exactly were the first two employees fired? It appears that now that these employees have been fired, they are under no obligation to answer any questions. Astounding.

Looking at Obama's File Gets Two Fired
By Glenn Kessler Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, March 21, 2008

The State Department said last night that it had fired two contract employees and disciplined a third for accessing Sen. Barack Obama's passport file.

Obama's presidential campaign immediately called for a "complete investigation."

State Department spokesman Tom Casey said the employees had individually looked into Obama's passport file on Jan. 9, Feb. 21 and March 14. To access such a file, the employees must first acknowledge a pledge to keep the information private.

The employees were each caught because of a computer-monitoring system that is triggered when the passport accounts of a "high-profile person" are accessed, he said. The system was put in place after the State Department was embroiled in a scandal involving the access of the passport records of then-presidential candidate Bill Clinton in 1992.

"The State Department has strict policies and controls on access to passport records by government and contract employees," Casey said.

The department uses contract employees to help with data entry, customer service and other administration tasks. The employee involved in the March 14 incident has only been disciplined so far, because the probe of that incident is continuing, an official said.

Though the workers were caught by a computer system that focuses on high-profile people, Casey said that a computer report is generated on every access to passport records and that spot checks are taken to ensure that employees are not violating the Privacy Act.

"This is an outrageous breach of security and privacy, even from an administration that has shown little regard for either over the last eight years," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said in a statement. "This is a serious matter that merits a complete investigation, and we demand to know who looked at Senator Obama's passport file, for what purpose, and why it took so long for them to reveal this security breach."

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If you missed our amazing interview with NBC Bureau Chief and award-winning foreign correspondent Martin Fletcher yesterday, you can listen in the archives to one of the best interviews we've ever done.




Award Winning Foreign Correspondent Guests on Basham & Cornell Radio Show...

Martin Fletcher is one of the most respected foreign correspondents in television news. He has covered almost every conflict and natural disaster in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East for thirty-five years, winning five Emmys, a Columbia University Dupont Award, several Overseas Press Club awards, and a cameraman’s award from Britain’s Royal Society of television. Fletcher and his wife, Hagar, have raised three sons. He is currently based in Israel, where he is NBC News bureau chief in Tel Aviv.

If you live in Vegas you can tune in Live or go to our website and listen in the audio archives.

The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 am Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern) on KLAV 1230 AM Radio live in Las Vegas. All shows are simulcast on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at Basham and Cornell Progressive Talk If you've missed our show, check out the audio archives. We have interviewed John & Elizabeth Edwards, Pat Buchanan, Dennis & Elizabeth Kucinich, John Dean, Valerie Plame, Christine Pelosi, Dahr Jamail, Senator Mike Gravel; Pulitzer Prize winner Charlie Savage, Congressman Charlie Rangel, Senator Byron Dorgan; bestselling authors Greg Palast, Paul Krugman, Greg Anrig, Mikey Weinstein, Paul Krugman; Media Matters’ Eric Boehlert and Paul Waldman are regular guests. Upcoming: Senator Tom Daschle, Senator Lincoln Chaffee, Naomi Klein, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. If you missed any of these shows, check out the archives on our website: Basham and Cornell Progressive Talk