You All Know What I Mean By This…

Say what you need to say

Walking like a one-man army
Fighting with the shadows in your head
Living out the same old moment
Knowing you’d be better off instead if you could only

Say what you need to say

Have no fear for giving in
Have no fear for giving over
You better know that in the end it’s better to say too much
Then never to say what you need to say…

Even if your hands are shaking
And your faith is broken
Even as the eyes are closing
Do it with a heart wide open

Say what you need to say…

How do I work up the courage to do this…?

Baby

You call her baby

But you don’t see

The years she hides behind her eyes.



Her sweet soft voice

Doesn’t tell you

Any of the pain she has been through.



Her feminine manner

Keeps well hidden

The tough memories she keeps.



Her soft hands

With their fine fingers

Don’t let you know her rough life passed.



You call her Baby.

But a baby she never was.

She grew up way too fast for that.



She moves so softly

You can’t help but think

How innocent she must really be.



You have no idea

That to your Baby

You are the toddler just learning to crawl.







Kimberly Morgan 6-19-08 21:15

How ‘Bout Them Cowgirls…

Once again, I’m turning to song to figure out how to tell people what I really want. The following is an excerpt from George Strait’s “How Bout Them Cowgirls”

“Boy, she don’t need you and she don’t need me
She can do just fine on her own two feet
But she wants a man who wants her to be herself
And she’ll never change, don’t know how to hide
Her stubborn will or her fightin’ side
But you treat her right and she’ll love you like no one else…”

That’s me to a T.

The Eye of the Hurricane

I have recently discovered my new favorite song of the week. I think it aptly describes how I feel right now, once again, in a far superrior way to what I ever could. It’s called Eye of the Hurricane by David Wilcox:

Tank is full, switch is on
Night is warm, cops are gone
Rocket bike is all her own
It’s called a hurricane

She told me once it’s quite a ride
It’s shaped so there’s this place inside
Where if you’re moving you can hide
Safe within the rain

She wants to run away
But there’s nowhere that she can go
Nowhere the pain won’t come again
But she can hide
Hide in the pouring rain
She rides the eye of the hurricane

Tell the truth, explain to me
How you got this need for speed
She laughed and said “it might just be
The next best thing to love.”

Hope is gone and she confessed
When you lay your dream to rest
You can get what’s second best
But it’s hard to get enough

She wants to run away
But there’s nowhere that she can go
Nowhere the pain won’t come again
But she can hide
Hide in the pouring rain
She rides the eye of the hurricane

We saw her ride so fast last night
Racing by a flash of light
Riding quick, the street was dark
A shining truck she thought was parked
It blocked her path, stopped her heart
But not the hurricane

She saw her chance to slip the trap
There was just the room to pass in back
But then it moved, closed the gap
She never felt the pain

She wants to run away
But there’s nowhere that she can go
Nowhere the pain won’t come again
But she can hide
Hide in the pouring rain
She rides the eye of the hurricane
She rides the eye of a hurricane

I couldn’t have said it better myself.

The Story…

I’ve had a few people aske me recently about the title to my blog- how I came up with it and what it means. To start, I should give you the full title:

“fighting to forget… surrendering to remember”

For those of you who know me, you know I’ve seen a lot of sewer-worthy stuff for my relatively short life and you also know the pain and hurt I’ve had to deal with in the last few years. This is where the “fighting to forget” part of the title comes in. I didn’t know what to call it at first, but as I was sitting in front of the computer, my mind completely blank, it was almost as if an audible voice spoke that phrase into my heart. It wasn’t until later, when reading my Bible, that I understoof why God gave that phrase to me:

Not that I have already obtained all of this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead.

Phillippians 3:12-13 NIV

I have a past that I need to let go of. I still have bad habits and thought processes from before I learned to lean on Christ that crop up all too frequently. They are things I know are hindering the growth of my faith and are holding back my relationship with the Father. If I were to let go (“forget”) about these things, I could have so much more life! There are also things that have happened to me, that if I allowed myself to forget instead of holding on to, I would be able to remove a fair amount of bitterness that still dwells in my life.

The above concept is something that I need to do for the sake of my own spiritual growth, but I also nee dot be willing to put that aside if the Lord were to ask it of me- which He does on a regular basis- often several times a day! This is where the second half of the title comes in-

“surrendering to remember”

The passage that most directly correlates with this directive is I Corinthians 9:19-23, but most notable verse 22b:

“I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some”

This creates a very fine line that I must walk (see “Walking the Fine Line” below). I needn’t worry about it, though, because God has never lead me astray. He created the path and put my feet upon it.

The reality is that, in my own personal life, I need to not dwell on my past and need to boldly move forward into this new life I have been handed. Yet, I also need to be willing to surrender to the memories when someone needs to hear them. I can’t tell you how often I’ve heard someone say how good it is to know that someone else had been there. It feels good to know for my own benefit that my pain and the struggles that I have been through to overcome them allow another individual a measure of peace and hope for themselves and where they are at in their own struggles.

I’ve been there- I’ve made those mistakes and I AM NOT PERFECT!!! But I do know what has worked for me and I can offer those things as a step-up for others to find their own means to

“fight to forget and surrender to remember”

*the above was adapted from a letter I wrote to my girls’ group

The Great Gatsby and Putting Pursuit Into Perspective

I was sitting at Caribou (yes- again) and chatting with a friend. We started out on a light topic of books and what we were/had currently been reading. This somehow wound around to the deeper subject love and of a cat-and-mouse relationship that two of our friends are involved in. We were chatting about it for a moment when it finally hit me- their relationship is like one of my favorite books: The Great Gatsby.

For those of you who have not had the pleasure of reading it, I will give you a brief synopsis. It is a tale well-penned by the author F. Scott Fitzgerald. The two main characters you need to know about for the purposes of this blog entry are the title character, Jay Gatsby, and a well-off socialite, Daisy Buchanon. It is set in the 1920’s during a period of opulence. Gatsby is an odd man that you don’t find much about directly, it is more through his indirect relationship with other characters that you learn what type of a man he is. Daisy is a reckless, fairly self-centered well-to-do individual who married a man named Tom for money and status. They met in Louisville in 1917 and Gatsby fell madly in love with her.

Now that you know enough about the two main characters I will be discussing, I shall delve further into the portions that are metaphorically relevent to this entry.

My original interest in the story was as a book for a thesis paper in high school that I had to write for an advanced placement class. The title of my thesis was (I believe- I can’t really remember for sure) The Great Gatsby and the Modern American Dream. I chose this title because I believed there to be a direct correlation between F. Scott Fitzgerald’s work and the way in which America had modernized the “American Dream”. But I digress, I’ll explain more of the book, and you can see where I might have gotten that theory- if there is any interest, I would be willing to post my thesis for discussion)…

The book starts out with Gatsby (he is very rarely referred to as Jay in the book) staring out across a pond at a distant green light. The light is that at the end of the dock of Daisy’s residence. This is symobolically significant because right away within the book, Fitzgerald is letting us know that Gatsby is pining after something. In this case, it is Daisy. We find out as the story continues, that Gatsby fell in love with Daisy many years ago, and has spent his entire life thereafter becoming someone “suitable” for her. He has amassed a great amount of wealth, followed her every move, and even moved to his current residence just so he could be near her. He begins to throw lavish parties in the hope that she will arrive, albeit uninvited (strange dynamic involved here- but to make a long story short- everyone wants what they can’t have)- because, remember, she is a socialite. Eventually she does show up and this is when Gatsby knows the time is right. He begins to somewhat overtly pursue her after that night. On one occasion, inviting her up to his room to show her clipppings he had saved about her, he watches her every move and judges her during this time- and this is where my point begins to be proven, as shown in the following quote:

“There must have been moments even that afternoon when Daisy tumbled short of his dreams — not through her own fault but because of the colossal vitality of his illusion. It had gone beyond her, beyond everything. He had thrown himself into it with a creative passion…”

The book quickly begins to run the rest of it’s course. It covers Daisy and Gatsby’s relationship, the relationship of her husband, Tom, and his mistress, and their awkward love triangle/square. None of these facts are necessary to delve into further than that (although it does make for a fascinating read). Daisy still continues to never fully live up to the dream Gatsby had developed in his mind over the years. Her pedestal was tall and she never could quite reach the top. He still continued the relentless pursuit, but his passion began to wane until it became a pursuit for the sake of pursuit. She begins to slowly realize that she will never be what he wants. And Tom finds out about their affair. He, although involved in his own, is furious at the thought of her infidelity and confronts them both. At this point in time, Gatsby and Daisy leave the place where Tom is and head back to their home (they had all taken a trip). Eventually TOm and a few of their friends begin driving back after them. They find out that the car Gatsby and Daisy had been in struck and killed Tom’s lover. Tom rushes back home to find that Daisy was the one who had been driving when the accident occured, but Gatsby plans to take all of the blame. The next day, Tom tells his lover’s husband that it was Gatbsy that killed his wife (yes- she was also married). He jumps to the conclusion that the one driving the car must have been his wife’s lover and sets out to exact his revenge. He finds Gatsby at home in his pool and shoots him dead before taking his own life.

All right, now that I’ve given a not-so-brief overview of the plot, (sorry for anyone who hasn’t read it- you really should still go out and get it. There is so much more on the pages than I could ever fit into a condensation of the plot) I can get to my point.

As it pertains to the situation, both Gatsby and Daisy represent two of my friends. The one has been pursuing the other for years- and I have no doubt his intentions are good. The other has been “pulling a Daisy” in that she has been doing a whole lot of leading him on but never truly being with him (I forgot to mention that Daisy refuses to leave her husband for Gatsby even though she continues the affair). It has all wound down into a black spiral. Just as in the story, my friend has spent all of these many years in the pursuit of his “Daisy”, and as all do when a pursuit becomes an obsession, he has built her up in his mind. The longer the pursuit lasts, the higher the pedestal becomes. She allows this to continue without giving anything back to him, rather teasing him and giving only the smallest of tastes to keep him craving more. It has become an all-consuming obsession for him now. Friends and other obligations are thrown aside in an attempt to woo her- all to no avail. It has almost become an obsession not of her, but of the pursuit. And she feeds off of it.

Because of this obsession, whenever they get close to developing a relationship, it always folds under its own weight. She falls short of the perfection he has attributed to her in his mind, which causes him to step back from his passions for her. Which causes her to realize that she isn’t on the pedestal, which causes her to be irritated with him, which causes him to even further realize that she isn’t what he had brought himself to believe she was, which causes him to step back more, and… well… you get the idea. Eventually the obsession itself destroys its own object and it implodes- only to be brought back around to a re-culmination when the passion again builds to it’s former level. The passion, obsession, and pursuit kill the dream because it is not grounded in reality, and has reached unhealthy proportions. They don’t realize that they, themselves, are crushing their dreams of a relationship. If they would only step back and put a foot on the ground- the solid ground of reality- and put the pursuit in perspective, they could easily attain the dream they have been seeking after for so long…

(Special thanks to www.sparknotes.com for refreshing my extremely retention-challenged brain)

Walking the Fine Line…

In most people’s lives there is a fine line to walk between two conflicting portions. For some it is between providing for their family with long hours at work, and spending quality time with them. For others it may be balancing between the separate worlds of work and school. Or giving and receiving. For me, it is walking the fine line between who I was and who I want to be.

Let me begin by giving a background for those of you who don’t know who I am. I am a former drug user and compulsive liar. I used to be very easy, drink too much, be very bitter, hate myself, and attract the wrong sort of people. I also, although I believed in the Trinity, also believed that all of the things wrong in my life were due to God trying to punish me. As a result, I decided to try to punish Him through my actions. Most of my choices were very deliberate, and very self-destructive.

It wasn’t until shortly my senior year of high school that I began to clean up my life- due in large part to my youth pastor (Mark Bingham), friends (Laci and Christian), and a couple mentors who really invested in me (Kaye and Gary). It wasn’t the easiest road to recovery, and I fell many times. I know I hurt all of them many times over, and most likely fairly severely. I wasn’t the most open to the advice and help they all tried to give me. Their examples made me want what they had, but my heart wasn’t in a place to be ready for it yet. I still believed that I wasn’t worthy of the happiness that they offered me. I didn’t believe that I was able to receive any sort of progress in my journey to that place because I assumed I had to clean up my life before I could receive any help doing it (crazy- I know- but many of the people in the place where I was would agree with it. We feel that we need to make a major amount of progress before anyone can help us do anything). They all told me through their actions and words that I was wrong and was just fine asking for help the way I was- but I couldn’t bring myself to believe it.

As a result, I walked away from the progress I had made several times. I would become overwhelmed and depressed and realize that I couldn’t do it on my own and then I would give up. I would go back to being exactly the way I had been before- or sometimes even worse. On several occasions I fell back down into heavy drinking, depression, drugs, and other self-destructive behaviors. Eventually I walked away from my positive influences completely. I went back to school where most of my time was spent at bars and parties rather than classes and lectures. I got into a lot of trouble there, and I also met a man I would eventually marry. Because of my “collegiate activities” and the man I was seeing, I eventually left the area and closed myself off to my friends and mentors. I think the thing I was trying to find out was if they would follow me- if they cared enough to chase after me and keep trying to bring me back. They never followed. I know now that this wasn’t their fault- I was extremely difficult to get a hold of and hadn’t made it easy for anyone (I went through several different phone numbers, moved to several locations, and wasn’t really living at any one physical address for any length of time). When they did get a hold of me, I would brush them off citing work or some other prior engagement.

God hadn’t forgotten about me, though. He slowly began turning my life upside down. My marriage began breaking down through my husband’s infidelity and his parents’ controlling tendencies. My family’s normal dysfunction became even more pronounced and my normally close relationship with my father suddenly developed an impenetrable wall. My farm began to finally take flight, only to come to a crash landing very quickly after. Many monetary debts I had wracked up and forgotten about caught up with me. Then the major things happened-

#1- My friend, Drew, was killed in the Iraq War (see Music and Emotion post below to find out more about this amazing man).

#3- Gary passed due to complications arising from a stroke.

#2- My mentor, Kaye, passed of a heart-attack.

It was really Kaye’s passing that brought my life into a sharp focus. She was someone I had viewed as a mother and a friend. One of the only people in my life that showed me what true unconditional love was. She not only loved me but also expected things from me. She was convinced I would make something out of my life (whether I believed her or not).

I had been contemplating a lot of things before I got that phone call, but when I heard Laci’s voice on the other end of the line telling me that Kaye had passed, well, it brought it all into a whole different realm of clarity.

This is another reason I know that God hadn’t forgotten about me. When I walked into that hospital, I saw people I needed to see. These were friends that I hadn’t seen in years, but they were all there and we all immediately began leaning on one another again. It was this immediate re-acceptance that finally brought my soul to the understanding that it didn’t matter what I had done- these people cared about me anyway. And if they cared about me- how much more did God? I began a quick zealous search for what God wanted me to accomplish with my life and discovered a world of happiness more amazing that I could ever imagine.

Well, that brings me to the present. I have found a church that I love and a work within it/through it that I am passionate about. I work with an at-risk group of girls (all of which are between the ages of 12 and 16). This is where I am having a problem walking my line.

When working with these girls (and most other people, really) I need to walk a VERY narrow line between who I was and who I want to be. You see, I need to open up my past to these girls in order for them to relate to me in a positive way that will help stear them away from the destructive paths they are on and closer to God. But, at the same time, I can’t be the person that I was. It’s kind of hard to describe. In order to make any headway with this group of girls I know I need to let a little of the old Kimi show through, but not come through. They need to know that I really do relate to the things that they are going through and I know exactly what they are dealing with, but they also need to know that I am not that way anymore. This is very hard for me. Where do I draw the line with discussions? How do I help them change without making them feel judged? How do I relate without regressing? Sometimes I feel like instead of walking the line, I’m hopping from one side to the other so quickly that it’s hard to tell if I am or not. That won’t work either. I know what these girls need- I know because I needed it. They need love, security, to feel safe, and probably most of all- stability. If I can’t offer them stability, then I can’t offer them anything else. If I can’t find a way to walk that line soon, then they are going to see that I am not that rock they need, and I will have dealt another blow to their relationship (or lack thereof) with Christ. I so desperately wish Kaye was here to help. She always knew how to walk it. She did it so well with me. She knew just how much of her imperfections to show without making it look like she was living life as a hypocrite. She provided the stability I so desperately needed. I so desperately wish I could do that for these kids- my heart aches for them. I know how dark the place is where they are. I just wish I knew how to walk the line…

Ok- I’m FINALLY Going to Do It…

All right- deep breath… in… and out…

I’m finally going to do it…

I’m going to FINISH writing one of the 13 books I’ve started…

I’ve narrowed it down to two possibilities…

One of them is titled “Thanks For the Moon”

and the other one is “Shadow of a Dream”

Which on is more intriguing?

I’m asking ya’ll to help me decide…

Cocoa For the Soul…

Hey la! Hey la! My boyfriend’s back!

I have different ring tones for a lot of people, so I can usually tell if I want to answer or ignore a call without having to look at my phone. Last night I was working in the kitchen when it rang. It was a tone I hadn’t heard in a while (if you’re reading this- don’t worry- that song isn’t your ring… you get the “cool sub sound” you like so much). I immediately grabbed it up to find out what my friend wanted. It turns out he had taken his bike out for a spin to enjoy the gorgeous weather and didn’t get back to the storage unit before they locked up for the night, so he wasn’t able to swap it back for his car. He was bored and wanted to kill some time and thought of giving me a call. He asked if I would like to meet him at Applebee’s just to chat for a while and I agreed.

It was just like old times. The conversation started out stupidly enough (as it always does when he and I get together) and gradually changed to more in-depth, serious topics (again, as always). We discussed our respective churches and churches in general, my girls’ group, his mom, our jobs, the house I’m looking at, the apartments he’s been thinking about, a few friends, motorcycles, his family and a little of mine, our crack-berries, dogs, some current happenings, a little about future plans, travel, and a few other topics.

We really covered a wide range of subjects and the various aspects of each, all with the ease of familiarity and comfort of talking with a close friend. I’ve missed that so much. The night really was like curling up in front of a fireplace with a steaming mug of cocoa for my soul. God is so good to me. He knew that I really needed it. I mean, I believe that I’ve been taking all that has been thrown at me lately with a fair amount of grace and have done a pretty good job (of course with Christ’s help) of keeping a smile on my face and dancing in the puddles of the sorrows Satan has rained into my life this last while, but lately I’ve been feeling the drain of it all. Between the divorce, my job, what is happening with each of my parents, and the stuff with my sister, I’ve been feeling rather isolated. Don’t get me wrong; I have an amazing network of friends, but they are all going through things right now, and the one I’ve been pouring it all out to lately has been rather preoccupied with her boyfriend. I needed something to help refresh and rejuvenate my spirit- and last night was just what the doctor ordered. If I’m completely honest, I was consciously (now, don’t laugh when I say this) thinking about crying. It was really weird, almost like I was having a debate about whether or not I should allow myself to feel like crying- which would lead to crying- which would feel like taking a step toward being depressed and letting these life situations tear me down. But, then Christ came to my rescue (as He always does) and the phone rang. To top it all off- my friend gave me a hug when we said our good-bye’s in the parking lot. It was a nice treat- I usually have to ask him for them. (Thanks dude- you really have no idea how much I needed that…)

I suppose I should explain why I chose quote at the opening of this blog entry. No- he is not my boyfriend. He is a friend, and happens to be a boy, but just a friend nonetheless. The reason I chose it was because the song is so upbeat (or maybe a better word would be up-tempo?) and because I saw a side of my friend that I haven’t seen in a long time. He was open and unguarded the entire time. There was no sense of the extreme jaded-ness I’ve seen in him lately. The cloud was still there, but it was more of the little grey one that he’s always carried around out of concern for his friends and family- it wasn’t the big nasty black one he’s developed recently. I still don’t know why it turned black. Maybe that’s a topic for a further conversation between him and I… But I digress; I more meant the line from the song represents what I feel about the way last night was. We used to have so many conversations just like how that one went. Late nights, starting off with nothing in particular, light airy topics, quite a few jokes and really bad movie lines thrown in, peppered with some random ideas, then the topics slowly become more serious and in depth, until we find ourselves chatting until 1 or 2 am (okay- so it didn’t go that late last night, but heck!- we’re getting old) and our cars have been “warming up” for 2 or 3 hours before we give up and turn them off. I always left those conversations feeling rejuvenated and ready to face the next day. They were my lifeline during that point of my life. I’ve really missed having a lifeline. I’ve really missed him. I hope he’s back to stay…

Music and Emotion…

So, I’ve discovered the wide wonderful world of last.fm and am LOVING it! But that’s not really relevant to this blog…

Occassionally I realize just how much my musical listening habits are just extensions of my emotion- or maybe they are intertwined? It seems that my emotions make me think of/crave songs and, on the flip side, sometimes songs are securely tied to making me feel/remember things.

Okay- I guess last.fm does relate to this post, because it was while listening to a song off my playlist that I started to have a very intense flashback tied to a very intense scene and a veritable emotional roller coaster- sorrow, mourning, frustration, anger, happiness, loss, mirth, and hope.

I was listening to “Home” by Michael Buble and not two lines into the song I burst into tears (it’s a good thing that I hide in the corner to avoid customers when at Caribou anyway). It is a song that brings to mind the boys I have lost to this war. I have several friends that will never again come home, or even now that they are home are not the men who left. Now, don’t get me wrong- they all believed in what they did and I believe in them- so this is definitely NOT and anti-war sentiment. But the one that really jumped out in my memory was that of a man I went to high school at CCS with- Cpl. Andrew Kemple. He passed February 12, 2006 in Tikrit when he was shot in the neck during an attack on his humvee.

I hadn’t seen him in years before I heard the news that he had been KIA. I broke down into a pathetic pile of sobbing mess when I found out. He had been a friend for me when I had needed him most. I had been thinking about trying to find him again for a few months prior (lesson to those of you who have lost touch with a good friend- don’t put off finding them- you never know when it’s going to be too late). I wanted to go to his funeral so badly- but I couldn’t bring myself to do that, so I went to just the reviewal. I don’t do well at funerals- and I found out later that I REALLY wouldn’t have done well at his. After his actual funeral had taken place I was Nick’s house when my dad called to make sure I wasn’t in jail- which I thought was very odd, but then he told me to turn on the TV- and I almost threw it against the wall I was so angry. You see, my friend, Drew, who worked hard to straighten out his life and then lived it being a friend to others, and gave it for something he believed in. My friend, Drew, who was the pale red-head with the always poorly timed joke who walked into school every morning singing “Sex and Candy” by Marcy’s Playground, the one I gave a bloody lip from an icy snowball, the one who was always there with a hug and a kiss on the cheek and an “it’s going to be okay”, that Drew was the very same that a group calling themselves Christians protested his funeral!!! They said that the very God he loved had killed him because of America’s stand on homosexuality!!! I was livid!

These people claim to be Christians- but they couldn’t even let a mother grieve for the loss of her son in peace! The Bible tells us “Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.” Hebrews 12:14. But apparently according to them you can listen to some parts of the Bible and dismiss others. Retarded.

Thankfully, for my sanity, at least, a group calling themselves Patriot Guard Riders have begun showing up at military funerals with the sole purpose of keeping the protesters at bay- I’ve only heard a bit about them, but the couple clips I’ve seen have been of hell’s angel-ish type burly men on motorcycles. Aparantly the followers of Rev. Phelps (yes- it’s a pastor leading these horrible people) only want to bring their “message” when it’s convenient and will give them the most media coverage with the least amount of work- because I haven’t heard of them being at any funeral when the Patriot Guard Riders are present.

Another note- there was supposed to be legislation introduced to make it illegal to protest within a vertain distance of a funeral. I hope and pray to God that it passed, but since this faded out of the media hype so long ago, I don’t know if it did and have been unable to find anything about it- does anyone know the status of it? I would be most grateful if anyone knew off-hand or could show and/or tell me how to navigate the impossible search engine our state calls public-resources. Anyone?

All I know is that I still break down every time I hear certain songs because of the empty spot at bonfires. I haven’t had a snowball fight in years. And I can’t sing Marcy’s Playground without smiling. I also now cry every time I hear of another soldier’s funeral- because I know what their friends and family are going through- but at least they are able to lay their sons and dughters to rest with respect. I also have a weak spot for the lone soldier in a bar- the one that is surrounded by friends, but he’s still on the battle field. I just want to say to them (or you- if you are reading this):

You are my hero. There are more of us who believe in you than you know. Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t be a soldier anymore- we need you here as well. And, most of all,

I UNDERSTAND…

The Star still has a couple of articals archived if you would like to read more about this amazing man or what happened -

http://www.startribune.com/world/11618001.html – More about him

http://www.startribune.com/politics/11758591.html – About the stupidity