Image from Sons and Daughters in Touch, a worthy group that care for the headstones of fallen soldiers for people who live too far from those graves to do so themselves

Memorial Day

As we are all enjoying our long holiday I think that we should think for a moment about our soldiers presently serving in harms way. No matter what we feel about the situation in Iraq, I think we can all agree to say a silent prayer (or just send golden beams of light if you're an athiest) that these men and women return safe... and soon.

I've just come back from a screening of an important new documentary on Darfur, The Devil Came on Horseback. It's a fascinating and informative film about a subject that I believe most people don't know a lot about: the genocide in the Sudan. Told through the eyes, story and most importantly photographs taken by young ex-Marine Brian Steidle while he spent six months as a military observer for the Afircan Union without being overtly politically slanted towards the right or left, it does ask what it will take for all of us to stop the ongoing horrors being perpetrated by the Sudanese govenment against the black African Sudanese in Darfur.

Check your elected leaders' record on Darfur

450,000 are dead
2.5-3 billion have been displaced

To put that into perspective for you, that is around the population of New Orleans Dead and3/4th of the state of Louisiana (or the population of Chicago) displaced. Think about that for a minute.

Oh, and it's still goin on...