Theodore Parker and his monumental manifesto. Influences.

One of the invocations of Justice with impressive allure is the assertion that "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice." This phrase keeps cropping up. The Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. frequently used it, crediting the Unitarian minister, Theodore Parker:

"I do not pretend to understand the moral universe: the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends towards Justice."

Parker fought those who sought to justify slavery and oppression from Biblical, or any other, authority. In 1841 he wrote the greatest of the Transcendentalist manifestos, compounding the republicanism of the authors of American Constitution with the liberalism of the true Church. Parker defined democracy, for the first time, as:

"...Government of all the people, by all the people, for all the people."

President Lincoln adopted this phrase in his pithy elimination of the "all", perhaps as a concession to the political reality.

How the Republicans plan to govern: The Same Way

From John Kerry: Yesterday, the Republicans released their "Pledge" of how they'd govern, and Republican Leader John Boehner let the truth slip out:

"We are not going to be any different than what we've been."

They are the gift that just wants to keep giving -- OUR money.

What remains, at the end of a life spent meaning well?

To my friend Quyen, who reminds me of Franklin in France, flirting and writing bagatelle's to the ladies as he negotiated the long-range brass naval canon with which the French battered Cornwallis in Yorktown to its surrender. Franklin visited the estate of the great insect philosopher, Claude-Henri Watelet, in the company of his frequent and vivacious companion, Madame Brillon de Jouy. She was, Quyen, one of the hotties among the educated women of Paris.

Franklin concludes an essay, "The Ephemera", in the voice of one of these insects that only lives for a few hours each day:

"To me, after all my eager pursuits, no solid pleasures now remain, but the reflection of a long life spent in meaning well, the sensible conversation of a few good lady ephemerae, and now and then a kind smile and a tune from the ever amiable Brillante."

Victims of Corporate Fraud - a Compensation Fund

In 2002, after the Halliburton no-bid profiteering in Iraq and the Enron bankruptcy revealed the depths of the Cheney-Lay-Skilling predatory mind-set of CEOs willing to pillage their own companies, AB 55 added a new Section to the California Corporation Code. Section 1502.1 establised the Victims of Corporate Fraud Compensation Fund (VCFCF) in the State Treasury administered by the Secretary of State.

The purpose of the Fund is to provide restitution to the victims of corporate fraud. Once a fraud judgment is obtained, if collection efforts are fruitless, victims can turn to the Fund. Apparently, however, since 2002, no victim has recovered.