Naming

My original intention when I named my blog Kokoro was to post about web media that appealed to the heart and the mind. I've been distracted by poetry recently, but I'm hoping to balance that out. In recent weeks, I've added a link to Salon's broadsheet, a forum about gender issues in the news, and Lisa Cullen's blog, a light-hearted discussion of the modern workplace. When I get back from brunch, I'll add links to several humanitarian organizations that have been quietly addressing diseases that afflict millions of people: Partners in Health, and the Carter Center. A review of Carter's book that calls the Israeli occupation of Palestine apartheid is available online at the New York Review of Books--> see the list of links to your right.

I've been meaning to unsubscribe to the Democrats Abroad Japan mailing list, oh, for about two years now. But they've just sent out a message about a video conference with Barack Obama for American expats. The topic of the talk seems pompous; the purpose--an ill-disguised fund-raising event; and I'm probably being swept away by all the Obama hype, but it's an interesting phenomenon, this multi-racial senator from Illinois. The sign-up page is here.