There is a great difference between the power which removes the invisible causes of disease, and which is Magic, and that which causes merely external effects [to] disappear, and which is Physic, Sorcery, and Quackery.
Paracelsus [Translated by Franz Hartmann]
Monday, December 31, 2007
Quotes by William James Durant
One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say.
Woe to him who teaches men faster than they can learn.
The family is the nucleus of civilization.
It may be true that you can't fool all the people all the time, but you can fool enough of them to rule a large country.
Moral codes adjust themselves to environmental conditions.
-- Quotes by William James Durant
Woe to him who teaches men faster than they can learn.
The family is the nucleus of civilization.
It may be true that you can't fool all the people all the time, but you can fool enough of them to rule a large country.
Moral codes adjust themselves to environmental conditions.
-- Quotes by William James Durant
Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality
The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. I do not mean the systematic scheme of thought which scholars have doubtfully extracted from his writings. I allude to the wealth of general ideas scattered through them...
Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality, p. 39 [Free Press, 1979];
Manly P. Hall
Every form existing in the diversified sphere of being is symbolic of the divine activity by which it is produced.
Manly P. Hall
Manly P. Hall
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Darwinism is the doctrine of natural selection and physical evolution. It has been said of Charles Robert Darwin that he determined to banish spirit altogether from the universe and make the infinite and omnipresent Mind itself synonymous with the all-pervading powers of an impersonal Nature.
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Sir Francis Bacon, Atheism
A little philosophy inclineth a man's mind to atheism; but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion.
Sir Francis Bacon, Atheism
Sir Francis Bacon, Atheism
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
I think only in movies is horror vocal.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
High calls low and low calls high .... The lower you are, the higher your mind will want to soar. It was natural that, bereft and desperate as I was, in the throes of unremitting suffering, I should turn to God.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
What a terrible thing it is to botch a farewell.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
High calls low and low calls high .... The lower you are, the higher your mind will want to soar. It was natural that, bereft and desperate as I was, in the throes of unremitting suffering, I should turn to God.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
What a terrible thing it is to botch a farewell.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Freeman, TheFreemanPerspective.Blogspot.com
There is no corporatism without Freemasonry, and they are the head of the fascist state.
Freeman, TheFreemanPerspective.Blogspot.com
Freeman, TheFreemanPerspective.Blogspot.com
Dr. Walter J. Kilner, The Human Atmosphere
HARDLY one person in ten thousand is aware that he or she is enveloped by a haze intimately connected with the body, whether asleep or awake, whether hot or cold, which, although invisible under ordinary circumstances, can be seen when conditions are favourable. This mist, the prototype of the nimbus or halo constantly depicted around saints, has been manifest to certain individuals possessing a specially gifted sight, who in consequence have received the title of "Clairvoyants," and until quite recently to no one else. This cloud or atmosphere, generally termed the AURA, is the subject of this treatise, in so far as it can be perceived by the employment of screens containing a peculiar chemical substance in solution. It may be stated at once that the writer does not make the slightest claim to clairvoyancy; nor is he an occultist; and he specially desires to impress upon his readers that his researches have been entirely physical, and can be repeated by any one who takes sufficient interest in the subject.
Dr. Walter J. Kilner, The Human Atmosphere
Dr. Walter J. Kilner, The Human Atmosphere
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Pythagorus taught that the dot symbolized the power of the number 1, the line the power of the number 2, the surface, the power of the number 3, and the solid the power of the number 4.
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
The first step in obtaining the numerical value of a word is to resolve it back into its original tongue. Only words of Greek or Hebrew derivation can be successfully analyzed by this method, and all words must be spelled in their most ancient and complete forms. Old Testament words and names, therefore, must be translated back into the early Hebrew characters and New Testament words into the Greek.
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Godfrey Higgins, Anacalypsis
The first striking circumstance in which the history of Pythagoras agrees with the history of Jesus is, that they were natives of nearly the same county; the former being born at Sidon, the latter at Bethlehem, both in Sytria. The father of Pythgoras, as well as the father of Jesus, was prophetically informed that his wife should bring forth a son, who should be a benefactor to mankind. They were both born when their mothers were from home on journeys, Joseph and his wife having gone up to Bethlehem to be taxed, and the father of Pythagoras having travelled from Samos, his residence, to Sidon, about his mercantile concerns. Pythais [Pythasis], the mother of Pythagorus, had a connexion with an Apolloniacal spectre, or ghost, of the God Apollo, or God Sol (of course this must have been a holy ghost, and here we have the Holy Ghost) which, afterward appeared to her husband, and told him that he must have no connexion with his wife during her pregancy -- a story evidently the same as that relating to Joseph and Mary. From theses peculiar circumstances, Pythagorus was known by the same title as Jesus, namely, the son of God; and was supposed by the multitutde to be under the influence of Divine inspiration.
Godfrey Higgins, Anacalypsis
Godfrey Higgins, Anacalypsis
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
Paper money makes possible a money supply that can be made to increase at substantally the same rate as the supply of goods and services in the economy increases. Paper money makes possible a money supply that can be made to increase substantially as the Monetary Authority of a country wants it to increase. Paper money (in contrast to gold or silver money) makes "monetary stability" an achievable goal. Paper money is one of the great inventions of all time.
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
It is no more necessary that money have intrinsic alue than it is for a postage stamp, a bus token, or an airplane ticket.
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
William F. Hixson, It's Your Money
Michael Tsarion
The stronger a light shines, the more darkness and dirt it will reveal.
Michael Tsarion
Michael Tsarion
Hugh McCulloch, 1868
I look upon an irredeemable paper currency as an evil .... Gold and silver are the only true money. I have no doubt that these metals were prepared by the Almighty for this very purpose.
Hugh McCulloch, Secretary of the Treasury of the United States. 1868
Hugh McCulloch, Secretary of the Treasury of the United States. 1868
Preable to Bank of Canada Act
The preamble of the Bank of Canada Act establishes its goal:
... to control and protect the external value of the national monetary unit and to mitigate by its influence fluctuations in the general level of production, trade, prices and employment, so far as may be possible within the scope of monetary action.
William Krehm, The Bank of Canada -- A Misused Tool
... to control and protect the external value of the national monetary unit and to mitigate by its influence fluctuations in the general level of production, trade, prices and employment, so far as may be possible within the scope of monetary action.
William Krehm, The Bank of Canada -- A Misused Tool
Friday, December 21, 2007
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
As institutions for the dissemination of ethical culture, the pagan Mysteries were the architects of civilization. Their power and dignity were personified in CHiram Abiff -- the Master builder -- but they eventually fell a victim to the onslaughts of that recurrent trio of state, church, and mob ....
When the mob governs, man is ruled by ignorance; when the church governs, he is ruled by superstition; and when the state governs, he is ruled by fear ....
The perfect government of the earth must be patterned eventually after that divine government by which the un iverse is ordered. In that day when perfect order is reestablished,
with peace universal and good triumphant, men will no longer seek for happiness, for they shall find it welling up within themselves.
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
When the mob governs, man is ruled by ignorance; when the church governs, he is ruled by superstition; and when the state governs, he is ruled by fear ....
The perfect government of the earth must be patterned eventually after that divine government by which the un iverse is ordered. In that day when perfect order is reestablished,
with peace universal and good triumphant, men will no longer seek for happiness, for they shall find it welling up within themselves.
Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Any zookeeper will tell you that a tiger, indeed any cat, will not attack in the face of a direct stare but will wait until the deer or antelope or wild ox has turned its eyes.
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
You can get used to anything -- haven't I already said that? Isn't that what all survivors say?
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
You can get used to anything -- haven't I already said that? Isn't that what all survivors say?
Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Thursday, December 13, 2007
Century of the Self
Just beyond the icy gates of winter, lies the open hearth of Christmas cheer ...
Freud and the Subconscious Mind
In the 1920s, Sigmund Freud discovered the subconscious mind. According to Freud it was the seat of man's drives -- essentially, his animal instincts. If men and women were to live together in collective peace, these drives had to be kept heartily in check. The intellectual elite, such as himself, I suppose, would have to devise ways to suppress these dangerous and anti-social drives. A rival of Freud, who died in a jail at the age of 60, Wilhelm Reich, believed in the subconscious; but, unlike Freud, believed that it was the seat of positive emotions, i.e. the essence of what makes us human (love, peace, forgiveness, generousity, etc.). Reich believed that the good instincts of humankind were supressed because the system, the social infrastructure, if you will, itself was very oppresive. Freud and Reich diverged to such an extent that, though Reich was originally a student of Freud's in university (in Austria) they eventually parted ways because of their differences in philosophy.
Bernays and Propaganda
Enter Edward Bernays. Bernays was a nephew of Sigmund Freud who often visited him at his university in Austria. Bernays was keen to understand the psyche of man because he was involved in the propaganda industry. The term propaganda had such a bad name, even in the 1920s that Bernays, in attempting to give the field some legitimacy, renamed it "public relations." Nowadays most governments, including our own, have public relations offices. This is the legacy of Edward Bernays, who, it is said, is "the father of public relations".
Bernays is one of the unsung heroes, or villains, depending on your perspective, of the last century. Not only did Bernays found the public relations office for governments -- used by both good and bad governments -- but he helped the advertising industry gain the stronghold that it has today over our young generations minds. It was he who borrowed his uncle's knowledge of the human psyche -- its subconscious desires -- and used them to manipulate, not individuals, but large groups of people, i.e. the masses.
His most famous coup was the breaking of the taboo of women smoking cigarettes. In the early 20th century many tobacco companies were happy that World War I brought them at least one thing: men returned home from the frontlines addicted to cigarettes -- as these were doled out freely to them in the frontlines. The problem for the tobacco industry was that only half the population was now hooked; what about the women? It was one of Bernays first assignments to get women smoking just like the men. Bernays knew just what to do, he consulted his uncle. But, when Freud was unavailable, he went to several of the most famous psycho-analysts in New York, where he lived. He asked them: "Why don't women smoke cigarettes?" Bernays was told that women don't smoke because it was a social taboo; attack the taboo, and you can get them smoking.
Bernays went to work. He wielded seemingly incredible power, or perhaps he just had unlimited funding from his tobacco employers, that he hired the most famous 'debutants' in New York, and gathered all the major media outlets for publicity stunt at a special parade that was being held in New York. It was important that the parade be about freedom and Bernays called cigarettes, "torches of freedom". Here, he was tapping into the subconscious desire for women to have freedom. It does not need to be stated that women, especially in the early 20th century were and incredibly suppressed demographic. The propaganda stunt worked, and women have been paying for with their lungs ever since; especially teenage women, and especially in countries like Canada.
Convincing, or persuading people, to buy things they don't need was at the heart of Bernays work. It is the hallmark of the consumer society we live in. The consumerist crescendo reaches its peak, appropriately at the end of the year. There is more to learn about the legacy of Bernays in his manipulation of the masses. Check out google video: “The Century of the Self”, but Adam Curtis of BBC Television.
Freud and the Subconscious Mind
In the 1920s, Sigmund Freud discovered the subconscious mind. According to Freud it was the seat of man's drives -- essentially, his animal instincts. If men and women were to live together in collective peace, these drives had to be kept heartily in check. The intellectual elite, such as himself, I suppose, would have to devise ways to suppress these dangerous and anti-social drives. A rival of Freud, who died in a jail at the age of 60, Wilhelm Reich, believed in the subconscious; but, unlike Freud, believed that it was the seat of positive emotions, i.e. the essence of what makes us human (love, peace, forgiveness, generousity, etc.). Reich believed that the good instincts of humankind were supressed because the system, the social infrastructure, if you will, itself was very oppresive. Freud and Reich diverged to such an extent that, though Reich was originally a student of Freud's in university (in Austria) they eventually parted ways because of their differences in philosophy.
Bernays and Propaganda
Enter Edward Bernays. Bernays was a nephew of Sigmund Freud who often visited him at his university in Austria. Bernays was keen to understand the psyche of man because he was involved in the propaganda industry. The term propaganda had such a bad name, even in the 1920s that Bernays, in attempting to give the field some legitimacy, renamed it "public relations." Nowadays most governments, including our own, have public relations offices. This is the legacy of Edward Bernays, who, it is said, is "the father of public relations".
Bernays is one of the unsung heroes, or villains, depending on your perspective, of the last century. Not only did Bernays found the public relations office for governments -- used by both good and bad governments -- but he helped the advertising industry gain the stronghold that it has today over our young generations minds. It was he who borrowed his uncle's knowledge of the human psyche -- its subconscious desires -- and used them to manipulate, not individuals, but large groups of people, i.e. the masses.
His most famous coup was the breaking of the taboo of women smoking cigarettes. In the early 20th century many tobacco companies were happy that World War I brought them at least one thing: men returned home from the frontlines addicted to cigarettes -- as these were doled out freely to them in the frontlines. The problem for the tobacco industry was that only half the population was now hooked; what about the women? It was one of Bernays first assignments to get women smoking just like the men. Bernays knew just what to do, he consulted his uncle. But, when Freud was unavailable, he went to several of the most famous psycho-analysts in New York, where he lived. He asked them: "Why don't women smoke cigarettes?" Bernays was told that women don't smoke because it was a social taboo; attack the taboo, and you can get them smoking.
Bernays went to work. He wielded seemingly incredible power, or perhaps he just had unlimited funding from his tobacco employers, that he hired the most famous 'debutants' in New York, and gathered all the major media outlets for publicity stunt at a special parade that was being held in New York. It was important that the parade be about freedom and Bernays called cigarettes, "torches of freedom". Here, he was tapping into the subconscious desire for women to have freedom. It does not need to be stated that women, especially in the early 20th century were and incredibly suppressed demographic. The propaganda stunt worked, and women have been paying for with their lungs ever since; especially teenage women, and especially in countries like Canada.
Convincing, or persuading people, to buy things they don't need was at the heart of Bernays work. It is the hallmark of the consumer society we live in. The consumerist crescendo reaches its peak, appropriately at the end of the year. There is more to learn about the legacy of Bernays in his manipulation of the masses. Check out google video: “The Century of the Self”, but Adam Curtis of BBC Television.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Mark Twain
"Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect."
Mark Twain
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
According to Sextus Empyricus, the Trojan war was fought over a statue of the moon goddess. For this lunar Helena, and not for a woman, the Greeks and Trojans struggled at the gates of Troy.
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
... the story of Noah and his ark is a cosmic allegory concerning the repopulation of planets at the beginning of each world period ...
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
... the story of Noah and his ark is a cosmic allegory concerning the repopulation of planets at the beginning of each world period ...
Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages
Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass
"The powers of the world are very strong. Men and women are moved by tides much fiercer than you can imagine, and they sweep us all up into their current. Keep your own counsel."
from Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass
from Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass
Friday, December 07, 2007
The Politics of Being Merry
Just beyond the icy gates of winter, lies the open hearth of Christmas cheer. Or so goes, at least, the age-old lore. There is a vague, but persistent, lament that the great mangler and twister of human tradition -- otherwise known as "progress" -- has transformed the hearth into a stony altar of consumerism, as cold and unforgiving as winter itself. It is upon this altar, continues the lament, that the spiritual essence of the holiday is ritually and mercilessly sacrificed.
Is this lament a universal one? Is it shared by each of us, in the muted voicings of our inner "social critic"? But wait! Before we can answer, the critic makes another parry at the behemoth of collective life. "Do not the ritual sacrifices of modern life (always carried out under the aegis of the High Priest of Progress) extend beyond the consumerist crescendo of Christmas? Almost daily we witness other comparable rituals -- for example, in film and music, we constantly watch art being sacrificed at the altar of entertainment, and in the political realm, we watch our once jealously guarded freedoms being sacrificed at the altar of security."
But, the lament turns into trepidation as our inner social critic asks, "Has our society become more 'cult' than 'culture'?" In spite of the myriad examples in our daily life that provide an affirmative answer to this question, our inner social critic, having turned from lamentation to trepidation, settles on a kind of downtrodden complacency as it braces itself for the onrush of society's year end festivities.
Mass Market Manipulation
In the battlefield of history, the human spirit has been surprisingly resistant to overt displays of force. But, out of the wreckage of human conflict emerged a force more powerful than the iron fists of papal and imperial rule. This is the seductive force of persuasion.
Persuasion is the 'light', the 'heat', the very 'Sun' around which revolve the orbs of society's marketing agencies. Much like the namesakes of the orbs of our solar system, these agencies appear as 'gods' atop the 'mountain' of 'Corporate Olympus', from which high societal perch they intervene daily in the fortunes of us all.
The predominant discourse in our society is not scientific, nor political, nor religious, the predominant, some would say tyrannical, voice of social discourse is advertising. Buy! Buy! We must buy and be merry!
But are we merry? We laugh and realize the laughter does not come from within. We dance and suddenly feel empty. It is at Christmas that we are confronted with this feeling of emptiness in spite of the abundance of the season.
The age of consumerism began in the 1920s when Edward Bernays attempted to sell cigarettes to women -- who up until that time were much too intelligent to take up the habit. Bernays tapped into the subconscious desires of self he heard about from his uncle Sigmund Freud. As a result, women, who simply wouldn't touch cigarettes, couldn't get their fill of "Torches of Freedom" as Bernays renamed them and sold them through celebrity endorsement and mainstream media. The transformation of cigarettes into "torches of freedom" in one blink of the public eye was to form the paradigm for the manipulation of the masses through marketing based on the association of a product or service with subconscious desires.
Author David Kupelian summed up modern marketing as "manipulating the emotions and thereby restructuring the thoughts and beliefs of large numbers of people.” Car companies don't sell cars but status, power and sex; insurance companies don't sell monetary compensation for material losses but "peace of mind"; soft-drink companies, among others, don't sell soft drinks but celebrity; clothing stores don't sell clothes but style. The filling of the voids in ourselves has been called "the pursuit of happiness" -- and it has collectively been agreed upon to be the ultimate objective of life.
The True Hearth of Christmas
How do we overcome this consumerism? How do we get back to being our true selves? The void of longing and desire that we have been socially conditioned -- through advertising -- to believe is our "self" is, in fact, not our true nature. Perhaps this is why, since God first wound nature's clock, most major religions have taught that this type of "self" is an illusion, something that must be overcome if we are to succeed on our journey towards the realization of who we really are.
In fact, buried deep within us is only energy -- hampered by the very walls we build in order to protect it. An energy that each of us -- as we are ever so gradually recruited from birth into the 'survival game' of modern life -- are encouraged to forget. It is an energy of which, in the seemingly boundless vocabulary of the English language, only two words, "love" and "spirit", provide a vague attempt at representation. Perhaps "hope" is a third. It is an energy only vaguely hinted at in the boy-meets-girl romances of movies and novels that we are socially conditioned to believe is love.
It is an energy whose vibrations every writer, every composer, every master of the fine arts has attempted to mimic; it is a primordial and creative energy -- a microcosm of the very Chaos that was the source of all creation; it is an energy that sits as an ocean in the vast basin of our hearts, but wells up into our eyes when we see the good deeds and selfless works of those who are moved by it (the same energy that causes our eyes to smile through those tears); it is an energy that the world's great leaders have tapped into, like so much oil, in the vast reserves of the human heart, and that has served as 'spiritual fuel' for the Golden Age of Man (and Woman), which was perhaps a prologue to history. It is an energy too pure to be sullied by distinctions of race, ethnicity, age, gender, colour, political views. It is an energy that spreads beyond our finger tips and toe tips, above our heads and beneath our feet to form a "spritual internet" that connects us all; it is an energy that creates out of each of us an artist, to paint, with the abundant palette of experience, on the canvas of space and time; it is an energy shared by every individual, of which the 'hearth of Christmas' -- if it burns still -- is but a collective holographic projection.
Is it not one of irony's cruel twists that the epic myths and legends of man (and woman) stand as imitative monuments to this undying energy of love and spirit; while, the social infrastructure of humanity, the 'world system', if you will, stands before each individual as a kind of rampart against the spirit for which a single life of 60, 70, or 80 years seems all too short a time to overcome? Is the human spirit forever plagued to swim against the torrential stream of avarice in the world; and like the salmon, only live long enough, upon reaching the destination, to sow the seeds of the next generation? It appears that the poetic observation of Robert Browning rings as inescapably true in our era of 'technological marvels' as in any other: "Man's reach must exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for."
But, perhaps Christmas is a time for us to peer over the spiritual rampart we have built for ourselves, and to gaze at the 'promised land' -- the final destination of our 'spiritual salmon' -- a land where spirits bask in the glow of their collective light; where the currency of love dwarfs the currency of money; and no one's light is dimmed by the spirit-draining business, or 'busy-ness', of daily life; where words of warmth are exchanged as easily as we exchange words of weather, and the emperor of our world, 'Fear,' stands clotheless, exposed in all his frailty and feebleness.
Just beyond the icy gates of winter, as another year is coaxed to sleep by the lullaby of time, may you catch the gaze of a stranger and share a moment's warmth. May you nestle in the arms of those you love, and have them see the flames of your 'spiritual fire' in the windows of your eyes. And in the warmth, may you remove the protective vestments of cold, hard experience and bask in the much lighter attire of a long-forgotten, but undying, innocence; the kind of innocence only children, our greatest treasure, remain unembarrassed to display.
"[F]or it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than Christmas," writes Dickens in A Christmas Carol, his literary monument to the season, "when its mighty Founder was a child himself."
Finally, cherished reader, let the 'Dollar Almighty' have the rest of the year to rule with its iron, or, rather, 'golden' fist. Christmas is a time for Spirit to reign supreme.
Is this lament a universal one? Is it shared by each of us, in the muted voicings of our inner "social critic"? But wait! Before we can answer, the critic makes another parry at the behemoth of collective life. "Do not the ritual sacrifices of modern life (always carried out under the aegis of the High Priest of Progress) extend beyond the consumerist crescendo of Christmas? Almost daily we witness other comparable rituals -- for example, in film and music, we constantly watch art being sacrificed at the altar of entertainment, and in the political realm, we watch our once jealously guarded freedoms being sacrificed at the altar of security."
But, the lament turns into trepidation as our inner social critic asks, "Has our society become more 'cult' than 'culture'?" In spite of the myriad examples in our daily life that provide an affirmative answer to this question, our inner social critic, having turned from lamentation to trepidation, settles on a kind of downtrodden complacency as it braces itself for the onrush of society's year end festivities.
Mass Market Manipulation
In the battlefield of history, the human spirit has been surprisingly resistant to overt displays of force. But, out of the wreckage of human conflict emerged a force more powerful than the iron fists of papal and imperial rule. This is the seductive force of persuasion.
Persuasion is the 'light', the 'heat', the very 'Sun' around which revolve the orbs of society's marketing agencies. Much like the namesakes of the orbs of our solar system, these agencies appear as 'gods' atop the 'mountain' of 'Corporate Olympus', from which high societal perch they intervene daily in the fortunes of us all.
The predominant discourse in our society is not scientific, nor political, nor religious, the predominant, some would say tyrannical, voice of social discourse is advertising. Buy! Buy! We must buy and be merry!
But are we merry? We laugh and realize the laughter does not come from within. We dance and suddenly feel empty. It is at Christmas that we are confronted with this feeling of emptiness in spite of the abundance of the season.
The age of consumerism began in the 1920s when Edward Bernays attempted to sell cigarettes to women -- who up until that time were much too intelligent to take up the habit. Bernays tapped into the subconscious desires of self he heard about from his uncle Sigmund Freud. As a result, women, who simply wouldn't touch cigarettes, couldn't get their fill of "Torches of Freedom" as Bernays renamed them and sold them through celebrity endorsement and mainstream media. The transformation of cigarettes into "torches of freedom" in one blink of the public eye was to form the paradigm for the manipulation of the masses through marketing based on the association of a product or service with subconscious desires.
Author David Kupelian summed up modern marketing as "manipulating the emotions and thereby restructuring the thoughts and beliefs of large numbers of people.” Car companies don't sell cars but status, power and sex; insurance companies don't sell monetary compensation for material losses but "peace of mind"; soft-drink companies, among others, don't sell soft drinks but celebrity; clothing stores don't sell clothes but style. The filling of the voids in ourselves has been called "the pursuit of happiness" -- and it has collectively been agreed upon to be the ultimate objective of life.
The True Hearth of Christmas
How do we overcome this consumerism? How do we get back to being our true selves? The void of longing and desire that we have been socially conditioned -- through advertising -- to believe is our "self" is, in fact, not our true nature. Perhaps this is why, since God first wound nature's clock, most major religions have taught that this type of "self" is an illusion, something that must be overcome if we are to succeed on our journey towards the realization of who we really are.
In fact, buried deep within us is only energy -- hampered by the very walls we build in order to protect it. An energy that each of us -- as we are ever so gradually recruited from birth into the 'survival game' of modern life -- are encouraged to forget. It is an energy of which, in the seemingly boundless vocabulary of the English language, only two words, "love" and "spirit", provide a vague attempt at representation. Perhaps "hope" is a third. It is an energy only vaguely hinted at in the boy-meets-girl romances of movies and novels that we are socially conditioned to believe is love.
It is an energy whose vibrations every writer, every composer, every master of the fine arts has attempted to mimic; it is a primordial and creative energy -- a microcosm of the very Chaos that was the source of all creation; it is an energy that sits as an ocean in the vast basin of our hearts, but wells up into our eyes when we see the good deeds and selfless works of those who are moved by it (the same energy that causes our eyes to smile through those tears); it is an energy that the world's great leaders have tapped into, like so much oil, in the vast reserves of the human heart, and that has served as 'spiritual fuel' for the Golden Age of Man (and Woman), which was perhaps a prologue to history. It is an energy too pure to be sullied by distinctions of race, ethnicity, age, gender, colour, political views. It is an energy that spreads beyond our finger tips and toe tips, above our heads and beneath our feet to form a "spritual internet" that connects us all; it is an energy that creates out of each of us an artist, to paint, with the abundant palette of experience, on the canvas of space and time; it is an energy shared by every individual, of which the 'hearth of Christmas' -- if it burns still -- is but a collective holographic projection.
Is it not one of irony's cruel twists that the epic myths and legends of man (and woman) stand as imitative monuments to this undying energy of love and spirit; while, the social infrastructure of humanity, the 'world system', if you will, stands before each individual as a kind of rampart against the spirit for which a single life of 60, 70, or 80 years seems all too short a time to overcome? Is the human spirit forever plagued to swim against the torrential stream of avarice in the world; and like the salmon, only live long enough, upon reaching the destination, to sow the seeds of the next generation? It appears that the poetic observation of Robert Browning rings as inescapably true in our era of 'technological marvels' as in any other: "Man's reach must exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for."
But, perhaps Christmas is a time for us to peer over the spiritual rampart we have built for ourselves, and to gaze at the 'promised land' -- the final destination of our 'spiritual salmon' -- a land where spirits bask in the glow of their collective light; where the currency of love dwarfs the currency of money; and no one's light is dimmed by the spirit-draining business, or 'busy-ness', of daily life; where words of warmth are exchanged as easily as we exchange words of weather, and the emperor of our world, 'Fear,' stands clotheless, exposed in all his frailty and feebleness.
Just beyond the icy gates of winter, as another year is coaxed to sleep by the lullaby of time, may you catch the gaze of a stranger and share a moment's warmth. May you nestle in the arms of those you love, and have them see the flames of your 'spiritual fire' in the windows of your eyes. And in the warmth, may you remove the protective vestments of cold, hard experience and bask in the much lighter attire of a long-forgotten, but undying, innocence; the kind of innocence only children, our greatest treasure, remain unembarrassed to display.
"[F]or it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than Christmas," writes Dickens in A Christmas Carol, his literary monument to the season, "when its mighty Founder was a child himself."
Finally, cherished reader, let the 'Dollar Almighty' have the rest of the year to rule with its iron, or, rather, 'golden' fist. Christmas is a time for Spirit to reign supreme.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
His Royal Highness
Q. What does it take to become leader of the "Free World?"
A. 100 million dollars.
I would say that kind of levels the playing field, wouldn't you?
Without that kind of money -- mere pocket change for most of us -- the media will ignore your campaign in search of political dialogue (I use that term very lightly) more profitable to their bottom line.
And one more layer of deception in the sham of modern democracy falls asunder ...
But, for more on exactly what it takes to become President of the United States, we have to all the way back 20 years for a Washington Times story (published on 6 July 1988) that is perhaps more relevant today than it was then. It reads, in part:
Bush Related to Europe's Royal Blood
"Vice-President George Bush is a distant cousin of Queen Elizabeth II and has blood ties with every other European royal family on or off the throne, according to the publishing director of a blueblood directory ... Harold Brooks-Baker, an American who has made a name for himself analyzing royal lineages, especially where they link up with the White House.
"Without a shadow of a doubt, Vice-President George Bush is connected to more imperial, royal, and noble houses than any previous president."
This week [Mr. Brooks-Baker] released a copy of Mr. Bush's family tree traced by his directory, Burke's Peerage, back to the 1400's. It says that Mr. Bush is a long-lost relative -- 13th cousin twice removed -- of Britain's current monarch, and is a direct descendant of King Henry VII, of one of Charles II's mistresses and of Henry VIII's younger sister, Mary, who married King Louis XII of France ...
Mr. Brook Baker said that while very few Americans are descendants of European monarchy, "An unbelievably high proportion of American presidents are connected to the 'Blood Royal."
Mr. Bush is without doubt connected to more great royal families than any reigning head of state today except His Serene Highness Prince Franz Josef of Liechtenstein. The vice-president also is related to 21 of Britain's 26 dukes, he said."
A. 100 million dollars.
I would say that kind of levels the playing field, wouldn't you?
Without that kind of money -- mere pocket change for most of us -- the media will ignore your campaign in search of political dialogue (I use that term very lightly) more profitable to their bottom line.
And one more layer of deception in the sham of modern democracy falls asunder ...
But, for more on exactly what it takes to become President of the United States, we have to all the way back 20 years for a Washington Times story (published on 6 July 1988) that is perhaps more relevant today than it was then. It reads, in part:
Bush Related to Europe's Royal Blood
"Vice-President George Bush is a distant cousin of Queen Elizabeth II and has blood ties with every other European royal family on or off the throne, according to the publishing director of a blueblood directory ... Harold Brooks-Baker, an American who has made a name for himself analyzing royal lineages, especially where they link up with the White House.
"Without a shadow of a doubt, Vice-President George Bush is connected to more imperial, royal, and noble houses than any previous president."
This week [Mr. Brooks-Baker] released a copy of Mr. Bush's family tree traced by his directory, Burke's Peerage, back to the 1400's. It says that Mr. Bush is a long-lost relative -- 13th cousin twice removed -- of Britain's current monarch, and is a direct descendant of King Henry VII, of one of Charles II's mistresses and of Henry VIII's younger sister, Mary, who married King Louis XII of France ...
Mr. Brook Baker said that while very few Americans are descendants of European monarchy, "An unbelievably high proportion of American presidents are connected to the 'Blood Royal."
Mr. Bush is without doubt connected to more great royal families than any reigning head of state today except His Serene Highness Prince Franz Josef of Liechtenstein. The vice-president also is related to 21 of Britain's 26 dukes, he said."
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Lyle Longclaws
"... before the healing can take place, the poison must first be exposed."
Lyle Longclaws
Lyle Longclaws
Saturday, November 10, 2007
Five Foundations of Human Development
Five Foundations of Human Development
Errol A. Gibbs and Philip A. Grey
Published by AuthorHouse
595 pages
Price?
Five Foundations of Human Development (FFHD) is an ambitous project -- eleven years in the making -- that, in the words of the authors, "offers hope for the survival of humanity in the 21st century and the new millennium."
Scientific Ecclesiastes
Shall we begin with Ecclesiastes? I think so.
The author of the Book of Ecclesiastes, identified as “the Philosopher”, evinces the spirit of modern day scientific inquiry when he declares in Chapter 1 verse 12, "I determined that I would examine and study all the things that are done in this world."
Perhaps not so characteristic of the modern age -- at least not of academicians that govern scientific dialogue from their (proverbial) ivory towers -- "the Philosopher" presents us with the conclusion of his study in verses 17-18,"But I found out that I might as well be chasing the wind. The wiser you are, the more worries you have; the more you know, the more it hurts."
Gibbs and Grey, authors of FFHD, interpret the Philosopher's conclusion as demonstrating "the intrinsic links between advancements in material knowledge and the Spiritual decline of nations." And further, "The fall of the great empires of the ancient world is a testament to this correlation, and an illustration of the futility of a society that abandons God's plan for human survival."
This interpretation provides an undercurrent to many of the thoughts and ideas in the book, and appears to be a primary motivation for Gibbs and Grey's entire oeuvre. Follow me.
Spirituality
The first and primary theme of the book deals with that collective side of ourselves, most conspicuous in so-called primitive societies, that celebrates our spiritual nature as the central and organizing principle of our societies. It is within these very societies, and under the leadership of ”spiritual man”, that the Abrahamic religions -- Judaism, Christianity, and Islam -- were founded.
Yet, in our modern or "advanced" age, humanity awakens, with each new generation, to find itself adrift on the vast ocean of existence, and under the captaincy of an entirely new creature, “scientific man”, if you will, or “materialistic man”-- that side of ourselves that places material knowledge as society's highest value.
Gibbs and Grey make the point that this chameleon-like transformation leaves humanity feeling cut off at the "source" and the authors' fivefold path to human development is an attempt to return to a more spiritual age, where former chief protagonist, the spiritual person, is allowed once again to take the lead on the world's stage. The result just might be that humanity would come full circle, as it were, with our collective eyes more open, and better for the experience. I am reminded here of a literary allusion to this possibility in a few of the sunset lines of T.S. Eliot's Fourth Quartet, Little Gidding,
"We shall not cease from exploration,
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time."
Morality
The second theme of the book, the disparity of material wealth among nations, the author's attribute to the "accumulation of superfluous wealth" among nations of the West. This theme is related to the second foundation of FFHD, namely morality -- just as the first theme is related to the first foundation, namely spirituality (more on the foundations proper later).
At the very heart of the book, pp. 273-5, we find what is perhaps its thematic climax. The responsibility to attain a more equitable distribution of wealth, say the authors, is essentially a spiritual one and "flows from the heart."
Here, the authors marry the themes of spirituality and morality by saying that the way our spirituality is realized in this material world is via ethical/moral behavior or, alternatively, the recognition of our spiritual nature is what leads us to behave morally in this material world of God's creation. This link at the heart of the book between the two major themes, is, in the opinion of this reader, almost ethereal in its brilliance. Brilliant for reasons not the least of which is that it affords the opportunity for everyone in our society to be a leader.
The authors point out that this universal law of human experience is summed up in the equally universal moral code of all the major world religions; namely "Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets." Matthew 7:12
The spiritual essence of this universal moral code is that it places people above material wants and desires and begs the rhetorical question, "What kind of 'heaven' (i.e., what a wonderful spiritual experience) life in this world could be if people were as important, or more important, than money."
Fuller Disclosure
It is, no doubt, the many years of experience -- both as humans and Christians (not that these are mutually exclusive!) -- under the authors' collective belts that allow them to speak so authoritatively not only on fundamental issues surrounding their faith, but on other topics they have tackled in the book, topics as diverse as education and technology, economics and health.
Canute B. Blake, in his foreword to the book, says "Grey and Gibbs have combined world travel experience in various countries within North and South America, Europe, Asia, the Caribbean and Africa." The authors, however, and perhaps disappointingly for the reader, have chosen to keep their experiences to themselves! The book, therefore, lacks the very persuasive influence of the human voice. The writing comes across as mildly dogmatic, monotone, bathed in a certain prosaic abstraction that "drowns out" the authors' very inspiring themes.
The authors may have knowingly sacrificed a more personal perspective for the 'foundational' one they were trying to achieve, but, in the opinion of this reader, the sacrifice was not necessary. The religious experience is, after all, one of the most personal of all experiences.
Nevertheless, we find the following lines written on page 95. After explaining how "Love begins with God", the authors assert "We will know that God's love is working in us and through us when we voluntarily enter the great battlefield of races and cultures, and champion the poor, the aged, the hungry, the dispossessed and the disenfranchised. It is only within these environments that God's incomprehensible love manifests its greatest patience with us, and we see its capacity to transform human lives, to overcome fear and to inspire care and compassion."
Here we find the evidence of the authors' own rich experiences, on which these lines are so plainly based, poking it's head through their restrictive writing style. The reader is left itching for a more direct disclosure of the authors' experiences emanating from the love of the God of Abraham and their resultant love for the "dispossessed" of humanity.
The Foundations
To the foundations themselves, then, shall we?
The major two foundations of "human development," as the authors call it, are spiritual and moral, in that order. Next are the social, intellectual and physical, in that order. About one sixth of the book (a hundred pages or so) is devoted to each of these five foundations.
In the section on spirituality, the authors, in keeping with their message of hope, discuss the characteristics of a society which is deeply rooted in the spiritual foundation. These characteristics include love, faith, hope, charity, peace, all of which -- if the 6:00 pm news are any indication -- seem like stations the "human train" has long since left, perhaps never to return.
In the moral foundation, distinction is made between "leadership" and "authority." The authors make the case that genuine leadership -- spiritual and moral -- has become but a flickering candle amidst the glaring and intrusive "spotlights" of societies' myriad "authority figures."
The vast territory of the book's subject matter is demarcated by a seemingly endless supply of biblical quotes, which typically sit with epigrammatic brilliance at the top of each chapter. These quotes echo the wisdom of the Bible and provide a flavor or sub-theme for each of the chapters in the book. For example, in discussing the nature and types of human relationships -- the first part of the social foundation -- the authors provide a biblical overture to the chapter from Romans 12:15-16. "Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited."
The author's round out their discussion of the social foundation with a biblically based discussion of the nature and causes of racism; a prescriptive analysis of human behavior, emphasizing the biblical legacy of King Solomon, i.e. the Book of Proverbs; and an analysis of the social causes and consequences of low self esteem.
The authors open the intellectual foundation with a 'theological' distinction between education and intelligence. Education , say the authors, is "the sole prerogative of human beings," while intelligence is rooted in our spiritual nature and therefore "begins with God." In the third chapter the authors analyze "knowledge" introduced by another biblical quote, this time fom Proverbs 9:10, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." In this chapter, the authors dwell on their view that, despite the information explosion in our society, "The full storehouse of human knowledge over the past centuries is infinitesimal in comparison to ... God's storehouse of His Spiritual knowledge."
The final chapter of the intellectual foundation dwells on humankind's ability, or lack thereof, to guide the course of its own destiny. If time is a river, as it has often been likened to, then, by all accounts, the history of humanity has been one of it's most tortuous estuaries. Human history can be defined as the very biography of human conflict, as though conflict itself were a species in its own right, complete with its own cultural, technological and political evolution. Who will be humanity's most capable guide? The authors find their answer in "God and his Son Jesus Christ," quoting from Proverbs 48:14 "For this is God, Our God forever and ever; He will be our guide Even to death."
The authors open the physical foundation with a discussion of human health where they emphasize a botanical rather than a synthetic approach to pharmacology as an essential element in the medical paradigm. One of them (though they do not mention who) has recently been on the receiving end of a "catastrophic diagnosis." Appropriately, the second chapter (of three) in the physical foundation is named, "catastrophic diseases," which is principally an epidemiological inquiry into the major causes of death in developed nations, i.e. heart disease, cancer, and diabetes. The final chapter of the physical foundation extols the benefits of physical activity, in part through a collection of the writings of a variety of society's health "authorities."
Conclusion
The authors stress the book is for everyone, "... it has a message that everyone can read, and everyone can benefit from." Canute B. Blake, however, says "The book … offers individuals in positions of leadership, both in private and public sectors, unique philosophical, religious and practical approaches from which to examine and solve the complex human problems of our modern world." FFHD, therefore, can be seen as a paradigm of sorts, based on a hierarchical value system, and through which, it is proposed, leaders can tackle humanities myriad hang-ups, draw-downs, and other species-threatening problems.
As my eyes swept past the above lines from Blake ("The book ... offers individuals ...") however, a random thought surfaced in my mind: "Politics is too important an issue to be left to the politicians." And in the days that ensued, similar thoughts arose, "Medicine is far too important an issue to be left to pharmaceutically-trained doctors!" and "Scholarship in general is far too important an issue to be left to the scholars!" I envision a much more democratic system of knowledge in our society, rather than the hierarchical-based knowledge system we currently have. Knowledge is power, after all, and power must be distributed evenly. I propose, therefore, that Gibbs and Grey's work should be targeted to the same grass roots communities from which it was evidently born, and not to the halls of power or of establishment academia.
True to the authors' objective in writing the book, FFHD inspired this reader, at least, with hope and faith in the realization that there are still some among us whose actions are based on conviction not currency. Pick up your copy, and be inspired.
Errol A. Gibbs and Philip A. Grey
Published by AuthorHouse
595 pages
Price?
Five Foundations of Human Development (FFHD) is an ambitous project -- eleven years in the making -- that, in the words of the authors, "offers hope for the survival of humanity in the 21st century and the new millennium."
Scientific Ecclesiastes
Shall we begin with Ecclesiastes? I think so.
The author of the Book of Ecclesiastes, identified as “the Philosopher”, evinces the spirit of modern day scientific inquiry when he declares in Chapter 1 verse 12, "I determined that I would examine and study all the things that are done in this world."
Perhaps not so characteristic of the modern age -- at least not of academicians that govern scientific dialogue from their (proverbial) ivory towers -- "the Philosopher" presents us with the conclusion of his study in verses 17-18,"But I found out that I might as well be chasing the wind. The wiser you are, the more worries you have; the more you know, the more it hurts."
Gibbs and Grey, authors of FFHD, interpret the Philosopher's conclusion as demonstrating "the intrinsic links between advancements in material knowledge and the Spiritual decline of nations." And further, "The fall of the great empires of the ancient world is a testament to this correlation, and an illustration of the futility of a society that abandons God's plan for human survival."
This interpretation provides an undercurrent to many of the thoughts and ideas in the book, and appears to be a primary motivation for Gibbs and Grey's entire oeuvre. Follow me.
Spirituality
The first and primary theme of the book deals with that collective side of ourselves, most conspicuous in so-called primitive societies, that celebrates our spiritual nature as the central and organizing principle of our societies. It is within these very societies, and under the leadership of ”spiritual man”, that the Abrahamic religions -- Judaism, Christianity, and Islam -- were founded.
Yet, in our modern or "advanced" age, humanity awakens, with each new generation, to find itself adrift on the vast ocean of existence, and under the captaincy of an entirely new creature, “scientific man”, if you will, or “materialistic man”-- that side of ourselves that places material knowledge as society's highest value.
Gibbs and Grey make the point that this chameleon-like transformation leaves humanity feeling cut off at the "source" and the authors' fivefold path to human development is an attempt to return to a more spiritual age, where former chief protagonist, the spiritual person, is allowed once again to take the lead on the world's stage. The result just might be that humanity would come full circle, as it were, with our collective eyes more open, and better for the experience. I am reminded here of a literary allusion to this possibility in a few of the sunset lines of T.S. Eliot's Fourth Quartet, Little Gidding,
"We shall not cease from exploration,
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time."
Morality
The second theme of the book, the disparity of material wealth among nations, the author's attribute to the "accumulation of superfluous wealth" among nations of the West. This theme is related to the second foundation of FFHD, namely morality -- just as the first theme is related to the first foundation, namely spirituality (more on the foundations proper later).
At the very heart of the book, pp. 273-5, we find what is perhaps its thematic climax. The responsibility to attain a more equitable distribution of wealth, say the authors, is essentially a spiritual one and "flows from the heart."
Here, the authors marry the themes of spirituality and morality by saying that the way our spirituality is realized in this material world is via ethical/moral behavior or, alternatively, the recognition of our spiritual nature is what leads us to behave morally in this material world of God's creation. This link at the heart of the book between the two major themes, is, in the opinion of this reader, almost ethereal in its brilliance. Brilliant for reasons not the least of which is that it affords the opportunity for everyone in our society to be a leader.
The authors point out that this universal law of human experience is summed up in the equally universal moral code of all the major world religions; namely "Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets." Matthew 7:12
The spiritual essence of this universal moral code is that it places people above material wants and desires and begs the rhetorical question, "What kind of 'heaven' (i.e., what a wonderful spiritual experience) life in this world could be if people were as important, or more important, than money."
Fuller Disclosure
It is, no doubt, the many years of experience -- both as humans and Christians (not that these are mutually exclusive!) -- under the authors' collective belts that allow them to speak so authoritatively not only on fundamental issues surrounding their faith, but on other topics they have tackled in the book, topics as diverse as education and technology, economics and health.
Canute B. Blake, in his foreword to the book, says "Grey and Gibbs have combined world travel experience in various countries within North and South America, Europe, Asia, the Caribbean and Africa." The authors, however, and perhaps disappointingly for the reader, have chosen to keep their experiences to themselves! The book, therefore, lacks the very persuasive influence of the human voice. The writing comes across as mildly dogmatic, monotone, bathed in a certain prosaic abstraction that "drowns out" the authors' very inspiring themes.
The authors may have knowingly sacrificed a more personal perspective for the 'foundational' one they were trying to achieve, but, in the opinion of this reader, the sacrifice was not necessary. The religious experience is, after all, one of the most personal of all experiences.
Nevertheless, we find the following lines written on page 95. After explaining how "Love begins with God", the authors assert "We will know that God's love is working in us and through us when we voluntarily enter the great battlefield of races and cultures, and champion the poor, the aged, the hungry, the dispossessed and the disenfranchised. It is only within these environments that God's incomprehensible love manifests its greatest patience with us, and we see its capacity to transform human lives, to overcome fear and to inspire care and compassion."
Here we find the evidence of the authors' own rich experiences, on which these lines are so plainly based, poking it's head through their restrictive writing style. The reader is left itching for a more direct disclosure of the authors' experiences emanating from the love of the God of Abraham and their resultant love for the "dispossessed" of humanity.
The Foundations
To the foundations themselves, then, shall we?
The major two foundations of "human development," as the authors call it, are spiritual and moral, in that order. Next are the social, intellectual and physical, in that order. About one sixth of the book (a hundred pages or so) is devoted to each of these five foundations.
In the section on spirituality, the authors, in keeping with their message of hope, discuss the characteristics of a society which is deeply rooted in the spiritual foundation. These characteristics include love, faith, hope, charity, peace, all of which -- if the 6:00 pm news are any indication -- seem like stations the "human train" has long since left, perhaps never to return.
In the moral foundation, distinction is made between "leadership" and "authority." The authors make the case that genuine leadership -- spiritual and moral -- has become but a flickering candle amidst the glaring and intrusive "spotlights" of societies' myriad "authority figures."
The vast territory of the book's subject matter is demarcated by a seemingly endless supply of biblical quotes, which typically sit with epigrammatic brilliance at the top of each chapter. These quotes echo the wisdom of the Bible and provide a flavor or sub-theme for each of the chapters in the book. For example, in discussing the nature and types of human relationships -- the first part of the social foundation -- the authors provide a biblical overture to the chapter from Romans 12:15-16. "Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited."
The author's round out their discussion of the social foundation with a biblically based discussion of the nature and causes of racism; a prescriptive analysis of human behavior, emphasizing the biblical legacy of King Solomon, i.e. the Book of Proverbs; and an analysis of the social causes and consequences of low self esteem.
The authors open the intellectual foundation with a 'theological' distinction between education and intelligence. Education , say the authors, is "the sole prerogative of human beings," while intelligence is rooted in our spiritual nature and therefore "begins with God." In the third chapter the authors analyze "knowledge" introduced by another biblical quote, this time fom Proverbs 9:10, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." In this chapter, the authors dwell on their view that, despite the information explosion in our society, "The full storehouse of human knowledge over the past centuries is infinitesimal in comparison to ... God's storehouse of His Spiritual knowledge."
The final chapter of the intellectual foundation dwells on humankind's ability, or lack thereof, to guide the course of its own destiny. If time is a river, as it has often been likened to, then, by all accounts, the history of humanity has been one of it's most tortuous estuaries. Human history can be defined as the very biography of human conflict, as though conflict itself were a species in its own right, complete with its own cultural, technological and political evolution. Who will be humanity's most capable guide? The authors find their answer in "God and his Son Jesus Christ," quoting from Proverbs 48:14 "For this is God, Our God forever and ever; He will be our guide Even to death."
The authors open the physical foundation with a discussion of human health where they emphasize a botanical rather than a synthetic approach to pharmacology as an essential element in the medical paradigm. One of them (though they do not mention who) has recently been on the receiving end of a "catastrophic diagnosis." Appropriately, the second chapter (of three) in the physical foundation is named, "catastrophic diseases," which is principally an epidemiological inquiry into the major causes of death in developed nations, i.e. heart disease, cancer, and diabetes. The final chapter of the physical foundation extols the benefits of physical activity, in part through a collection of the writings of a variety of society's health "authorities."
Conclusion
The authors stress the book is for everyone, "... it has a message that everyone can read, and everyone can benefit from." Canute B. Blake, however, says "The book … offers individuals in positions of leadership, both in private and public sectors, unique philosophical, religious and practical approaches from which to examine and solve the complex human problems of our modern world." FFHD, therefore, can be seen as a paradigm of sorts, based on a hierarchical value system, and through which, it is proposed, leaders can tackle humanities myriad hang-ups, draw-downs, and other species-threatening problems.
As my eyes swept past the above lines from Blake ("The book ... offers individuals ...") however, a random thought surfaced in my mind: "Politics is too important an issue to be left to the politicians." And in the days that ensued, similar thoughts arose, "Medicine is far too important an issue to be left to pharmaceutically-trained doctors!" and "Scholarship in general is far too important an issue to be left to the scholars!" I envision a much more democratic system of knowledge in our society, rather than the hierarchical-based knowledge system we currently have. Knowledge is power, after all, and power must be distributed evenly. I propose, therefore, that Gibbs and Grey's work should be targeted to the same grass roots communities from which it was evidently born, and not to the halls of power or of establishment academia.
True to the authors' objective in writing the book, FFHD inspired this reader, at least, with hope and faith in the realization that there are still some among us whose actions are based on conviction not currency. Pick up your copy, and be inspired.
Old Drug + New Disease = New Patent
Old Drug + New Disease = New Patent
There is an unsavory though well-established pattern of behavior among the big drug companies (collectively referred to as Big Pharma) to seek out criteria for “new diseases” in order to find new markets for drugs which have lost their original markets or whose exclusive patents are about to expire.
As an example, the drug manufacturer Eli Lilly was about to lose their exclusive patent of Prozac, the anti-depressant drug that is known to, in fact, aggravate depressive symptoms by increasing the likelihood of suicide in patients taking the drug. The end of Ely Lilly’s exclusive patent meant that other drug companies would be allowed to sell generic Prozac for a fraction of the cost. How did Ely Lilly deal with this threat to their most lucrative product (2 billion dollars per year)?
Easy, they 1) changed the name of the pill, and 2) marketed it to a new demographic – women suffering from premenstrual symptoms 3) invented a new condition called PMDD (premenstrual dysphoric disorder) – completely unrelated to the more common disorder PMS (wink, wink).
The “new” drug, “Sarafem,” thus became the only drug on the market approved to treat a brand new condition called “PMDD” (premenstrual dysphoric disorder). Ely Lilly changed the color of the pill from green in the case of Prozac, to pink in the case of “Sarafem.”
Armed with a new disease, a new color for their drug, Ely Lilly was able to obtain a new patent for a very old drug. As such, they are now the only drug company allowed to treat this new condition. “A lot of women would really be outraged” said Marcia Angell, former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, in a documentary called ‘Big Bucks, Big Pharma’ “if they knew that they were just taking good old Prozac, same dose, but priced over three times as much as generic Prozac.”
The suppressed documentary “Big Bucks, Big Pharma,” reveals this and other drugs that have undergone similar “transformations” for the sake of renewing expiring patents of drugs that contribute billions to drug companies’ bottom line.
New diseases represent entirely new markets, and as the above example illustrates, drug companies don’t hesitate to turn their operating strategy on its head: from creating new drugs for old diseases to creating new diseases for old drugs.
“Every marketers dream is to find an unidentified or unknown market and develop it. That’s what we were able to do with Social Anxiety Disorder.” Admitted Paxil (another anti-depressant) product director Barry Brand. The alphabet networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, CTV …) were more than happy to promote the “S.A.D.”: e.g. NBC’s Good Morning America aired a “special two-part series” to market this new illness.
“Experts” also often change the parameters of health resulting in tremendous boosts to Big Pharma’s profits. "All you have to do is change the definition of high blood pressure,” said Marcia Angell, “and you can increase that market by tens of millions of people. Or change the definition of high cholesterol."
Once again, the mainstream alphabet networks are happy to comply. The following are actual quotes from “news reports”: "Your blood pressure may have gone from normal to high over night. New government guidelines mean millions need a checkup. Do you?" "If you didn't have a cholesterol problem yesterday, you may have one now." "The new guidelines call for a huge boost in cholesterol lowering drugs known as statins." "The new numbers mean millions of Americans may be taking statin drugs for the rest of their lives."
Let’s hear it for the new numbers!
The same equation, Old Drug + New Disease = New Patent, exists in the history of the phenomonen I spoke of in last months issue of EU, namely that of HIV/AIDS.
From the beginning of the AIDS “outbreak” in 1981, AIDS was promoted in the public and the nascent AIDS industry itself as a “new disease.” In fact, as I spoke of in the article, it is actually a group of old diseases, like tuberculosis and pneumonia, with a new name.
Instead of coming out with a vaccine, and just as in the case of Prozac/Sarafem, where an old drug was made new again via the discovery of a new disease, drug companies found a new market, i.e. a “new disease,” for a very old drug, this time, AZT. Despite the perception molded by the media, AZT is not a new drug at all; it is a very old drug, which was originally designed to treat cancer, but was taken off the market because it was deemed too toxic to treat cancer or any other condition.
So, here we have the same equation: Old Drug + New Disease = New Patent. Here we have an otherwise defunct drug – with life-threatening side effects – that was able to be re-patented for tremendous profit thanks to a “new disease.”
Also, just as in the case of Prozac, which has been found to exacerbate depressive symptoms by increasing likelihood of suicide, AZT exacerbates the symptoms of the very disease it is said to treat. Yes, it causes the very illness it is supposed to treat.
“If you think about it, you put in a person – [who is ] making hundreds of thousands of new T cells every minute -- an inhibitor of DNA synthesis, because the virus needs DNA to be replicated. But, the virus is 10 kbps and the human DNA is 1 million kbps.
You’re shooting nuclear weapons at bunnies. Yes, you’ll probably knock out a few bunnies. But, the forest doesn’t look very good after your hunt is over.” Peter Duesberg, University of California at Berkeley. The forest, in this case, is the human body. It was precisely for this reason that AZT was taken off the market as being too toxic even for cancer patients: it had a nasty habit of killing the patient before killing the cancer.
There is an unsavory though well-established pattern of behavior among the big drug companies (collectively referred to as Big Pharma) to seek out criteria for “new diseases” in order to find new markets for drugs which have lost their original markets or whose exclusive patents are about to expire.
As an example, the drug manufacturer Eli Lilly was about to lose their exclusive patent of Prozac, the anti-depressant drug that is known to, in fact, aggravate depressive symptoms by increasing the likelihood of suicide in patients taking the drug. The end of Ely Lilly’s exclusive patent meant that other drug companies would be allowed to sell generic Prozac for a fraction of the cost. How did Ely Lilly deal with this threat to their most lucrative product (2 billion dollars per year)?
Easy, they 1) changed the name of the pill, and 2) marketed it to a new demographic – women suffering from premenstrual symptoms 3) invented a new condition called PMDD (premenstrual dysphoric disorder) – completely unrelated to the more common disorder PMS (wink, wink).
The “new” drug, “Sarafem,” thus became the only drug on the market approved to treat a brand new condition called “PMDD” (premenstrual dysphoric disorder). Ely Lilly changed the color of the pill from green in the case of Prozac, to pink in the case of “Sarafem.”
Armed with a new disease, a new color for their drug, Ely Lilly was able to obtain a new patent for a very old drug. As such, they are now the only drug company allowed to treat this new condition. “A lot of women would really be outraged” said Marcia Angell, former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, in a documentary called ‘Big Bucks, Big Pharma’ “if they knew that they were just taking good old Prozac, same dose, but priced over three times as much as generic Prozac.”
The suppressed documentary “Big Bucks, Big Pharma,” reveals this and other drugs that have undergone similar “transformations” for the sake of renewing expiring patents of drugs that contribute billions to drug companies’ bottom line.
New diseases represent entirely new markets, and as the above example illustrates, drug companies don’t hesitate to turn their operating strategy on its head: from creating new drugs for old diseases to creating new diseases for old drugs.
“Every marketers dream is to find an unidentified or unknown market and develop it. That’s what we were able to do with Social Anxiety Disorder.” Admitted Paxil (another anti-depressant) product director Barry Brand. The alphabet networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, CTV …) were more than happy to promote the “S.A.D.”: e.g. NBC’s Good Morning America aired a “special two-part series” to market this new illness.
“Experts” also often change the parameters of health resulting in tremendous boosts to Big Pharma’s profits. "All you have to do is change the definition of high blood pressure,” said Marcia Angell, “and you can increase that market by tens of millions of people. Or change the definition of high cholesterol."
Once again, the mainstream alphabet networks are happy to comply. The following are actual quotes from “news reports”: "Your blood pressure may have gone from normal to high over night. New government guidelines mean millions need a checkup. Do you?" "If you didn't have a cholesterol problem yesterday, you may have one now." "The new guidelines call for a huge boost in cholesterol lowering drugs known as statins." "The new numbers mean millions of Americans may be taking statin drugs for the rest of their lives."
Let’s hear it for the new numbers!
The same equation, Old Drug + New Disease = New Patent, exists in the history of the phenomonen I spoke of in last months issue of EU, namely that of HIV/AIDS.
From the beginning of the AIDS “outbreak” in 1981, AIDS was promoted in the public and the nascent AIDS industry itself as a “new disease.” In fact, as I spoke of in the article, it is actually a group of old diseases, like tuberculosis and pneumonia, with a new name.
Instead of coming out with a vaccine, and just as in the case of Prozac/Sarafem, where an old drug was made new again via the discovery of a new disease, drug companies found a new market, i.e. a “new disease,” for a very old drug, this time, AZT. Despite the perception molded by the media, AZT is not a new drug at all; it is a very old drug, which was originally designed to treat cancer, but was taken off the market because it was deemed too toxic to treat cancer or any other condition.
So, here we have the same equation: Old Drug + New Disease = New Patent. Here we have an otherwise defunct drug – with life-threatening side effects – that was able to be re-patented for tremendous profit thanks to a “new disease.”
Also, just as in the case of Prozac, which has been found to exacerbate depressive symptoms by increasing likelihood of suicide, AZT exacerbates the symptoms of the very disease it is said to treat. Yes, it causes the very illness it is supposed to treat.
“If you think about it, you put in a person – [who is ] making hundreds of thousands of new T cells every minute -- an inhibitor of DNA synthesis, because the virus needs DNA to be replicated. But, the virus is 10 kbps and the human DNA is 1 million kbps.
You’re shooting nuclear weapons at bunnies. Yes, you’ll probably knock out a few bunnies. But, the forest doesn’t look very good after your hunt is over.” Peter Duesberg, University of California at Berkeley. The forest, in this case, is the human body. It was precisely for this reason that AZT was taken off the market as being too toxic even for cancer patients: it had a nasty habit of killing the patient before killing the cancer.
Credo Mutwa and the History of Africa
“When the white men started destroying our religion; when he started demonizing our Gods; when he started ridiculing what we believed in, and actually using educated Africans to destroy that ancient African religion, in many parts of Africa, our ancient religion went underground. And there were, call them secret societies, all over Africa, south, east, west, north, where this knowledge was stored and kept by aging guardians, many of whom did not know that in other parts of the land there were other guardians who were doing exactly what they were doing.”
In this quote, Credo Mutwa, the last Zulu Shaman (also called Sanusi, or Sangoma) describes how he came to be initiated into the rites and ceremonies, the knowledge and wealth of information of authentic African history, culture, and civilization.
According to researcher David Icke, who has done much to give exposure to Credo Mutwa and his vast knowledge of authentic African history, there are only two Sangomas or Sanusis left in Africa. Credo Mutwa is one.
“[Credo] Mutwa is the official keeper of the history and knowledge of the Zulu people” says Icke. “The true version of history of the continent of Africa is dying. It’s being lost to the official nonsense we’re told is history.”
Winston Churchill said, “History is written by the victors.” That means the history of Africa was written by the white colonists.
In this quote, Credo Mutwa hints at the richness of the African civilizations decimated when the continent was colonized and pillaged of it’s wealth by the white European power elite – which continues to pillage Africa of all its wealth to this day:
“When I first became a Sangoma, I was already a person of education. I had entered school as a child of 14 years, and when I became a Sangoma, I was a youth of 16 years. What my aunt and my grandfather as well as my maternal grandmother told me shook me to the core of my soul.
“I found that the missionary schools had been teaching me lies about my people all along. Missionaries had told us as children that the only light came to Africa with the white people, that before the white men came we black people had no idea about God, we had no belief in a life after death and that our people were just a race of savages who used to lie around in the sun, womanize, fight, and drink beer everyday.
“I was suddenly awakened to the fact that Africans had been far greater intellectually than the missionaries were willing to give them credit for. That, like the white men, we had astrology, astronomy, we had surgery. In fact, I found that zulu surgeons in the early 19th century, the 18th century and even prior, could perform operations which white surgeons were not capable of performing.”
And the more I learned about my people, the more I wanted to learn. And when my initiation under my father and grandmother had ended, I wanted to learn more and more and more.”
“Our people need development, need peace, we are basically a peaceful people, we are not warlike. Don’t tell historians tell you a lot of rubbish. Africa is not perceived by people outside her as she really is. One, my people are Zulu’s – a tribe famous for warrior exploits for many years now. But wait, do you know sir that Zulu people actually hated war, and didn’t love it as historians [claim.]"
A continuation of this interview can be viewed on Google video (under "Reptilian Agenda") or by visiting David Icke's website, www.davidicke.com.
In this quote, Credo Mutwa, the last Zulu Shaman (also called Sanusi, or Sangoma) describes how he came to be initiated into the rites and ceremonies, the knowledge and wealth of information of authentic African history, culture, and civilization.
According to researcher David Icke, who has done much to give exposure to Credo Mutwa and his vast knowledge of authentic African history, there are only two Sangomas or Sanusis left in Africa. Credo Mutwa is one.
“[Credo] Mutwa is the official keeper of the history and knowledge of the Zulu people” says Icke. “The true version of history of the continent of Africa is dying. It’s being lost to the official nonsense we’re told is history.”
Winston Churchill said, “History is written by the victors.” That means the history of Africa was written by the white colonists.
In this quote, Credo Mutwa hints at the richness of the African civilizations decimated when the continent was colonized and pillaged of it’s wealth by the white European power elite – which continues to pillage Africa of all its wealth to this day:
“When I first became a Sangoma, I was already a person of education. I had entered school as a child of 14 years, and when I became a Sangoma, I was a youth of 16 years. What my aunt and my grandfather as well as my maternal grandmother told me shook me to the core of my soul.
“I found that the missionary schools had been teaching me lies about my people all along. Missionaries had told us as children that the only light came to Africa with the white people, that before the white men came we black people had no idea about God, we had no belief in a life after death and that our people were just a race of savages who used to lie around in the sun, womanize, fight, and drink beer everyday.
“I was suddenly awakened to the fact that Africans had been far greater intellectually than the missionaries were willing to give them credit for. That, like the white men, we had astrology, astronomy, we had surgery. In fact, I found that zulu surgeons in the early 19th century, the 18th century and even prior, could perform operations which white surgeons were not capable of performing.”
And the more I learned about my people, the more I wanted to learn. And when my initiation under my father and grandmother had ended, I wanted to learn more and more and more.”
“Our people need development, need peace, we are basically a peaceful people, we are not warlike. Don’t tell historians tell you a lot of rubbish. Africa is not perceived by people outside her as she really is. One, my people are Zulu’s – a tribe famous for warrior exploits for many years now. But wait, do you know sir that Zulu people actually hated war, and didn’t love it as historians [claim.]"
A continuation of this interview can be viewed on Google video (under "Reptilian Agenda") or by visiting David Icke's website, www.davidicke.com.
Thursday, October 25, 2007
GD Bouma and GBJ Atkinson, Social Science Research
We are confronted by questions all through life. What ist he best diet for weight loss? What effect does unemployment have on health? Is higher education worthwhile? Is co-education better for males than females? We may spend a lot of time discussing these and similar questions, but how do we find reliable answers to our questions? How do we get the knowledge to find the answers?
GD Bouma and GBJ Atkinson, Social Science Research
GD Bouma and GBJ Atkinson, Social Science Research
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Prophet Mohammed
On 8 June AD 632 Mohammed, the Prophet of Allah, died at Medina in present-day Saudi Arabia. The last of the prophets had gone to his reward. Addressing Mohammed's followers, Abu Bakr, his father-in-law, said: "People, let him amongst you who served Mohammed know that Mohammed is dead, but let him who served God continue in his service for Mohammed's God lives and never dies." The succession was decided between Abu Baskr, Umar and Mohammed's cousin Ali, the choice finally falling on Abu Bakr, who became the first Khalifa (deputy). We know him as the firs Caliph.
A.M. Wilson, The Infinite in the Finite
A.M. Wilson, The Infinite in the Finite
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Alan Watt
“People today who are coming out of school seem to think that democracy has always been here. We never really had it; and it’s not here anyway. The reality is, corporate interests always came first. And, if you look into politicians, you’ll find that they all have either been involved as corporate CEOs or affiliated with them. And they’re in and out of politics and back to the CEO positions like musical chairs. That’s called fascism.”
Alan Watt
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Apollo Astronaut, Dr. Brain O'Leary, 14 Sept. 2005
The human experiment on the planet Earth is on the verge of self-destruction. Looking at the threats of nuclear war, the chemical and biological ecocide, global climate change, proliferating weapons on Earth and in space, the greed of corporations, and the gross cronyism and mismanagement of the US government, the bloated military budgets and aggression, the distractions of our cultural conditioning, the spread of fear and ignorance, the suppression of life-saving technologies, the disparity of wealth and poverty among us, it is amazing that we are still here. Barely.
Apollo Astronaut, Dr. Brain O'Leary, 14 Sept. 2005
Apollo Astronaut, Dr. Brain O'Leary, 14 Sept. 2005
Sunday, October 14, 2007
Albert Pike
"Fictions are necessary to the people and the truth becomes deadly to those who are not strong enough to contemplate it in all its brilliance. In fact, what can there be in common between the vile multitude and sublime wisdom? The truth must be kept secret, and the masses need a teaching proportional to their imperfect reason."
Albert Pike, Sovereign Grand Commander, Mother Supreme Council of the World, the Supreme Council of the 33rd Degree, Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry.
Albert Pike, Sovereign Grand Commander, Mother Supreme Council of the World, the Supreme Council of the 33rd Degree, Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry.
Arthur Schopenhauer
The truth passes through three stages. First it is ridiculed. Second it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as self-evident.
Arthur Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer
Mahatma Ghandi
"There is no path to peace -- peace is the path."
"Even when you are in the minority of one -- the truth is still the truth."
Mahatma Ghandi
"Even when you are in the minority of one -- the truth is still the truth."
Mahatma Ghandi
Albert Einstein
Do not worry about your difficulties in Mathematics. I can assure you mine are still greater.
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
Sunday, October 07, 2007
Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged
Quote from Ayn Rand's, "Atlas Shrugged", 1957
When you see that in order to produce, you need to
obtain permission from men who produce nothing -
When you see that money is flowing to those
who deal, not in goods, but in favors -
When you see that men get richer by graft and
by pull than by work, and your laws don’t
protect you against them, but protect
them against you -
When you see corruption being rewarded and
honesty becoming a self-sacrifice -
You may know that your society is doomed."
Friday, October 05, 2007
Author: James Baldwin
It is very nearly impossible... to become an educated person in a country so distrustful of the independent mind.
Author: James Baldwin
Author: James Baldwin
Charles Mathias, Jr.
"I cannot help but wonder whether, by continuing and expanding the school lunch program, we aren't witnessing, if not encouraging, the slow demise of yet another American tradition: the brown bag. ... Perhaps we are beholding yet another break in the chain that links child to home." Charles Mathias, Jr.
Thomas Huxley
Every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority.
Thomas Huxley
Albert Einstein
He who joyfully marches to music rank and file, has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once. Heroism at command, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be a part of so base an action. It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder.
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
Amy Goodman, Democracy Now
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Glen Kealey, Canadian Businessman
It's what you think you know that isn't so.
Glen Kealey, Canadian Businessman
Glen Kealey, Canadian Businessman
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
F. SCOTT FITZGERALD on The Rich
Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them, makes them soft where we are hard, and cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you were born rich, it is difficult to understand. They think, deep in their hearts, that they are better than we are because we bad to discover the compensations and refuges of life for ourselves. Even when they enter deep into our world or sink below us, they still think that they are better than we are. They are different.
F. SCOTT FITZGERALD
F. SCOTT FITZGERALD
Sunday, September 16, 2007
Celia Farber on Science
And then science itself, I would say, if I had to put it simply, has ceased to covet curiosity. This is what a lot of scientists talk about—that heaven help you if you go against the doctrine of the time. And the doctrine of the time, you will see, almost without fail, is driven by the vested financial interest of the time.
Celia Farber, journalist, and author of Serious Adverse Events: An Uncensored History of AIDS
Celia Farber, journalist, and author of Serious Adverse Events: An Uncensored History of AIDS
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Simpsons: The Movie
Sir, you've gone made with power!
Of course I have. Have you ever tried going mad without power? It's boring. Nobody listens to you.
Of course I have. Have you ever tried going mad without power? It's boring. Nobody listens to you.
Friday, September 14, 2007
Alan Watt
It's voting time in the provinces. A big glossy pamphlet about a foot and a half long says "Vote! Don't Let Others Speak For You!" That's kind of an oxymoron because the whole point, supposedly, in the scam of voting is that you're voting for someone to speak for you.
Alan Watt
Alan Watt
HIV/AIDS Funding Wasted
WASHINGTON — So much HIV/AIDS-related funding is subject to waste and fraud that some patients could actually be suffering from it, a Washington-based government watchdog charged Friday.
Citizens Against Government Waste, a non-partisan organization dedicated to rooting out fiscal mismanagement in the federal government, released a study this week complaining that about $1 billion out of $13 billion in total HIV/AIDS funding has already been wasted this year.
continued here
Bertolt Brecht's Life of Galileo
"My object is not to establish that I was right but to find out if I am."
from Bertolt Brecht's Life of Galileo
from Bertolt Brecht's Life of Galileo
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Sherlock Holmes
How often have I said to you, that when you have eliminated the
impossible, whatever remains however improbable must be the truth.
Sherlock Holmes
impossible, whatever remains however improbable must be the truth.
Sherlock Holmes
Harry Hopkins (FDR advisor), Russian Aid Rally, 1942
"We are determined
that nothing shall stop us
from sharing with you
all that we have . . ."
-Harry Hopkins
at the Russian Aid Rally
Madison Square Garden
June 1942
-Harry Hopkins was one of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's closest advisors
that nothing shall stop us
from sharing with you
all that we have . . ."
-Harry Hopkins
at the Russian Aid Rally
Madison Square Garden
June 1942
-Harry Hopkins was one of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's closest advisors
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Public Law 95-79 and Public Law 97-375
"The use of human subjects will be allowed for the testing of chemical and biological agents by the U.S. Department of Defense, accounting to Congressional committees with respect to the experiments and studies."
"The Secretary of Defense [may] conduct tests and experiments involving the use of chemical and biological [warfare] agents on civilian populations [within the United States]."
SOURCE
Public Law 95-79, Title VIII, Sec. 808, July 30, 1977, 91 Stat. 334.
In U.S. Statutes-at-Large, Vol. 91, page 334, you will find Public Law 95-79.
Public Law 97-375, title II, Sec. 203(a)(1), Dec. 21, 1982, 96 Stat. 1882.
In U.S. Statutes-at-Large, Vol. 96, page 1882, you will find Public Law 97-375.
"The Secretary of Defense [may] conduct tests and experiments involving the use of chemical and biological [warfare] agents on civilian populations [within the United States]."
SOURCE
Public Law 95-79, Title VIII, Sec. 808, July 30, 1977, 91 Stat. 334.
In U.S. Statutes-at-Large, Vol. 91, page 334, you will find Public Law 95-79.
Public Law 97-375, title II, Sec. 203(a)(1), Dec. 21, 1982, 96 Stat. 1882.
In U.S. Statutes-at-Large, Vol. 96, page 1882, you will find Public Law 97-375.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Dr. Robert Scott Root-Bernstein
"A century ago, they let patients die by denying that germs had anything to do with diseases. Today they may be letting them die by insisting that the germ is everything." ~ Dr. Robert Scott Root-Bernstein ~
MacArthur Foundation Genius award winner, professor of Physiology at the State University of Michigan and Author of: Rethinking Aids: The Tragic Cost of Premature Consensus.
MacArthur Foundation Genius award winner, professor of Physiology at the State University of Michigan and Author of: Rethinking Aids: The Tragic Cost of Premature Consensus.
Dr. Joseph Sonnabend, M.D.
"Part of the problem today is that science writers are a pretty limp lot. They don't do any investigating. They just sit there and receive their press kits . . . They are so gullible, these science writers now-lazy and gullible."
Dr. Joseph Sonnabend, M.D., among the the first and foremost AIDS experts, (interview 12/92)
Dr. Joseph Sonnabend, M.D., among the the first and foremost AIDS experts, (interview 12/92)
Washington State Supreme Court Justice William Goodloe
"I have heard and seen reports of the possible artificial origin of the AIDS virus ... and an immediate governmental investigation at the highest level should be commenced."
Washington State Supreme Court Justice William Goodloe
Washington State Supreme Court Justice William Goodloe
Eric Taylor, Persons with AIDS vs. Uncle Sam Class Action Lawsuit
Further compelling evidence appears in the 1972 Bulletin of the United National World Health Organization in an article entitled "Virus-Associated Immunopathology: Animal models and Implications for Human Disease." It states: "An attempt should be made to ascertain whether viruses can, in fact, exert selective effects on immune function, e.g. by . . . affecting T cell function as opposed to B cell function. The possibility should also be looked into that the immune response to the virus itself may be impaired if the infecting virus damages more or less selectively the cells responding to the viral antigens."
Eric Taylor, Persons with AIDS vs. Uncle Sam Class Action Lawsuit
Eric Taylor, Persons with AIDS vs. Uncle Sam Class Action Lawsuit
J. Clemenson, Danish Cancer Registry, 1973
"We are in fact establishing conditions for a possible pandemic of an oncogenic virus varied on the scale of influenza of 1918."
J. Clemenson, Danish Cancer Registry, 1973
"It is possible to visualize the mutation of a virus into a variety of high contageousity to man resulting in a pandemic of neoplastic disease before we could develop a vaccine."
J. Clemenson, Danish Cancer Registry, 1973
J. Clemenson, Danish Cancer Registry, 1973
"It is possible to visualize the mutation of a virus into a variety of high contageousity to man resulting in a pandemic of neoplastic disease before we could develop a vaccine."
J. Clemenson, Danish Cancer Registry, 1973
Robert O'Driscoll and Elizabeth Elliot, New World Order Corruption in Canada
In 1972, the bulletin of the World Health Organization proposed that 'an attempt should be made to see if viruses can in fact exert selective effects on immune function,. The possibility should be looked into that the immune response to the virus itself may be impaired if the infecting virus damages, more or less selectively, the cell responding to the virus."
Robert O'Driscoll and Elizabeth Elliot, New World Order Corruption in Canada
Robert O'Driscoll and Elizabeth Elliot, New World Order Corruption in Canada
Robert O'Driscoll and Elizabeth Elliot on Global Population Problems
In 1938, the Committee on Population Problems (part of the National Resources Committee) recommended in its report to President Roosevelt that appropriate legislative action should be taken regarding global population problems. The NRS stated that 'transition from an increasing to a stationary or decreasing population may on the whole be a benefit to the life of the nation.'
Robert O'Driscoll and Elizabeth Elliot, New World Order Corruption in Canada
Robert O'Driscoll and Elizabeth Elliot, New World Order Corruption in Canada
Sunday, September 09, 2007
Carolyn Dean, MD, Friends of Freedom International
“I wrote Death By Modern Medicine inspired after writing a paper called Death By Medicine. What I found after analyzing government databases and peer-reviewed journal articles, is that 784,000 people are dying annually, prematurely due to modern medicine intervention. And I found studies that said, we’re only capturing 5-20% of the actual deaths.”
Carolyn Dean, MD, Friends of Freedom International
Carolyn Dean, MD, Friends of Freedom International
Eustace Mullins, Author of Murder By Injection
“The operation was successful, but the patient died.”
That’s modern medicine.
Eustace Mullins
That’s modern medicine.
Eustace Mullins
Eustace Mullins, Author of Murder By Injection
When you go to a doctor, he says
‘Oh, you have cancer. I really can’t do anything for you, but I’m going to give you a lot of treatments. It’s going to cost you a lot of money, and a lot of pain. You’re hair is going to fall out. You’re going to wish you were dead, and sooner or later you will be. But, meanwhile, we’ll get all your money.’
This is called cancer treatment in the United States.
Eustace Mullins, Author of Murder By Injection
‘Oh, you have cancer. I really can’t do anything for you, but I’m going to give you a lot of treatments. It’s going to cost you a lot of money, and a lot of pain. You’re hair is going to fall out. You’re going to wish you were dead, and sooner or later you will be. But, meanwhile, we’ll get all your money.’
This is called cancer treatment in the United States.
Eustace Mullins, Author of Murder By Injection
Robert Becker, The Body Electric
"If a human is merely a chemical machine, then the ultimate human is a robot”
Robert Becker, The Body Electric
There is only one health, but diseases are many. Likewise, there appears to be one fundamental force that heals, although the myriad schools of medicine all have their favorite ways of cajoling it into action.
Robert Becker, The Body Electric
Robert Becker, The Body Electric
There is only one health, but diseases are many. Likewise, there appears to be one fundamental force that heals, although the myriad schools of medicine all have their favorite ways of cajoling it into action.
Robert Becker, The Body Electric
Gordon Thomas, Journey Into Madness
"Their [CIA] behavior poses a continuous threat to those of us who still possess that most precious of all gifts: the right of the human spirit to choose. In working on this book I have come to terms with my own emotions - disbelief, bewilderment, disgust, and anger, and more than once in the early stages, a feeling that the subject was simply too evil to cope with. Nothing I had researched before could have prepared me for the dark reality of doctors who set out to deliberately destroy minds ... with even more horrifying descriptions of the agonies endured by the victims of the CIA-funded psychiatric mid control experiments; the reader watches as officials of the CIA and other US government agencies are drawn further and further into a chilling, inhuman world, in which all consideration for human rights and freedom are trampled in the search for the key to mind control."
Gordon Thomas, Journey Into Madness
Gordon Thomas, Journey Into Madness
John Fogerty, I Saw It On TV
JOHN FOGERTY
I Saw It On TV
They sent us home to watch the show comin' on the little screen;
A man named Ike was in the White House, big black limousine;
There were many shows to follow, from 'Hooter' to 'Doodyville',
Though I saw them all, I can't recall which cartoon was real.
The coon-skin caps, Yankee bats, the "Hound Dog" man's big start;
The A-Bomb fears, Annette had ears, I lusted in my heart.
A young man from Boston set sail the new frontier,
And we watched the Dream dead-end in Dallas,
They buried innocence that year.
I know it's true, oh so true, 'cause I saw it on TV.
We gathered round to hear the sound comin' on the little screen,
The grief had passed, the old men laughed, and all the girls screamed
'Cause four guys from England took us all by the hand,
It was time to laugh, time to sing, time to join the band.
But all too soon, we hit the moon, and covered up the sky;
They built their bombs, and aimed their guns, and still I don't know why
The dominoes tumbled and big business roared;
Every night at six, they showed the pictures and counted up the score.
I know it's true, oh so true, 'cause I saw it on TV.
The old man rocks among his dreams, a prisoner of the porch;
"The light," he says "At the end of the tunnel,
Was nothin' but a burglar's torch."
And them that was caught in the Cover are all rich and free,
But they chained my mind to an endless tomb
When they took my only son from me.
I know it's true, oh so true, 'cause I saw it on TV.
I know it's true, oh so true, 'cause I saw it on TV.
I Saw It On TV
They sent us home to watch the show comin' on the little screen;
A man named Ike was in the White House, big black limousine;
There were many shows to follow, from 'Hooter' to 'Doodyville',
Though I saw them all, I can't recall which cartoon was real.
The coon-skin caps, Yankee bats, the "Hound Dog" man's big start;
The A-Bomb fears, Annette had ears, I lusted in my heart.
A young man from Boston set sail the new frontier,
And we watched the Dream dead-end in Dallas,
They buried innocence that year.
I know it's true, oh so true, 'cause I saw it on TV.
We gathered round to hear the sound comin' on the little screen,
The grief had passed, the old men laughed, and all the girls screamed
'Cause four guys from England took us all by the hand,
It was time to laugh, time to sing, time to join the band.
But all too soon, we hit the moon, and covered up the sky;
They built their bombs, and aimed their guns, and still I don't know why
The dominoes tumbled and big business roared;
Every night at six, they showed the pictures and counted up the score.
I know it's true, oh so true, 'cause I saw it on TV.
The old man rocks among his dreams, a prisoner of the porch;
"The light," he says "At the end of the tunnel,
Was nothin' but a burglar's torch."
And them that was caught in the Cover are all rich and free,
But they chained my mind to an endless tomb
When they took my only son from me.
I know it's true, oh so true, 'cause I saw it on TV.
I know it's true, oh so true, 'cause I saw it on TV.
W.B. Yeats, The Four Ages of Man
The Four Ages of Man
He with body waged a fight,
But body won; it walks upright.
Then he struggled with the heart;
Innocence and peace depart.
Then he struggled with the mind;
His proud heart he left behind.
Now his wars on God begin;
At stroke of midnight God shall win.
W.B. Yeats
He with body waged a fight,
But body won; it walks upright.
Then he struggled with the heart;
Innocence and peace depart.
Then he struggled with the mind;
His proud heart he left behind.
Now his wars on God begin;
At stroke of midnight God shall win.
W.B. Yeats
Alan Watt
Every tyrant in history would salivate at the thought of the ability to have an entire continent watching and hearing the same news at the same time through television.
Alan Watt
Alan Watt
"The Report", "The New World Order in North America"
The MJTF [Multi-Jurisdictional Task Force] are in virtually every state of the Union of the United States at this time. Their primary mission is house-to-house search and seizure; separation and categorization of men, women, and children in large numbers; the transferral to detention facilities, and the use of those facilities for interrogation purposes.
"The Report", Robert O'Driscoll and JJ Mills, "The New World Order in North America"
"The Report", Robert O'Driscoll and JJ Mills, "The New World Order in North America"
Saturday, September 08, 2007
Thursday, September 06, 2007
Adolf Hitler on Gun Control
“(this year) will go down in history! For the first time a civilised nation has full gun registration! Our streets will be safer, our police more efficient, and the world will follow our lead in the future!” Adolph Hitler, 1935
Robert O'Driscoll on Canadian Franklin Delano Roosevelt
... Campobello Island, New Brunswick, where Franklin Delano Roosevelt was actually born, and where he spent much of his childhood and vacationing in latter life. His mother had the birth certificate falsified, it is said, so that he could become President of the United States. Being Canadina-born, he was actually an illegal President.
Robert O'Driscoll, The New World Order in Canada
Robert O'Driscoll, The New World Order in Canada
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
http://thewayhomeorfacethefire.info/
What if you are not who you think you are but only who you were taught to believe you are?
http://thewayhomeorfacethefire.info/
http://thewayhomeorfacethefire.info/
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Marcia Angell, Former Editor, New England Journal of Medicine
"All you have to do is change the definition of high blood pressure, and you can increase that market by tens of millions of people. Or change the definition of high cholesterol." Marcia Angell, Former Editor, New England Journal of Medicine
Monday, September 03, 2007
Sir Winston Churchill
"A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on."
Sir Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Churchill
Sunday, September 02, 2007
Germans 'break the speed of light'
Germans 'break the speed of light'
August 28, 2007 - 3:31PM
Two German physicists claim to have done the impossible and broken the speed of light.
If their claims are confirmed, they will have proved wrong Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity, which requires an infinite amount of energy to propel an object at more than 299,792,458 metres per second.
Article continued here
August 28, 2007 - 3:31PM
Two German physicists claim to have done the impossible and broken the speed of light.
If their claims are confirmed, they will have proved wrong Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity, which requires an infinite amount of energy to propel an object at more than 299,792,458 metres per second.
Article continued here
Saturday, September 01, 2007
Vernon Coleman on Sacred AIDS
AIDS has become a sacred disease. To question the motives of those involved in the search for a vaccine or a cure, or the treatment of alleged AIDS patients, is politically incorrect and utterly unacceptable.
Vernon Coleman, M.D. and author of 114 books which have sold over 2 million copies in the UK
Vernon Coleman, M.D. and author of 114 books which have sold over 2 million copies in the UK
John Lauristen on Freedom of Information
Anyone who requests government documents under the Freedom of Information Act should be aware that he's in for a hard time. If the requested documents are completely innocuous, then the government will probably lose them through incompetence. If the documents are not innocuous, then dilatory tactics of every kind will be employed, on top of the usual incompetence. If the documents should eventually be found and released, they will be heavily censored.
John Lauritsen, FDA DOCUMENTS SHOW FRAUD IN AZT TRIALS, New York Native 30 March 1992
John Lauritsen, FDA DOCUMENTS SHOW FRAUD IN AZT TRIALS, New York Native 30 March 1992
Friday, August 31, 2007
Kary Mullis (Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry) on AIDS
We have not been able to discover any good reasons why most of the people on earth believe that AIDS is a disease caused by a virus called HIV. There is simply no scientific evidence demonstrating that this is true.
We have also not been able to discover why doctors prescribe a toxic drug called AZT (Zidovudine) to people who have no other complaint other than the fact that they have the presence of antibodies to HIV in their blood. In fact, we cannot understand why humans would take this drug for any reason.
We cannot understand how all this madness came about, and having both lived in Berkeley, we've seen some strange things indeed. We know that to err is human, but the HIV/AIDS hypothesis is one hell of a mistake.
Kary Mullis (Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry), Foreward to "Inventing the AIDS Virus" by Peter H. Duesberg, 1996
We have also not been able to discover why doctors prescribe a toxic drug called AZT (Zidovudine) to people who have no other complaint other than the fact that they have the presence of antibodies to HIV in their blood. In fact, we cannot understand why humans would take this drug for any reason.
We cannot understand how all this madness came about, and having both lived in Berkeley, we've seen some strange things indeed. We know that to err is human, but the HIV/AIDS hypothesis is one hell of a mistake.
Kary Mullis (Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry), Foreward to "Inventing the AIDS Virus" by Peter H. Duesberg, 1996
Bio/Technology Journal, 11:696-707, 1993
"The only way to distinguish between real reactions and cross-reactions is to use HIV isolation. All claims of HIV isolation are based on a set of phenomena detected in tissue culture, none of which are isolation and none of which are even specific for retroviruses...We don't know how many positive tests occur in the absence of HIV infection. There is no specificity of the HIV antibody tests for HIV infection."
Bio/Technology Journal, 11:696-707, 1993
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
Bio/Technology Journal, 11:696-707, 1993
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
US News & World Report, November 23, 1987
"With public health officials and politicians thrashing out who should be tested for HIV, the accuracy of the test itself has been nearly ignored. A study last month by Congress' Office of Technology Assessment found that HIV tests can be very inaccurate indeed. For groups at very low risk -- people who don't use IV drugs or have sex with gay or bisexual men -- 9 in 10 positive findings are called false positives, indicating infection where none exists."
US News & World Report, November 23, 1987
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
US News & World Report, November 23, 1987
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
USA Today, October 2 1987
"People who receive gamma globulin shots for chicken pox, measles and hepatitis could test positive for HIV even if they've never been infected. The Food and Drug Administration says that a positive test could be caused by antibodies found in most of America's supply of gamma globulin. Gamma globulin is made from blood collected from thousands of donors and is routinely given to millions of people each year as temporary protection against many infectious diseases. Dr. Thomas Zuck of the FDA's Blood and Blood Products Division says the government didn't release the information because 'we thought it would do more harm than good.'"
USA Today, October 2, 1987
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
USA Today, October 2, 1987
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
Celia Farber, Impression Magazine, June 21, 199
"Two weeks ago, a 3-year-old child in Winston Salem, North Carolina, was struck by a car and rushed to a nearby hospital. Because the child's skull had been broken and there was a blood spill, the hospital performed an HIV test. As the traumatized mother was sitting at her child's bedside, a doctor came in and told her the child was HIV-positive. Both parents are negative. The doctor told the mother that she needed to launch an investigation into her entire family and circle of friends because this child had been sexually abused. There was no other way, the doctor said, that the child could be positive. A few days later, the mother demanded a second test. It came back negative. The hospital held a press conference where a remarkable admission was made. In her effort to clear the hospital of any wrongdoing, a hospital spokesperson announced that 'these HIV tests are not reliable; a lot of factors can skew the tests, like fever or pregnancy. Everybody knows that.'"
Celia Farber, Impression Magazine, June 21, 1999
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
Celia Farber, Impression Magazine, June 21, 1999
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
Woman Sues St. Paul's
"A Vancouver woman is suing St. Paul's Hospital and several doctors because she was diagnosed as carrying the AIDS virus, when in fact she wasn't. In a BC Supreme Court writ, Lisa Lebed claims when she was admitted to the hospital in late 1995 to give birth to a daughter, a blood sample was taken without her consent. It revealed she was HIV positive, so she gave up the baby girl for adoption and decided to have a tubal ligation. A year and a half later, while undergoing AIDS treatment, she found out she was not HIV positive. The explanation she was given was a lab error. She says because of the negligence of the hospital, she's now sterile and has lost a daughter."
Woman Sues St. Paul's, CKNW Radio 98, June 10, 1999
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
Woman Sues St. Paul's, CKNW Radio 98, June 10, 1999
from: http://www.aliveandwell.org/html/questioning/questioningthetests.html
Elinor Burkett, Is HIV Guilty?
Every American adult should have a small scar on his upper arm or thigh: a smallpox vaccination. Smallpox once was a deadly scourge-killing millions. Vaccinations have virtually wiped it out. It's an ingenious concept: You introduce a minuscule amount of weakened or dead disease-causing bugs into the human system. The body responds by producing antibodies-a natural antidote that neutralizes the invading bug. Once you have the antibodies, you're immune. So why is it such devastating news when a person tests positive for HIV antibodies?
Elinor Burkett, IS HIV GUILTY?, Miami Herald 23 Dec. 1990
Elinor Burkett, IS HIV GUILTY?, Miami Herald 23 Dec. 1990
AIDS Quote, 21 June 1994
"AIDS will never be cured until we cure the research."
Said at a conference of the Pacific Division of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in San Francisco on 21 June 1994.
Said at a conference of the Pacific Division of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in San Francisco on 21 June 1994.
Karl Thompson, The Possibility of a Cure for AIDS
A cure for AIDS will never materialize within the next ten years, unless mainstream science and pharmaceutical giants shed current dogma and actually look at the facts. But, unfortunately, as in so many other areas of our daily lives, there is too much profit at stake for this to happen.
Karl Thompson, The Possibility of a Cure for AIDS
Karl Thompson, The Possibility of a Cure for AIDS
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Bertrand Russell
The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not entirely absurd, indeed, in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widespread belief is more likely to be foolish that sensible.
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell
Author Unknown
It is easy to believe that something must be true because everyone else believes it. But the truth often only comes to light by daring to question the unquestionable, by doubting notions which are so commonly believed that they are taken for granted.
Author Unknown
Author Unknown
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Bruce Stokes, CFR Senior Fellow
Globalist think tank explores most effective ways to shift Americans
national identity and ideas of sovereignty into alignment with a
"North American Consciousness" - Panelists see America as the
"greatest obstacle" to "North American Integration"
"This is how we will create a North American consciousness and a true North American Community. It will be forged in the heat of conflict, not through a rational discussion, as painful as that may be. It really cannot happen any other way." - Bruce Stokes, CFR Senior Fellow, speaking at the "Toward a North American Community?" conference, June 11, 2002
national identity and ideas of sovereignty into alignment with a
"North American Consciousness" - Panelists see America as the
"greatest obstacle" to "North American Integration"
"This is how we will create a North American consciousness and a true North American Community. It will be forged in the heat of conflict, not through a rational discussion, as painful as that may be. It really cannot happen any other way." - Bruce Stokes, CFR Senior Fellow, speaking at the "Toward a North American Community?" conference, June 11, 2002
Monday, August 27, 2007
Plato on Atlantis
... in a single day and night of misfortune, the island of Atlantis disappeared into the depths of the sea."
Plato, 360 BC
Plato, 360 BC
Friday, August 24, 2007
Reuters, Martian Soil May Contain Life
By Ben Hirschler
LONDON (Reuters) - The soil on Mars may contain microbial life, according to a new interpretation of data first collected more than 30 years ago.
The search for life on Mars appeared to hit a dead end in 1976 when Viking landers touched down on the red planet and failed to detect biological activity.
But Joop Houtkooper of the University of Giessen, Germany, said on Friday the spacecraft may in fact have found signs of a weird life form based on hydrogen peroxide on the subfreezing, arid Martian surface.
article continued here
LONDON (Reuters) - The soil on Mars may contain microbial life, according to a new interpretation of data first collected more than 30 years ago.
The search for life on Mars appeared to hit a dead end in 1976 when Viking landers touched down on the red planet and failed to detect biological activity.
But Joop Houtkooper of the University of Giessen, Germany, said on Friday the spacecraft may in fact have found signs of a weird life form based on hydrogen peroxide on the subfreezing, arid Martian surface.
article continued here
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Bruce Cockburn, Call It Democracy
Call it Democracy
by Bruce Cockburn, written Nov. 1985
Padded with power here they come
international loan sharks backed by the guns
of market hungry military profiteers
whose word is a swamp and whose brow is smeared
with the blood of the poor
Who rob life of its quality
who render rage a necessity
by turning countries into labour camps
modern slavers in drag as champions of freedom
Sinister cynical instrument
who makes the gun into a sacrament --
the only response to the deification
of tyranny by so-called "developed" nations'
idolatry of ideology
North south east west
kill the best and buy the rest
it's just spend a buck to make a buck
you don't really give a flying fuck
about the people in misery
IMF dirty MF
takes away everything it can get
always making certain that there's one thing left
keep them on the hook with insupportable debt
See the paid-off local bottom feeders
passing themselves off as leaders
kiss the ladies shake hands with the fellows
open for business like a cheap bordello
And they call it democracy
and they call it democracy
and they call it democracy
and they call it democracy
See the loaded eyes of the children too
trying to make the best of it the way kids do
one day you're going to rise from your habitual feast
to find yourself staring down the throat of the beast
they call the revolution
IMF dirty MF
takes away everything it can get
always making certain that there's one thing left
keep them on the hook with insupportable debt
by Bruce Cockburn, written Nov. 1985
Padded with power here they come
international loan sharks backed by the guns
of market hungry military profiteers
whose word is a swamp and whose brow is smeared
with the blood of the poor
Who rob life of its quality
who render rage a necessity
by turning countries into labour camps
modern slavers in drag as champions of freedom
Sinister cynical instrument
who makes the gun into a sacrament --
the only response to the deification
of tyranny by so-called "developed" nations'
idolatry of ideology
North south east west
kill the best and buy the rest
it's just spend a buck to make a buck
you don't really give a flying fuck
about the people in misery
IMF dirty MF
takes away everything it can get
always making certain that there's one thing left
keep them on the hook with insupportable debt
See the paid-off local bottom feeders
passing themselves off as leaders
kiss the ladies shake hands with the fellows
open for business like a cheap bordello
And they call it democracy
and they call it democracy
and they call it democracy
and they call it democracy
See the loaded eyes of the children too
trying to make the best of it the way kids do
one day you're going to rise from your habitual feast
to find yourself staring down the throat of the beast
they call the revolution
IMF dirty MF
takes away everything it can get
always making certain that there's one thing left
keep them on the hook with insupportable debt
Horst Albin Poehler, Ph. D., Cassini Cancers
Plutonium is an element that was created by man, and introduced into the environment by man.
Horst Albin Poehler, Ph. D.
Cassini Cancers
("The Plutonium Story")
Horst Albin Poehler, Ph. D.
Cassini Cancers
("The Plutonium Story")
Horst Albin Poehler, Ph. D, Cassini Cancers
NASA thrives on secrecy and deceit.
Horst Albin Poehler, Ph. D, Cassini Cancers
("The Plutonium Story")
Horst Albin Poehler, Ph. D, Cassini Cancers
("The Plutonium Story")
Alan Watt
There is nothing at the moment that will stop people right now from bartering goods. But there are laws in the books that will come in and stop you from bartering. Again this goes back ten years or more, because they say that anyone who barters is really running an 'underground economy' and they're trying to make the people think that because you don't pay taxes on a straight barter, you're robbing 'the public' of getting more tax money to help the public -- this is the con that they're pulling. So, bartering itself is going to come under attack. If your going to swap a bag of corn for a bag of oats, they government wants to get between you because, as far as they're concerned, a third or a half of that bag is theirs.
Alan Watt
Alan Watt
Alan Watt
This war on terror being used on the public was decided a long time ago to be used, because it was the fastest way to get the Americans to give up their rights and freedoms. Right after 9/11 happened, the US and Canadian media were talking with the supposed 'man on the street' for weeks and weeks with the same question: "Are you willing to give up your freedoms for greater security?"
Alan Watt
Alan Watt
Alan Watt
Science is always compartmentalized. From professorship down is the lowest level of science and knowledge. There's a level above that, that certain students with gifts are brought out of university and pushed up beyond. And there's a level above that. The level at the bottom is called "research" because the search has already been done at the top.
Alan Watt
Alan Watt
Alan Watt
In this system -- which keeps us off balance and terrified of poverty, loneliness, sickness, and starvation -- money is given as the key to all our problems. We're trained from birth to run after money. That's what school's only purpose is: to give you a quality approval stamp called a degree or certificate: that means you're stupid enough to work in their system without figuring it out. So, we've all been fooled.
Not just us, every generation before us have all been fooled into working for this global system which is based on usury and compound interest, and this odd little thing that you can't even eat, called money.
Alan Watt
Not just us, every generation before us have all been fooled into working for this global system which is based on usury and compound interest, and this odd little thing that you can't even eat, called money.
Alan Watt
Leonard Cohen, Everybody Knows
Everybody knows the dice are loaded
Everybody roles with their fingers crossed.
Everybody knows the war is over,
Everybody knows the good guys lost,
Everybody knows the fight was fixed
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich,
That's how it goes, everybody knows.
Leonard Cohen
Everybody roles with their fingers crossed.
Everybody knows the war is over,
Everybody knows the good guys lost,
Everybody knows the fight was fixed
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich,
That's how it goes, everybody knows.
Leonard Cohen
"Carnivore"
"The [British] measure... would give the government new powers to require Internet service providers to install 'black box' surveillance systems that would sort and send a range of data and e-mail to a monitoring center controlled by the domestic security service, M.I.5.
"Such systems are also being used in the United States by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, where the technology is known as Carnivore because it is able to extract the 'meat' quickly from vast quantities of e-mail messages and other communications between computers." [1]
"British Authorities May Get Wide Power to Decode E-Mail", New York Times International, 7-19-00
"Such systems are also being used in the United States by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, where the technology is known as Carnivore because it is able to extract the 'meat' quickly from vast quantities of e-mail messages and other communications between computers." [1]
"British Authorities May Get Wide Power to Decode E-Mail", New York Times International, 7-19-00
Berit Kjos, Star Wars Joins United Religions at the Presidio
The "Force" is with George Lucas. Literally. Trouncing his competitors, the master of movie magic has won the coveted right to build his Star Wars empire on 23 acres of the Presidio, the former army base overlooking the Golden Gate bridge. Lucasfilm and Lucas Learning Ltd. will share this prize piece of San Francisco real estate with the Gorbachev Foundation, the Thoreau Center for Sustainability, FEMA, the United Religions Initiative (URI), the United Nations Resource Center, and a host of other environmental, spiritual, educational, and governmental organizations.1 Together they share a common crusade: to build a unified, earth-friendly global civilization based on "new" universal beliefs and values.
Star Wars Joins United Religions at the Presidio
by Berit Kjos
Star Wars Joins United Religions at the Presidio
by Berit Kjos
Berit Kjos, Molding Human Resources
Do you wonder who really plans your child’s education? What their true motives are?
Molding Human Resources
for the Global Workforce
by Berit Kjos
Molding Human Resources
for the Global Workforce
by Berit Kjos
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Berit Kjos, Local Agenda 21
This global contract binds governments around the world to the UN plan for changing the ways we live, eat, learn, and communicate - all under the noble banner of saving the earth. Its regulations would severely limit water, electricity, and transportation - even deny human access to our most treasured wilderness areas. If implemented, it would manage and monitor all lands and people. No one would be free from the watchful eye of the new global tracking and information system.
Local Agenda 21
The U.N. Plan for Your Community
By Berit Kjos
Local Agenda 21
The U.N. Plan for Your Community
By Berit Kjos
Maurice Strong, 1992 UN Conference
"...current lifestyles and consumption patterns of the affluent middle class - involving high meat intake use of fossil fuels, appliances, home and work-place air-conditioning, and suburban housing - are not sustainable. A shift is necessary. which will require a vast strengthening of the multilateral system, including the United Nations..." 1
Maurice Strong , opening speech at the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development
Maurice Strong , opening speech at the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development
Jonathan Coopersmith, Nuclear waste in space?
For twenty years, the federal government’s preferred solution to the nuclear waste problem is underground disposal, specifically, over 11,000 30–80 ton canisters buried in 160 kilometers of tunnels hundreds of meters underneath Yucca Mountain in northern Nevada. Forty-nine states favor this plan. It’s not hard to guess which state does not.
Nuclear waste in space?
by Jonathan Coopersmith
Monday, August 22, 2005
Nuclear waste in space?
by Jonathan Coopersmith
Monday, August 22, 2005
CAQ.ORG
It is part of the American myth that our major media are objective and unbiased, a mainstay of democracy. We believe, however, that the overwhelmingly dominant corporate media have become merely the voice of an increasingly unilateral and controlled empire, devoted to the indoctrination of the public in the interests of corporate, industrial, military, and ruling powers. There has been, throughout the post-World War II years, little analysis of this phenomenon, little criticism of the myth of the impartial media.
CovertAction Quarterly
CovertAction Quarterly
Nuclear Fusion, UCAR
Nuclear fusion is a process where two or more nuclei combine to form an element with a higher atomic number (more protons in the nucleus). Fusion is the reverse process of nuclear fission. Fusion reactions power the Sun and other stars.
Fusion releases energy. The energy released is related to Einstein's famous equation, E=mc2.
For a fusion reaction to occur it is necessary to bring the nuclei so close together that nuclear forces become important and "glue" the nuclei together. The nuclear force only acts over incredibly small distances and has to counteract the electrostatic force where the positively charged nuclei repel each other. For these reasons fusion most easily occurs in a high density, high temperature environment.
On Earth, nuclear fusion was first reached in the explosion of the Hydrogen bomb. In a non-destructive manner, fusion has also been reached in different experimental devices aimed at studying the possibility of producing energy in a controlled fashion.
From: University Corporation for Atmospheric Research Website
Fusion releases energy. The energy released is related to Einstein's famous equation, E=mc2.
For a fusion reaction to occur it is necessary to bring the nuclei so close together that nuclear forces become important and "glue" the nuclei together. The nuclear force only acts over incredibly small distances and has to counteract the electrostatic force where the positively charged nuclei repel each other. For these reasons fusion most easily occurs in a high density, high temperature environment.
On Earth, nuclear fusion was first reached in the explosion of the Hydrogen bomb. In a non-destructive manner, fusion has also been reached in different experimental devices aimed at studying the possibility of producing energy in a controlled fashion.
From: University Corporation for Atmospheric Research Website
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Michael Tsarion on Neural Processing in the Brain
There are 240,000 miles of neural threads in the human brain, enough to stretch from the earth to the moon. On every micrometer of these threads there exist 250,000 units of information. This data is recorded only as pictograms, as composite images, and not as words.
Michael Tsarion
Michael Tsarion
Jerry Mander on the Worship of Graven Images
... the Hebrews emerging between 3000 and 2000 BC won an important political victory by denouncing what they called the "worship of graven images." By destroying the power of the sculptures of the Sumerians, and others who preceded them, they effectively destroyed nature-based religion and the veracity of images.
This made possible the substitution of an abstract, male, human, all-powerful God. Because it was a sin to create any sculpture of it, it maintained its abstract nature.
Jerry Mander, Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television
This made possible the substitution of an abstract, male, human, all-powerful God. Because it was a sin to create any sculpture of it, it maintained its abstract nature.
Jerry Mander, Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television
Charles, Prince of Wales
The less people know about what is really going on, the easier it is to wield power and authority.
Charles, Prince of Wales
Charles, Prince of Wales
Cryil Fagan, Astrological Origins
In their desire to appear highly intellectual, scientific and mathematical, the Greeks, probably about the time of Alexander the Great, adopted the solar nomenclature, thereby turning ancient zodiacal symbolism topsy turvy and making it sheer nonsense.
Cyril Fagan, Astrological Origins
Cyril Fagan, Astrological Origins
Herodotus
... the Egyptians were the first to discover the solar year, and to portion out its course in twelve parts, both the space of time and the seasons which they delimit. It was observation of the course of the stars which led them to adopt this division. It is also the Egyptians who first brought into use the names of the twelve gods, which the Greeks adopted from them.
Herodotus
Herodotus
Professor Max Mueller
No people ancient or modern has given woman so high a legal status as did the inhabitants of the Nile Valley.
Professor Max Mueller
Professor Max Mueller
Vice President Dick Cheney
"Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt that he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies and against us." - Vice Pres. Dick Cheney, August 26, 2002
Defining "Genius"
Knowing to believe only half of what you hear is a sign of intelligence. Knowing which half to believe can make you a genius.
Read on an Internet Forum.
Read on an Internet Forum.
Manly P Hall, The Secret Teachings of All the Ages
“Not only were many of the founders of the United States government Masons, but they received aid from a secret and august body existing in Europe which helped them to establish this country for A PECULIAR AND PARTICULAR PURPOSE known only to the intiated few.”
- Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages, pp. XC and XCI
- Manly P. Hall, The Secret Teachings of All Ages, pp. XC and XCI
Monday, August 20, 2007
Bruce Gagon on Weaponization of Space
"We have this one chance, this one moment in history, to stop the weaponization of space from happening."
Bruce Gagon, coodinator of the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space
Bruce Gagon, coodinator of the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space
Friday, August 17, 2007
Mr. W. Hickson
"The very idea of a government that can create money for itself allowing banks to create money that the government then borrows and pays interest on is so preposterous that it staggers the imagination."
Mr. W. Hickson, It's Your Money
Mr. W. Hickson, It's Your Money
Denis Kucinich
"More than ½ the homeless families in Iowa are headed by someone who is employed. Congress will not pass an increase in the $5.15 minimum wage even though the inflation adjusted minimum wage is 21% lower today than in 1979. "
"The restoration of the rights of workers in America and throughout the North American continent will begin when we repeal NAFTA. NAFTA has spurred a $360 billion trade deficit, costing 363,000 high paying jobs, most in manufacturing."
"It is no secret that Congress and the Senate did not seek the best interest of working families in passing the North American Free Trade Agreement. There was nothing free about this treaty but it was the greatest theft of jobs in American history. What has your U. S. Senator been doing to repeal this legislation?"
Denis Kucinich, Democratic Representative for Ohio
"The restoration of the rights of workers in America and throughout the North American continent will begin when we repeal NAFTA. NAFTA has spurred a $360 billion trade deficit, costing 363,000 high paying jobs, most in manufacturing."
"It is no secret that Congress and the Senate did not seek the best interest of working families in passing the North American Free Trade Agreement. There was nothing free about this treaty but it was the greatest theft of jobs in American history. What has your U. S. Senator been doing to repeal this legislation?"
Denis Kucinich, Democratic Representative for Ohio
John F McManus
In his revealing 1994 interview, Cheney stated, "Once you got to Iraq and took it over, and took down Saddam Hussein's government, then what are you going to put in its place?" Describing the country as "very volatile," he said that after removing Saddam "you can easily end up seeing the pieces of Iraq fly off." He even mentioned the designs Iran would have on the nation. Forecasting the current disaster in Iraq that he has had such a large role in bringing about, he said, "It's a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq."
Regarding casualties, he noted that many "were impressed" that the coalition had accomplished its mission with only "146 Americans killed in action." Posing the question himself about "how many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth," he answered "not very many."
John F McManus, "In 1994, Cheney Predicted That Invading Iraq Would Produce a Quagmire'", 16 August, 2007
Regarding casualties, he noted that many "were impressed" that the coalition had accomplished its mission with only "146 Americans killed in action." Posing the question himself about "how many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth," he answered "not very many."
John F McManus, "In 1994, Cheney Predicted That Invading Iraq Would Produce a Quagmire'", 16 August, 2007
Henry Kissinger
Henry Kissinger, for instance, writing in support of NAFTA in a July 18, 1993 op-ed for the Los Angeles Times, said of the agreement : "It will represent the most creative step toward a new world order taken by any group of countries since the end of the Cold War, and the first step toward an even larger vision of a free-trade zone for the entire Western Hemisphere." NAFTA "is not a conventional trade agreement," Kissinger said, "but the architecture of a new international system."
Jeff Lindsay, May 1, 2004
Jeff Lindsay, May 1, 2004
Abraham Lincoln's Own Words on Slavery
"Free them, and make them politically and socially, our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this; and if mine would, we well know that those of the great mass of white people will not."
"There is no right, and ought to be no inclination in the people of the free States to enter into the slave States, and interfere with the question of slavery at all."
"Judge Douglas, and whoever like him teaches that the negro has no share, humble though it may be, in the Declaration of Independence, is going back to the era of our liberty and independence"
"It is nothing but a miserable perversion of what I have said, to assume that I have declared Missouri, or any other slave State shall emancipate her slaves. I have proposed no such thing."
"It does not follow that social and political equality between whites and blacks, must be incorporated, because slavery must not."
"I say that we must not interfere with the institution of slavery in the states where it exists, because the constitution forbids it, and the general welfare does not require us to do so."
"My paramount object in this struggle, is to save the Union and it not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it..."
"I have no purpose directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."
Abraham Lincoln
"There is no right, and ought to be no inclination in the people of the free States to enter into the slave States, and interfere with the question of slavery at all."
"Judge Douglas, and whoever like him teaches that the negro has no share, humble though it may be, in the Declaration of Independence, is going back to the era of our liberty and independence"
"It is nothing but a miserable perversion of what I have said, to assume that I have declared Missouri, or any other slave State shall emancipate her slaves. I have proposed no such thing."
"It does not follow that social and political equality between whites and blacks, must be incorporated, because slavery must not."
"I say that we must not interfere with the institution of slavery in the states where it exists, because the constitution forbids it, and the general welfare does not require us to do so."
"My paramount object in this struggle, is to save the Union and it not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it..."
"I have no purpose directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."
Abraham Lincoln
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