Wheee, the People!

     Instead of paying attention,
     you'll want and work for all the Things
     The Look, The Trappings Power brings
     like instantly yet MORE Power springs
     a well, a spell of Gain, warming,
     the spiral spinning uncoiling
     pinwheel ride painted up all Free
     but Not Really.
     Nailed in the middle
     squeeking and clattering unmerciful
     smoking and smelling bad
     all the safety valves bypassed or wired shut
     governors corrupted beyond any use whatever
     candidates with all the shiny shoes and blowjobs
     we turn the volume up again to hear the millionth version
     them saying, 'Be calm.  Everything is A.O.K.'
   

Pencilvania; Picking the Teeth of Empire

     Asked for his remarks then about all the reported 'collateral damages' (innocent bystanders*) he'd killed in pursuit of policy, Secretary Schultz spoke in a way that managed to sound both confidential and dismissive:  '...ya hafta break eggs to make a omelet...'

     Schultz (Bechtel) running State, Weinberger (Bechtel) at Defense, Big Wheels in the Reagan Revolution cooking up a banquet for...whom?...for what? Taking big piecemeal chomps out of populations and life-support systems at home and elsewhere, leaving destruction, contamination, extinction, and waste.

     The '80's saw this golden dawn of Greed come about by the 'Big Landslide' for Reagan everyone still talks about.  The one the Democrats have pointed their prayer mats at ever since.  It wasn't a landslide.

     Get out your pencil and paper and arithmetic.  Voter turnout was 48%, the lowest of all Earth's 'democracies' except Botswana that cycle!  Reagan's share was 52 or 53 percent -- look it up -- Big Landslide NOT.  Comes out to some 28% of registered voters that put Ronnie in the White House.
Twenty eight percent is not a landslide number.  That's less than one third of registered voters.  That's not anything but a former democratic republic with a comatose electorate gone Flatline.  This is where America sold the last of its soul for an 'aw, shucks' and yet another record quarter's earnings.  The Democrats swooned at that faux 'Great Landslide,' doing all in their considerable power ever since to mimic Ronnie's 'success,' just like the Clintons.  Yes, it was already exit-bound, but that's where America finally left the Building of Pretense, where folks in numbers still play at 'democratic republic,' all unaware.



* Murders; homicides; unlawful killings; war crimes

UnRealpolitik

     Speaking of Saudi Arabia as a major client of U.S. policy, as a giant Weapons Customer, as favored among our Best Pals, and as a Primary Sponsor of Violent Radical Extremism worldwide, including the events of September 11, 2001, Noam Chomsky made an observation that needs more attention.  He said that Britain, and then the U.S. [see T. E. Lawrence] have always "...stimulated radical Islamist developments..." as destabilizing implements in the Mideast.

     This is too kind of Dr. Chomsky.  He makes it sound as if the west just took advantage of 'troubles' as they arose unbidden, all along.  Maybe the good doctor was indulging in some seismic under-statement.

     Here, now:  The west (spelled U-S) has never missed a 'chance' through this morning to Fuck Things Up good and proper for those with the poor judgement to be born over oil, etc.  [Further, let it be known here as it is everywhere else, if you make your own 'chances,' by the examples of the U.S. Oil Industry of the past 150 years, you won't risk missing many.  It's an UnNatural Selection kind of deal...Survival of the Most Devious and Murderous and UnFit]

     We are led to believe, even with the effrontery to 'warn' us, that that's just the way things are, and to get over it.  We're repeatedly reminded that's 'How Things Work.'

     We observe how this Plan has not worked out so well for us, ever, worse for others, and how it yet proceeds...anyway...

     ...to the Vast Enrichment of a tiny, secret minority who do have names, addresses, pulses, and temperatures in the neighborhood of 98 degrees F.

Baby, It's You (Not Bernie, or Donald, or Julio)

It's something you're doing.
Yes, it is.
It's also something you're not doing.
Oho, yes, it is.
How many times have you picked among the offered evils for a 'lesser?'
As if it was a Freedom of Choice kind of deal, but for Real?
As if it was any Good whatever, then, now, or later?
And then turned your back like you did your part?
And walked off into the sunset with the girl?
And no choices to speak of, really?
Denied by your own denial scrim
All the way up past here
     Where you don't get what you pay for
     Where Someone Else does
     Where Somebody Else gets all you pay for
     And all you pay for it
     And pay for it
     And pay for it
Poll cats and lobbyists with a common ground
Blindside roundhouse suckerpunch usually
And used to it and by it
Taking a solid clout to the back of the head, each
Where the independent silent swing comes by
When it comes by...

Time is a wolf that gets us all
Whether we give 'er a run that is worth it
Chasing 'er down
Or watching from your hide.

War Crimes On Drugs

     Today's news (Daily Kos-style) held a quote from one of the Nixon admin's ex-convicts, John Ehrlichmann, concerning the infamous, so-called war on drugs.  Mr. Ehrlichmann states clearly and flatly that demonizing marijuana was a Nixon White House strategy to destabilize and disrupt the anti-Viet Nam war and African-American communities.  This 'stragedy' was supported by a compliant and subservient news media, parroting the Admin lies, NIGHTLY.

     Does this ring any bells for anyone watching the current creeps spewing 'news' from the Main Media?

     So.  The flood of refugees fleeing the horrors of the Drug War in Central and South America flowing over our borders is -- TA-DA! -- thanks to the feral dog GOP (and to those who fell in line behind them).

     All those unfortunates now trying to leave Mexico can thank the Republicans.  All those in prison (and far worse) for pot charges can thank the Republicans.  All those who've suffered from various health issues all this time, who could've been helped or cured with medicinal hemp, can thank the Republicans for their needless torment.  Those suffering and dying from Global Warming because Fossil Fuels are killing the Planet, when hemp seed oil has long been a proven, co2 neutral substitute, can thank the Republicans.  The Mexican cartels?  They, too, can thank the Republicans for their highly profitable enterprises.

     The list goes on, the Republican villains' gallery overflows...

Artifuct

if you've listened with one ear
you must've heard the story told
how Man creates an artifact
to help him reach a goal

the Man takes a gadget
and fails to understand
the gadget takes a gadget
and the gadget takes the Man

with brilliant engine-uity
and immaculate intention
he's overshot the mark and screwed
our Mother of invention

of all the best-laid plans gone wrong
of any time or nation
there's never been one even near
the bloody corpiration

we set it up and turned it on
to go and do our biddin'
the puppet took the reins and road
with pow'r we are forbidden

Surveil This

[2-19-14]

     Take notice, y'all Secret Police sons of bitches (this dishonorific not meant as gender-specific.):

     We're not sure where you're from, but around here, secrecy in government would be our own worst enemy, so we don't allow it.  A truly free, informed People like we are can manage our affairs nicely, thank you, without your very dubious 'assistance.'  We're actually competent at figuring out what's good for us, what's the smart decision in any given case.  Should we decide to do something stupid, we goddamned sure won't need any help from the likes of you.  This may come as a great surprise to you who pose as Intelligence Experts, but you'll get over this shock if you live long enough to wise up, and we hope you do.  We also look forward to seeing you indicted, charged, arrested, tried by Due Process, convicted of some of the horrific crimes of which you are manifestly guilty, then appropriately sentenced, and we're working on it.  We strongly suggest it might help your likely legal difficulties if you now (now) find the nearest whistle and blow the crap out of it, just like your life depends on it.  With feeling.  You can see, can you not, that we are not holding our breath?
     Unlike yourselves, we abide by the Law -- we stop on the red and go on the green -- simply to get along.  This is a Basic Awareness kind of deal, and you need to be taking notes.  You will be tested.
     Let's be doubly clear, for the benefit of your many belabored 'analysts:'

• Secrecy is the dark enemy of any enlightened People.  Ben Franklin clearly warned the new Republic against it to start with.  Mr. Franklin had observed first-hand for some years how the monarchies of Europe worked it.  He cautioned that once 'covert' actions were allowed, they quickly become the MAIN behavior of renegade governments.  Good call, Ben.
• Secrecy got the corpirations enthroned in the United States, as announced then by Abe Lincoln in 1865, to the destruction of our democratic Republic.  Really.
• Secrecy has kept that dire turning point very well camouflaged even to this day.
• Secrecy brought us all this War Business -- ALL if it, to ALL of us --demanding ever more secrecy, and not a lick of it justified, ever.
• Secrecy is the servant of traitors and other unfaithful cowards; corrupt politicians; embezzlers; blind-side 'economists;' lawyers; thieves; bushwackers; the extremely filthy rich; and other species of criminals, and no one else.  If you've a fondness for secrecy, you are counted in this disgusting company; congratulations are not in order, but arrest warrants are.
• Secrecy gets our Presidents murdered, among many others, followed by horseshit cover-stories instead of Justice.
• Secrecy allowed a Presidential election to be stolen from beneath our noses, letting a witless clown into the White House.
• Secrecy let that same unelected, witless clown lead us into war on Iraq based on 'intelligence' which ranged all the way from POOR to NONE.
• Secrecy cost us 60,000 Americans, and counting, in the likewise needless Viet Nam conflict, along with millions of that country's People.
• Secrecy enables the label of War to be applied to belligerent U.S. actions unsupported by any legal Declaration of War, the lack of which renders all such actions War Crimes...the list of which is too long to discuss here.
• Secrecy has acted as cover for acts of Terror against those on that list, against the People there and their governments, thereby sponsoring and exporting Terrorism, usually under the Stars and Stripes, no matter at all what you call it.
• Secrecy has made our country hated, feared and ridiculed for the most revolting, compelling reasons, in almost every corner of our little Globe, the opposite of security.
• Secrecy is also the opposite, the amputation of intelligence.
• Secrecy gets the American Revolutionary TIP (Turd in Punchbowl) Award as a kind of life-time achievement prize...for all of History.

     If you have the least doubt about any of the foregoing, you'll need to ask someone who knows something.  I'm glad to say there are plenty more out here who feel just this way.

Intelligence

     Congratulations.  If you're reading this, you're already a member of the only species in the known universe with a word for intelligence, or the need for one.  This need is expressed in many ways, most obviously by this word's incessant presence in Modern Life.  Few terms in any language experience the flogging and bogging, the many hard miles over hard terrain that our word intelligence gets, daily.  It sounds like we're as smart as we can get and getting smarter by the minute, to hear us tell it.  Is it so?
     A while back, cleaning his paddock with my younger brother, Scott, we had an amusing exchange about smarts.  He was aware I usually avoid horses for the same reasons I'm not drawn to crowds of Humans.  Horses and people are similar in that if there's anything worse than a dumb one -- and Lordy, do they know dumb -- it's an 'intelligent' one.  Stay clear of 'em, I say.  He told me this, about an endurance ride he'd competed in:  An off-course turn took him and his mount up a very narrow trail, cliffs up on the left, down on the right, leaving no room to dismount or make a mounted u-turn.  Rounding a bend, they were blocked by a tree down over the trail, hanging precarious.  Scott said after a very few minutes of, 'Now what...,' and swiveling ears, the horse did something unhorselike.  He stood up on his back feet with Scott aboard, turned around in the trail, and went back to all fours headed safer back downhill.  Scott said, 'Tell me they're not intelligent,' speaking for his horses.  I said, 'Yeah.  And likewise, just because you can pronounce the word intelligence does not mean you have some, or would know where to find any, or would recognize it if it served you at McDonald's.'  We laughed.
     It's our very Distinguishing Characteristic, which no one seems to think is funny.  Look around you anywhere; distinguished?  How?  Where?
     There's a positive overdose blizzard of chaff marked 'intelligence,' and little more in evidence behind the label.  Distinguished by what, 'we-need-a-flood-of-good-clean-ideas-and-here-comes-a-smarts-drought?'  Tried to think and nothing happened?  Bushels of intelligence and most of it 'secret?'  This is an intelligence apparatus made almost entirely of open circuits, with not a glimmer at the bulb or a quiver on the needle.
     While you look around for some positive evidence of intelligence at work in your world, consider this:  Everyone (EVERYBODY) knows the words politician and crook are almost synonymous, near interchangeable, for very good and very old reasons.  Yet, a good number of otherwise normal-looking People, when elections creep up and campaigns start flinging 'product,' will actually engage in long, bitter arguments, debating back and forth, but seriously, which of the lying, thieving, murdering dogs among the candidates is the more believable.  Seriously.  Slim pickin's in the smarts department around election time, no doubt whatever.  Maybe in November, the smarter cells are hibernating, leaving the rest to sort among the evils for a 'lesser?'
     Intelligence is so highly valued, and so often-cited a factor in skills for survival (to hear the survivors tell it), you'd think there'd be more visible exercise of it.  Maybe we shouldn't expect so much.  We've got by on so little, so far so good, right?  Right?
     And the Official Intelligence Expert with an entire briefcase full of Intelligence does not have to show you anything, because you're just a cannon-fodder corrections-grist tax-cattle civilian mooing about intelligence and you don't even have a security clearance.  And more often than not, the briefcase holds only an underwear change, a few viagra, some outdated but hopeful condoms, and some worn porn.  A walking intelligence bonanza.  With a real, live Rolex.  It's too bleak to speak.
     If you're all hopeful, convinced that some real intelligence needs to spring forth to our rescue, beware: intelligence hasn't really played that big a role positively, so far.  And there are many things labeled 'intelligence' and convincingly packaged and all...that open up empty, or worse.  A spontaneous taxyak upwising seems unlikely...
     Ask an intelligence expert for examples of smarts operating successfully as a survival mechanism, and you'll find you're in the wrong building, Elvis.  The densest, most industrial-strength concentrations of deliberate ignorance and intentional stupidity are consistently exhibited by those known as intelligence experts.  We've come a long way, baby, on this brand of intelligence.  So does it look like it's going well?  Ask SETI, maybe.
     Succeeding in your quest for intelligence, like any other search, depends largely on where you look.  The official Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence is looking everywhere but this planet in accord with their title.  Does that mean they've given up looking around here?  What, exactly, are their search parameters?  Would they know intelligence in the highly unlikely event they should run across it?  If they were to find intelligence out there, would SETI's response be the same as the intelligent response?
     Here on terra infirma we've a vast surplus of those who claim the gift of intelligence.  Some of these are documented with degrees, diplomas, citations, clearances, folksy memoirs, and more; others simply proclaim their smarts all unabashed, and recognize no intelligence whatever in those who disagree with them in this or any question.  (The old 'I'm smart, and you're not' deal that used to whirl across the schoolyard leaving a whiff of idiocy in its wake.)  Both these categories, claimants to be entitled, 'intelligent,' seem unmotivated to practice any of their art but bragging about it.  Long intel-drought there, too.
     There are legions of those in official capacity who claim possession of intelligence in two ways, for starters:
     1.  A claim of intelligence as a personal faculty with which they are blessed as individuals, having it in their possession and control, they say, with charts.
     2.  A claim of proprietary rights to way too much unspecified intelligence -- rights not found in Law -- including spurious rights to hide intelligence, or classify it.
     Why would a sworn and well-fed public servant want to hide important information by classification?
     Good intelligence or Bad intelligence, wouldn't it serve the Public, US, better to be wised up?  Isn't that kind of like the democratic approach?

   Whose Little Intel Is This?

A Quiz 

     Questions:

•      Who's PAYING for this intelligence, and paying and paying and...?
•      Whose security is supposed to depend on this intelligence, emphatically?
•      Who gets selected NOT to take part in this intelligence 'for their own good,' unless it goes bad (unclassified), uncovering the rot, the crimes, the lives ruined and lost and stolen?  Time.  After.  Time.
•      Who gets to clean up this horror?
•      Who gets to pay again and pay again, and so on...?
•      Who never gives themselves credit where they won it?
•      Who takes a screwin' and keeps on mooin'?

     Answers:

          Us, us, us, us, us, us, and us, respectively

     Long time lucky thing for us self-appointed intelligent beings, thanks to Murphy and to God and all her little Helpers, there's way more to this smarts deal than you would think. 

Suggested Reading

Conspiracy for Empire; Big Business, Corruption, and the Politics of Imperialism in America, 1876-1907
     --  Luzviminda Bartolome Francisco, Jonathan Shepard Fast

Theodore Rex
     --  Edmund Morris

War Is A Racket
     --  General Smedley D. Butler

The Crusades Through Arab Eyes
     --  Amin Maalouf

Seven Pillars of Wisdom
     --  T. E. Lawrence

Confession of an Economic Hit Man
     --  John Perkins

The Control of Nature
     --  John McPhee

Damn and Other Disasters; A Century of the Army Corps of Engineers in Civil Works
     --  Arthur E. Morgan

Tiananmen Diary
     --  Harrison E. Salisbury

Heaven's Breath; A Natural History of the Wind
     --  Lyall Watson

Out of the Box!

[This entry was originally written just one month after 911.  I include it here as further illustration of how badly we can screw up a problem just by not defining it correctly, yet insisting on trying to 'solve' it anyway.  No one had yet whispered any lie about 'weapons of mass destruction]

     Allow me to present a different perspective on the horrible events of this September 11 (call it 9-11, or 911).  Though the national perception seems to be that this is where the Problem began, we know this must be far from accurate.  How far?  Not even close.  And at best, we're not near the end.  Take your vitamins.

     It is understandable that most of us have no idea what's been going on in the Mideast since 1900; why would we?  If one is not a historian or a petroleum geologist, what reason would one have for knowing anything about Jordan, or Iraq or Saudi Arabia or any of these exotic desert lands?  It's none of our business, right?  Not exactly none of our business.

     There are two distinct modes of American involvement in the Mideast:  Mode 1 of the 'normal' uninvolved citizen sees it as mostly none of our business.  This is only proper and just, being in accordance with the American revolutionary principle that everyone has the Right to tend to their own knitting without outside interference.  Mode 2 of the petroleum geologists, engineers, drillers, refiners, executives, lobbyists, politicians, and accountants sees the Mideast as most definitely our business.  Mode 2 is the single major factor, the prime salient fact of life in the Mideast and is largely responsible for 911.  Please keep this in mind, remember I said it.

     Certainly Mode 1 bears some responsibility for its ravenous hunger for petroleum.  Yet, ignorant of the reality 'on the ground' in Arabia for the last 100 years, Mode 1 has been sleepwalking along half-conscious, thinking everything is 'normal.'  Most unfortunately for us all, this half-witted concept of 'normal' has allowed Mode 2 to install the current tenant in the White House.  If you think Geo. W. Bush was duly elected President of the United States, think again.  While it may be understandable that Joe Citizen has no idea of the causes and likelihood of 911, this understanding cannot extend to Desert Storm, Jr., and his mentors.  In fact, it is impossible that they would not comprehend the causes and likelihood of 911 since they and their predecessors have been intimately involved from day one in creating this ongoing catastrophe; it's the way they do business.

* * *

     The Pentagon is widely recognized as the center of the planet's greatest military power; the place is swarming with highly paid Experts in readiness and defense.  They meticulously cover every military subject, from the most mundane and pedestrian to the most arcane and exotic, under multiple layers of generals.

     The Pentagon's office of Plans and Operations was the nucleus of this vast and most powerful institution, the brains of the outfit.  On the morning of September 11, the paint was still drying from a multimillion dollar renovation of Plans and Operations when a highjacked airliner wiped it out with a direct hit.  

     Instead of the surviving Readiness Experts being relieved of their duties, or even investigated, they were promptly assigned to solving the Problem.

* * *

     Almost anywhere in the world you can pass as a patriot for simply believing what you're told and waving whatever flag is handy; we Americans need a better idea:  Get yourself a large color image of the Trade Towers exploding in flame with glass and paper and bodies showering down, smoke raging to the sky.  Inscribe in large, neat letters across the bottom:  "YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK"

rickweddle@hotmail.com

Book Review #86

Next to Hughes;

Behind the Power and Tragic Downfall of Howard Hughes

by His Closest Advisor

-- Robert Maheu

     This one rocked me.

     Hughes has fascinated me, like many, as the ultra-rich, power-mad, playboy-recluse, cottonpicker-genius-legend that he appeared to be.

     The  isolated horror of his end, and the waves of corruption, both deep and wide, around him in the Meantime are unbelievably shocking.  However unbelievable, this story is yet another stark proof of the old rule, '...the love of money is the root of all evil.'  In this case, Hughes realized there was Nothing he couldn't buy...so of course, that's what he went for, and got:  LOTS of Nothing.

     Maheu's personal story, which sounds pretty believable, has him at or near the center of many of the most pivotal events of modern civilization.  All this reminds me that our word, civilization, comes down to us as Rome's great gift to the world...it's what you get when the dust settles and the blood soaks into the ground.

     Life and Peace get next to zero credit for enduring this process and paying ALL the bills, ALL the time.  I'm guessing this is largely 'cause the pirates write the history and run the schools that teach it.  

     The Rich ARE different.

     Such a deal!

Horses' Mouths

During the '70's and '80's there were pronouncements from a couple of Americans, both of whom had been in positions to know, which were of prime interest then, and should still be so for us, today.  These statements, by notorious figures with histories of involvement in 'organized crime,' shed brilliant light on the very nature of organized crime, how it works, for whom it works, and clear insights into its behind-the-scenes organizational structures and modes of operation.
Whether you think of them as 'folk heroes' or simply as criminals, what they had to say was, and is, well worth thinking about...

     Mickey Cohen -- Confirmed mobster, longtime boss of gambling in California, presented a recipe for success in organized crime, requiring these essential ingredients in hand:
     The Chief of Police
     The Sheriff
     The District Attorney
...and stated flatly that if you control these elements in any given location, "...you can do anything you want..."

     Malcolm X -- From his previous incarnation as the underworld figure, 'Detroit Red,' he concluded that, "...organized crime exists only to the extent that it is known to 'the authorities'...

Our most trusted 'public servants,' then, are in fact involved deeply in organized criminal activities, not just by their tacit approval, but in collusion and direct participation; it's the way 'they do business.'

These statements were not provided (then or now) as blueprints for prospective organized criminals, but as descriptions of the mechanisms already in place in our towns, cities, nation, and in the world...stark images of 'how things work' in the Big Picture.

The Real Lesson, if there is one, is recognizing and acknowledging what this means to us here and now, today.  How does it relate to Big Money's unlawful control of our governments (Executive, Legislative, Judicial branches, elections, the Pentagon, and more); economies (markets, banks, tax structures, Treasury, resources, and more); media (the Press, TV, internet and other electronic communications, and more)?
How does it relate to our imposed and enforced addictions to the most dangerous and expensive energy sources (petroleum, coal, fracking, nukes, etc.), in spite of the eternal presence of alternative, infinite, FREE sources, most urgently in need only of recognition and development?  How does it relate to these Most Dangerous Energies' contributions to the growing crisis of Global Warming?  How does it relate to the explosive growth in War Industries, and the mushrooming emphasis on War-making?...[I could go on, and generally do, given half a chance.]...

Just wondering...

Please let me know what you think; I encourage you to leave a comment here, and if you've the time and inclination, please also see my other notes here and respond accordingly.  Thank you. 

Most Important Quotes In History (So Far)

(And Somehow, Mysteriously Unknown Almost Everywhere)

   "A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various and powerful interests, combined into one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in the banks."

--John C. Calhoun

     "I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country...Corporations have been enthroned, an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money-power of the country will endeavour to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until the wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed."

--Abraham Lincoln

     "You don't think we'd let that fool in the White House, do you?  You know you can get half the people in this country to shoot the other half, and we've got the money to hire them."

--Mark Hanna, speaking of his boy McKinley's opponent, William Jennings Bryan

     "I should probably have gone to the penitentiary than to the White House."

--William McKinley

War Is Crime

Thursday, 4-12-12

     Von Klauswitz said, "The sole cause of war is undefended wealth."  This seems a rash oversimplification of a most complex and persistent problem.  Yet, von K. is still highly regarded as one of history's foremost authorities on things military, required reading at West Point and other institutions of the 'military mind.'  What, in Herr von Klauswitz's considered and revered opinion, did he mean by such a statement?  It looks, for all the world, like another way of saying, "War is armed robbery."  If this is true, then it was a most prudent Public Relations move, and an ingenious and timely marketing ploy following WWII, to change the name of the U.S. War Department to the Department of Defense.  This fumigated the pesky odor of crime, bleached the stigma of aggression, and still encourages patriotic compliance and support.  Since then, all things with a 'defense' tag have been held as sacrosanct:  'Defense' budgets inflate explosively, immune to cuts; Blood-merchant 'defense' contractors even achieve preferred status, clothed in false innocence and 'benevolent' strength...all for the 'common good.'  Any opposition to this juggernaut of piracy is then depicted as attacking our common defenses.

     Nonetheless, such opposition has come, not only from the consistent Public outcry, but from many in our pantheon of true American 'Greats,' all in positions to know whereof they speak:

     General George Washington saw a standing army as inherently dangerous to our Liberties, and warned against allowing it...correctly.

     Abraham Lincoln announced the 'enthronement' of the corpirations by 1865, "...because of the war...," and predicted the destruction of our Republic in a rising flood of greed and corruption...correctly.

     Mark Twain and the Anti-Imperialist League spoke loud warnings against the acts and consequences of Empire...correctly.

     General Omar Bradley eloquently warned after WWII of our increasing focus on war-making... correctly.

     General Dwight D. Eisenhower warned against the military-industrial complex...correctly.

     Theodore Roosevelt warned against "...that most dangerous of classes: the wealthy criminal class...", correctly. 

     General Smedley D. Butler even wrote a book, War Is A Racket (1932), in which he said, "I spent 33 years in the Marines, most of my time being a high-class muscle man for big business, for Wall Street and the bankers.  In short, I was a racketeer for Capitalism."  Where von Klauswitz's statement was an exquisitely diplomatic way of blaming the victim for the crime, Smedley Butler's language is in blunt American English, leaving no room for intellectual mincing.  General Butler goes on to recount his participation as a hired killer of dark-skinned people in China, Haiti, the Philippines, and elsewhere, for American corpirations.

     Redefining war as highly organized crime, according to Herr von Klauswitz and all these great Americans, then overturns the very way we see war, and the very ways we think about it.  This sheds a new and terrible light on our own national conduct toward those of other nations.  Once we entertain the possibility that covert forces within our nation have used us personally, and have used our awesome national might to work piracy and plunder on other countries, we recognize this possibility's becoming a likelihood, and then a certainty.  This is shocking enough on the face of it, that America's People could be so deep under the spell of the military-industrial cult that we've been party to the rape and pillage of any of the rest of the planet for someone's gain.  There are further revolutionary revelations...

     Having turned over this one rock, redefining war as crime, and exposing the corpirate criminal vermin there, let's not freeze up in shock and awe.  In the revolutionary spirit of leaving no stone unturned here, let us have the fortitude to recognize that the furtive forces, the corpirations and bankers who have subverted and corrupted our highest offices, have in fact been making war on us.  They have, at least since 1865, seen America and all our riches...our natural resources; our Human resources; our groundwater, lakes, streams and seas; our very atmosphere itself...as undefended wealth, ripe for plunder and exploitation.  They have succeeded nicely, so far.  Yet this success is based upon our not recognizing its true nature.  Not recognizing it, we'd not even see the need to defend ourselves.  We'd be pressed into compliance and cooperation and 'patriotic' submission to their illegal wars they wage on others, and on us.

     We've long thought of war as a clear division between us ('friend'), and them ('enemy').  To prevail, we defend our weak spots and mobilize our strengths to pierce their weak spots and destroy or neutralize their strengths.  Our victory means securing our position, and gaining control of their position.  For defensive aims, victory ends any threat they've posed to us.  For offensive aims, victory gives open access to their natural resources, Human resources, political machinery, and real estate, all their wealth and power as prizes of war...plunder.  Making war without real defensive reasons...lying about the threats...is, then, offensive war for plunder, confirming von Klauswitz's naming war as Armed Robbery.  We traditionally have seen this highly organized-criminal looting as limited to the extent of their undefended wealth.  Yet the modern machinery of war-thievery ravages a booty far greater and more valuable than theirs: yours and mine.

     Having lied to us repeatedly about 'threats' and 'sneak attacks' is itself a blind-side attack on our ability to make informed decisions about our own life-and-death issues.  This has defeated us at the outset, leaving undefended our own natural resources, Human resources, political machinery and real estate, all our wealth and power...to be plundered at will by the the very apparatus of our own 'defense,' with the active collusion of 'our' politicians.  It's becoming more starkly clear by the hour that this is the circumstance in which we in America and our world find ourselves, today.  One hundred fifty years' covert insurgency by the corpirations and bankers have drenched us and our flag and our world in innocent blood.  It has obliterated wide swaths of our Life Support Systems, fouling the Earth, the waters, and the sky.  It has gutted the lawful sovereignty of America's People and others' around the planet.  Rigged for ever-greater profits for ever-fewer individuals, it lays waste to ever more and more.

     What does this mean in dollars and sense?  Take a glimpse of General Butler's numbers

for WWI, alone:

Corpiration                             Peacetime avg. annual profit             Bloodmoney avg.       %Increase

duPont . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $6,000,000.00  (1910-1914) . . . . . . . .$58,000,000.00 . . . . . >950%

Bethlehem Steel . . . . . . . . . . $6,000,000.00  (1910-1914) . . . . . . . .$49,000,000.00 . . . . . >800%

U.S. Steel  . . . . . . . . . . . . . .$105,000,000.00 (1909-1914) . . . . . . . $240,000,000.00. . . . . >100%

Anaconda Copper . . . . . . . . .$10,000,000.00 (1910-1914) . . . . . . . .$34,000,000.00 . . . . . >300%

Utah Copper. . . . . . . . . . . . . . $5,000,000.00  (1910-1914) . . . . . . . .$21,000,000.00 . . . . . >400%

Central Leather Co.  . . . . . . . $1,167,000.00  (1911-1914) . . . . . . . .$15,000,000.00 . . . . .  1100%

General Chemical Co. . . . . . .     $800,000.00 (1911-1914) . . . . . . . .$12,000,000.00 . . . . .  1400%

International Nickel Co.  . . . . $4,000,000,00  (1910-1914). . . . . . . .$73,500,000.00 . . . . . . 1700%

American Sugar Ref. Co. . . . .    $200,000.00  (1911-1914). . . . . . . .  $6,000,000.00 . . . . . .   300%

122 meat packers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .200-300%

340 coal producers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100-7856%

     

     WWI corpirate ripoffs for which we taxpayers (the 99%!) are still paying (again, this is a partial list):

• 35,000,000 pairs hobnailed shoes (for 4,000,000 soldiers)
• Hundreds of thousands of McClellan saddles (for non-existent overseas 'cavalry')
• 20,000,000 mosquito nets (for troops in France; not one delivered)
• 40,000,000 additional yards of netting (?!!)
• $1,000,000,000.00 for airplanes, engines (for France; not one delivered)
• 4,000,000 extra sets of 'gear' (knapsacks, contents) (obsolete 'surplus' at war's end)
• 6,000 buckboard wagons (not one deployed)
• $635,000,000.00 for wooden 'ships' (wouldn't even float -- gone)

     $25,000,000,000.00 National debt, 1918 (owed to 'bankers')

     $52,000,000,000.00 WWI cost to U.S. taxpayers, for generations

.....and this is just looking under one little corner of the rug, as of the end of WWI.

* * *

     Regarding how the government and the war-profiteers 'support our troops,' consider the 'Bonus Army:'

American troops in WWI were promised a 'victory bonus' of $1,000.00 each (to those surviving) at the successful conclusion of the conflict.  This would have been a hefty chunk of change then, especially handy in a Depression.  Fourteen years after the end of the War, in the depths of the Great Depression, they still had not been paid this bonus.  Tens of thousands of these veterans converged on Washington in the 'Bonus March' in 1932, demanding their promised reward.  In support of these veterans, General Butler stood as their spokesperson, to encourage them and advocate for them.  This gathering in Washington D.C. was then actually attacked by active-duty U.S. troops, to end the 'demonstration' and disperse the massed vets.  One adult and one infant were killed in the melee.  Commanding this attack were Douglas MacArthur and George Patton, later to become such vaunted 'heroes' in WWII, the 'good' war.  The significance of that treatment of American veterans then is not lost on us, today; that betrayal is typical of the behavior of the military-industrial cult in all its highly profitable dealings around the world...making our country so 'great,' so famously loved and respected everywhere.

      

Friendly Fire; One Veteran's View

     My American Heritage Dictionary, 4th edition, defines the word oxymoron as meaning "...pointedly foolish..."  The expression friendly fire clearly fits this description.  A product of military intelligence, it's covered in layers of irony so thick and so many, we might expect it to take the cake in the oxymoron department.  But, until today, each occurence of 'friendly fire' has taken considerably more than 'cake.'  Among the victims of such mistaken aim, few survive to tell of it;  if you can find one of these survivors, ask them how friendly it felt.  Further, look up the one who pulled the trigger in each of these instances; consider the horror, grief, and self-condemnation each will carry to their last breath.  Is there any way any of these, on either side of the 'friendly fire,' could not take it personally?  No.  The rest of us are encouraged not to think of it at all, or if we must, to call it 'regrettable...tragic...inadvertent,' and so on; a sad side-effect of armed conflict.  So far in this observation, we're talking about circumstances in which individual soldiers on the battlefield, PEOPLE, have literally called the shots.
     By 1865, when Abraham Lincoln announced it, corpirate traitors had secretly seized control of the U.S. government, lock, stock, barrel, and armed forces.  Since that time, the corpirations have in fact been calling the shots in the 'big picture.'  Do you think Honest Abe was kidding?  I don't think so.  If you're a fan of friendly fire, you're sure to get a really big bang out of the consequences of these covert subversions, and the corpirations' rule-by-remote-control for the past 150 years or so;  for instance:
     Late 1800's
     Exercising dominant sea-power, 'American interests'* eagerly set about the building of Empire; subjugating, and yes, enslaving Chinese, Japanese, Polynesian, and American workers across the Pacific, and along the coasts of Chile and Peru for guano, the raw material for fertilizers and other agrichemicals, and for feed-stocks for plants producing gunpowder and other explosives, laying the foundations for the Military-Industrial Cult.  These pools of 'cheap labor' were also forcibly brought to work the woods, mines, and railroads of the American West.  When war with Spain threatened, Spain quickly met U.S. demands to avoid it.  These 'American Interests' took us to war with Spain anyway, for cheap real estate, resources, and labor.  The subsequent occupation of the Philippines, and the ongoing 'difficulties' there are covered in some detail in the book Conspiracy for Empire; Big Business, Corruption and the Politics of Imperialism in America, 1876-1907, by Luzviminda Bartolome Francisco and Jonathan Shepard Fast.  This piece of work should be required reading for anyone who still thinks it might be ok for corpirations to run our country (and the world) behind the scenes.  This needless conflict also fit in well with the designs of the Sugar Trust of Henry Havemeyer, gaining control of Cuba, Puerto Rico, much of Central and South America, even Hawai'i, indirectly.  While these corpirate 'American' incursions made many Americans 'uncomfortable,' their significance and apparent success was not lost on other powers, notably, Germany and Japan, both of whom felt elbowed away from the Imperial trough.  Could this have contributed to the hard feelings leading to WWI, WWII, and so on?  Quite obviously, it did.  How many American PEOPLE were put in harm's way for these commercial ventures?  How many American PEOPLE lost their lives, limbs, and loves, there?  Some 10,000,000 Filipino men, women, and children perished (so far).  Could all these losses be attributed to a kind of 'friendly fire?'  Could America's aim be so far off as to allow such things to happen?  I say, it could, and it did...and it is.
     Early 1900's:
     Similarly, Marxism and other socialist movements came in direct response to these corpirate predations around the world.  And, Kaiser Wilhelm was not about to let 'American interests' get by with all their plunder without getting in on the action, hence WWI...hence the interference in the Mideast by European and 'American interests' for their oil...
     Mid-1900's:
     ...hence German National Socialism (the German-flavored Military-Industrial Cult), the rise of militarism in Japan, and WWII...hence the cutting up of the planet like a pie between 'American interests' and 'Soviet interests,' the Cold War, and the Arms Race.  No discussion of 'friendly fire' should miss the advent of nuclear weapons.  Ostensibly created for our own defense, these heartwarming arms quickly reached a magnitude such that they threaten our entire biosphere.  That is, they are potentially so destructive, it no longer matters whose they are, or where they are aimed, the entire planet has been directly in the line of fire, ever since.  This has widely been recognized as 'unthinkable,' first, by the awakening to it among PEOPLE, and only then, with seeming reluctance among our 'leaders.'  Having then accomplished the 'unthinkable,' and further, having still accomodated it to this day, we must conclude we have done so, and continue to do so, unwittingly.  Congratulations.  Unwittingly is no way to avoid 'friendly fire.'
     2000's:
     The terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 have been seen here largely as coming 'out of the blue,' perpetrated by vicious, religious fundamentalist wackos, for some twisted reasons unknowable to reasonable minds.  However, knowing how 'American interests' have behaved toward the PEOPLES of the oil-rich Mideast, at least since the end of WWI, would leave little room for such great surprise.  911 was nothing more, and not a bit less than the 'chickens of Empire' coming home to roost.  The manipulation of governments, rigging and abolishing free elections, installing despots cooperative with 'American interests,' would have predictable, unpleasant consequences.  In fact, the growth of Islamic fundamentalism in the Mideast, as the only outlet for the voice of the PEOPLE in those countries, was predicted.  Such dire predictions were promptly ignored, most unfortunately for us all.  Further, 'American interests' then engineered a 'counter-attack' on these nebulous terrorist forces, in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, clearly based on 'intelligence' which ranged all the way from poor to none.  That these ill-advised military adventures work to the immense benefit of the infamous 'American interests' is no coincidence whatever.  Making such undeclared wars here and there pretty much guarantees control of their oil by these 'American interests,' and in the process, racks up astonishing profits for these same corpirate bandits.  How much do you suppose it costs to fuel a fighter jet?  An aircraft carrier?  Who gets the money?  The corpirate catastrophes we still insist on calling 'American interests,' that's who.  Who pays for it?  You and I do, in cash and blood, and at the cost of our hard-won American revolution!  To say very little about 'collateral damages.'
     Still certainly regrettable and tragic, these great 'friendly fires' are in no way inadvertent, since they have been, and still are perpetrated deliberately, by design, for immediate profit and control of potential profits.  And I repeat, we are all in the line of fire on this little globe.

* * *

      More Deliberate 'Friendly Fire'

     James Fallows's book, National Defense, traces the development and deployment of two of the most important weapons in the vast U.S. arsenal, the F-16 fighter jet, and the M16 assualt rifle.  Each of these charming artifacts was originally designed and produced as an extremely efficient and dependable killing machine.  Each was then further 'developed' by 'American interests' to the point that ruined its dependability and efficiency, resulting in the killings of thousands of American troops (our PEOPLE).  Lobbyists for the defense contractors, bent on yet more record profits, altered each of these designs, to the peril, and to the destruction of GI's, and at huge additional, needless costs.

     F-16:  They insisted on larger engines for these planes, overpowering their airframes, with the result that they spent more time in the 'shop' than in the air;  They changed the onboard electronics so that the aircraft became a glaringly obvious target on enemy radars...  The question is:  "Why?!"  The answer is, "$$$$$!!"

     M16:  Originally Colt's Armalite AR15, this little honey had a .223 bore with ballistics that ripped flesh and bone to hamburger; it's ammo had a fast-burning powder, matched to its chamber/round design that made for a ferocious rate of fire on 'full auto;' it was small, light, made largely of plastic (immune to rust), which made it easy to carry and use, its ammo being small enough to carry lots of it; it was quite resistant to jamming caused by the dirt and debris of the battlefield; all-in-all, an impressive little implement for mayhem and slaughter.  Yet, it was greeted with derision by the lobbyists and the 'big wheels' at the Pentagon; they saw it as a silly toy...not a 'real man's' rifle.  Here, they changed it for a bigger, heavier, 'more macho' chamber/round design; they rejected the faster-burning powder in favor of that which had been supplied 'our' armed forces since 1900 (duPont?).  They dubbed this altered weapon, 'M16.'  These changes resulted in a rifle obviously harder to carry and use, with fewer extra bullets, and notoriously prone to jamming in combat.  Combat field commanders in Vietnam were near unanimous in reporting 80% of their battlefield casualties were because of jammed M16's.  (It got so that in combat situations, GI's would throw down their @#&*!! M16's and pick up a Russian or Chinese AK47 whenever possible!)  Again, the question is:  "Why?!"  And again, the answer is:  "$$$$$!!"

     [For those of you in the carnage business, you may be pleased to know the AR15 is still available...should you be more interested in surviving a firefight than not.  Or, if you prefer, there are so many tin-and-plastic AK47's around, you might buy one, in the Mideast for instance, for around $5!]

* * *

     The Bradley Fighting Vehicle:

     This immensely expensive piece of killing equipment was deadly to GI's from the very drawing-board.  The precursor to the infamous Stryker, this vehicle doomed many of 'our' troops from the beginning.  The driver could not even see adequately out half his view; small 'rifle' ports on the sides were ok to see out of, unless you poked your rifle out, then your view was severely restricted; the aluminum 'armor' actually enhanced the explosive force of armor-piercing rounds, spraying molten 'armor' all over the interior, again, killing and maiming 'our' troops (PEOPLE).  These 'design oversights' were quickly and painfully obvious to GI's stuck in them.

     Designed and marketed by FMC, Farm Machinery Corporation (sic(sic!)) out of California, these deadly machines were funded by Congress and approved by the Brains at the Pentagon with some enthusiasm.  Even after it became known that they were killing our own PEOPLE, the Congressional representatives involved sustained their approval, implying that FMC, in its infinite wisdom, would correct any pesky problems.  (General Omar Bradley would spin in his grave, screaming and puking, if he knew they named this thing for him.)  You can find the names of these 'public servants,' in Congress and the Pentagon, should you care to look into it; please do.  Yet again, the question is:  "Why?!"  And, one more time, the answer is:  "$$$$$!!"

     Is anyone besides me getting sick of this endless, astronomically expensive (in dollars and in lives) corpirate pattern?  If so, talk to me!

 * * *

     Until and unless we recognize and acknowledge these most unpleasant truths, 'friendly fire' will become more and more the most salient feature of our great Western 'civilization.'

     Good luck; we're going to need it!

*A consistent media euphemism for the corpirations, distinct from America's PEOPLE

le difference vive

[These commentaries are posted here in reverse chronological order (latest on top).  You will find the introduction and a hint of context by scrolling down to the end (1st) of the entries.  I encourage you to leave a comment, if you please.  Thank you, rw]

     It all goes back to the End of America.
     Pick five of our greatest current crises.  Any five.
     Odds are, at least four of your five crises are SYNTHETIC, fabricated, installed, and set in motion in our midst, on purpose, and largely with our cooperation.
     These artificial processes carry consequences outside the limits of survival, and repulsive to Human sensibilities.  Further, these end-consequences get little or no native regard as a matter of course in 'the process.'  Further still, unfavorable end-consequences are actively disregarded, even discredited to 'benefit' the process only.  This self-blinding creature was designed to crash, but to ignore it.  So manifestly unqualified, these contrived 'beings' quickly came to calling the shots, literally, with one eye out for a quick buck, and the other eye, too...both eyes out, sort of.
     You might say America ended as a democratic republic (of, by, and for People), when Abe Lincoln announced the enthronement of corporations in 1865.*
     I do say so, here and now.
     Then, based on the 13th Amendment to 'free the slaves,' the Court's decision to recognize corporations as 'persons' in legal fact, let the hyenas loose in the nursery;  so long, America, dream and all.  The custom-built beast elbowed us out of our Lobbies, and set to work.
     How many of 'our troops' (and others')(and others) have been sacrificed since then?  Count them.  Name them.  Find them in their tombstone legions, or unmarked places off in the fields.  Dig around in the dirt a little with your fingers, in respect for the millions of 'collateral damages,' see what you come up with.
     Has any corporation anywhere made any sacrifice whatever, ever, where the cost isn't passed along to us?  No.  A corporation couldn't sacrifice of itself, even if it thought of it and wanted to, neither likely.  A corporation does not have a self, but on paper.
     Hold up a finger.  Turn it about this way and that, and look at it.  That's something else a corporation can't do, never did, never will.  One finger outnumbers all the corporations in history.  And there are a lot more 'persons' with fingers and so on, than 'persons' not so blessed.
     Somebody's surrounded.




*Honest Abe also said, "...you cant fool all the People all the time."

Truth, Justice, and the American Way Quiz #1

Questions
     In accordance with the U.S. Constitution and its Bill of Rights, is it legal in any case to:
     1.  Make any arrest without a warrant?
         Yes___ No___
     2.  Make any arrest without available defense counsel?
         Yes___ No___
     3.  Make any arrest without specific charges?
         Yes___ No___
     4.  Make any arrest without the Right to a phone call?
         Yes___ No___
     5.  Make any arrest without the reading of 'Miranda' Rights?
         Yes___ No___
     6.  Inflict any punishment whatever  without conviction by Due Process?
         Yes___ No___
     7.  Let suspicions of 'terrorism' alter the above considerations in any way whatever?

Answers
     No, no, no, no, no, no, and NO, respectively.

* * *

     If you answered 'yes' to any of these questions, you don't know anything about the American system of Justice.  You will need to go ask someone who does know, or get up on your back feet and look it up for yourself.  Without doing so, your way will by definition be UN-American.  Until you do so...until you get it Right...we're dying out here.

Having and Having Not

     When Lincoln announced the enthronement of corporations (without naming them), warning of the consequences, he was promptly shot by a 'lone gunman.'  Boothe's small circle of conspirator/accom-plices had links to wartime commercial interests; these links were then obscured in the ensuing uproar and never pursued.
     Those events marked the END of America's democratic republic, as lawfully Constituted.  That corpirate sneak attack, piercing the head and heart of the United States, was in fact an act of war perpetrated for gain against the People of America and our Constitutional form of government.  It remains with us, upon us, today; look around.  The enduring dominance of this corpirate rule relies on our neither recognizing nor acknowledging it.*  This confusion was greatly reinforced by the Court's recognition of corpirations as persons, citing the 13th Amendment, originally meant to free African-American slaves.  Witness the wide acceptance of corpirations as members of the 'private sector,' like just plain folks.  Since that time, our country in its entirety has been held Prisoners of War, our democratic institutions gone Missing In Action, all inflicted with Post Traumatic Stress Disorders, some more, some less.

Some folks bathe in the Ganges;

We're up past our ass in Denial

     What we have in the Land of the 'Free:'

     Enforced Cognitive Dissonance (A spell imposed to keep us in a fog of wishful thinking and creative nostalgia.  Our 'freedoms' are allowed only so far as to keep us as cooperative, compliant tax-cattle...our 'liberties' permitted only so far as to keep us contributing to the flow of all wealth and power into fewer and fewer hands...the more enthusiastic your participation, the higher your rewards.)

     What we do not have:

     'Our' troops -- Since corpirations started calling the shots, we don't have any troops...A human has a life to give; a corpiration does not, but can buy some and take more.

     'Our' flag -- The stars and stripes gone stolen, desecrated, soaked in innocent blood here and there around the world.

     'Our' government -- Sold off to the highest bidders, lock, stock, and barrels.

     'Our' Constitution -- "...just a goddamn piece of paper!"  --George W. Bush

     'Our' economy -- A rigged feeding frenzy of corpirate sharks, unsustainable, bleeding out.

     'Our' energy resources -- Monopolized, focused on the most dangerous and most centralized, to the specific exclusion of safe, local, sustainable, INFINITE energy alternatives.

     'Our' People -- Dehumanized, stunned and mesmerized, divided and conquered, herded along like lemmings toward the precipice.

*If this is so, as it seems, then the first POSITIVE step away from this mess is to recognize and acknowledge the unlawful dominance of corpirations, that they are in fact a criminal, alien, artificial species...and it's quite late in the game.

     



Poll-Cat Soup

I did a poll from Pole to Pole last night
Just to see what we might need
The results are real surprising
It seems Everything's agreed

I skipped the 'higher' powers
And their rigged and bloody game
Since Everything always changes
While their Nothing stays the same

(You can dig from top to bottom there,
It's enough to make you wince
If it makes enough dollars, hey,
Who needs a lick of sense?)

(Our Founders cast a Bell for Free
An' about the time they sprang it,
Turned out that it was foundered wrong,
It cracked and you cain't rang it!)

We see the Sun and Moon spin 'round
Through Rain and Shine, these Dancers,
They don't ask Nothing nothin,' no,
And don't take 'no' for answers

We get some real Good Questions, now
Ever since we left our Mother
Like what we feel, and why, and how
And IF is quite another.

If you can and do, well then,
Your vital signs aren't flat;
A corpiration can't and won't
It's sad, but, hey, that's that.

In news-confusions troubles grow,
Fake who's and wheres and whats,
When 'Why (we really need to know)
These numb-rods call the shots?!'

Who let them in behind the hall
To sneak in and begin it
To steal our Flag and troops and all,
The White House, House and Senate?!

The Court, the Land, the Sky, the Sea,
Their looting knows no bounds
They take the torch of Liberty
And snuff it on the ground

While War steals all the credit,
All the 'honors' and the frills*
With Humans' blood and tears and sweat
PEACE PAYS ALL THE BILLS!**

We need our Law in living hands
To break this zombie spell
A beating heart, a breathing life
Determined to get well

No puppets nor remote controls
Can clear this thorny bramble
We must reconstitute ourselves
Without lengthy preamble

About Freedom and Liberty
Then let us have no doubt:
These aren't some mass commodity
Which you can 'order out!'

You won't keep Freedom now, of course,
To start nor then continue,
If you sell it off, or worse,
IF YOU DON'T HAVE IT IN YOU!


*...Lately
**Always did; always will!

New World Odor

     Since corporations seized the helm of America's ship of state in 1865, they've never let go.  That's the Main Reason our world looks and smells the way it does, almost everywhere, today.  More than three times more PEOPLE have died since then, in open warfare, 'covert actions,' and other acts of piracy, than in all the previous history of what we fondly call civilization.  Congratulations.  Where's the memorial for all these millions?
     Back then, as the Military-Industrial Cult, firmly rooted in slavery, spread across North America, the Caribbean, Central and South America, Polynesia, the Mideast, and the Orient, there was still room enough in our world to sweep the growing heaps of 'collateral damages' under the rug and hide the stench.  Today, running short of elbow-room and resources, amid accelerating extinctions of ever more species, some Humans actually stir with awakening recognition and begin to wonder, 'What's that horrible smell...and where is it coming from?'
     Hamlet was puzzled, too.  Shakespeare presented 'Denmark's' rank aroma as a stark warning.  Today, again, the horrors of corruption on high are upon us, and no amount of dithering inaction is going anywhere but further down the road to hell on earth.  Maunder on, useless, about 'to be or not to be,' or...snap out of it and BE for all you're worth.  And Good Luck;  you're going to need it.
     A breath of fresh air is getting damned rare in an atmosphere where common sense is so scarce.  No amount of wishful thinking or creative nostalgia is going to get us out of this mess.  The utmost courage and greatest strength will only continue to get us Nowhere, faster, unless they bring us to ask the Hard Questions, and come up with real, honest answers.
     For instance:  Q:  What does an ostrich do about quicksand?  A:  Not very much...and not for very long.  Presently, the great quandry in the public arena is, "How do we get 'our' economy 'back on track?'"  The only possibility of reaching a fruitful answer in this case is to realize that this is the wrong question, to start with.  No honest answer can come to such an erroneous question.  So, what's wrong about it, exactly?  Everything.
     Trying to puzzle out our economic mess with 'How do we get our economy back on track' is delusional and diversionary.  This is not our economy, Virginia!  If we actually had a system for the exchange of goods and services for our mutual benefit, based on values defined by Human needs and skills and talents, it would look a lot different, last a lot longer, and smell a lot better.  But we don't.  Calling the present economic arrangement ours is very like the slave regarding the chains at wrist and ankles and brains as his own; there is no direction to Freedom from such a place.  Every element of this vast apparatus we're conditioned to call 'our' economy, including ourselves and our participation in in, are parts of a machine devised solely for funneling all wealth, resources, and power into the hands of fewer and fewer, faster and faster.  Trying to get this troublesome machine, which has made all this mess from the beginning, 'back on track' is not just fruitless on the face of it, but clinically pathological behavior, repeating the same tragic actions and expecting different results.
     The point here is, this loud and poisonous disaster machine was derailed at the start, for gain, for the very fewest possible to benefit.  Efforts to get it back on track (1) perpetuate these inherent catastrophes, and (2) divert us from positive optional courses.  There's just no real future in it, not in this biosphere.
     'Thinking outside the box' needs urgently to be something more than a catchy phrase; it must again become a living, breathing habit.  This ability is not just a sign of individual intelligence, and a charasteric of our species, we've become Human because of it, and won't be without it (plus a lot of Luck, Providence, the Grace of God in Her Infinite Wisdom, and so on...).
     Is there even a whiff of real, positive, HUMAN change in the air today, anywhere?  I'm really glad to see there is.  You'll be damned unlikely to get wind of it from the corpirate 'news' outlets, but there are indeed increasing causes for optimism.  Prominent among these fresh scents of Freedom is the emergence of the 'Arab Spring' movements in the Mideast.  These popular uprisings, in countries and circumstances unlikely enough to be seen as miraculous, are certainly cause for hope.  Further, they have led to similar mass demonstrations of public outrage and determination in Portugal, Ireland, Greece, and Spain (the 'PIGS' outpourings), and now even the Occupy Wall Street event and its spread to more than 60 other U.S. cities.  We can't yet know if these sweet breezes will actually clear the air, but they are a great relief, just as they unfold.  To these PEOPLE we owe much gratitude, solidarity, and support.  To the corpirations, bankers, and puppet-masters who've created all this mess and turmoil for cash and prizes, we owe NOTHING;  THEY OWE US.