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 20 Nov 2007 @ 02:23
The timpanist plays upon a living being. The stars are bursting with their messages: Turn to a child for the star's announcement.
---Robert Aitken
Greed is the basic cause of misery. Free yourself of greed, and the mountains, rivers, and earth do not block the light of your eyes.
---She-Hsien
To enter one's own self, it is necessary to go armed to the teeth.
---Paul Valery
Why 2015? That is the year, dictated by consensus of the 2500 scientists whose work created the UN report on global warming, when further growth of carbon emissions on this planet must cease. Within 35 years from that date, carbon dioxide and other atmospheric polluting gases must be reduced by 50 to 85 percent to avoid killing as many as a quarter of the species on Earth. [link] This was the announcement on Saturday, when the final portion of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) study was released to the public by this group that already has won the Nobel Prize.
I try to be a patient man. I waited Sunday and I waited today. I expected lead items in newspapers and broadcasts in this country. Well...let's say I hoped for them. Certainly it is the case elsewhere in the world, where concern is at the forefront. One of the good things about Google News is you can see what makes news in the various nations of the world...and what that news is. At the moment you have to type "global warming" into Search to find anything about these stark pronouncements.
We have people campaigning for President right now. The New York Times reported today that in Iowa, a sixth-grader asked Mrs. Clinton if she had any views on global warming. The paper went on to consider whether the question had been planted in the student's mind. There was no mention of what the candidate replied. [link] Have we all gone mad?
Recently it has been the pattern in this country for a person elected (or otherwise achieving the office of) President to serve 2 terms or 8 years. If that continues, whoever ends up President in 2008 still may be there in 2015. Do any of these candidates have a plan for such an incredible challenge? Next month---that's NEXT month---President Bush will lead the United States delegation to the United Nations Conference on climate change in Bali. Last year around this time that man announced he was pretty sure global warming wasn't caused by anything consumers in the free market might be doing...like burning coal or oil. US News & World Report asked this morning Do we HAVE to have this guy representing us? [link]
I listened pretty hard to my world today to see or hear if anyone seemed concerned about the IPCC report or global warming. It's going to be in the mid to upper 60s tomorrow and probably for Thanksgiving. People did remark on that...and sorta smile and shake heads. Ten years ago Dana and I were proud to go out to the garden and kick some snow off a little kale that was left to serve our smoked oysters on for Thanksgiving dinner. The other day people were telling me the crocuses and daffodils they planted in September are coming up already. What will it take to crash through all this denial? More >
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 12 Nov 2007 @ 11:23
Does one really have to fret about enlightenment? No matter what road I travel, I'm going home.
---Shinso
To find the universal elements enough; to be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter...to be thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird's nest or a wildflower in spring---these are some of the rewards of the simple life.
---John Burroughs
I know there is no good in my trying to explain to you why I am away from home—war doesn’t make sense even when you are grown up.
---(Lt.) Henry Fonda to his children during World War II
In the photo, former President George H.W. Bush makes his entrance to his presidential museum during a rededication ceremony with Army Sgt. 1st Class Mike Elliott with the Golden Knights parachute team in College Station, Texas, on Saturday, Nov. 10, 2007. (AP Photo/College Station Eagle, Gabriel Chmielewski)
From: "Annie Warmke"
To: "Richard Carlson"
Sent: Sunday, November 11, 2007 10:05 AM
Subject: happy veteran's day
> Happy Veteran's Day!
> This morning the local NPR station played their favorite tunes for "Happy
> Veteran's Day" and each year after about 15 minutes I have to turn the radio
> off.
>
> The songs are full of one message - pain. Some sing about the pain of going
> to war. Others tell the story of losing a limb, or losing children. They
> all tell a story that leads me to the same conclusion each year. War is
> hell and it is not the solution.
>
> So today I've turned off the radio earlier than usual and begun to wonder if
> that's not what America is doing each morning when the radio offers the
> morning "war report" as I call it. I'm wondering how much longer we'll turn
> off or tune out the news of death and destruction that is happening in our
> names.
>
> The elections this last week remind me that nothing so far has changed. We're
> still up to our eyeballs in corruption in the government. The Democrats
> refuse to take a stand that actually changes anything on any issue - you
> pick one and you'll see what I mean.
>
> As I look out the window at the colorful leaves on the trees - the trees
> that ought to be naked - I am reminded that we're at war in many places on
> this earth, and it seems we're losing them all.
>
> Annie Warmke is an activist, writer and farmer who lives at Blue Rock
> Station with her family of humans, llamas, chickens, goats, cats and her
> French-speaking dog, Rosie.
Dear Annie,
I haven't been to a Veterans Day parade in Athens in a couple years. I guess they've been on weekends, but when kids are in class a bunch of schools march and show up or something. Usually people on the staff put the pressure on or the principal is gung ho, and whole elementary schools turn out. The last couple have been particularly patriotic in the cloying way that makes me uncomfortable. That was before there was more of a general mood of We Support The Soldiers But Not This War. Of course in the military-trained mind---and for the kind of people who run parades like this---there's no such thing as not supporting a war, because your commander has issued an order.
As a kid, it still was Armistice Day. I knew it was about the end of World War I, at 11:00 on 11/11 in some long ago year (1918) but I didn't know what any of that was about. Few others did either, and there certainly weren't a lot of festivities. I wonder if anybody today knows what World War I was about. We sent 2 million soldiers to France, and 100,000 didn't come back. I read in the New York Times this morning, only one veteran from that war remains alive in the States. Garrison Keillor said Saturday World War II was just World War I continued...and I do remember some history classes in college supported that notion. I have a friend who claims the continuous war of the Twentieth Century was about only one thing: oil.
Armistice Day became Veterans Day as Decoration Day became Memorial Day and we added "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance all in the mid-1950s. A general for our president, the McCarthy Era, and the Cold War geared us up to be tough guys. Now we rattle our sabers anytime we feel like it, no one tells us what to do, and we say anything we want to the other nations. The other day Bush told the Pakistani prime minister to take off his uniform because you can't be a military commander and the president at the same time. Huh?
I hear in Baghdad they're claiming the suicide bombings have lessened considerably. That's a good thing...and I suppose we should credit the "surge." But are the inSURGEnts all dead now...or running away into the desert? Or have they been redirected? Are they massing somewhere else? If so, I wonder where that could be? Let's see, what staunch ally of the United States has nuclear weapons but is teetering into instability? Where is there Emergency Control for the next 2 months until more great democratic elections will be held to celebrate freedom? Where are suicide bombings increasing? And where is Osama Bin Laden, dead or alive? The answers to these and other questions will be revealed in forthcoming exciting episodes---or maybe later today. More >
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 7 Nov 2007 @ 21:08
A cricket chirps and is silent.
The guttering lamp sinks and flairs up again.
Outside the window evening rain is heard.
It is the banana plant that speaks of it first.
---Po Chu-I
Only in solitude do we find ourselves.
---Miguel De Unamuno
It is our mind, and that alone, that chains us or sets us free.
---Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
In the photo another American dignitary (in this case Paul Bremer) enjoys real freedom out in the world.
I had thought the Blackwater story would just fade away like all the others. There didn't seem to be anything different about it than countless other news items about the degradation of the American soul in these years of Bush administration. The private security firm, with rightwing and evangelical roots and bucks, did just what the Rove textbook tells the Bushies to do when under scrutiny: loom bigger than they are! If Congress or the press wants to talk to you, blow them off fast with how important the work is you're doing for the American people...and you just don't have time for this nonsense. Out came the announcements that Blackwater not only provides a private army for your convenience...but a private CIA too. Total Intelligence Solutions---and we do mean TOTAL. [link] What more can a good boy with an inherited fortune do? He's done it by the Book---both Rove's and Jesus'.
But type "Blackwater" in Google News Search right now, and see what comes up. Well over a month later the story lives on. Finally something has brought the press alive. This no-bid contract has captured it all. It's at the black heart of how things are done now. And Americans are ashamed and outraged...and the media knows it...and it's about time! Will anything actually get done? The status quo tumbles over itself to keep things humming along as if normal. Kucinich introduces impeachment of Cheney on the House floor yesterday, and it took the administrators an hour to quiet things down and shuffle the motion off to committee---where they hope it will disappear. [link] But it wasn't easy. People wanted to debate. People wanted to talk. No no, was the answer, Congress is too busy with really important business to become bogged down in this petty political maneuvering. But everyone knows now such remarks from the administrators are laughable and desperate. No one can keep the lid on the corruption forever.
I write and post stuff at 4 different sites on the Net...and sometimes more, and when I sent out and put up Part 1 about Blackwater, back in September, comments started to show up at 2 of the locations. And they haven't stopped. At Blogspot the people now are launched into discussion about "pure" democracy, and what a republic is, town meetings and whether the Internet can save or advance Freedom of Speech. When this happens at a blog it can be very difficult to join in. At really big ones you can find hundreds of comments, often involving give and take among a few participants that goes on for days. It's hard for a newcomer to sort out...and usually such threads just die because there's too much scrolling, you can't find that comment you wanted to reference, and nothing's ever going to get done about it anyway. But it's wonderful to me when people let loose and express themselves somewhere! So I decided this time to start a Part 2 about Blackwater...and all the topic involves. That includes torture and waterboarding, which Mukasey says he can't discuss because he hasn't been "briefed," and the President backs him up. That includes secrecy and looting the treasury. It includes everything.
If you're looking for the energy to get started on a comment or a reply, you can't do better than Keith Olbermann's talk Monday night about viewing the Presidency as Criminal Conspiracy. Not since Tom Paine, folks! More >
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 20 Oct 2007 @ 12:23
Great doubt results in great enlightenment, small doubt results in small enlightenment, no doubt results in no enlightenment.
---Yuan-Hsien
A hundred thousand worlds are flowers in the sky.
A single mind and body is moonlight in the water.
Once thinking ends and information stops,
At that moment there is no place for thought.
---Han-Shan
All wisdom comes out of one center, and the number of wisdom is one.
---Paracelsus
I thought it was a good thing when www.factcheck.org showed up a few years ago. I immediately subscribed to its occasional dispatches. A Karl Rove in power was reason enough. "Spin" was the middle name of this White House and, while acknowledged, journalists didn't seem to do much about it. We heard about "framing" your presentations so that particular words would hook your audience. We learned that "reality" is a hindrance to true economic marketfreedom. It seemed evident that lies repeated over and over finally sink in and become accepted as truth. What's a mother to do? FactCheck stepped up to the plate to test the veracity of political ads and politician claims. That seemed to be a help.
But I find I don't read everything FactCheck sends out, and sometimes I don't find the "facts" particularly convincing. I confess I probably am rooting for my good guys and don't like it much when FactCheck goes after them. The site is run by the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, a research group of impeccable credentials...as far as I know. So I'm glad FactCheck is around, particularly during endless campaign seasons.
But last month the Washington Post published an intriguing article that said the whole strategy of creating myths depends on the assertive statement of the story. The Post implied that by emphasizing these myths FactCheck actually is defeating its own purpose. People read the myth and that's enough to keep it going no matter how the facts check out. [link]
That was enough to send FactCheck to the couch and after a month of analysis, it has emerged with a special report on its soundness of mind. Beware: they've gone all the way back to Descartes and Spinoza. There's some deep slogging here, and it's perfectly possible you may emerge with the belief Spinoza invented spin. Maybe he did. That part's hazy. Anyway, here it is~~~ More >
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 29 Sep 2007 @ 12:38
Nobody sees a flower---really---it is so small it takes time---we haven't time---and to see takes time, like to have a friend takes time.
---Georgia O'Keeffe
Let us be moral. Let us contemplate existence.
---Charles Dickens
We learn something by doing it. There is no other way.
---John Holt
Many of us here in the coal mining regions of Appalachia can hear Jean Ritchie's sweet voice in our imaginations by just reading her lyric in the title up there. Black water refers to the toxic sludge that kills all life in the creeks and streams near mining operations, particularly what's called mountaintop removal. Sometimes whole hillsides of the stuff falls down on top of properties owned by people for generations. Folks have been killed in those landslides, but there's little recourse since Bush made the previously banned practice legal 5 years ago.
So when I learn a good Republican Christian boy decided to name his private security company Blackwater, and stick it in North Carolina, I thought there must be some kind of---er---black humor involved. Maybe there is. Erik Prince was making the Navy Seals his career until his mother died and left him the family fortune. His sister was the chairperson of the Republican Party in Michigan, and wife to gubernatorial candidate Dick DeVos. Erik moved South, set up Blackwater, and also sits on the board of Christian Freedom International, a group helping "Christians who are persecuted for their faith in Jesus Christ". [link]
This was 10 years ago, when Erik was 27. Now, we learn, "Blackwater is currently the biggest of the US State Department's three private security contractors. At least 90% of its revenue comes from government contracts, two-thirds of which are no-bid contracts." [link] To be well connected thus seems the best way...and maybe the only way...to really get in to the true American liberty we call global capitalism. Papa Bush introduced it as The New World Order, but wasn't that a mite Roman Empire? So the following presidents just talk about the freedom and democracy of globalization. We know quite a few families have gotten very rich from all this, but many of the rest of us look at our tax bill and feel we're financing the whole thing. Are the returns worth it? More >
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This is my News Log, actually the second manifestation of jazzoLOG. I moved the first edition to another site, where those articles still are archived and available for continued comment if you wish. Please copy and paste to access~~~ http://web.archive.org/web/20060315012857/http://www.upsaid.com/jazzolog/ |
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I don't know about you, but sometimes I work a long time, cumulatively for hours, on comments I make on these News Logs. I plan to edit this Log regularly and delete things. Before I do that, I want to assure you, I shall notify each commentator of such an amendment so you may have time to copy anything you wish to save and paste somewhere else. Create your own News Log in your profile. |
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