Lao Tzu speaks of the progressions of degenerating governance. “A leader is best when people barely know that he exists, not so good when people obey and acclaim him, worst when they despise him. Fail to honor people and they fail to honor you. But of a good leader, who talks little, when his work is done and his aim is fulfilled, they will all say, we did this ourselves.”
Lao Tzu said it well as he said everything well, “Cut down on useless craving”. You’re only poor if you want shit you don’t need. The universe seems to be inclined to take care of everything else.
"I looked up at the moon, then lowered my head, remembering my home town." Li Bai
"By the time Obama leaves office, you will not be able to exchange dollars for any sound currency in the world without permission from the U.S. government. The price of gold will be well over $2,500 per ounce. Most importantly, commodities will no longer be priced in dollars either, but instead in the currencies of the leading producer. Americans haven't experienced anything like this since the Great Depression." – Porter Stansberry
As the gentleman said "Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these," the lilies of the field.
Deaths from gunfire are under a hundred per year in all western countries according to Michael Moore's "Bowling for Columbine," except the US where they're over 11,000 (eleven thousand) per year.
Standing head and shoulders over all other communications for illustrative power is an Israeli government spokesman "When you have a Palestinian kid facing an Israeli tank, how do you explain that the tank is actually David and the kid is Goliath?"
"Swine Flu" has killed 149 people in Mexico and all schools have been closed. Infected people in the US appear to recover better. The virus is human to human transmitted, a combination of the H1N4 "Avian Flu" virus, and others, and may have the potential to create a pandemic (World wide epidemic.) There is no shortage of commentators suggesting it is a laboratory (not naturally occurring) created virus, to give the slaughter of the browns program a bit of a new boost. For details see http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N24524032.htm
According to a new book published in Jakarta, Indonesia, written by the Indonesian Minister of Health and endorsed by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, the US is trying to use bird flu samples to create a biological weapon.
(See http://www.legitgov.org/flu_oddities_shortnews.html)
The US government has ordered half a million air tight coffins, suitable for burying infectious plague victims.
The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration recently postponed its crucial program to rejuvenate quarter-century-old Trident missile warheads because no one can remember how to make a key component of the weapons (codenamed "Fogbank"), according to a March 2 report of the Government Accountability Office. The GAO found that, despite concern over the bombs' safety and reliability, NNSA could not replicate the manufacturing process because all knowledgeable personnel have left the agency and no written records were kept. Said one commentator, "This is like James Bond destroying his instructions as soon as he's read them." [Sunday Herald (Glasgow), 3-7-09]
The GAO report came two months after the German Interior Ministry reported to Parliament that over a 10-year period, it had lost 332 secret files that were in fact so secret that no one in the Ministry could recall what was in them. [The Local (Berlin), 12-13-08]
Appointed to a recent Japanese administration was a practicing Buddhist, who declined to sign any of the execution orders that fell under his Ministry of the Interior's control of the prisons and execution sector, refusing to order the death of another living being. An example of sticking to your guns, or sticking to your principles, or even to your principals. Result? No executions were carried out in Japan during his tenure of the office. All of us can do as much; no one can do more.
"Observe calmly; secure our position; cope with affairs calmly; hide our capacities and bide our time; be good at maintaining a low profile; and never claim leadership." Deng Xiao Ping, on Chinese international policy
Relaxation of money transfer and travel restrictions to Cuba - good start! Now, slowly, carefully, enter into closer dialogue with Cuba itself, visibly in a transitional period, the optimum window for negotiating relations both sides can rest content with. (The standard neocon approach "The government you have is not legitimate because we don't like it" was never workable for anyone except undisputed world dictator, and like the famous NSA declaration of US "Ownership of space" - i.e., the entire universe - really demonstrates very little except that the neocons are clearly not playing with a full deck.) The great prize you can dangle, though initially in the background, is handing the entire Guantanomo Bay territory back to Cuba,(Castro has never cashed any of the checks sent in payment of the lease negotiated with Batista, or whatever blood soaked dictator ran the place before Castro) and admitting the Batista era really is over, and the legitimate government of Cuba is the one it has. That's a heady prize to dangle, Hanuman, and the result would be even more beneficial to these United States than to Cuba.
How Dick Cheney managed to get control of all the country's levers of power without one solitary vote, except his own, having ever been cast for him, is a mystery future gerations will scratch their heads over, indeed many people were already scratching their heads over it even during his reign. (To view the rise of Mr. Cheney from "Dick Who?" to virtual emperorship see "Ruled by a dick" in April 2008 at http://wahyusamputra.blogspot.com/2008/04/ruled-by-dick_02.html)
The mainstream media's attitude is perhaps best typified by the story of Fox News and the Monsanto Growth Hormone. A team of reporters, Steve Wilson & Jane Akre, researched the effects of synthetic bovine growth hormone on cattle and discovered that a great deal of evidence exists that people who consume the meat or dairy products from treated cattle can suffer adverse health effects. Monsanto got wind of the story and together with dairy associations pressured Fox News to shut the story down. Fox News ordered the reporters to change the story, the reporters refused and Fox fired them. The reporters sued and LOST on appeal when the court ruled that since there is no law requiring the media to tell the truth about anything, the mainstream media is within their legal rights to fire reporters who refuse to lie! As a side note, that legal precedent is troubling when one realizes that our national elections are counted by a privately owned company, owned jointly by the TV networks (who are not bound by law to tell the truth) and not subject to either citizen or governmental oversight.
"If you don't stand up for something, you'll fall for anything." Malcolm X
"George Bush wants to be remembered as the war president. I can't understand it. It's like wanting to be remembered as the syphilis president." Kurt Vonnegut
“…the ancient skill of pacifying and keeping reasonably fruitful relations with the majority tribe. If a Luo came to power, would you expect him to make enemies all round by prosecuting crimes by previous administrations, or leave all those awesome powers Bush exercised in place, - might come in useful – and indeed increase some of them?“
But we do want to have a good dig and find out what was going on, right? Followed by a flood of torture authorizations, torture reports (waterboarded 183 times in one month? Six times a day? Yes, but he did confess to masterminding the 911 attack, in addition to crucifying Jesus Christ with rusty nails, according to published reports. And perhaps to having sex with the Virgin Mary? For courage and humor Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has it all over Mr. Cheney's torturers.) and self incriminating statements from major actors, (so Dick Cheney was admittedly in charge of the WH assassination squad? An interesting conversation with Senator Wellstone perhaps requires some explanation. Well, if Avigdor Lieberman, the "kingmaker," cousin of our own Senator Lieberman of Connecticut, says "The Americans will do what we tell them," as he is reported to have done, then he must be responsible for his own remarks, right? No doubt people will continue to make unfortunate remarks.)
Well now if the wave of public revulsion reached a point where the president had no alternative to appointing some kind of commission or special prosecutor, (I know just the man for the job) and retreating rapidly from any further involvement, then that wouldn’t be his fault would it? Or anything to do with him, really, right? Hanuman!
“Realms of bliss, realms of light,
Some are born to sweet delight,
Some are born to sweet delight,
Some are born to the endless night,
End of the night.” Jim Morrison
"So put no trust in saviours Judas said for every one
Must be to him or her own self a sun."
As the Zen masters, rolling around with laughter at the
thought that they would sacrifice a single hair from
their beards for possession of the whole empire, observed,
if you do not understand that the only thing that has changed
is that you have lost one hair from your beard, then you do
not understand anything at all.
Update for May 14, 2009:
The ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) successfully applied under the FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) to have published a series of hundreds of new pictures of US military abuse of prisoners. Not even Dick Cheney can deny that the pictures exist. The only question is should they be published?
Having accepted the court’s decision in favor of the ACLU application, the Obama administration must consider the effect of publication, and at considerable personal risk to Obama’s promise of more open and accountable government, reluctantly decides that publication of hundreds of very graphic pictures of US military abuse of helpless prisoners would create a wave of anti-American sentiment that would increase the danger of attacks on the US military. Not even the leading right wing wackos wish to throw doubt on the existence of the pictures, fearing that such challenges risk publication to counter them.
He has it going and coming! Obama is forced, literally, to prevent publication of graphic scenes, left to every one’s imagination, of abuse admitted to have taken place, to protect the military. What else can he do? Hanuman!
He’s a real bonny fighter.
Update for May 27, 2009
Of the 140 villagers torn apart by high explosive, in the US air strike on Farah province, Bala Baluk district, western Afghanistan, on May 3, 2009, only 22 were male and over 18. 93 were children.
"British pilots in Afghanistan are firing an increasing number of "enhanced blast" thermobaric weapons, designed to kill everyone in buildings they strike, the UK Ministry of Defence has revealed. Since the start of this year more than 20 of the US-designed missiles, which have what is officially described as a "blast fragmentation warhead", have been fired by pilots of British planes."
The Guardian, Thursday May 28 2009 Richard Norton-Taylor
The standard final excuse “Terrorists are using children as human shields” rings somewhat hollow in light of the thermobaric weapons being used by the UK Ministry of Defence (MOD). If they are really trying to kill only the terrorists, and not their shields or hostages, why use these weapons, guaranteed to kill every living thing inside?
Meanwhile, Mr. Geithner has made his trip to Beijing, where the Chinese have shifted their support of US debt to the very short term debt, avoiding the longer term paper, no doubt to plead for more debt support, and was told to bugger off. So it goes.
The news of the bankruptcy of General Motors came on a day where the DOW went up another hundred points or so in its recent strong advance, and a few days after the Bilderberg decision that "the destruction of the US dollar must continue." Go figure.
And remember Maynard Keynes "The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent."
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