Too confused to ever earn a living I've learned to let things have their way. With only three handfuls of rice in my bag and a few branches by my fireside I pursue neither right or wrong and forget worldly fortune and fame. This damp night under a grassy roof I stretch out my legs without regrets.
Ryokan
Wednesday, July 28, 2004
Qian Zhaohong's seminars
Rick asked for a review of the seminars I've gone to for the past three weekends
Qian Zhaohong is a master from Shanghai and has been practicing for 50 years. At the age of 8 he began study of Xin yi liu he quan, or what some call Honan style xingyiquan.
He has learned many different systems including taiji, tongbeiquan, bagua, liuhe ba fa and others.
This series of seminars was an introduction to xinyiliuhe and chan ssuu taijia, a taiji style that he has created.
Master Qian gave very detailed instructions on two drills from the xinyiluihe system that we practiced every day of the seminars. Simple actions that he corrected, gave very precise details to and demonstrated with numerous applications. I will continue to practice these for a long time. I was very impressed with their versatility.
Master Qian spent a great deal of time on things that are not usually talked in American classes such as stretching the tendons and squeezing the bones, opposite force in posture, proper alignment for enabling the small heavenly circulation to be done properly and more.
The first seminar I went to (and of course the one I did not bring my camcorder to) was when he was a bit rough. He was showing applications, slapping and throwing peoples around, and demonstrating some power. I would have liked to see more of it but I think some of them might have complained. One bid American taiji guy kept on trying and wanted to do go in at Qian faster and harder. Qian is at a level that his body reacts on its own and I had his friends stop the big guy or he would have gotten injured. Qian's nicknam in China is "Buzzsaw". That's enough explanation.
Master Qian was nice enough to give me some special attention because I drove so far to attend. A very nice, but no-nonsense guy. If I lived closer I would be driving back again every weekend until he leaves in August for private lessons. I feel that I got some very good stuff from Qian. The xinyiliuhe drills have helped me loosen my shoulders a lot. A problem that's been plaguing me for years.
On a scale of 1 to 10 I would give the seminars and 8. Mostly because he only speaks Mandarin and it was hard for me to follow sometimes. Luckilly I knew several of the guys there from my taiji days in Virginia and Maryland and they were all to happy to assist.
Of note, it was interesting to learn that You Peng Xi's nephew is teaching yiquan in northern Virginia. Also, the seminar promoter was a student of the Yao brothers 20 years ago. He learned the long pole shaking from them. He is training privately with Qian every day until August and Qian wants him to give up zhan zhuang and the pole shaking. He claims that pole shaking tightens the abdomen and one of Qian's insistings is that the dan tien area always be kept soft. I thought that might interest some of you.
0. jmedurga on 7/21/2004 10:05:20 AM [quote]
Rick asked for a review of the seminars I've gone to for the past three weekends
Qian Zhaohong is a master from Shanghai and has been practicing for 50 years. At the age of 8 he began study of Xin yi liu he quan, or what some call Honan style xingyiquan.
He has learned many different systems including taiji, tongbeiquan, bagua, liuhe ba fa and others.
This series of seminars was an introduction to xinyiliuhe and chan ssuu taijia, a taiji style that he has created.
Master Qian gave very detailed instructions on two drills from the xinyiluihe system that we practiced every day of the seminars. Simple actions that he corrected, gave very precise details to and demonstrated with numerous applications. I will continue to practice these for a long time. I was very impressed with their versatility.
Master Qian spent a great deal of time on things that are not usually talked in American classes such as stretching the tendons and squeezing the bones, opposite force in posture, proper alignment for enabling the small heavenly circulation to be done properly and more.
The first seminar I went to (and of course the one I did not bring my camcorder to) was when he was a bit rough. He was showing applications, slapping and throwing peoples around, and demonstrating some power. I would have liked to see more of it but I think some of them might have complained. One bid American taiji guy kept on trying and wanted to do go in at Qian faster and harder. Qian is at a level that his body reacts on its own and I had his friends stop the big guy or he would have gotten injured. Qian's nicknam in China is "Buzzsaw". That's enough explanation.
Master Qian was nice enough to give me some special attention because I drove so far to attend. A very nice, but no-nonsense guy. If I lived closer I would be driving back again every weekend until he leaves in August for private lessons. I feel that I got some very good stuff from Qian. The xinyiliuhe drills have helped me loosen my shoulders a lot. A problem that's been plaguing me for years.
On a scale of 1 to 10 I would give the seminars and 8. Mostly because he only speaks Mandarin and it was hard for me to follow sometimes. Luckilly I knew several of the guys there from my taiji days in Virginia and Maryland and they were all to happy to assist.
Of note, it was interesting to learn that You Peng Xi's nephew is teaching yiquan in northern Virginia. Also, the seminar promoter was a student of the Yao brothers 20 years ago. He learned the long pole shaking from them. He is training privately with Qian every day until August and Qian wants him to give up zhan zhuang and the pole shaking. He claims that pole shaking tightens the abdomen and one of Qian's insistings is that the dan tien area always be kept soft. I thought that might interest some of you.
0. jmedurga on 7/21/2004 10:05:20 AM [quote]
Friday, July 23, 2004
We have our own water. It's from a well, with a solar powered pump (that only
runs when the sun is shining, which we're supposed to have plenty of in
Colorado) goes through a one micron filter and then through a UV purification
system, then into a tank, where we go fill up our barrels to take back to our
houses. So, it sounds like we're doing well, off the grid, pretty much
independent of the "system."
Ok, here are the (until now) unrecognized dangers.
Our water tasted and smelled bad this week, so we got it tested. There had been
a low voltage regulator on the UV system that broke. We replaced it (purchased
parts, from a company that produces the parts with the power of oil, all the way
from the oil in the plastic that's in the part, to the power to run the
machinery to make the part) , but my brother bought the wrong one and it didn't
have an automatic shut off if the power was too low from the solar panels. So,
the pump kept on pumping and the UV system wasn't working, so water with
choliforms is now in our entire system.
What this has made me realize is that no matter how independent I have thought
we were becoming, our entire standard of life, low as it is, is 100% dependent
upon oil.
This dependency is in spite of living in a house that has NO power inside it
that we don't make ourselves. We don't have gas or oil lines to the house, we
don't use propane, we cook with wood rather than be dependent upon the outside
source of propane tanks. We do have an electric stove top oven and a hot plate
that we use during the summer, but at any point we can't get gas for the
generator, we can always go cook on the wood stove in the outside kitchen, so we
don't consider that "dependency" but rather convenience.
But without water, we are dependent. That's it. No way around it.
As hard as we have been working to become self-sufficient, this is what it comes
down to. I tremble for those of you who imagine you're going in the right
direction by learning how to grow vegies in pots on the patio.
Tom Brown Jr's Apache Grandfather had a vision in which he saw cities burning,
people starving, people eating children, agony, disease, terror and death. He
saw that the only people who survived would be the "children of the earth."
What are the children of the earth? Are they the farmers? Are they those who
actually move into caves in the earth? Are they the ones who learn how to gain
their sustenence solely from our Mother the Earth?
If I have imagined that I was becoming self-sufficient while trying to live in
both worlds - writing on this computer and sending out the letter across
cyberspace to others sitting in front of utility supplied electrical
connections, powered by oil all over the world - well, my mind is reeling with
the reality of how desperately dependent I am in truth, on the grid.
Sharon, Linda, other farmers - methinks those who advocate the hunter-gatherer
life are in the right of it. The only ones who will survive are truly the
children of the earth who can do it without a tool created by modern man.
Lua in Colorado
runs when the sun is shining, which we're supposed to have plenty of in
Colorado) goes through a one micron filter and then through a UV purification
system, then into a tank, where we go fill up our barrels to take back to our
houses. So, it sounds like we're doing well, off the grid, pretty much
independent of the "system."
Ok, here are the (until now) unrecognized dangers.
Our water tasted and smelled bad this week, so we got it tested. There had been
a low voltage regulator on the UV system that broke. We replaced it (purchased
parts, from a company that produces the parts with the power of oil, all the way
from the oil in the plastic that's in the part, to the power to run the
machinery to make the part) , but my brother bought the wrong one and it didn't
have an automatic shut off if the power was too low from the solar panels. So,
the pump kept on pumping and the UV system wasn't working, so water with
choliforms is now in our entire system.
What this has made me realize is that no matter how independent I have thought
we were becoming, our entire standard of life, low as it is, is 100% dependent
upon oil.
This dependency is in spite of living in a house that has NO power inside it
that we don't make ourselves. We don't have gas or oil lines to the house, we
don't use propane, we cook with wood rather than be dependent upon the outside
source of propane tanks. We do have an electric stove top oven and a hot plate
that we use during the summer, but at any point we can't get gas for the
generator, we can always go cook on the wood stove in the outside kitchen, so we
don't consider that "dependency" but rather convenience.
But without water, we are dependent. That's it. No way around it.
As hard as we have been working to become self-sufficient, this is what it comes
down to. I tremble for those of you who imagine you're going in the right
direction by learning how to grow vegies in pots on the patio.
Tom Brown Jr's Apache Grandfather had a vision in which he saw cities burning,
people starving, people eating children, agony, disease, terror and death. He
saw that the only people who survived would be the "children of the earth."
What are the children of the earth? Are they the farmers? Are they those who
actually move into caves in the earth? Are they the ones who learn how to gain
their sustenence solely from our Mother the Earth?
If I have imagined that I was becoming self-sufficient while trying to live in
both worlds - writing on this computer and sending out the letter across
cyberspace to others sitting in front of utility supplied electrical
connections, powered by oil all over the world - well, my mind is reeling with
the reality of how desperately dependent I am in truth, on the grid.
Sharon, Linda, other farmers - methinks those who advocate the hunter-gatherer
life are in the right of it. The only ones who will survive are truly the
children of the earth who can do it without a tool created by modern man.
Lua in Colorado
Monday, July 19, 2004
You won't get the answers you ultimately seek in some leather bound book embossed with gold letters containing self-serving historical atrocities. You will find it in deepest, darkest, scariest sleep, deep in the darkness where there is nothing to worry about except loving well enough, except accepting love fast enough because there is such an abundance of it in everything, could you but only see it.
- John Kaminski
- John Kaminski
Monday, July 12, 2004
Living the Inspiration of Sri Ramana Maharshi
A dialogue between David Godman and Maalok, an Indian academic now teaching in America
Maalok: Ramana Maharshi has had a lasting influence on your life. For those of us who don't know much about the Maharshi, could you please share some of the salient aspects of his life that have influenced you deeply.
David: About two or three times a year someone asks me this question, 'Summarize Ramana Maharshi's life and teachings in a few words for people who know little or nothing about him'. It's always hard to know where to start with a question like this.
Let me say first that Ramana Maharshi was one of the most highly regarded and widely respected spiritual figures that twentieth-century India produced. I can't think of any other candidate who is as persistently held out to be an example of all that is best in the Hindu spiritual tradition. Everyone reveres him as the perfect example of what a true saint and sage ought to be.
How did this come about? While he was still in his teens Sri Ramana underwent a remarkable, spontaneous experience in which his individuality died, leaving him in a state in which he found his true identity to be the Self, the immanent and transcendent substratum. It was a permanent awakening that was truly remarkable because he had not previously had any interest in spiritual matters. He left his family home a few weeks later, without telling anyone where he was going, and spent the remainder of his life at the foot of Arunachala, a holy mountain and pilgrimage center that is about 120 miles south west of Chennai.
After a few years there - a period in which he was largely oblivious to the world and his body - he began to attract devotees because there was a spiritual radiance emanating from him that many people around him experienced as peace or happiness. This, I think, is the secret of his subsequent fame and popularity. He didn't get a reputation for being a great sage because of what he did or said. It came about because people, who arrived at his ashram with all kinds of questions and doubts, suddenly found themselves becoming quiet, peaceful and happy in his presence. There was a continuous, benign flow of energy coming off him that somehow evaporated the mental anxieties and busy minds of the people who came to see him. He didn't ask people to come. People just came of their own accord. A 19th century American author once wrote that if you invent a better mousetrap, even if you try to hide yourself in the woods, people will beat a path to your door. People beat a path to Sri Ramana's door - for many years he lived in very inaccessible places - because he had something far better than an improved mousetrap to offer; he had a natural ability to induce peace in the people around him.
Let me expand on this because this is the key to understanding both his state and the effect he had on other people. When he had his final experience at the age of sixteen, his mind, his sense of being an individual person vanished forever, leaving him in a state of unassailable peace. He realized and understood that this was not some new experience that was mediated by and through his 'I', his sense of being an individual person. It was, instead, his natural state, something that is there all the time, but which is only experienced when the mind and its perpetual busy-ness is absent. By abiding in this natural and effortless state of inner silence he somehow charged up the atmosphere around him with a healing, quietening energy. People who came to see him spontaneously became happy, peaceful and quiet. Why? Because Sri Ramana himself was effortlessly broadcasting his own experience of happiness, peace and quietude in such a way that those people who were around him got an inner taste, an inner flavor of this natural state that is inherent to all of us. I should say that this power was not restricted to his physical vicinity, although it did seem to be stronger there. People who merely thought about him wherever they happened to be discovered that they could experience something of this peace simply through having this mental contact with him.
So, having given that background, I can now answer the question: 'Who was Ramana Maharshi and what were his teachings?'
Sri Ramana Maharshi was a living embodiment of peace and happiness and his 'teachings' were the emanations of that state which helped other people to find and experience their own inner happiness and peace.
If all this sounds a little abstract, let me tell you a story that was passed on to me by Arthur Osborne's daughter. In the 1940s their house was a kind of dormitory for all the stray foreigners who couldn't find anywhere else to stay near Sri Ramana's ashram. A miserable, crabby women appeared one evening, having been sent by the ashram. They put her up, gave her breakfast and sent her off to see Sri Ramana the next morning. She came back at lunchtime looking absolutely radiant. She was glowing with happiness. The whole family was waiting to hear the story of what happened, but she never said anything about her visit to the ashram. Everyone in the house was expecting some dramatic story: 'He looked at me and this happened,' or 'I asked a question and then I had this great experience.' As the lunch plates were being cleared away, her hosts could not contain their curiosity any longer.
'What happened?' asked one of them. 'What did Bhagavan do to you? What did he say to you?'
The woman looked most surprised. 'He didn't do anything. He didn't say anything to me. I just sat there for the whole morning and then came back for lunch.'
She had been just one new person sitting in a crowd of people, but the power coming off Sri Ramana had been enough to wash away a lifetime of depression, leaving her with a taste of what lay underneath it: her own inherent, natural happiness and peace.
Sri Ramana knew that transformations such as these were going on around him all the time, but he never accepted responsibility for them. He would never say, 'I transformed this woman'. When he was asked about the effect he was having on people, he would sometimes say that by continuously abiding in his own natural state of peace, a sannidhi, a powerful presence, was somehow created that automatically took care of the mental problems of the people who visited him. By abiding in silence as silence, this energy field was created, a field that miraculously transformed the people around him.
Your original question was, 'Why has Ramana Maharshi influenced me so much?' The answer is, 'I came into his sannidhi and through its catalytic activity I discovered my own peace, my own happiness.'
A dialogue between David Godman and Maalok, an Indian academic now teaching in America
Maalok: Ramana Maharshi has had a lasting influence on your life. For those of us who don't know much about the Maharshi, could you please share some of the salient aspects of his life that have influenced you deeply.
David: About two or three times a year someone asks me this question, 'Summarize Ramana Maharshi's life and teachings in a few words for people who know little or nothing about him'. It's always hard to know where to start with a question like this.
Let me say first that Ramana Maharshi was one of the most highly regarded and widely respected spiritual figures that twentieth-century India produced. I can't think of any other candidate who is as persistently held out to be an example of all that is best in the Hindu spiritual tradition. Everyone reveres him as the perfect example of what a true saint and sage ought to be.
How did this come about? While he was still in his teens Sri Ramana underwent a remarkable, spontaneous experience in which his individuality died, leaving him in a state in which he found his true identity to be the Self, the immanent and transcendent substratum. It was a permanent awakening that was truly remarkable because he had not previously had any interest in spiritual matters. He left his family home a few weeks later, without telling anyone where he was going, and spent the remainder of his life at the foot of Arunachala, a holy mountain and pilgrimage center that is about 120 miles south west of Chennai.
After a few years there - a period in which he was largely oblivious to the world and his body - he began to attract devotees because there was a spiritual radiance emanating from him that many people around him experienced as peace or happiness. This, I think, is the secret of his subsequent fame and popularity. He didn't get a reputation for being a great sage because of what he did or said. It came about because people, who arrived at his ashram with all kinds of questions and doubts, suddenly found themselves becoming quiet, peaceful and happy in his presence. There was a continuous, benign flow of energy coming off him that somehow evaporated the mental anxieties and busy minds of the people who came to see him. He didn't ask people to come. People just came of their own accord. A 19th century American author once wrote that if you invent a better mousetrap, even if you try to hide yourself in the woods, people will beat a path to your door. People beat a path to Sri Ramana's door - for many years he lived in very inaccessible places - because he had something far better than an improved mousetrap to offer; he had a natural ability to induce peace in the people around him.
Let me expand on this because this is the key to understanding both his state and the effect he had on other people. When he had his final experience at the age of sixteen, his mind, his sense of being an individual person vanished forever, leaving him in a state of unassailable peace. He realized and understood that this was not some new experience that was mediated by and through his 'I', his sense of being an individual person. It was, instead, his natural state, something that is there all the time, but which is only experienced when the mind and its perpetual busy-ness is absent. By abiding in this natural and effortless state of inner silence he somehow charged up the atmosphere around him with a healing, quietening energy. People who came to see him spontaneously became happy, peaceful and quiet. Why? Because Sri Ramana himself was effortlessly broadcasting his own experience of happiness, peace and quietude in such a way that those people who were around him got an inner taste, an inner flavor of this natural state that is inherent to all of us. I should say that this power was not restricted to his physical vicinity, although it did seem to be stronger there. People who merely thought about him wherever they happened to be discovered that they could experience something of this peace simply through having this mental contact with him.
So, having given that background, I can now answer the question: 'Who was Ramana Maharshi and what were his teachings?'
Sri Ramana Maharshi was a living embodiment of peace and happiness and his 'teachings' were the emanations of that state which helped other people to find and experience their own inner happiness and peace.
If all this sounds a little abstract, let me tell you a story that was passed on to me by Arthur Osborne's daughter. In the 1940s their house was a kind of dormitory for all the stray foreigners who couldn't find anywhere else to stay near Sri Ramana's ashram. A miserable, crabby women appeared one evening, having been sent by the ashram. They put her up, gave her breakfast and sent her off to see Sri Ramana the next morning. She came back at lunchtime looking absolutely radiant. She was glowing with happiness. The whole family was waiting to hear the story of what happened, but she never said anything about her visit to the ashram. Everyone in the house was expecting some dramatic story: 'He looked at me and this happened,' or 'I asked a question and then I had this great experience.' As the lunch plates were being cleared away, her hosts could not contain their curiosity any longer.
'What happened?' asked one of them. 'What did Bhagavan do to you? What did he say to you?'
The woman looked most surprised. 'He didn't do anything. He didn't say anything to me. I just sat there for the whole morning and then came back for lunch.'
She had been just one new person sitting in a crowd of people, but the power coming off Sri Ramana had been enough to wash away a lifetime of depression, leaving her with a taste of what lay underneath it: her own inherent, natural happiness and peace.
Sri Ramana knew that transformations such as these were going on around him all the time, but he never accepted responsibility for them. He would never say, 'I transformed this woman'. When he was asked about the effect he was having on people, he would sometimes say that by continuously abiding in his own natural state of peace, a sannidhi, a powerful presence, was somehow created that automatically took care of the mental problems of the people who visited him. By abiding in silence as silence, this energy field was created, a field that miraculously transformed the people around him.
Your original question was, 'Why has Ramana Maharshi influenced me so much?' The answer is, 'I came into his sannidhi and through its catalytic activity I discovered my own peace, my own happiness.'
You cannot deliberately progress towards an open state, you can only see clearly that you are in a blocked state. So, you let your body- mind slowly become more open to your conviction that you can attain nothing. That you are going to die in total stupidity. You may die in the very next moment, so there is no time to reach anything, to achieve anything. In sadhana you live with the feeling that you are going to die the very next minute; thus, you no longer make strategies and you just do things for the sake of doing them. If you think that you will die within two minutes, what do you do? Nothing. You don't call anybody, you don't think of anything, you just totally enjoy seeing, feeling, smelling, listening to the last seconds of your life, the beauty of life.
- short excerpt from an interview with Éric Baret, Montreal
- short excerpt from an interview with Éric Baret, Montreal
Friday, July 02, 2004
Freedom Means Servitude
Judith Moriarty
noahshouse@adelphia.net
7-2-4
I heard the usual mind-numbed fools, calling into C-Span this morning, lauding going to war. They felt that everyone should do their DUTY by being drafted into the military. Naturally those croaking such insanities, are doing so between breaths of oxygen-taking their heart medications, putting their Depend diapers on, bunion pads, and elastic waist pants! That, or they're calling in from some off-shore island, or foreign resort, where there's no chance that all of this patriotism and nationalism will be visited on themslurp!
Forced servitude or conscription to serve the interests of corporate hucksters, is no longer FREEDOM-but slavery. Either we are a mindless herd to be driven from battlefield to battlefield or INDIVIDUALS, making our own choices as to the days of our lives. If a person chooses to spend their life sitting on a tree stump in some back marsh spitting tobacco FINE. Forced volunteerism is a oxymoron, whether it be in the schools or called to kill.
Nobody has the right to determine my child's future. Nobody has the right to demand that a child be trained to go off to a foreign land to kill another mother's child, so that oil fields might be confiscated, pipelines protected, and timber and water stolen! This is NOT about invasion or protecting one's country from invading hordes. One man said this morning, "Being drafted made a man out of me!" Really! And what is a man? Is learning to kill-to be conditioned to stack naked bodies, to set snarling dogs on people, to kick down doors, to set villages on fire, the new credentials for manhood? Give me a man who will risk his life to save another not destroy. Give me a man who spends his life making the place where he abides a better place. Better because he was there.
"There is no glory in battle worth the blood it costs." (Eisenhower) Man is free or he is a slave to the government and commanded to go and kill others. Today we see that this perversion of our freedoms can call men back to duty who have already served, or keep soldiers extended for as long as desired-or until they end up getting blown to smithereens.
American Foreign Policy was based upon the wisdom of Washington's Farewell Address ( I bet you won't find this in your child's history book-if they have one). The defeat of the Confederacy during the War for the Right to Secede set this nation upon a road to empire. The actions of Roosevelt and Wilson set the stage for the society that we have become. The masters are no longer the people, but the people have been conditioned and programmed to think of themselves as drones-non-persons within their own land.
Are we to believe the voices of today's public relations jingoism- that allegiance or love for one's nation is judged by one's willingness to kill a stranger, who is of no threat to me or mine (outside a full tank of gas!). This perversion sees us no longer protecting our shores but protecting the interests of the Corporate/State. The mindless, soulless, malignant, malevolent, conscienceless Corporate/State is now disguised as Lady Liberty and Uncle Sam. Beneath the red-white and boo and crown of yellow ribbons is a pimp and his whore.
All this brouhaha, of dressing up and marching off to invade foreign lands in pre-emptive strikes, while the lie imploded at our feet! WAKE-UP. Over these many decades trillions have been spent under the guise of a cold war-national defense-intelligence etc., to supposedly defend us from harm. Really! On Sept. 11-2001 this lie was shown as volcanic clouds of ash chased citizens down concrete canyons! Protection! Everyone sat on their asses, went to take a leak, called the wrong office, or stood around like obedient lap dogs that they were and waited for someone to tell them to do their jobs and PROTECT AMERICA! Trillions! And we are led to believe that some grubby cave men, took some lessons on two seated crop dusters, bought some box cutters, and just shocked and surprised everyone! Well by God then everyone needs to have their ass fired.
A joke of a Commission is set up, and we all know what the report will say. Most of us with any literacy skills and a GED could write it now. White -out the word Warren and magic bullet and insert 911 and magic planes and there you have it. Oh, and the findings that these incompetent, inept, lying bastards need billions more in funds so that they can continue on in their labyrinths of nothingness.
Excuse me, but the idea that a citizen has a duty to serve his government (which is hello himself) is a malignant perversion of the proper obligation that a citizen has to his neighbor and society. A archaic idea, and not spoken of in today's" Shock and Awe Theater;" but each individual person is to choose the course of action in his/her own life which will create the greatest good. For all these wars, all these deaths, all these walls and marble memorials, are we any better off? How does a nation protect it's people and it's shores when the land is emptied of it's men? Men off in desert lands protecting pipelines and protecting a puppet government for a puppet people! A people given no voice in their supposed "liberation".
Defense of one's homeland is a legitimate call to arms. A people have a right to self-defense. One does not have the right to be commanded to take another's life for any other reason. All life is sacred. No man-politician or otherwise, has the right to order a nation's youngsters to become killers of mankind. There is no argument here. Those without conscience or a moral compass have no problem in creating a world of killing forever. "Choose you this day whom you will serve".
The carnage and chaos of war creates monsters. Monsters of insatiable greed, and corrupted power, who in their delusional state of mind see themselves as gods. Men, hollow soulless men, in plush board rooms, and war rooms, moving the people of the world around as if they were mere pieces on a global board game. Monopoly gone mad! Monopoly, with its "enemy combatants" disappeared ones, with no rights and no voice. The innocent caught up with the truly guilty (whoever that might be) too bad, tough luck. Is this the "freedom" that men/women are ordered to die for?
On 9/11/2001 we the people (we) became the enemy. The victims in this mad board game are now searched, scanned, fingerprinted, stopped at road blocks, or beaten down by men with clubs, stun guns, tear gas, and jaw shattering plastic bullets. Is this what global freedom means? Dissent and freedom of speech are now marked as the enemy. Is this what our children and children's children should die for? Why should our nation's children die for a foreign land to be liberated while it's own is being enslaved? What's wrong with this picture?
War turns men into monsters. Abusing, torturing, assaulting, and sexually humiliating citizens, caught up in village sweeps. Citizens from small farms and villages labeled "camel jockeys-towel heads-rag heads-sand niggers". One dehumanizes others in war so that it is more acceptable to kill and torture. Men become depraved monsters shooting down (in their fear) any and all who threaten. Some in this madness kill for the sheer joy of it. I saw a young man/boy of perhaps twenty on the news. He was in a snit because he'd been assigned guard duty. With a sullen snarl, when interviewed he said, "I was trained to kick down doors and shoot people, not to stand around doing nothing". This snot nosed kid- who just a few months back was probably hanging out at the mall or on a local street corner in Any Town USA, is now waiting for the thrill to kill.
Those returned from war end up in shelters, under bridges, or abandoned cars. Some never acclimate back to small town- work a day living. From a warrior, with the power to kill, now back in rust town USA, is quite a downer. No more gun-no more legal authority to kill. Now he's just another citizen watching out for the local cop to stop him for a speeding or traffic violation. Others are crippled for life; absent sight, limbs or their minds. They are now just mere cannon fodder. Much like litter they end up kicked to the curb.
Vice President Cheney who received numerous deferments has no problem with sending future generations off to fight Forever Wars (our new economy). He said, "The war on terrorism will not be over in our lifetime. It is different than the cold war in the sense that it may NEVER END, at least not in our lifetime. The way I think of it -it's a new normalcy" (Oct 21-2001).
Think on these words of his. This new "normalcy" is continuing war. Children marked to die in this perverse "new normalcy". Is the world we want-this madness that sees war, continual never ending war as a "new normalcy". Not for him-deferred again. Why give birth, if you know you're merely incubating a commodity until the state is ready to assign him/her to a killing field? And so we are spending approximately five billion plus per month on war and the invention of bigger and better annihilating weaponry. Not on schools, hospitals, affordable housing, a real energy policy (minus dependence on oil), education (minus change agents with their testing), our decaying infra-structure or medical care minus the corporate vampires of the pharmaceutical-insurance-and HMOs, who decide who will live and who will not in some distant sterile cubicle. Rest assured this injustice is not visited on our politicians or retired Presidents. They have made sure that they have the best of insurance (we pay 72% of costs) and pensions that are obscene. Meanwhile they allow ours to be stolen. How long can a nation working at Wal-Marts-Prisons-Convenience Stores-Home Depots-as black-jack dealers-ski lift operators or maids support forever and ever war? Just wondering?
Judith Moriarty
noahshouse@adelphia.net
7-2-4
I heard the usual mind-numbed fools, calling into C-Span this morning, lauding going to war. They felt that everyone should do their DUTY by being drafted into the military. Naturally those croaking such insanities, are doing so between breaths of oxygen-taking their heart medications, putting their Depend diapers on, bunion pads, and elastic waist pants! That, or they're calling in from some off-shore island, or foreign resort, where there's no chance that all of this patriotism and nationalism will be visited on themslurp!
Forced servitude or conscription to serve the interests of corporate hucksters, is no longer FREEDOM-but slavery. Either we are a mindless herd to be driven from battlefield to battlefield or INDIVIDUALS, making our own choices as to the days of our lives. If a person chooses to spend their life sitting on a tree stump in some back marsh spitting tobacco FINE. Forced volunteerism is a oxymoron, whether it be in the schools or called to kill.
Nobody has the right to determine my child's future. Nobody has the right to demand that a child be trained to go off to a foreign land to kill another mother's child, so that oil fields might be confiscated, pipelines protected, and timber and water stolen! This is NOT about invasion or protecting one's country from invading hordes. One man said this morning, "Being drafted made a man out of me!" Really! And what is a man? Is learning to kill-to be conditioned to stack naked bodies, to set snarling dogs on people, to kick down doors, to set villages on fire, the new credentials for manhood? Give me a man who will risk his life to save another not destroy. Give me a man who spends his life making the place where he abides a better place. Better because he was there.
"There is no glory in battle worth the blood it costs." (Eisenhower) Man is free or he is a slave to the government and commanded to go and kill others. Today we see that this perversion of our freedoms can call men back to duty who have already served, or keep soldiers extended for as long as desired-or until they end up getting blown to smithereens.
American Foreign Policy was based upon the wisdom of Washington's Farewell Address ( I bet you won't find this in your child's history book-if they have one). The defeat of the Confederacy during the War for the Right to Secede set this nation upon a road to empire. The actions of Roosevelt and Wilson set the stage for the society that we have become. The masters are no longer the people, but the people have been conditioned and programmed to think of themselves as drones-non-persons within their own land.
Are we to believe the voices of today's public relations jingoism- that allegiance or love for one's nation is judged by one's willingness to kill a stranger, who is of no threat to me or mine (outside a full tank of gas!). This perversion sees us no longer protecting our shores but protecting the interests of the Corporate/State. The mindless, soulless, malignant, malevolent, conscienceless Corporate/State is now disguised as Lady Liberty and Uncle Sam. Beneath the red-white and boo and crown of yellow ribbons is a pimp and his whore.
All this brouhaha, of dressing up and marching off to invade foreign lands in pre-emptive strikes, while the lie imploded at our feet! WAKE-UP. Over these many decades trillions have been spent under the guise of a cold war-national defense-intelligence etc., to supposedly defend us from harm. Really! On Sept. 11-2001 this lie was shown as volcanic clouds of ash chased citizens down concrete canyons! Protection! Everyone sat on their asses, went to take a leak, called the wrong office, or stood around like obedient lap dogs that they were and waited for someone to tell them to do their jobs and PROTECT AMERICA! Trillions! And we are led to believe that some grubby cave men, took some lessons on two seated crop dusters, bought some box cutters, and just shocked and surprised everyone! Well by God then everyone needs to have their ass fired.
A joke of a Commission is set up, and we all know what the report will say. Most of us with any literacy skills and a GED could write it now. White -out the word Warren and magic bullet and insert 911 and magic planes and there you have it. Oh, and the findings that these incompetent, inept, lying bastards need billions more in funds so that they can continue on in their labyrinths of nothingness.
Excuse me, but the idea that a citizen has a duty to serve his government (which is hello himself) is a malignant perversion of the proper obligation that a citizen has to his neighbor and society. A archaic idea, and not spoken of in today's" Shock and Awe Theater;" but each individual person is to choose the course of action in his/her own life which will create the greatest good. For all these wars, all these deaths, all these walls and marble memorials, are we any better off? How does a nation protect it's people and it's shores when the land is emptied of it's men? Men off in desert lands protecting pipelines and protecting a puppet government for a puppet people! A people given no voice in their supposed "liberation".
Defense of one's homeland is a legitimate call to arms. A people have a right to self-defense. One does not have the right to be commanded to take another's life for any other reason. All life is sacred. No man-politician or otherwise, has the right to order a nation's youngsters to become killers of mankind. There is no argument here. Those without conscience or a moral compass have no problem in creating a world of killing forever. "Choose you this day whom you will serve".
The carnage and chaos of war creates monsters. Monsters of insatiable greed, and corrupted power, who in their delusional state of mind see themselves as gods. Men, hollow soulless men, in plush board rooms, and war rooms, moving the people of the world around as if they were mere pieces on a global board game. Monopoly gone mad! Monopoly, with its "enemy combatants" disappeared ones, with no rights and no voice. The innocent caught up with the truly guilty (whoever that might be) too bad, tough luck. Is this the "freedom" that men/women are ordered to die for?
On 9/11/2001 we the people (we) became the enemy. The victims in this mad board game are now searched, scanned, fingerprinted, stopped at road blocks, or beaten down by men with clubs, stun guns, tear gas, and jaw shattering plastic bullets. Is this what global freedom means? Dissent and freedom of speech are now marked as the enemy. Is this what our children and children's children should die for? Why should our nation's children die for a foreign land to be liberated while it's own is being enslaved? What's wrong with this picture?
War turns men into monsters. Abusing, torturing, assaulting, and sexually humiliating citizens, caught up in village sweeps. Citizens from small farms and villages labeled "camel jockeys-towel heads-rag heads-sand niggers". One dehumanizes others in war so that it is more acceptable to kill and torture. Men become depraved monsters shooting down (in their fear) any and all who threaten. Some in this madness kill for the sheer joy of it. I saw a young man/boy of perhaps twenty on the news. He was in a snit because he'd been assigned guard duty. With a sullen snarl, when interviewed he said, "I was trained to kick down doors and shoot people, not to stand around doing nothing". This snot nosed kid- who just a few months back was probably hanging out at the mall or on a local street corner in Any Town USA, is now waiting for the thrill to kill.
Those returned from war end up in shelters, under bridges, or abandoned cars. Some never acclimate back to small town- work a day living. From a warrior, with the power to kill, now back in rust town USA, is quite a downer. No more gun-no more legal authority to kill. Now he's just another citizen watching out for the local cop to stop him for a speeding or traffic violation. Others are crippled for life; absent sight, limbs or their minds. They are now just mere cannon fodder. Much like litter they end up kicked to the curb.
Vice President Cheney who received numerous deferments has no problem with sending future generations off to fight Forever Wars (our new economy). He said, "The war on terrorism will not be over in our lifetime. It is different than the cold war in the sense that it may NEVER END, at least not in our lifetime. The way I think of it -it's a new normalcy" (Oct 21-2001).
Think on these words of his. This new "normalcy" is continuing war. Children marked to die in this perverse "new normalcy". Is the world we want-this madness that sees war, continual never ending war as a "new normalcy". Not for him-deferred again. Why give birth, if you know you're merely incubating a commodity until the state is ready to assign him/her to a killing field? And so we are spending approximately five billion plus per month on war and the invention of bigger and better annihilating weaponry. Not on schools, hospitals, affordable housing, a real energy policy (minus dependence on oil), education (minus change agents with their testing), our decaying infra-structure or medical care minus the corporate vampires of the pharmaceutical-insurance-and HMOs, who decide who will live and who will not in some distant sterile cubicle. Rest assured this injustice is not visited on our politicians or retired Presidents. They have made sure that they have the best of insurance (we pay 72% of costs) and pensions that are obscene. Meanwhile they allow ours to be stolen. How long can a nation working at Wal-Marts-Prisons-Convenience Stores-Home Depots-as black-jack dealers-ski lift operators or maids support forever and ever war? Just wondering?
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