A thought from far off New Zealand ...

" A thought from far off New Zealand.

Focusing on GW Bush, isn't entirely helpful. The bigger question is why are people in general and American's in particular so willing to believe complete nonsense. People even say they "believe it" and act accordingly. But if you can get them to sit outside their political party and the other groups they are committed to supporting, and ask a the question again, they will confirm that they KNOW what they say they believe is bullshit. How can that be? We all have the capability of knowing while we are also unknowing.

You need to understand two ideas. First about the burden of proof. Sir Carl Popper said that if a proposition is framed in a scientific way, no amount of evidence can ever prove that any theory is true. NO AMOUNT of evidence can prove TRUTH. On the other hand any single piece of evidence can prove untruth.

The second idea is the importance of "membership". People will go to great personal cost to establish and maintain their membership of groups that are important to them. People find in group membership something larger that themselves that gives their lives meaning.

This creates a potential clash between real events and what we expect and wish to be the case. For instance if I wish to see myself as a truly patriotic American Citizen, I might accept that the President of the United States is elected by the citizens, and perhaps even appointed by God. The President's word therefore is always to be believed, MY PRESIDENT would never lie.

That house of cards tumbles on any single lie. It does not depend on what the President was told, or what he thought he knew, or what advice he was given. There is no room to hide. Chinese walls don't work in Sir Carl Popper's world. The world contains a set of objective realities that have nothing to do with what side we are on. (Like a scientific reality.) The statements of the President either meet that test or they don't. Sir Carl's test is very strict. Any single failure destroys the entire argument for Presidential credibility.

Because of our loyalty to various organizations that we commit ourselves to be members of, we choose to be blind to certain facts that threaten our membership. We choose not to see things that we can clearly and plainly see. We do this as an act of self protection, to protect our own identity. When we commit to organisations that are imporant to us, we choose not to know or to dismiss or minimize facts that contradict our beliefs.

When we understand the ideas above, we can begin to appreciate why the USA is so strongly divided. Despite the appalling behavior of GW Bush and his administration there are still people who support the administration.

For about half of all Americans, to see the truth, to acknowledge it, is to attack organizations that one has given time and money and loyalty to. If those organizations are devalued one's life is devalued too. That's scary. If the things I truely believe are in fact based on falsehood, my whole life might lose it's meaning focus and purpose. Far safer to believe the lie. To support the lie and to defend the actions of those involved.

Too many people entering the world of public debate, come with a trumpet to blow. They come with pre-recorded music to play. No matter what the evidence is, no matter what the tone of the debate, those trumpets, and that pre-recorded music will be played over and over and over. There is no engagement in the process, no attempt to learn, and no effort meet other people in a real dialogue. That's the problem, and in some ways we are each part of it. "

John S Veitch

http://toppers-tap.com/wiki/index.php?title=A_thought_from_far_off_New_Zealand

Do I know you ... ?

Why do I not live my life in rage as others do ?

Certainly I could ...

I talk to people of a day who rage for reasons of their own - rage against a war, against a President.

They focus their rage on a point they have selected.

They have identified an enemy on which to focus the rage of their perceived powerlessness.

Their enemy moves in shadows all the while, unseen by them, unknown to them.

Some of these people I talk with focus some of their rage on the homeless.

Among the homeless on the streets of America are military Veterans - Black, White ... men of all shapes and colours, different backgrounds, all with a common experience.

Ordinary citizens in their rage against government want government to do something about the homeless.

Ordinary citizens sometimes work sincerely to help the homeless.

Other ordinary citizens want only for the homeless to disappear - a government program to clear them all away.

Some ordinary American citizens have never been in war - not even since September 11

Some ordinary American citizens know little or nothing about life in the military, surviving in war.

I wish all citizens everywhere on Earth were so fortunate as they.

Many of us are not.

Some of us remember how ordinary American citizens supplied the enemy.

Jack Cunningham remembers: http://www.capveterans.com/

We remember how those supplies got our best friend killed.

Some of us do live in constant rage so many years later, knowing what we know ...

Some of us Veterans choose a life on the fringe, on the out, because we do not trust ordinary citizens.

Not even ordinary American citizens.

Some Veterans will never again trust ordinary citizens because to them any one of "them" could be the enemy.

We have not forgot our friends who died, nor will.


JB

the highs and lows ...

Beautiful day here - bright sunshine, clear air continues to flow from north.

Cold - mid 20s on Fahrenheit scale. Not unheard of in this area for December ... neither is it expected weather as I can see.

Not common weather to be sure, and has been years since we have had a cold spell such as this ...

A foot of snow remains from the past week's fall.

Last snow was the finest powder I have seen in a long time.

Air has been so cold for a week there is no moisture on the surface - no thawing at all.

Only evaporation, so some nights thick fog settles in here, as it did for eight days prior to the snowfall December 1.

My question is: Is this weather "natural" ?

What has happened so far this winter is very different from last year, when the same weather pattern reoccured along the West Coast of the United States the entire winter.

Last winter was a mild winter as winters go around here - a winter without snow, and greater than average rainfall for the Oregon desert.

Is man able to now "make" weather ? Manipulate weather ? Cause storms and other disturbances on the surface of the earth ?

A serious question, and one that you must decide for yourself.

Reading what Tom Bearden has to say on that subject reveals more than you might want to know ...

http://www.earthchangestv.com/ufo/0209gandor.htm

Imagine

Imagine there's no heaven,
It's easy if you try,
No hell below us,
Above us only sky,
Imagine all the people
living for today...

Imagine there's no countries,
It isnt hard to do,
Nothing to kill or die for,
No religion too,
Imagine all the people
living life in peace...

Imagine no possesions,
I wonder if you can,
No need for greed or hunger,
A brotherhood of man,
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

You may say Im a dreamer,
but Im not the only one,
I hope some day you'll join us,
And the world will live as one.


- John Winston Ono Lennon, (October 9, 1940 – December 8, 1980)

We still remember ...

64 years ago today - we remember what happened, and we remember we do not know why it happened. "History is not always what you expect."

Today, far away from that time, there is a new paradigm of invasion.

AMERICA’S IMMIGRATION CRISIS: WHAT YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT
By Frosty Wooldridge (12/05/05)

" America is in trouble. Look across our nation. It’s quiet, like the stillness before a tornado when birds stop singing. Those who see ‘it’ coming are in the minority. The ‘it’ is a massive whirlwind of illegal aliens funneling into our country. This nation is in danger--more danger than anyone could have imagined a decade ago.

You can ‘feel’ it when you listen to the evening news. You shake your head in disbelief at what’s happening around the world. In the Middle East, bombers strive for martyrdom on busses full of innocent people. Iraq can’t help itself, but we’re dying trying to help them. Who ever dreamed that Israel and Muslims could commit such mayhem on each other?

Back in the United States, who imagined a $7.9 trillion U.S. debt brought to us by our politicians? Who is at the helm of this Titanic, anyway? Quiet! You can hear it in our schools, banks, coffee shops, card games and recreation centers. People are talking. Who dreamed that our national language, English, would be SO disrespected by newcomers to the American Dream that it’s not spoken in public. You feel like a foreigner in your own country.

Who could imagine the rate of immigration exceeds the rate of assimilation? We’re allowing a country within our country. The same thing happened to Rome.

This nation is in the midst of profound almost diabolical change. People mumble their fears concerning change, but in this case, not positive change. What is positive about California today with a budget crisis at $38 billion that explodes without solution? What can be good when that state suffers eternal gridlock, escalating ethnic violence in its schools, urban gangs dominating entire sections of cities and a sense of hopelessness? Because of illegal immigration, California must build one new school 24/7 and staff it with teachers who can speak over 50 languages in order to keep up with their insane growth driven by immigration. They are failing and their kids suffer. Is that positive change? The Golden State’s problems are so overwhelming that 800,000 Californians fled last year. Ironically, today, more Californians live in Idaho than native Idahoans. "

Read entire article, and what you can do:
http://www.americandaily.com/article/10530

I have that creepy feeling again ...

"A "new" kind of electromagnetic (EM) wave began development and testing over 30 years ago (originally discovered by Nikola Tesla) in the empty vacuum of space which, when engineered, can be an inexhaustible supply of energy in great magnitude at any place in the universe. Tesla called it "radiant energy." Because Tesla proposed developing this into free energy for the entire world, his funding was terminated and Tesla’s great inventions, which would have prevented any energy crisis, were never known by the common man. However, both the U.S. and Russia were quick to confiscate his many patents and secretly financed development into areas more advantageous to the controlling elites’ way of thinking."

Believe it or do not, but first read the entire article:
http://prisonplanet.com/articles/november2005/061105Tesla.htm