A Country Rag
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Jubilation
 Graphic: Henry in the apple tree, digitized photo of publisher's great-Godson The pace of change: "Is it today already? I wasn't quite used to yesterday yet." -- unattributed e-mail in circulation
"The meek have filed a class action lawsuit to disinherit the earth."
"Your name comes up, and immediately you've got these advocacy groups that sort of fill up a garbage can and start dumping it all over you."
"Due to current budget restraints, the light at the end of tunnel has been turned off. Sorry for any inconvenience." ".... The collapse of Lehman Brothers almost destroyed the world financial system, and we can’t risk letting much bigger institutions like Citigroup or Bank of America implode.... Lately the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation has been seizing banks it deems insolvent at the rate of about two a week. When the F.D.I.C. seizes a bank, it takes over the bank’s bad assets, pays off some of its debt, and resells the cleaned-up institution to private investors.... Yes, the whole thing would have a Claude Rains feel to it, as a government that has been propping up banks for months declares itself shocked, shocked at the miserable state of their balance sheets. But that’s O.K.... The finance blog Calculated Risk suggests that instead of calling the process nationalization, we should call it 'preprivatization.'... But what we have now isn’t private enterprise, it’s lemon socialism: banks get the upside but taxpayers bear the risks. And it’s perpetuating zombie banks, blocking economic recovery...." -- Paul Krugman in Banking on the Brink, New York Times, 2/22/09 Economics in a Nutshell: If you don't pay them, they can't pay me and I can't pay others, who can't pay anyone else either, see? And if you steal from me or borrow without repaying, that makes it even more difficult to handle reliably bills and receipts. But, on the other hand, if you don't pay them, they can't pay me and I can't pay others, who can't pay anyone else either. So... maybe there's something wrong with this cycle. Let's see. If taxpayers give money to banks [they aren't 501(c)(3) non-profit entities entitled to charitable funding] and banks loan that money back to taxpayers at high interest rates and fees, then taxpayers have that much less personal money to pay their bills and invest in production and consumption while bank personnel are celebrating with extravagant and ingenius glee at the suckers they've found right here and fallen on their very own ground. Maybe it doesn't make sense for taxpayers to do that rather just keep their own money to begin with as a sort-of interest-free self-loan for sustenance and survival individually and collectively. I believe we've found the leak, or one of them, in our system! It is supposed to be capitalism -- not welfare largesse for financial institutions or other businesses demanding unconstrained socialism for themselves and their personnel -- and the production of market goods based on consumer delight and demand. And we can do it! Yes, we can.
There are way too many good, honest, working or retired people, investors and entrepreneurs, civilians and military personnel, innocent children, who are living now on the streets and in cars, shelters and tent cities or somewhat more safely with relatives or friends, having lost their homes, incomes, credit and other assets, and jobs, increasingly exposed even further to potential harms and losses because of past government policies at all levels and corporate malfeasance and malfunction from minute to massive -- all in the service of very cruel and callous, monumental and brazen greed and irresponsiblity. Any continued assistance or support, rather than identification and punishment of those actively involved in these crimes against humanity, sanity, and legality just lends credence and insult to injuries sustained and unimaginable only a decade or so ago in this country particularly. It's time to stop "feeding the beast" and turn the world around as it is meant to and should be without further mercy or clemency for the extremely pitiless and remorseless in desecretion and depravity. There is no excuse, for instance, for gold-plated helicopters in a world of sick and starving people manipulated to the point of death repeatedly by fraud and waste.
Life in prison without parole for those culpable is a small price for them to pay for what they've done indelibly to others who have lived through, are living through, and will always have nightmares as a consequence. Very obvious criminals, and some still less detected, losing all they have and have gained materially is simply fair. That includes our ex-President and his Administration who violated their oaths of office sequentially and multiply without solid alibi in any number of well-known and promulgated cases. Arrest and adjudication will allow all of them plenty of opportunity to face what they've really done and been to unsuspecting and trusting people and this country and world and to think about all of that for a very, very long time as it really is without their specious excuses and errant justifications for what is truly insanity of the worst possible kinds. They should live to an old age with unusual longevity, be treated well in apprehension, prosecution and detention to the extent that all of their most basic needs for survival are recognized and met. All of us adversely affected by their calamitous choices, decisions and activities deserve this closure for what we've endured and will continue to endure as they played their evil hands. As obvious to common sense as all the rest, the Eleventh Commandment is: Thou shalt not reward bad behavior, or punish the good. Otherwise, all we have most naturally is hell on earth spreading from one person to place to planet until all of us drown in it. "Why hasn't an independent council been called for yet to deal with the great damage Republicans do to America's economy and image from the 'Blew it Bush/Republicans administration" that has left President Obama a mess and left all Americans in record debt of over $1.2 trillion dollar deficit, all of it criminal? As an American, I'm disgusted with what the Republicans' criminal record shows, and why they are not in jail is beyond me. (me too) I guess the American people don't care about the great damage done by the 'Blew it Bush/Republicans administration,' and the torture they used on so-called enemy combatants which goes against U.S. law and international law. In conclusion, my fellow students, faculty, staff, I say to you, where's the outrage over the Republicans' criminal record that has ruined the economy and image around the world and left all Americans in record debt and with great injustice done to America's moral standing in the world?" -- Thomas Birchfield, East Tennessean Letters to the Editor, Johnson City TN As one of many active well-wishers for our new and truly democratically-elected Administration, we might continue to thank those individuals and God in all manifestations for their sacrifice, response and dedication in addressing issues of inter/national importance and essence, and their determination along with others less officially to work and help in rebuilding America from putrid ashes left all around us by those who prevailed until very recently and, unfortunately, still do in too many places as they are legion, well-funded and, however waningly, still powerful in control of materiel and money as long as they are free, as they should not be by local, state, national and international laws protecting citizens in their hard-won civil liberties. Since parts of our mayhem has been served courtesy of various members of bar associations, and humor helps sometimes to alleviate passing pain, a humorous e-mail has been circulating regarding courtroom experiences recorded as they happened. Perhaps some of the lawyers cited anonymously represented employees of AIG and most particularly its financial products division in securing extravagant bonuses for services not rendered and maybe formulated the contract for $1 million a month to a British AIG financial consultant over the past few years and to date.
"S/he who values nothing will have nothing of value." "Follow the money." -- Deep Throat "There is a subtle but important difference between the highest commitments of religious faith and public office. Most great religions espouse the golden rule, based on agape -- love or self-sacrifice, for the benefit of others. A government's ultimate goals are to preserve security and to insure justice: to treat people fairly, to guarantee their rights, to alleviate suffering and to try to resolve disputes peacefully." -- President Jimmy Carter, 12/24/96
Graphic: Reverse of the Great Seal of the United States -- "Novus ordo seclorum" means "New order of the ages" -- which appears now on the back of American dollar bills It's interesting how sweetly poetic, as well as prophetic and enlightening, much of the Bible is encountered unadorned by the misconstructions, misguidance and/or malignments seen through "interpretive" eyes. Many of its words and sentences are simple and comprehensible to nearly anyone literate in any language. We understand the lyrics to whatever music is popular because it speaks to our experience, knowledge and longings. In that sense, the Bible is really not that much different despite all the years between its scripture and now. The Gideons with their mission of providing to traveling strangers for many years a copy in every hotel and motel room know the comfort, good instruction and inspiration contained therein and shared, preserved despite calamitous centuries so that we can all still hear, if we choose to. Although there are certainly excellent lawyers dedicated to personal, community and country beneficence -- our new President, Ralph Nader, and those who've worked for the Southern Poverty Law Center come to mind quickly among many others, it's good to remember in the interests of healthy humility and guidance that Jesus said two thousand or so years ago: "Shame on you lawyers! for you load people with burdens heavy to bear, but you yourselves refuse to carry even a light load"; "Shame on you! for you erect memorials for the prophets, the prophets your fathers killed. Thus you witness and consent to the deeds of your fathers; for they killed the prophets and you build monuments for them."; "Shame on you lawyers! for you have taken the key of knowledge away from the people. You yourselves do not enter the kingdom of God and you prevent those who would enter from going in." Those words are as insightful and relevant today as they were when spoken, good evidence for believing that Jesus spoke the eternal Word. It's also interesting to remember that our national Constitution formally creating the nation by structure, principle and ideal was not crafted by attorneys but philosophers, scientists, students of history and active revolutionaries against the British monarchy's rule on this continent. We do not survive, thrive and prosper from the courtroom arguments over, analogically, how many angels may dance on the end of a pin, but by productive endeavor and daring in construction and creation. Lawyers who truly serve God and man toward those ends are as blessed as the wealthy who, like the camel, metaphorically, have figured out how to go through the head of a needle to enter heaven and exult in God's kingdom. For those outspoken proponents over the past decades of "law and order," most predominantly from the right wing of our Republican Party, it is apparently necessary to note that that condition cannot be attained by ignoring or abrogating Constitutional law or misconstruing its intent, or that of any other passed, nor is the consequence of doing any of that arbitrarily and selectively "order" by any definitive construction of the word. That is an oxymoron, an absurdity on its surface and at the profoundest level of logical meaning and real encounter. The result rather, and unsurprisingly, is of course criminality, chaos and random unpredictability which make any sane individual or organization nervous, to say the least and at least occasionally. True dedication to "law and order" is the heart-felt enactment and intelligently rigorous enforcement of all the codes of our country, our states and smaller localities, including those long since assuring non-discrimination and protection at every level regardless of race, creed or gender.
"But whosoever drinketh of the waters that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." -- Jesus (John 4:14) Concommitant with the extinction or nearly so of some flora and fauna species, quite a few beneficial and/or splendid, the planet has become increasingly over-populated with bacteria and waste products, to name just two, and human beings. At the turn of the 20th century that species numbered approximately 1,650,000,000. In 1999, it was around 5,978,000,000. In 2008, it was estimated at 6,707,000,000, while requisite resources of potable water, food nutrients, education, employment, competent health care, housing and generally survivable nevermind nurturing environments dwindled. According to World Bank statistics, "almost half the world — over three billion people — live on less than $2.50 a day"; and "At least 80% of humanity lives on less than $10 a day." The on-line comunally-fed and excellent encyclopedic resource Wikipedia states that "[a]ccording to Jean Ziegler (the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food for 2000 to March 2008), mortality due to malnutrition accounted for 58% of the total mortality in 2006: 'In the world, approximately 62 millions people, all causes of death combined, die each year. In 2006, more than 36 millions died of hunger or diseases due to deficiencies in micronutrients.'"
Graphic below: Feminine Nature, multi-media by Vera Jones, Jonesborough TN
When God said, "Go forth and multiply," there was a relatively vast and profusely endowed sphere to be discovered, explored, utilized and developed for sustenance, but that has not been the case now for many years. Conservative planning in many areas and including parenthood by sentient beings is essential in the 21st century to avoid planetary exhaustion and to revive depleted stores of jobs, good schools and teachers, nutritive staples, competent construction, responsible businesses and the accessibility of healthful activities like exercise, entertainment and art. It's time and past to turn our swords into ploughshares, thoughtfully, toward a liveable and pleasant Earth for all. We deserve better as a whole than we've had recently as greed and aggression gained sway to the detriment of nearly every thing and one. It's time to turn away and work pragmatically toward a better day for ourselves and children especially everywhere, who certainly deserve individual nurture and compassionate love.
Aside from propping up governments we support with money we don't really have, we might offer our expertise and knowledgeable democratically humane values in the form perhaps of more Peace Corps volunteers to countries like Palestine and some particularly worrisome African and Asian nations as well as reputable contractors to be paid with foreign aid funds. Money by itself without helpful, positive direction is useless to worse depending on levels of inexperience, anarchy and corruption. We need to hold out a hand up as well as a dollar or two, or that may be dissipated without taking root in solid, stable foundation structures which is our real intent, goal, promise and hope. Throwing money at something is not like water on a fire but confetti over a parade however it exists in order or melee and presentation. We have wonderful resources of peaceable principle, organization, science, education, research and diverse skill to profer those who look up to American prowess and progress in many fields historically and nascently again now across a much broader swath. Our plentifully great museums and libraries, universities and shops are all glowing evidence of that. We have way more to share than just gold and silver coins and paper currency that is precious and worthy. We need to get over that mindset that real value is measurable on the sides of a ledger. We don't venerate Greek civilization in pounds of drachma but in its flowering and flourishing of art, philosophy, lively business and government, entertainment and mythology, architecture and social interaction.
In less than 150 years African-Americans have lifted themselves out of the bondage, degradations and distortions of slavery during a time when, even as free men they were counted as only three-fifths of a human being, through abusive and derogatory discrimination over many decades to hold now the highest offices of our two political parties in this land. Women, the voting majority of whom along with other ethnicities have worked recently to reclaim and reinvigorate our democratic processes and social equities, have been treated similarly and did not receive the franchise until much later than ethnic men. The race and gender of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Thomas Paine, Patrick Henry, Abraham Lincoln, James Monroe and Woodrow Wilson, along with many other pillars of our founding, had certainly reached the nadir of its developmental progress with behaviors and attitudes exhibited increasingly to the detriment of all now so painfully evident. That those fathers were abandoned in their wisdom and work is a very sad reflection on the deteriorating mental and moral prowess pursued with arrogance and vanity by those who apparently believe that God and infinite wisdom is, belongs to and represents only a "white" man, now shown to be delelict of duty, ethics and common sense in corporate leadership and government generally, although there are certainly exceptions to that. We might more reasonably honor and express gratitude to the women and ethnicities who've exhibited true character and devotion, study and hard work, faith and determination, courage and strength in enduring and endeavoring to restore all of our trampled civil liberties and social responsibilities to each other, our country and the planet we all inhabit for ourselves and our children.
With a re/surgence of civil democracy and responsible liberty for each individual God-given spark/le around the globe, and even into space and worlds uncharted and unknown, community by nation by continent and island by planet all will experience a worldwide rennaissance of culture from ancient to present to future foreseen, the true glory of God and God's gift of and to the world freed and as foretold and meant to be.
Taxpayer money should not be used in whole or in part to fund any specific faith and/or its restrictive dogmas, e.g. homophobia or anti-Semitism. That would be a violation of Constitutional guarantees giving equal rights to the expression of all religions, sexual preference and ethnicity in terms of lifestyle and employment. If, for instance, World Vision finds it must decline federal funds rather than hire homosexuals, so be it. That's a matter of free choice in pursuing and keeping one's own beliefs. No one is advocating that World Vision be dismantled for holding them, however distasteful to some and against commercial fair hiring practices they may be. However, re-allegiance and re-commitment to all of the provisions of our Constitution as written and intended in interpretation by the authors is essential to reconstructing our tattered country and its vibrancy of civic and civil life, experience and expression. Within that context, difference and conflict of individual realities, opinions, viewpoints and directions is an inevitable sign of healthy and dynamic lifeform interaction. That exists and has in communities and countries historically with constructive and productive consequences, so there's no reason to believe it's detrimental now nationally or worldwide, but rather that it's a path to growth and expansion of every good and positive type for the benefit of all non-pernicious species. At its profoundest, this is the meaning and promise of liberty for all responsible in its service. The document defining our nation is based upon principles developed and fought for by individuals and armies over centuries regarding the rights of citizens in relationship to their governments and rulers. It is usually traced to the English Magna Carta of 1215 and their later 1628 Petition of Right, producing as amended here occasionally something slightly to grandly new, original and unique in consequence. Rather than "just a piece of paper," it is the shining culmination of thoughtful, erudite and brave efforts over the years of our evolution on this planet toward a good and just, healthy society of individuals from babies to the elderly and all beneficial species other than the deserving of our own.
Graphic: Government Welfare for the Filthy Filthy Wealthy
Blowing off the tops of God's mountains cannot be considered honoring the divine, anymore than dumping toxic or untreated wastes into our air and waters is.
"In a 2-1 ruling, the appellate court said U.S. District Court Judge Robert C. Chambers wrongly rescinded and remanded back to the Corps four permits for Massey Energy-owned mines in southern West Virginia in March 2007. Chambers ruled that the procedures used by the Army Corps of Engineers to determine the environmental impact of valley fills did not live up to the requirements stipulated in the Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act.
The appellate court also reversed Friday a summary judgment Chambers ordered in June 2007 regarding runoff water. Environmental groups requested the summary judgment on the grounds that stream segments running from a valley fill to a sediment pond are “streams of the United States” and that the Corps did not have the authority to permit the discharge of pollutants into those waters.
Valley fills are created in many mining operations, particularly the controversial mountaintop mining practice, as a way to dispose of rocks and rubble left over from the mining process...." -- WOWK-TV WV
Hope is based on progress through education by study, constructive environmental interaction, creativity and innovation. The "greatest nation on earth" will have the "best and brightest" human beings, its greatest resource in a naturally resource-rich country, involved in real learning, accomplishment, and the productive use of all good and innate skills and aptitudes. Dumbing everybody down from children to the aged is not a path to be recommended or pursued in establishing that. Instead, it means investing in every way in sharp and creative minds knowledgeable in humanities and sciences with recognition and reward for hard, constructive work in positive directions personally and socially. It also requires teachers and leaders of honest and exemplary backgrounds and expertise in scholarship, research and achievement. Reward with publicity, prestige and ceremonial honor of companies and corporations competing to outshine each other in community and national service with responsible environmental dealings, including with other businesses and with governments, people, flora and fauna is also important.
Additionally, while elevating the best and reverencing those historical individuals who've forged through the highest traits of endeavor and intellect trails for others to follow and expand upon, hope demands punishment and/or segregation for those who exhibit the worst of behaviors. For instance, disregarding the commandment "Thou shalt not kill," our under-funded and under-staffed, sometimes misdirected or ignored Food and Drug Administration has allowed increasing contamination of products with irradiations and well-known toxins like salmonella and mercury which have caused illness and death for babies to the elderly as some company executives put profit over diligence in providing safe consumptives from basic nutrients to medications for worldwide populace. A rededication to honorable business practices in addition to careful oversight and monitoring is essential to restoring and maintaining healthy bodies and minds capable of peak learning and productive activities which are necessary for the greatest nation on earth to continue and prosper, along with the rest of the planet. It is a true horror to afflict the weakest -- children, elderly and the poor -- with unregulated substances advertised to provide sustenance, not disease and mortality, a total absence of responsibility and caring provoking outrage and nearly defying belief. These are murderous inclinations which need to be subject to prosecution and remediation. It is homegrown bio-terrorism by our own American companies, their owners and operators, and we do have laws against that. It was also a value of the Bush Administration to fund, investigate and stamp out that kind of malfeasance against our citizens -- although they tended to ignore corporate instances in favor of shadowy mirages with dark skins from foreign lands and backgrounds who might be hiding in our midst or plotting overseas instead. How frequently when we're looking for something, it turns out to be right under our noses! It's past time to hold individuals and corporations accountable for their suicidally short-sighted and self-aggrandizing choices and actions in pursuit of "the almighty dollar" without ethics or remorse or recalibration of their destinations for all, including themselves. That is just as much of an unprovoked murder spree of innocents as those of the Boston strangler or D.C. stalkers or the Columbine tragedy. This is the day to "call a spade a spade" and deal with it for what it really is: killing randomly and wantonly of God's children, a violation of divine and earthly law and a worthy exercise of legal skills for those certified in that profession (and perhaps wishing to be and stay in the light and power of God), who have in the past extracted billions for individuals and government programs at the federal, state and local levels from cigarette companies for ills associated with smoking, as well as writing and helping to pass restrictive and prohibitive legislation on that. They can certainly do likewise in an analagous, but more appalling since it is completely un-chosen by the trusting and unaware consumers, situation while our new government re-envigorates the FDA with determinedly humane purpose and activity. Dependably pure supplies for our citizens, and especially children, of potable water and nutritive foods is an essential so basic one would think it wouldn't need mentioning. But it does.
Tests show ground peanuts at a Texas plant were contaminated with the same strain of salmonella that has sickened hundreds of people across the nation, state health officials said Wednesday. The peanut meal was tested at the Plainview plant Feb. 12 after the facility had voluntarily shut down, said Doug McBride, a spokesman for the Texas Department of State Health Services. Previously, private tests conducted by Virginia-based Peanut Corp. of America, which operated the plant, had tentatively indicated that there may have been salmonella at the plant. The Texas plant is the second facility operated by the embattled Peanut Corp. to test positive for salmonella. A different strain was found at the company's Blakely, Ga., plant. The national outbreak has sickened more than 600 people and is suspected of causing at least nine deaths, and led to one of the largest product recalls in U.S. history. Unable to recover from the fallout, the company has filed for bankruptcy." -- Jamie Stengle for the Associated Press, 2/25/09
A very sad and not atypical incident has been reported recently of two Pennsylvania judges selling the lives of around 250 school-age teenagers into prison servitude for months to years for millions of dollars in kickbacks from owners of privately-owned commercial jails. I don't believe there are earthly punishments reasonably accessible to us commensurate to crimes against children such as these, although they certainly have earned legally life in prison or execution after suitable decades of incarceration themselves. No one can ever give back to those youngsters their lost days of enslavement or apologize adequately for what they, and those who love them most intimately, have experienced in horror and heartbreak. I hope those affected see with the election just past and changes in progress and in place that there are honorable and esteemable elders in their state, nation and world to follow, look up to, work for and emulate. There's light everywhere if they look for it and many people with faith, hope and good wishes for them as they put themselves and their lives back together again. How our country could have sunk that low is an agonizing sorrow to me and I know many others, but we can pray they recover health and trust, and help the rest of us in remaking America as it's meant to be and sometimes has been. Those young people just lost some time in their lives, but the perpetrators lost their souls completely and have certainly sealed their destinies. With humane and caring assistance and guidance, those harmed so cruelly will find some things worthwhile to know and share from their traumatic experiences, like those who lived through the Nazi holocaust to become outstanding world leaders as well as professionals in many fields and good citizens of many countries. There are heroes and heroines to find and follow for inspiration while they recover from nightmares they might want to communicate through various art forms as well as other compassionate and healing therapies. This is, by the way, an example of terrorism within, overlooked and condoned in some circles and is a province of our Department of Homeland Security. What could be more important to our security than a healthy and productive younger generation?
Charity is sharing materially and immaterially with those who are more challenged by cognition and/or worldly goods. We almost all have something positive to offer at least of one or the other, including time/energy, ability, and stored provisions. A strong and profoundly wealthy nation and citizenry can do that, and must now at the nadir of our infrastructure at a zenith in realization of loftily historic principles and ideals with the overwhelming citizen participation and choice during fall 2008 nationwide elections. Volunteering skills to local cultural, charitable and social organizations is vital to community envigoration and nearly everyone can give minimally a can or two of food for distribution to the dispossessed or never had. One outlet for that in Jonesborough is the local library. In the Shenandoah Valley it used to be, conveniently by rural mailbox as well as office, the Postal Service. Spare winter coats and jackets, old household furniture and appliances as well as extra blankets, pillows, magazines and books, among many items, are welcomed also by well-established organizations and reputable distributors like the Salvation Army and Good Will. This is the time to pitch in and help. The intrinsic rewards of participating actively are immense in terms of learning, meeting others with like interests and values, and enjoying sometimes celebratory events. If you can afford the time, energy and money, children and domestic animals are suffering now disproportionately also. Taking any in or extending a helping hand whether they're familial or strangers for conscientious care will be, as ever, a welcome and multiple blessing.
We can't count just on our new incoming President, his adminstration, and Congress to heal and change this country as we all need. It has to be a nationwide endeavor, one home and community, entrepreneur and retiree, employee and employer, youngster and student at a time working altogether in similar positive and blessed directions for the benefit of all ultimately, this nation and world, and our place in history.
Proveable miracles have occurred in the past, and we all might pray, reconformed, that God will grant us that in establishing healthy and fair socio-economic systems worldwide. To believe we can do that by ourselves alone would be just another arrogance of man to the divine. A few examples of holy intervention en masse are: the parting of the Red Sea for Moses and other of the Chosen People to cross onward toward Jerusalem, and its subsequent swallowing of Egyptian armies in pursuit; feeding of assembled multitudes with a few loaves and fishes by Jesus Christ; teenage St. Jeanne D'Arc leading victorious armies against foreign invaders of France; and Jewish reclamation of the desert-strewn land of Israel into a productively bounteous and powerful nation, and their survival and defeat multiply of massive hostile incursions and insurrections against existence and authority there and elsewhere over thousands of years really. One of the most notable individual examples of somewhat miraculous achievement is that of Ludwig Van Beethoven ("Beethoven's story is one of personal triumph over tragedy
and supreme musical achievement. A complex and brilliant man,
no composer before or since has exerted greater influence."), increasingly to totally deaf over the best part of his musical performing and composing career, who is noted historically and beloved nearly universally for creating some of the most spectacularly memorable and beautifully moving cadences ever known to exist or be heard in the world.
To life, then. L'chaim.
Along those lines, there are many innovative ways that communities can bring businesses and individuals together in working toward health and progress despite economic disturbances at present.
At the opposite extreme from generally enlightened regions and the Manny's in this world are those spreading "mind germs" that cause disorientation, disarray, distress, illness, and disease. A recent example of that is my recent encounter with an aggressive and arrogant older, "white," business-looking man who all of a sudden brusquely and loudly berated me in a public place for coughing, rather than laughing or smiling as usual, out loud.
So save a child today.
As another personal example of how dysfunctional some of our nation's systems have become and in addition to the market and housing meltdown in evidence now, in January I requested a brokerage check which was posted on the 12th day of that month. Never receiving it, although other communications from that source arrived regularly, I called that institution. The representative had the first check cancelled and a second issued on February 5th. A later representative said to allow the post office up to ten business days for delivery which would have been the 18th. The check, in an envelope postage-stamped the 17th, arrived in my mailbox on the 20th. My local branch of a national mega-bank put a hold on all of the funds drawn against another national mega-bank until March 3rd, although previously they've allowed some to be released immediately. I gather from this that not only do consumers and federal government agencies not like and trust our banking system but also that the banks don't like and trust each other. Both banks involved, and the brokerage company, are well-known "household name" types one would expect, in addition to the postal service, to be reliable and upstanding. Personal and public economies cannot function dependably or sanely in this overall situation, compounded by job and benefit losses, usurious interest rates and walloping late fees. This is an economic system on its knees in which one set of culprits are now referred to on NPR and from other sources as "zombie banks," described as dead, robotic, and flailing off flesh from the living which need to be "shot" in the best interests of all. Like the incorrigible teenager who keeps charging Ferrari's and shopping at Neiman Marcus and then comes pleading over and over again to parents with a sob story about not being able to pay rent, these adolescents need to be made responsible by refusing to accommodate their proclivities of self-absorption and uncivil disobedience to common sense. In the words of an old saying, "We are up to our asses in alligators" here, and the calvary is overdue to appear.
Many members and followers of the Republican Party have been and are educated, talented, well-experienced, intelligent, distinguished, reputable, innovative and competent. It's time for that political alignment's moderating adherents to reclaim it in thoughtful leadership and contribute also to inter/national dialogue, recovery and success as true and devoted patriots who sometimes honestly disagree -- without, hopefully, rancour or ill-will -- in "a new game" by rules guaranteed in the Constitution of the United States while the humble donkey, conveyor of the Virgin Mary and divine Christ child, reigns for awhile under the sweeping laws of God. During a period of catastrophic socio-economic emergency in this country and throughout the world, we need all the best and most capable spirit/souls and minds on the line pushing back against vast desolation and dismay for the challenge and fight of a lifetime that the powers of light expand and prevail. We evolve in part or whole by the dialectic, the yin and yang of forces vibrating, pulsing and cycling through the universe, and we need "the loyal opposition" present here.
Simply being opposed to everything or nearly is not a party platform, vision for the future, or guide path in the present moment to anything but destruction, to which we have been treated substantially in the most recent past. The Republican Party of Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and Dwight D. Eisenhower, among other honorable notables at the presidential and lesser levels, needs to regain its foothold in positive national history from the fanatically psychotic grip of the likes of Tricky Dick, George W. and recent undermining of democratic processes and retribution of wealth through tax code revision and federal spending from the poor and middle class to the filthy rich. The tumbling of the Soviet Union into lawless and dangerous debacle of a nuclear-armed Russia overrun by criminals and lost to myriad historic glories of the Russian Empire is not an inspiring example of healthy foreign policy either. Neither, of course, is the chaotic misery of Iraq and our soldiers there. But we need a multi-party system for the dynamism of debate and fresh ideas, honestly differing viewpoints and experiences and insights into our condition past, present and yet-to-be. It may take some courage on the part of more moderate and sane elements extant on that side of the political spectrum to stand up for what they truly believe and perceive but now is definitely the time that is needed, a time for heroes.
If past administration and business leaders had not become irresponsibly drunk on unchecked power and greed, citizens and governments and organizations today would not need to undergo radical restructure in taking extraordinary measures to right and assure the health of our gutted systems at all levels of encounter and experience. Responsible behavior guards individual rights and obligations to communities, children, and our home environment, which has not been in evidence for so long that, in the words of a passing acquaintance, "They destroyed our country." It's long due for some "conservative" (of what has never been apparent, especially recently) Republicans and Democrats to open their eyes and look at what they've really done and been. This is not fantasy or abstract theory. This is the reality we all must live with and in, and not by the choice of majorities on the planet adversely affected, as must the perpetrators, by this catastrophe of life in all its presentations. "Irresponsible" is a mild word to apply to those who brought us all to this near-death crisis without a thought at all, apparently, to what might be the consequences. Republicans, in particular, need to "pull up their pants," take their full measure of responsibility for what has happened, and work with the rest of us to correct it. There is no excuse for the behaviors and attitudes exhibited to date by too many. Now is the time for them to grow up, grab a shovel and trash bag, and help us and our President, overly challenged and burdened by harms and problems not in any way of his own making, to clean up the mess they've made everywhere -- those not in prison or on their ways, anyway -- as we resuscitate America, and concommitantly the world.
Crime does not pay, in any sense of that phrase; most of us can see that very well and only in retrospect for some. "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem," and that is especially true today. In a recent blaze of further irresponsibility toward residents, businesses, workers, retirees, youngsters and educational facilities, a few "conservative" governors are considering refusal of stimulus funds meant to reinvigorate our nation state by state and federally. What that would "conserve," other than poverty and despair and disarray, is patently unclear, as ever. Perhaps some comparative stock values from 1/01/07 to 2/25/09 from 1/01/07 would be enlightening, along with the fact that many citizens haven't the funds now to invest even if they wanted to plunge in at what might be the proverbially and hopefully announced market "bottom": Citigroup 55.66, 2.60; General Motors 30.30, 2.22; New York Times 24.27, 3.95; General Electric 30.30, 9.08; Office Depot 38.27, 1.26; US Airways 53.89, 3.66. In terms of capitalization, some marker values in billions for those two dates are: eBay 41.9, 16.1; Dow Chemical 38.1, 9.9; American International Group 186.3, 2.8; Fannie Mae 57.9, 0.6; Freddie Mac 47.0, 0.3. Only a skimming of those and similar figures representative of the state of the economy as left to us most recently is necessary to understand the scope and extent of this emergency of past and mass irresponsibility on the part of those trusted to conserve our resources of all kinds and our destinies as living and thriving human beings in this nation and on this planet in this solar system.
Because the behaviors and attitudes of some corporate executives have been massively irresponsible in their disregard for populace and socio-economic environment -- as well as criminal and sinful in disdain for spiritual realities and guidance, they need to be identified, jailed, and all of their assets seized.
In a measure in insulation, aloofness and irresponsibility entertained without charity or common sense by kingpins of recent criminal experience, Bernard Madoff (out on $10 million bond) -- past NASDAQ chairman and admitted entrepreneur of an international Ponzi scheme bilking $50 billion or so from trusting and duped individuals, governments and institutions -- and his wife were about to mail off checks totalling around $173 million to friends and family at the time of his arrest and sent over $1 million worth of Christmas gifts to them for the December 2008 holiday, according to the Associated Press on January 8, 2009, while they continued to live in their $7 million Manhattan penthouse and others deserving much better fell ill and/or homeless or starved.
Bush Administration Vice President Richard Bruce Cheney interviewed recently on National Public Radio was heard, and no doubt taped, as stating matter-of-factly our government's initiation and complicity with techniques of torturing prisoners to obtain information which he said had been crucial in identifying and locating al qaeda operatives and their activities. We have not in seven years, however, captured ÃÓÇãÉ Èä ãÍãÏ Èä ÚæÖ Èä áÇÏä (Osama bin Laden), diminished power of the Taliban appreciably, which may be attributed to the reality that there is no historical or psychological evidence showing torture elicits reliable data. Rather, interrogators receive confused and contradictory statements from those who seek to end their torment and are disoriented by it. Frequently those statements which lend support to beliefs and desired directions of the interrogators are chosen out of the many as true and acted upon as if they are valid. The Spanish Inquisition is an old example of that, but there are many others throughout millenia. Torture is a violation of the Geneva Conventions to which the United States of America along with many other countries is a signatory.
"Torture is the tool of the lazy, the stupid and the pseudo-tough. It's also perhaps the greatest recruiting tool that the terrorists have." -- U.S. Major General Paul Easton, 1/09
A partial answer, for instance, to rising health care costs is national support for proven holistic remedies -- physicians, psychologists, and medications -- some of which have been used worldwide for up to 5,000 years and longer. Our concentration on surgeries and prescription pills, and pills to counteract side effects of those, has not created a healthy or self-reliant populace physically, mentally or financially. A Surgeon General schooled and experienced in traditional and "alternative" methodologies would disseminate information and directions citizens need to take charge of their materiality in wholesome ways, and insurance coverage would include those paths to wellness, relieving a burden on hospitals, hospices, physicians, communities and individuals. In a similar vein, normal healthy children are lively, energetic, curious, and occasionally boisterous. They don't need (expensive and sometimes addictive) prescription drugs to lull and dull them, but teachers trained well to manage their behaviors and interests in positive, productive, exploratory pursuits to prepare them well for further higher education and responsible, participatory citizenship. Real clinical hyperactivity and autism, as an example, are rare although well-balanced natural meals and healthy environments are also necessary to achieve autonomously thriving function for developing youngsters.
In terms of solutions, additionally, examination of financial records is also in order for those entities subject to public accounting. Recently, for instance, some executives are reported as having no idea how government bailout money has been spent by their corporations. This is, at best, lazy and facetious as they all have accounting records readily available to them and skillfully educated personnel employed exclusively to maintain and update those capably and reliably. The simple answer is to run detail income and expense reports from the date bailout funds were received to the present which will explicate receipts and disbursements. If debits and credits don't balance for the data produced, then auditors and managers need to identify and track down discrepancies to determine sources of omission and commission by following and examining whatever paper trails and other computerized information exist and by interviewing corporate and government accountants and their assistants involved and responsible for collections, corrections and expenditures.
Incomplete and/or incorrect accounting books are a violation of legal corporate responsibilities to shareholders, as well as to local, state and federal governments for, among other things, tax purposes. As an accounting system is created, every credit transaction -- stored with a date and code -- has a balancing debit one -- also stored with a date and code: e.g. a credit of $1,500 to Joan for her December salary is a debit to the business payroll account of $1,500. Debits to credits always equal zero at the detail and summary level, or should if they're recorded accurately. If the $1,500 Joan credit is recorded instead as a widget purchase, there should be a widget to show to trace its whereabouts and an angry Joan to answer to, as well as a discrepancy in total payroll and total inventory debit accounts. A very large widget might be debited to multiple accounts such as cash checking on hand, plus bailout funds received, plus savings. In accounting, though, there is no "vanishing point." Something is always there. We have a penny, or a fraction thereof, or we do not, and a widget or a witch. It's concrete, not abstract and real, not theoretical. There either are two apples or there are not. It is binary at the profoundest level, just like a computer bit is either on or off. There are reputable auditors, certified public accountants, worldwide who are quite experienced, available, and capable of ruminating over and revealing the intricacies of recent government agency and corporate accounts and determining their accuracy or criminality in regard to tax evasion, and obfuscation or clarity of real in-flow and out-go of funds.
It is an international crime to attack a sovereign state -- its citizens, buildings and land, particularly with the purpose of conquest -- as Hamas as insistently done to Israel. It is and has been behaving criminally, just as the Japanese in bombing Pearl Harbor or Al Qaeda in attacking the World Trade Center and The Pentagon. If its Gaza inhabitants devoted the same amounts of energy, time, talent and resources to developing for themselves wholesome, self-reliant and self-sustaining communities as they do to armaments and the buildup of an aggressive army bent on illegal intent, the area wouldn't be a welfare state dependent upon economic support from the world of productive nations which include, of course, Israel. The problem is with Hamas -- its relentless evil motivations and activities. It is murderously anti-Semitic and dedicated to disruption and dissolution of the Jew's home, the Promised Land of the Old Testament, where they were led by God and Moses, part of which documentary history and inspiration is also the basis of Mohammedanism, as it was re-established on May 11, 1949 by United Nations General Assembly Resolution 273. Of course, it is also the birthplace of Jesus, founder of the Christian faith too. It is only by the generosity and good will of Jews that Hamas and the Palestinians have Gaza at all as a land to call their home, as it was taken during a previous assault of regional Arab nations on Israel and then given to them in trust they would behave responsibly and with reasonable gratitude, which has never manifested itself at all.
Arguing now about whether or not Israel should exist as a nation is a little bit like debating whether the United States of America should still be part of the British Empire. Israel is a well-settled, developed, strong and thriving, independent country from kibbutz farmlands to high-tech high-rises built over the past sixty years, beset as it has been frequently be hostile and sometimes invasive Arab neighbors. However, God decided millenia past that it is the Jew's "land of milk and honey." History is replete with examples that overriding God's will is not an intelligent or worthwhile thing to do, and we need to keep in mind again that Jesus was and is a Jew, raised by Jewish parents and family within their tradition of Biblical insight and instruction as chosen by God. It's doubtful that he or Divinity would be satisfied to see the Promised Land occupied and controlled by radical Islamic militants instead.
On January 10, as the United Nations called for a ceasefire by both sides, Hamas sent 80 propellants into southern Israel, which has no obligation to martyrdom rather than self-defense of its legal residents and boundaries, just like all others in the family of countries on earth. Any who refer to Israeli aggression are employing or falling for a psychological ploy, sleight-of-hand, in the mental gymnastics and arsenals of war mongerers. It is Hamas who aggresses against legality and reality, not the economic, military, political, social and spiritual powerhouse of ancient Israel, which has repeatedly demonstrated patience and forebearance in dealing with would-be and actual invaders, perhaps showing more trust and forgiveness than they deserved and could handle with decency and honor. There is no example in my recollection of the United States of America, for instance, returning territories taken in wars not of its own making, which is actually an historic abberation. Militant Muslims will be no more successful in the long run in securing Judeo-Christian territories than early Christian Crusaders were in holding lands of Mohammed. Cultural deities belong where they were born, grew and are, so it's best to leave them alone and concentrate each to their own in construction rather than armed destruction. This is not a new message for the ages. Defense is acceptable and expected; offense is not. Perpetrators of offense must be stopped, punished and, in extremis killed, to end their incursions against order, civilization and peace.
Nations and groups that foster and seek to take over countries and parts of the world by force in the name of and for rule by their specific creed are the enemies of democracy, which allows and stands for the free expression of every non-aggressive faith. The former are, therefore, enemies of democratic principles and states. Because they are, by the tenet of their radical orders, militant aggressors against that, they must be fought and stopped, whether they are Muslims or "born-again" Christians or Communists. Representative democracy and small-business capitalism must exist and prevail here and everywhere for a truly peaceful and productive world of healthy and vibrant diversity.
Giving aid to terrorists like Hamas, who threaten not only the government and citizens of Israel but also the legal ones of the country of Palestine, makes absolutely no sense at all. What we want to do is encourage Hamas adults, and especially children, to become good and productive citizens of their own nation. Feeding and clothing them to arm, plot and fight against that is suicidal to legality and simply enriches the coffers of arms dealers while supporting the aims of a belligerant, aggressive, militant and threatening Iranian government of fanatic and intolerant Muslim clerics and tyrannical politicians bent on hegemony for their restrictive and hateful version of Islam. This is not the way to world peace and justice nor the defeat of terrorism against legal entities personal and public.
President Obama
 and his helpers working 
 and taking a break 
May the meaning, mystery, magic and message, remembrance and thankfulness of this season encompass the planet and its inhabitants with blessing. Felice Navidad.
 Graphic: Photo of Daniel, 5, and Dylan, 3, in front of their family Christmas tree
"Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God." (Isaiah 9:6) "Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." (Isaiah 9:6) "Holy One." (Mark 1:24) "Son of the Highest." (Luke 1:32) "Emmanuel." (Matthew 1:23) "Lamb of God." (John 1:29) "Prince of Life." (Acts 3:15) "Lord God Almighty." (Revelations 15:3) "Lion of the Tribe of Judah." (Revelations 5:5) "Root of David." (Revelations 22:10) "Word of Life." (1 Jn 1:1) "King of Kings." (Revelations 19:16) "I Am." (John 8:23) "Lord of Lords." (Revelations 19:16) "Advocate." (1 Jn 2:1) "The Way, The Truth, The Life." (John 14:6) "Day Spring." (Luke 1:41) "Lord of All." (Acts 10:36) "Messiah." (John 1:41) "Son of God." (John 1:34) "Saviour." (2 Peter 2:20) "Shepherd and Bishop of Your Souls." (1 Peter 2:25) "Author and Finisher of Our Faith." (Hebrews 12:2) "Chief Cornerstone." (Ephesians 2:20) "Righteous Judge." (2 Timothy 4:8) "Light of the World." (John 8:12) "Morning Star." (Revelations 22:16) "Head of the Church." (Ephesians 1:20) "Chief Shepherd." (1 Peter 5:4) "Resurrection and Life." (John 11:25) "I am Alpha and Omega." (Revelations 21:6)
"The chief executive of a Standard & Poor's 500 company made, on average, $14.2 million in total compensation." -- AFL-CIO "I will send them prophets and wise men, some of whom they will kill and persecute."
The Book of Q
"Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord."
"But if I exorcise demons by the finger of God, then God's rule has caught up with you."
"Every kingdom divided against itself is destroyed, and every house divided against itself will not stand. And if Satan also is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand?"
"How fortunate are the eyes that see what you see! for I'm telling you that many prophets and kings longed to see what you see and did not see it, and to hear what you hear and did not hear it."
"The queen of the south [the queen of Sheba] will arise at the judgment and condemn this generation. For she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and look, something greater than Solomon is here."
"Every one who admits in public that they know me, the son of man will acknowledge before the angels of God [heavenly court]."
"Just as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be on the day of the son of man. They ate, they drank, they married, they were given in marriage right up until the day when Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came and took them all.... This is how it will be on the day when the son of man appears."
"You also must be ready. For the son of man is coming at an hour you do not expect."
"You cannot serve God and wealth [mammon]."
"I am grateful to you, father, Master of heaven and earth, because you have kept these things hidden from the wise and understanding and revealed them to babies. Truly I am grateful, father, for that was your gracious will. Authority over all the world has been given to me by my father. No one recognizes the son except the father; and no one knows who the father is except the son and the one to whom the son chooses to reveal him."
"The hearer who obeys not is likened to the foolish man who built his house on the sand. Every one knows how transitory and shifting is a sandy foundation. Whole towns on the Missouri or lower Mississippi have been undermined and gone into the vortex because they were built upon the sand. So will fall the disobedient." (People's New Testament translation from Biblos)
"He is like a man which built an house, and digged deep (Luke adds: This is often needful to reach the rock. We must dig deep, even to our heart, to its center, to build upon the Rock, Christ our Lord. The confession of faith in Christ must be believed with the heart [Ro 10:10], confessed with the mouth, in order that we may be built upon the Rock.) and laid the foundation on a rock: and when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and could not shake it: for it was founded upon a rock. But he that heareth, and doeth not, is like a man that without a foundation built an house upon the earth; against which the stream did beat vehemently, and immediately it fell; and the ruin of that house was great." (People's New Testament translation from Biblos)
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"[The source of Jesus' prophetic and mystical teaching] include not only various Jewish traditions, but also those of Egyptian wisdom and other indigenous folk traditions [of the Middle East] active at the time. Yeshua lived in a world where the sacred and the natural were part of each other, not separated by a wide gulf.... the division between heaven and earth, which we take for granted, is the result of an inadequate translation and interpretation of a very profound Jewish creation story.... When Western Christianity made the choices it did fifteen hundred or so years ago... it also weakened the links between humanity, nature and the divine. The tendency to limit diversity in spiritual experience carried over to a tendency to limit and control the natural world, for the purposes of advancing what we call civilization. Now many of us have begun to question just what sort of civilization this is that has brought us to the brink of ecological disaster...."
Global Issues reports that "According to UNICEF, 26,500-30,000 children die each day due to poverty.... Around 27-28 percent of all children in developing countries are estimated to be underweight or stunted.... about 72 million children of primary school age in the developing world were not in school in 2005.... Nearly a billion people entered the 21st century unable to read a book or sign their names.... An estimated 40 million people are living with HIV/AIDS, with 3 million deaths in 2004. Every year there are 350–500 million cases of malaria, with 1 million fatalities.... 1 billion (every second child) is poverty-stricken.... For the 1.9 billion children from the developing world, there are: 640 million without adequate shelter (1 in 3), 400 million with no access to safe water (1 in 5), 270 million with no access to health services (1 in 7).... 10.6 million died in 2003 before they reached the age of 5 (same as children population in France, Germany, Greece and Italy), 1.4 million die each year from lack of access to safe drinking water and adequate sanitation.... Worldwide, 2.2 million children die each year because they are not immunized, 15 million children orphaned due to HIV/AIDS (similar to the total children population in Germany or United Kingdom).... Indoor air pollution resulting from the use of solid fuels [by poorer segments of society] is a major killer. It claims the lives of 1.5 million people each year, more than half of them below the age of five: that is 4000 deaths a day.... The world’s wealthiest countries (approximately 1 billion people) accounted for $36.6 trillion dollars (76%) [or world gross domestic product, GDP]. The world’s billionaires — just 497 people (approximately 0.000008% of the world’s population) — were worth $3.5 trillion (over 7% of world GDP).... For every $1 in aid a developing country receives, over $25 is spent on debt repayment.... An analysis of long-term trends shows the distance between the richest and poorest countries was about: 3 to 1 in 1820; 11 to 1 in 1913; 35 to 1 in 1950; 44 to 1 in 1973; 72 to 1 in 1992.... A mere 12 percent of the world’s population uses 85 percent of its water, and these 12 percent do not live in the Third World.... " Additional facts are readily available at 
I wonder how the ultra-wealthy business owners and executives here -- who have lobbied so aggressively for extravagant tax breaks and lax regulation, socialism for corporations in the form of lavish government bailout funds, and luxurient bonuses and retreats for themselves, and who continue to do the same -- would respond today to President John F. Kennedy Jr.'s exhortation that they "ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country"? Would they renounce their citizenship instead, having plundered this nation to completion with nothing "trickling down" but disarray, destruction and destitution, and settle in one less ravaged like China, which holds 25% of our debt and whose citizens save 25% of their income, or one of the Arab states now building lavish architectural and cultural marvels for their populations? Having shown no past true allegiance or patriotism to America, and unless nabbed by judicial officials now actually devoted to enforcing and strengthening our laws, would this be an enticing choice for them? Perhaps some already have havens selected and paid for elsewhere, along with monies deposited securely in secret accounts abroad, for just this occasion.
Good leaders, teachers and therapists of mind and body -- and all including family and friends -- know there is a great joy in bringing out the best of a child or adult, an intrinsic reward of honor and gratitude that no money can replace or even come close to. It's awesome, magnificent, a miracle in a way, an ongoing discovery of a wondrous kind at the God-given and unexpected treasures that may be inside and appear in any individual. Of course, we need to encourage that with our many means of supporting worthwhile endeavors, including public recognition for those outstanding. The seven counties surrounding my hometown here accept nominations from seven counties to choose three individuals from each who have exemplified the "Six Pillars of Character" in their lives as a way of doing that in a publicized community award presentation annually. That program is organized and funded by the 
In taking time and effort concertedly to go through my accounts, he managed to refund a total of over one hundred dollars in fees, lower my interest rates to humane and sane levels, find a credit line unbeknownst to me and recommend another also with a palatable rate, and share laughter and commiseration over the toll our present socio-economic situation is taking on nearly everyone, individual to corporate to governmental. Explaining that stocks I own have currently lost as much as seventy percent of their face value, making it cheaper to borrow than sell, he agreed that our present experience is something like being whirled around in a blender for most people. I asked finally what angel sent him, to which he responded that he'd helped others voluntarily too to manage their accounts survivably and received great personal pleasure in doing so. Subsequently, I commended his activities and attitudes to his supervisor and promised to pray publicly for his continued success and that it be catching with co-workers and others. Manny is a true and joyous light in a sometimes stressful and distressing world. I'm sure God and Jesus will remember him fondly with beneficence and bliss. Along now with the
CEO of his employer, Citigroup, who certainly earned blessing and honor in setting a exemplary precedent by requesting of its Board of Directors that he be paid only $1 annually in salary without bonuses until that company and the country have become more balanced economically. Another shining light example is the actively involved owner of the apartment complex where I live now. An appreciative supporter/lover of art with Dutch ethnicity, whose favorite painter is 
The following is an excerpt from the Johnson City Press dated December 20 and written by Sue Quinn Legg:
County-by-county statistics compiled by the Tennessee Housing Development Authority show Washington, Sullivan, Carter, Unicoi and Johnson counties have some of the state's lowest foreclosure rates.... The data, supplied by RealtyTrac, shows a statewide rate of one foreclosure for every 220 households and a national rate of one for every 163 households. It includes homes in three different stages of foreclosure: default notice, auction stage and 'real-estate owned'." With a five-county rate of one foreclosure for every 870 households, the Tri-Cities has a rate one-fifth of the national average, and roughly one-fourth of Tennessee's average.... 'Our lenders tend to stay with more conventional underwriting standards,' [community development director Steve] Baldwin says.... While the Tri-Cities did see some of those products during the 2003-2006 housing bubble, area home prices weren't headed into the stratosphere and the market may not have been as attractive to purveyors of those troublesome loans. Baldwin says that left more area homebuyers tied in with community banks that, by and large, stuck with the basics: fixed rate 30-year mortgages for amounts that left buyers with an affordable debt-to-income ratio.... Stephanie Conner runs the local Crye-Leike office, where she's heading up the corporation's local 'Save the Dream' efforts. Crye-Leike's founders initiated a companywide effort in November that asked each Crye-Leike real estate agent to try and find one family facing foreclosure and help them avoid it if possible.... 'If you begin to see a lot of foreclosures, it just creates a downward spiral for prices as those homes then compete with non-foreclosed ones on the market,' Conner says. 'Once that begins, it affects the local economy even more and sometimes whole areas of a community can really start suffering. Those foreclosure pockets spread, and that's part of what's devastating the housing market in so many areas.'... And Conner has a message for anyone who might be facing foreclosure: seek help.... 'I would never advise anybody to not try to work something out,' Conner says. 'It goes on your credit and they run a credit check on you for everything these days. The possibility of not getting a job due to having a foreclosure is certainly out there.'"
When I commented that he might learn to express himself more pleasantly, he advised, "You have absolutely no concern for other people's health," an unknowingly negative projection of the real truth that other people had way too little concern for the health of me to the point of near fatality while I have always worked as well as possible toward wholesomeness at every level and for nearly everybody. (It is also legally actionable slander, although I didn't pursue it in that direction, and might better have been expressed courteously and considerately as, for instance, "Honey, it sounds like you're coming down with something. Maybe you should stay home and take care of yourself for awhile.") In another instance, two men of similar description argued vociferously and without surcease, despite pleas from the somewhat distressed and rattled woman officially in charge to leave or desist, about which one of them had parked illegally. (That is a prosecutable disturbance of the peace, and they might more considerately have removed themselves voluntarily to a private place to continue their argument or never have started it there in the first place.) It doesn't bode well for real and productive interaction as a species, especially in these days of multiple pressures toward dissolution and disillusion abounding daily, to break rather than make a stranger's day. We all have a choice of the world we make for ourselves and others one instant or infraction at a time. Our free-will choices over the past decade or so have brought us to the brink of extinction on nearly every front from the domestic auto industry to viable individual and community economies to thrivingly abundant ecosystems worldwide. We still need to decide collectively whether to live or to die. It's up to us to take the full measure and responsibility of our actions, attitudes, beliefs and mindsets in the past and now, this moment in history, planet and humanity. One thing we don't need is unapologetic and presumptive idiots spreading "mind germs" in the air and raising the level of madness to despair.
Spread joy and hope, not misconception and misery everywhere. Our current situation is similar to miners forgetting what the canaries are there for, covering their cages to muffle the sounds, and finally attempting to kill them to make them stop squawking, because the noise is bothering diggers who are busy working -- right up until the day mines start collapsing on top of them as, having dug so far down and deep into the earth, they scramble with much trouble to escape back up where there is still clean and breathable, liveable air, and the remaining canaries with not much to do but watch and record for posterity start singing about what happened there and attempting to resume their native warble for whatever survivors there may be.
The past decade and experience will be referred to by historians and populace with 
Flabbergast Suckotask, Hate's Gate, The Unbelievers -- Period,
Hell Spell, Deconstruction Induction, Infliction Affliction, Of Dikes and Dens, Smart Lite, Elite Beat Retreat, Spit and Slit, Stink, Sunk and Spank Conjunction, Holy Toledo and The Creed-O, Help Whelp Shelf and The Self, The Great Gas Pass, Serious Delerious, Crime Spree and Flee, Muddled Mind Field, Squeal Appeal, The Mutant Pollutants, Steal and Deal Cock Tail, The Four Shakers and The Shaken Makers, Demise of the Ayes of the Gentile Male, Chromosome Corruption, Mutation Malfunction Dysjunction, Sale to the Thief, Socialism for the Rich and Powerful, Jail to the Chief, Hale to the Bleep, Bust Lust, Die Tech and The Wreck, Cretin Eliten, Dislike Spike, Dickie Trick, Egads and The Mads, While You Were Out..., Dive Strive, Unreal Unreality, Die Dive, Heart Fart, Rehash Rehash, Smelt Down, Snotty Potty, The Superior Inferiors, Profound Ground Sound, The Unholy Intemperator, Of Price and Pen, Atrocity Ferocity Velocity, Constabulary Vocabulary, Madlogs and Blandishments, Of Yikes and Yen, Perverse Hearse, Humanity Calamity, Perversion Reversion, Whompf-Whompf-Whompf, Nutspell, Heart Failure, Revulsion Compulsion, Heart Damage Rampage, Fright Nite, Connive and Dive, Massacre Macabre, Enlarged Garbage Barge, Irregulation Regulation, Care Less Dare, Cruel Fuel Fool Drool Stool Tool, Merciless Rehearsal and Reversal, Throw Up and Out Stout Clout Bout and Flout, Float and Gloat, A Giant Leap Backwards for Mankind, Heart Less Dis Stress, The Baloney Brigade, The War for Peace, Obfuscation Nation, Friction Fiction, Tickle Trickle Tackle Faculty Factory, Debit Sluice, Shipwreck on Deck, The Hit-A-Hell, Scammy Bums and Other Breakfast Treats, Constirail Megatap, Scalding (or Scalping) of the Melting Pot, Slime and Rewind Time, DITOTA (Day Inmates Took Over The Asylum), Trickle Down Triage, The Icky Sickies, Skin And Spin, The No Sense, The Nite Mare, Eruption Erection, Cull and Kill, Mediocre Mirage, Au Courant Puissant, The Disordered Disorderly, The Big Dis, The Flight To Fright, The Big Y, Abyss Absess, The Grand Slam, The Out-To-Lunch Bunch, The Bush Bang Theory of Decreation, The Plague To End All Plagues, Crunch Hunch, The Declaration of Dependence, Deconstitution Union, The Looner Faze, The War S'Mores, Terror Error, A New Meaning for ... Everything, Devolution Devined, Trick or Tweet, Regress Release, The Last Grasp, Hall of Fearors, Drag Flag, The Stink-A-Long, Hog Bog, National Crashin' All, The Big Sneeze, The Squeaze, Vivisection Infection, The Nattering Negatives, Immobile Moguls, The Deep Frieze, Cereal Thrillers and Killers, The Statues of Limitations, Blasphemy Blast, The Rotten Misbegotten Coffin, The Blood Curdling Huddling Hurdle, Freeze Pleas, The Stick Heads and Stuck Ends and Stack Em Ups, Turpitude Servitude, The Dull and The Dastardly, Viper Pit, The Glassy Sealing, Shatter and Scatter Clatter Clabber Glamor Grammar Clamor, Tender Versus Tender, Too Bad to Kill, Misery Muck Ups, Dirge Urge, Paralysis Analysis, Mitee Mouse, The Shuffler Muffler, Addled and Saddled, Fearless Peer Less, Born Damned, Hearse of the Ill-Besotten, Poof Positive, Piss Miss, Obscene Teem and The Scream, Gall Pall Pals, The House of Cards, H&R (Hubris and Reversal) Block,
The Cocky Horror Show, The P P (Perverse Perverted), The Trick Stars, The "W" Factor, The Wastrels, the National Historic Garbage Heap, The Plumbing Problem, The United Satyrs of Arcania, Grand Slam, The Blow Herds, Suck It Puppets,
Noxious Nausea, The Oily Orgiastic Oligarchy,
Debacle Debut, Better Than God Sot and Sod, The Uglification of America, Magus Moriarty, DDT (Disease Destroy Totally), Is Isn't, The Great Divide, Zonker Conquer, Leave It To Cleaver, Rough Stuffing, Eluctable Destructable Deductable, Nerve Swerve, Force Coarse, Fine Line and Divine Time, How To Succeed in Ruin Without Really Trying, Obscenetheives, MMMMs (Mad Masticating Machinations Machine),
The Suck Up, The Brain Cleaner, Sponge Lunge, The Skin and Bones Theory of Economics, Nobody At The Helm, The Impolite Embodied Impolitics, Bull Honkey, The Disgusting Unjusting, Bust and Bomb Throng, The Illegal Illegal Regals, Ship of Berate and Irradiate, The Spit and Slit Hit Parade, Scourge and Scour Power, The Serpent Servants, Corruption Rave and Rage Conclave, The Power Tower Cower, Intravenous Evil Confusion Infusion, Pick 'Em Clean Machine, Call of Tearors, George and The Gorge, Maniacs and Insaniacs, Unexception Conception, Delerium Tremons Felons, Deconstruction Deluction, The Big Erasure, I&D (Instability Unstabilized and Disability Disabled), Taste For Blood Flood, Trick 'Em and Trap 'Em, Maul-It-Off CopTale, Crook and Took, Stall of Mirrors, Averice Carnavorous, Screwed Blue, Snarky and The Barfy Barky, Push Against Progress, Excremental Potential, Glower and Sour Power, Progressive Recessive, The Death Trip, Drag and Sag Bog Bag, Gut Glut, Sad and Bad, Abuse Excuse, Shock Loch, The Enslaved Enslavers, Kiss The Abyss, Sort-A-Sotty, The Inconsistency Constant, Death by Humor, Rime Time, Hoax and The Folks, Tort-A-Toddy, The Eleventh Commandment, And Then There Were None Fun, Fort-A-Foggy, Macho Mash and The Crash, Court-A-Clotty, Dumber Than Dumb Bum Run and The Mum, Liar Crackers, Abort-A-Boggy, No Sense Et Al, Glog-A-Sloggy, Le Triomphe de Travestissement, Witch Ditch, The Hole-in-the-Call Gang, Harm School, The Horrible Incorrigibles, The Wrecking Fall, Bull in the China Closet, Abomination Contamination, Bushy Douchie Let Lucy, Spillers and Spoilers, Savage Scavenge, Bonker Zonkers, Rile and File Style, Misery Mile, Looter Scooters, Burn To Lose, Heads Down, The Loin Toss, Rich Bitch Bewitch, The Hazy Lazy, Bush Rush and Crush, Hammy Whammy, Christ Shyst and Heist, Comic Histrionic Laconics, Slog-A-Gloggy, Scheisser Meisters, Chainy Defamy League, Brute Scootin Boogers, Shame Wreck, Blown and Flown, Emergency!, Acid Whip and Whit, Incarceration Incineration, Hell's Kitchenette, Ugly Inc., Fear and Loathing in the USA, Mourning in America, Ecstacy S&M Reek, Carnage Career Careen, Rapine and Ravage Rampage, Eh peuw, Brutish?, Androgynes and Cllitellum, The Big Blank Out, Antinomy and Climacterica, Heart Brake, Seizure and Kleptomania, We Never Promised You A Post Pardon, The Nip Pits, Shake Spear, Gone With The Sinned, The Cayenne of the Earth, Cracked Pots, Aghastagog, Fire and Mire, The South Will Not Rise Again, Flabberblast, Snot Bot Rot and Trot, Junc Juncket, Where's The Money?, Bite of the Living Dead, Swamped in The Swamp, Sincerely Insane or Dead, Inoperable Toppleable, The Meat Grinder, Changling Range and The Same Game, Sold! to #s C1, I497 and AS1!!, Dead Bad and Glad, The WASP Disposal, Lights Out, The Booty Snatchers, Antimony and Clerestory, The Blow and Blow Up Blipaloon, Catastrophe Apostasy, The Blabber Moths, Dem Miserables, The Nasty Hole, Harsh Hannibal and The Cannibals, The Uncivic Bore, Naked Aggression Progression Recession, The Trouble Fakers, Clamp and Stamp Stomp, The Saloon Spitoon, Humiliating Exoriating Exfoliating Expiration Conflagration, The Texas Two-Stomp, Proof Inconsummate That Nature Abhors A Vacuum, The Suicide Mission, Rube Lube Tube, The Not-So-Secret Weapon, Government-Sponsored Iniquity and Inequity, Booby Boobs, Love Kiln and Kill, Dye Before The Throne, The Goading and Gelding Arena, Debacle Debut, The Sticky Icky Sickies, Breaking The Bank, Liar Liar Pants On Fire, The Silence Conspiracy, Global GOB (Good Old Boys) Glob, The Looney Din, Mega-Corpse, The Money Hunch Bunch, Nacro-Lets-See, The Holed Up, Dodo Fists, The Big Hoar, Gall Fall, Scatter and Shatter Clatter, Defiant Reliant, Nine-One-One Undone, Rape Gate, Loonatick Binge, Tyrannus Testosteroneous, Abuse Excuse, Heart Brake, Moral Morass, Lurch to Lunacy, Breaking The Hollar, Brain Brake, Minus Zero To The Zero Power, Be and Eat Crap, Snatcheral Burn Keelers, Shrivel Drivel, Kill Her Economics, Parent Less, Scribble Dribble, Chance Out, The Floundering Fathers, Flout Bout, Redemption and Reclamation Damp Down to Declenation, Insane Flame Fame, The Burn Agains, Compound Error, Witch's Stew, Vice Grip, For Hell Cartel, TNT (Trust No Truth), Mope-A-Soap, The Mother Of All Wrong Turns, Trouble and Travail Fail-Strafe Trail, Gore and Bore, Grin No More, Brains Not Included, Illegal Regals, Just A Piece Of (Toilet) Paper, Timber! and Escape From Albatross.
Not only would that send a strong message that their activities have been totally unacceptable in this country and world, but the material benefit to the government and its good citizens -- to whom they plead again for billions to "save them from themselves" and their insistently erroneous ways -- would assist in correcting some of the harm they've caused in stock, job and small business losses, for instance, and health generally in best long-term interests of working people, property owners, retirees, the disabled, and the children and the flowers. Those to be indicted have proven themselves to be like maggots feeding on the dead bodies of people and planet they've killed, or attempted to, with their greed and cruelty. In the process, they have created something like a photographic negative of what is real and true about themselves and others and the nations and world around us all in and with which we must live.
Resultant of behaviors like that and with our economic system crumbling in freefall federally and state by state as individuals high to low have committed reactant suicide, Laura Bush and Condaleeza Rice recently expounded to interviewers on "the positive legacy of the Bush Administration" and their belief that history would view it more kindly than current worldwide public opinion does. The two women cited some successful programs abroad without mentioning the current economic crisis nationally and worldwide. Perhaps it's important to point out that our President's highest priority is, and is meant to be governing systems in this country, the United States of America, healthily and maintaining, or in this case reestablishing our esteemable place among nations of the planet.
A nation and world that continues to reward psychopaths with special privilege, compensation and consideration while inflicting suffering on the good, honest and hard-working is on a collision course with a deadly destiny. Gentiles who continue to abuse and denigrate God's Chosen People have crossed a precipice from which there is no recovery, return, recourse or salvation. The mistakes of our own and our ancestors in callous and cruel discrimination, arrogance and self-delusion are not to be dismissed, accepted and condoned but faced forthrightly and corrected. God didn't choose the Gentile but the Jew to birth and instruct their professed Savior. There's a reason for that. God is not stupid or error-prone. It's past time for Gentiles to get a grip on something beside their genitalia and their purses. They have missed the message repeatedly and without remorse or redress in the process of nearly destroying this planet and annihilating a larger and larger percentage of its health-full species and systems. The largest portion of the book considered holy by "Christians" is a history of the interaction between God and Jews, selected over and over again as especially precious to the divine. It's not likely that God views their defamation and decimation as proof in any way of earthly sacristy, enlightment or salvation, more "dead again" than "born again" in true apprehension and knowledge and ascension. Virulent and predatory anti-Semitism is a non-sequitar, an oxymoron, devil worship, an abomination to being a real Christian, Christly, follower of God and Christ and Christ-spirit in the world and individual.
The clock is ticking as collapse continues around us unabated. To a casual observer it would appear that the Creator is not happy with this particular emanation's refusal to honor basic, profound and ultimately simple law not transmitted idly because the Creator had nothing better to do on a day or two than send the same one over and over again in various forms, formats and formulations. Loving God does not mean persecuting the truly faithful and believing, nor in stealing from or murdering or torturing one's innocent neighbor. There are no clearer or more easily understandable precepts than these. Those who abrogate them are criminals and sinners who need to be rounded up summarily and divested of all their unearned and undeserved properties, assets and personal possessions. They are not be coddled, excused, justified, patted on the head and given another candy bar to munch on. They are to be constrained in restraining circumstances where they may pray for one instead if they're still alive, as many of these crimes are capital offenses, and able to. Hasty retreats over untouched aquifers while increasing numbers are thirsting for pure water, materially and spiritually, will not save the wicked from God's holocaust for those who've defied divine will and promise without mind, morality, remorse or remittance. Our government, its leaders and citizens, need to choose not to collude in evil and depravity decisively and permanently, as well as we're able to perceive and enact that, in proving to God and man that we know, we care and we "get it" finally. The hourglass has nearly run out of sand for that purpose and for "Christians" to be on their knees humbly and honestly in apology, concordance and supplication of forgiveness and saving with "amazing grace" from their unspeakable and unthinkable abominations including in further victimizing victims of horrendous and well-documented holocausts throughout time.
In a measure of how quickly situations can change a few months ago, during the windup and finale of Presidential campaigns, gasoline prices at the pump were plus-or-minus $4 a gallon, there were shortages, lines, dire predictions of escalation, and multiple panic alarms about what is today seemingly a plentiful commodity selling at around $1.50 per gallon at stations in this region anyway and without reference to previous calamities, forecast and extant.
Numbers can be tedious on the surface, but it's surprising sometimes what realities they reveal. An apocryphal accounting trick of old was to round every fractional cent down and deposit the leftover amount into an individual's account. At the detail level, this seemed insignificant and was easily dismissed or overlooked, yet the accrued sum from a large and busy banking institution, for instance, reached into the millions fairly quickly and without detection frequently. As a parallel example, a credit account has an interest rate of 14.98% annually, which computes to a daily periodic rate of .041068%. In a month where the days in that billing cycle are 29 and the balance loaned is $2,558.38, that equals $1.0506754 per day of interest due or $30.469586 total for the month. However, the statement charges $30.55, leaving a negligable $.080414 to be deposited theoretically to another account while one set of books might show $30.47 charged and paid instead. With a million accounts of exactly equal value, which of course they wouldn't be in the real financial world, $80,414 would be deposited to an individual's account "off the books" for the 29-day cycle amounting to $1,012,107.20 for a 365-day year.
There is an extraordinarily simple solution to the "Hamas-Israeli conflict." Hamas stops lobbing rockets into that sovereign nation and joins the international community, very belatedly, in recognizing Israel's existence and right to be as it has been over half a century, and previously. Instead of devoting its time and resources to a futile and in some ways childish exercise of belligerance and rebellion, Hamas minds its own business -- building and supporting schools, companies, shops, healthy families, arts and science enterprises and positive, historic culture and spirituality for Palestinians, as well as responsible, responsively constructive governments for its own citizens within the boundaries of Gaza, its legal homeland now. Leaders and followers of the ancient Coptic Christian religion in Syria and Egypt might provide a wholesome and intelligent counterpoint in the debate over how those of different, but historically enmeshed on a divine level, faiths might co-exist productively in the best interests of all. Attempts, successful or not, to conquer other territories and foreign peoples inevitably lead to misery for all, sooner or later, and collapse as the record of rising and falling civilizations has made clear. Perhaps truly enlightened rulers and citizens would stop in their tracks, and geographic borders, now and concentrate on their own economies and cultures with worldwide sharing through communications, travel and marketing with mutual support and defense against transgressors of those actualities, values, directions and aspirations -- learning from each other through acquaintance, study and respect for the diversity of human experience.
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text and graphics © Jeannette Harris and A Country Rag, Inc.. December 2008, February 2009. All rights reserved.
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