Reason 452 why my life hasn't been entirely fabulous (despite what a grossly uninformed and judgmental "friend" thinks): I have Eosinophilic Esophagitis. I've suffered with it for a long time and am now, finally, getting some good treatment for it.
I wish this on no one, it can be hell.
Of course, this thing will not prevent me from laughing at the self-proclaimed Po' Man over gas prices while simultaneously being a bad parent, bad blogger, bad voter, owner of an evil truck, occasional typo scofflaw, someone completely undeserving of my income or the home in which I live, racist white-flighter, etc, etc. Cuz, you know, I was born with a silver spoon in my mouth.
Note: Sorry about that last paragraph but I'm using my blog (arrogantly and because I'm filthy rich) to call someone whose been acting like a complete asshole lately an, well, asshole. I'm sure he can take as well as he dishes. Apologies sincerely welcome.
Update: Yes applying for sympathy before going on the counter-attack is a cheap ploy but this blog, like the Bush administration, is not bound by the Geneva Convention.
Many years ago I was quite fond of reading paperbacks. Paperbacks were very popular back in the 1970s. Censorship in America had for the most part come to an end, as far as most books were concerned, and the paperback was the means by which authors could reach an eager public.
Before 200 channel cable television, or Internet there were magazines, AM/FM radios, and books.
For an impressionable boy with a strong interest in Science Arthur C. Clarke held tremendous sway with me. Reading his short stories, and books was a way to see a future too distant for me to live long enough to actually experience.
Of course Arthur C. Clarke is known for writing 2001 A Space Odyssey, and for his "invention" of the geosynchronous communications satellite, but for most of those who listened to, and read his futuristic pronouncements we will know him for his faith in the potential for human beings to create a more prosperous, and peaceful world through the careful use of technology.
Thank you Arthur C. Clarke for entertaining me, for teaching me, and inspiring me. You are not forgotten sir.
There's something there. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it's there. A mixture of intellect, and competence. Of moral vision, and purpose. Of desire for change, yet absence of irrationality. And get this - of honesty - in a politician of all people.
Barack Obama has begun to inspire me - and for anyone to inspire me now, at my advanced age, is quite rare indeed.
Nearly eight years of tolerating the bumpkin fool, the dishonest clown - George "W" Bush - has nearly broken my faith in the political process. I say "nearly", because to give up only enables the "W"s of the world, and that is something that must never be done.
So soon will be the end of our long national nightmare - the army of crooks that slither about K Street, and the halls of the White House will soon be gone - o.k I'm being overly optimistic here, but at least we should expect significant improvement.
That is my hope.
Somewhat jaded, and tarnished with age, but I still recognize it for what it is. It is hope. Hope for a better deal for the American people, and hope for a better world.
Hope that We The People, the real people, and not just the upper two percent of income earners, or the Washington lobbyist, will be represented in the White House.
I've voted for Barack Obama twice now, once during his Senate race, and once in the Illinois Primary, and I hope to vote for him again this November. I'm proud to support Barack Obama.
GoBama!
The following is the full text of Barack Obama's speech on Race, titled, 'A More Perfect Union'. The video appears above.
Oh, and don't forget to check out the official Barack Obama site at mybarackobama.com.
Remarks of Senator Barack Obama: 'A More Perfect Union'
Philadelphia, PA | March 18, 2008 As Prepared for Delivery
"We the people, in order to form a more perfect union."
Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787.
The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation's original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.
Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution - a Constitution that had at its very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.
And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part - through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.
This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign - to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for our children and our grandchildren.
This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.
I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton's Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I've gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world's poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners - an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.
It's a story that hasn't made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts - that out of many, we are truly one.
Throughout the first year of this campaign, against all predictions to the contrary, we saw how hungry the American people were for this message of unity. Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans and white Americans.
This is not to say that race has not been an issue in the campaign. At various stages in the campaign, some commentators have deemed me either "too black" or "not black enough." We saw racial tensions bubble to the surface during the week before the South Carolina primary. The press has scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.
And yet, it has only been in the last couple of weeks that the discussion of race in this campaign has taken a particularly divisive turn.
On one end of the spectrum, we've heard the implication that my candidacy is somehow an exercise in affirmative action; that it's based solely on the desire of wide-eyed liberals to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap. On the other end, we've heard my former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offend white and black alike.
I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some, nagging questions remain. Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely - just as I'm sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors, priests, or rabbis with which you strongly disagreed.
But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren't simply controversial. They weren't simply a religious leader's effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country - a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam.
As such, Reverend Wright's comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems - two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.
Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way
But the truth is, that isn't all that I know of the man. The man I met more than twenty years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor. He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine; who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God's work here on Earth - by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.
In my first book, Dreams From My Father, I described the experience of my first service at Trinity:
"People began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out, a forceful wind carrying the reverend's voice up into the rafters....And in that single note - hope! - I heard something else; at the foot of that cross, inside the thousands of churches across the city, I imagined the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of David and Goliath, Moses and Pharaoh, the Christians in the lion's den, Ezekiel's field of dry bones. Those stories - of survival, and freedom, and hope - became our story, my story; the blood that had spilled was our blood, the tears our tears; until this black church, on this bright day, seemed once more a vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world. Our trials and triumphs became at once unique and universal, black and more than black; in chronicling our journey, the stories and songs gave us a means to reclaim memories that we didn't need to feel shame about...memories that all people might study and cherish - and with which we could start to rebuild."
That has been my experience at Trinity. Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety - the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.
And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions - the good and the bad - of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.
I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.
These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.
Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.
But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America - to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.
The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through - a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.
Understanding this reality requires a reminder of how we arrived at this point. As William Faulkner once wrote, "The past isn't dead and buried. In fact, it isn't even past." We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country. But we do need to remind ourselves that so many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.
Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven't fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today's black and white students.
Legalized discrimination - where blacks were prevented, often through violence, from owning property, or loans were not granted to African-American business owners, or black homeowners could not access FHA mortgages, or blacks were excluded from unions, or the police force, or fire departments - meant that black families could not amass any meaningful wealth to bequeath to future generations. That history helps explain the wealth and income gap between black and white, and the concentrated pockets of poverty that persists in so many of today's urban and rural communities.
A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one's family, contributed to the erosion of black families - a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods - parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement - all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.
This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What's remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.
But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn't make it - those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations - those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright's generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician's own failings.
And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright's sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.
In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience - as far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything, they've built it from scratch. They've worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they're told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.
Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.
Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze - a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.
This is where we are right now. It's a racial stalemate we've been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy - particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.
But I have asserted a firm conviction - a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people - that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice if we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.
For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances - for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives - by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.
Ironically, this quintessentially American - and yes, conservative - notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright's sermons. But what my former pastor too often failed to understand is that embarking on a program of self-help also requires a belief that society can change.
The profound mistake of Reverend Wright's sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It's that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country - a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old -- is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past. But what we know -- what we have seen - is that America can change. That is the true genius of this nation. What we have already achieved gives us hope - the audacity to hope - for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.
In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds - by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.
In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world's great religions demand - that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother's keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister's keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.
For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle - as we did in the OJ trial - or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright's sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she's playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.
We can do that.
But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we'll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.
That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, "Not this time." This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can't learn; that those kids who don't look like us are somebody else's problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.
This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don't have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.
This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn't look like you might take your job; it's that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.
This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should've been authorized and never should've been waged, and we want to talk about how we'll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.
I would not be running for President if I didn't believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation - the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.
There is one story in particularly that I'd like to leave you with today - a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King's birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.
There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.
And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that's when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.
She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.
She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.
Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother's problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn't. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.
Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they're supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who's been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he's there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, "I am here because of Ashley."
"I'm here because of Ashley." By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children.
But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.
The Red State Christian Right only votes for candidates whose faith in the central tenants of Christianity is paired to a literal interpretation of the Bible. However, in order to garner support from the Christian Right candidates must also oppose abortion, drug use, the equality of women, sexual freedom, and Science.
Due to this list of conditions few Blue State Democratic Party candidates could ever expect support from members of the Red State Christian Right.
Ignorance - Origins of the Red State Christian Right
Blue States with large multi-racial urban populations have developed economies which are dependent upon large numbers of well educated workers - workers proficient in the use of high technology, and who possess communication skills. This type of urban workforce is valuable for those businesses which are based upon international commerce.
Ignorance, irrationality and superstition, all hallmarks of the Red State Christian Right, are the stock and trade of the international anti-modernist movement. This movement is evident in less economically developed regions and nations such as the United States (rural), Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, and Saudi Arabia.
Anti-Modernism justified by "Old Time Religion" is the reaction to the demands of an increasing technological world by hundreds of millions of people who are ill prepared to survive and succeed in such a world - usually those who are poor, and less educated.
Instead these Conservatives yearn for the simplicity of a previous era, an era in which decisions about who would succeed versus who would fail were based essentially by the color of one's skin, and the type of genitalia one possesses.
Reduced to its most essential ingredient Red State Christian Conservatism based its entire pecking order of who is most good upon the amount of melanin in and the shape of a few ounces of flesh between a person's legs.
Northern Pakistan & Southern U.S. - Brothers At Heart
In Pakistan large cities in the south are dependent upon a higher level of education, commerce, and International trade. Acceptance of western science, progress, and western economic practices has been crucial in developing Pakistan's economy. Millions of Pakistanis use cell phones, watch color television, own ipods, drive automobiles, live in homes with modern facilities, and can expect an increased standard of living because they have embraced western modernism.
The northern interior of Pakistan, however, is significantly underdeveloped, rural, less educated, poor, with high levels of religious fundamentalism being present - just as in the rural southern U.S.
Similarly, the so called Red States of the southern United States are what they are today due to their commitment to slavery, and apartheid. Slavery is a rejection of worker and consumer rights, and it anti competitive.
While the northern states in the U.S. embraced rapid industrialization to generate wealth the Rich White Men of the South desired to Conserve the practice of owning human beings so that they could force those human beings to work for nothing. Owning human beings was their means of generating economic growth, but in the end it led to a stagnant economy, and a culture doomed to fail.
Opposition to modernity was an important part of the Southern Way of Life. Even in the midst of the U.S. Civil War while the Northern States were installing thousands of miles of telegraph lines the South didn't see the point in networking their society. Southern Red State White Men believed that networking was a threat to their isolation - an isolation which favored their abusive means of controlling their population.
After the devastating loss of the American Civil War whites in the South continued to oppose progress, believing that by keeping a large sector of their population uneducated, underemployed, and impoverished would somehow Conserve their "Utopian" society.
Universal education, fair housing and fair employment practices may seem like good ideas to most of those living in the U.S. today, but for Conservative White Christians in the Red States such ideas met with absolute opposition.
Red State Christian White Men believed themselves to be the natural rulers of society, and white women would never be equal, but most important of all was skin color. The darker the skin, the less human. This Red State Conservative Christian Value was central above all others.
NAZI Germany Ends White Penis Supremacy In United States!
It was precisely because of this White Penis Supremacy that the economy of the Southern Red States were more than a century behind those of the Northern Blue States one hundred years after the end of American Civil War. This economic disparity might have remained up until this very day if not for the Great Depression and World War Two.
The incredible turnaround for the Red States took place during the industrialization of the South during World War II.
NAZI Germany brought an end to legal apartheid in the United States! Years of pressure to reform only brought about Jim Crow Laws. It was only World War II which forced the South, kicking and screaming, into the Twentieth Century.
Now two generations from those days of legal apartheid we still see a nation run by wealthy white men. If you have any doubts please look at the color and gender of the members of the boards of directors of most Fortune 500 companies, and also look at the race and gender of the U.S. Senate.
As a white man it is possible for me to blog about this uncomfortable reality in American society, but for some reason it is considered controversial for Barack Obama's former pastor to say this - even from the pulpit.
While I disagree with many of the statements made by Pastor Jeremiah Wright I can understand why many black people in the U.S. would agree with him.
My take on Jeremiah Wright's Rant
Is the U.S. run by rich white men? - Yes. That's slowly changing, but overall it's still true. Do cab drivers refuse to pick up black men?Yes. They're afraid to be robbed. Did the U.S. support apartheid in South Africa? - Yes. During the Cold War out of "necessity".Have police officers planted evidence to frame blacks (and whites)?Yes. They do, but rarely. U.S. Govt. created HIV to wipe out black people? - No. - Use Condoms and stop blaming others. White people using drugs to oppress black people? - No. Blacks are doing this to themselves. War on Drugs failing to help blacks? - Yes. It has been a dismal failure. Hurting more than it helps.Do police profile people based on race? - Yes. More cops would result in less need to profile. Did the Bush Administration lie about WMD in Iraq? - Yes. The dirty bastards! The Bush Administration lied about an Iraq-Al Queda link? - Yes. Our soldiers die for their lies. Would U.S. Operatives plant WMD in Iraq? - Yes. If ordered to do so. Has the Clinton Campaign slyly played the race card? - Yes. Shame on You Hillary Clinton! Do some whites use the N-word to slur blacks? - Yes. Mostly when they're afraid or angry. Does the U.S. support the Israeli Occupation of Gaza and West Bank? - Yes. Reluctantly. Was Jesus Black? - Yes. Palestinians at that time were much darker than today. Were Romans White? - No. They were brown skinned people too, but "classified" Caucasians. Did Truman Bat an Eye About Hiroshima? - Yes. It was total war, and saved a million lives. Did the U.S. deserve 9-11? - No. Two wrongs are never right. The pastor should know that! Is Jeremiah Wright a racist? - Yes. He appears to be heavily infected with racism. Is Barack Obama under Wright's spell? - No. Democrats go to church because it looks good.
In a nutshell Pastor Jeremiah Wright is a racist. He is no better in his racism than would be a member of the Ku Klux Klan. His various attempts to blame the white ruled U.S. government for all of the maladies which affect blacks is irresponsible, paranoid, and based upon hate. Instead of blaming whites for drug use, and HIV in the black community it is time to face the reality that what is to blame is the transition from a religion based family structure to chaos.
The demise of the black family was fueled by welfare checks, and segregation, and it was also counter intuitively helped by the flight of over half the black community into the suburbs with whites. Those blacks who could left urban centers, leaving poorer blacks behind. Intergenerational poverty is to blame, more than any other factor. Addressing poverty is the solution, not racist name calling, and paranoid conspiracies.
Jeremiah Wright is an embarrassment to the Obama campaign, but fortunately most Americans don't agree with everything their pastors say. On the other hand Mr. Wright's rant, and the reaction of those attending his sermon does illustrate just how far the U.S. has to go in terms of eliminating the racial divide - a divide created in ignorance and hate, and sustained by short sighted greed - a divide that hurts whites, and blacks - a divide that must end.
I looked in your eyes - they were frozen in tears. I heard all your lies - your love was just fear - no more than a heartache.
I am death all alone - in darkness and pain. I cry and I moan - I'm going insane. They whisper go home, return to your harms and your heart stake.
While your darkness did reign - and it's your legacy now. All I felt was your pain, asking why, but not how - filled only with heart break.
Now though my fate be despair - to no longer know care. I shall always be there. I will never return, nor be victim of you and your heart rape. . . Image courtesy of ImageSavant.Com
Gasoline Prices Expected To Increase To $4.00/Gallon in U.S.
For millions of upper middle class, and upper class U.S. consumers tacking on an extra dollar per gallon to the price of gasoline is no big deal, however, to the millions of working Americans who live from paycheck to paycheck the recent increase spells for financial hardship.
I can only speak from my own experience, and so I will.
I recently purchased an SUV. The SUV's gas tank has a capacity of 22 gallons. I fill the tank up twice a month. Adding one dollar to the price of a gallon of gasoline works out to a $44 per month increase in gasoline cost for our SUV.
We also own a coupe which tops off at 17 gallons per tank, and that tank is also filled up twice per month. Adding one dollar to the price of a gallon of gasoline works out to a $34 per month increase in gasoline cost for our Coupe.
That sums to an increase of $78 per month to purchase the same gasoline with no added benefit.
The Cost Of Everything Is On The Rise
Everything Else
A one dollar increase in the price of gallon of gasoline will effectively raise the price of everything else. Food prices are already on the rise. Inflation driven by higher energy cost will increase the cost of every good, and every service. Even when products aren't made with oil the price of oil will in some way effect the cost of that product. The cost of services are also effected directly, and indirectly by the cost of oil.
I'm not an economist but I'd guess that the indirect effects of a dollar increase on a gallon of gasoline would have an effect similar to the direct effect that increase creates. Using my estimate of the impact a dollar increase on gasoline I'm assuming that such an increase will drive up cost for everything else. I'm adding an additional charge of $78 per month in expenses for everything else.
Adding these cost together we come to an additional cost of $156 per month.
To net that $156 I have to gross about $177 dollars.
For millions of upper middle class, and upper class U.S. consumers $156 per month is a paltry amount - perhaps a night out on the town - nothing to become concerned about.
However, for tens of millions of wage earners added monthly cost of $156 take home represents several years of pay raises. For these earners a one dollar increase in the price of gasoline eliminates income increases designed to counter the effect of inflation which took them several years of hard work to earn.
While upper middle class, and upper class Americans will chuckle at a one dollar increase in the price of a gallon of gasoline tens of millions of American families will be forced to find ways to survive.
Many American families live at the very brink of self sufficiency, barely keeping up with their bills from month to month. The question is then, how do these tens of millions of working American families survive?
Cutting Back
Expect millions of Americans to cut back on purchases of every kind. For those who could afford a night out on the town on occasion it now becomes a rarity. For those who could barely afford a night out it now becomes impossible. For those who already could not afford going out to a restaurant or going to see a movie these people may find themselves seeking assistance from charities for food and clothing even though they work.
Finding Second Jobs
Millions of Americans already work two, and even three jobs, we should expect to see an increase in the number of American workers who must work several jobs in order to survive.
The Coming Recession
As the price of gasoline and everyday items increases consumers will be forced to cut back their purchases of goods and services. Slowly, but surely the effect of decreased consumer activity will lead to drops in profits for employers, which will in turn lead to workforce reductions.
As unemployment increases the vicious downward cycle will begin in the U.S. economy - an economy based upon imported inexpensive light crude oil.
For European Readers
You surely must be envious of our low gas prices, but remember that Americans drive much larger and less efficient automobiles. Also note that Americans commute a longer distance going between work, and home. Remember that mass transit systems in the U.S. are crude in comparison to those available in Europe. Americans are trapped through years of poor decisions, and short sighted greed, into maintaining a dependence upon large inefficient automobiles.
Also remember that Americans have little in the way of a social safety net. People are enslaved to their jobs to maintain their health care, if they even have it, and ultimately will pay whatever is asked for gasoline just so that they can keep their jobs.
Remember too my European readers that American's have extremely corrupt State and Federal representation that take bribes, and payoffs from the oil industry. Gasoline prices are increasing in the U.S. not because taxes are being increased to fund mass transit systems, or to pay for tax breaks for fuel efficient automobiles - no, the price of gasoline is rising in the U.S. because gasoline is subject to speculation, and the corrupt representatives of the people have turned a blind eye to the illegal price fixing that takes place within the oil, and gasoline distribution system.
Available Soon - The 125 Mile Per Gallon Plug In Prius
Possible Solutions
Decreasing cost will become important. Buying fuel efficient automobiles will help keep slow the increase in gasoline, but shifting to alternative fuels will be the only true long term solution. Unfortunately, a shift to more fuel efficient automobiles will take years, and shifting to alternative fuels will take decades. A change away from fossil fuels will take more than time, it will demand a government not completely controlled by Big Oil. Is this even possible? Unlikely in the near term, but an eventuality in the long term.
I responded by writing in a comment I left on his Youtube Post that since I didn't know him that I don't really know what to believe. However, I did say that I believed that such an strange "encounter" was possible. That doesn't say a whole lot, because many highly improbable events are still possible.
I've known people who have had similar UFO "experiences", and I have a few stories of my own "experiences" to share. I'd believed the stories that I was told by those I had known personally because I felt they had no reason to lie to me. In fact with the ridicule that seemingly awaits those who tell such stories they had every reason not to share their stories, but courageously shared their stories anyway.
I also believe that the "encounters" which I myself recall having experienced actually took place, and therefore I should assume that other individuals could be experiencing similar events - whatever their underlying cause.
Therefore, in my opinion Adam's story sounds possible, and he tells his story in a believable manner. On the other hand he may just be an acting student having a bit of fun. Or perhaps he and his friends were high on adrenaline, have little in the way of scientific skepticism, and mistook Venus for a UFO.
Then again perhaps he did see something very strange indeed. Perhaps he saw some type of event based upon technology? If so, it would be a very interesting story indeed.
Assuming Adam's story is based upon technology, and not a natural phenomena, let's look at the technology, and possible motivations behind his "encounter".
Means
Very light weight aircraft. A remote controlled carbon composite airframe filled with helium (i.e., a hard shelled blimp would do the trick.
The ring of strobe lights wrapped around the airframe suggest that the RPV is meant to be seen. Therefore we'll classify this as a psy-op - a psychological operation of some type.
A loudspeaker to play the high pitched shrieks.
A very powerful Alpha, Delta, and Theta wave transmitter to induce a brain wave response (sleep) in those unknowing test subjects on the ground. Note that the Alpha, Delta, and Theta wave transmitter need not actually operate from within the RPV itself, but could be located nearby in a ground vehicle.
Motives?
Motivation I (if terrestrial): Train special ops teams to locate, approach, and subdue individuals at night through the use of advanced technology (night vision, RPVs, and sleep induction).
Motivation II (if terrestrial): Increase belief in extra terrestrial encounters which continues to act as a method of disinf0rmation for development of advanced weapons, and training.
Motivation III (if extra terrestrial): Soft Contact Operation, intended to prepare culture for an eventual First Contact.
Motivation IV (if terrestrial): Create a "UFO" encounter only so that it can be debunked as a means of misleading the public into believing that UFOs encounters are not extra terrestrial.
Who Would Possess The Means and Motivation?
The U.S. Military using state of the art technology and tactics. Extra Terrestrial Technology or Life Forms
Some BackGround
Inducing Sleep
The Following Description of the effects of Alpha, Theta and Delta Waves from PsyWeb
Alpha (8-12 Hz)
Subjective feeling states: relaxed, not agitated, but not drowsy; tranquil, conscious. Associated tasks & behaviors: meditation, no action. Effects of Training: can produce relaxation.
Theta (4-8 Hz)
Associated tasks & behaviors: creative, intuitive but may also be distracted, unfocused. Effects of Training: if enhanced, can induce drifting, trance-like state. If suppressed, can improve concentration, ability to focus attention
Delta (0.1-3 Hz)
Subjective feeling states: deep, dreamless sleep, non-REM sleep, trance, unconscious. Associated tasks & behaviors: lethargic, not moving, not attentive. Effects of training: can induce drowsiness, trance, deeply relaxed states
Effects of ELF (Extremely Low Frequencies) Upon Brain Waves
Looks like most people wouldn't mind the opportunity to mix it up as far a sex and chocolate is concerned. Sounds fun, but some believe that saying no to sex, and chocolate is possible! Perverts! Just kidding.
The poll was conducted during the Month of February 2007, and asked which was best: Sex, Chocolate, Sex and Chocolate, or Just Saying No. There were two hundred votes placed.
Parental Pride Endangers Children's Lives In Backyard Swimming Pools . . A Tragedy Waiting To Happen
Not long ago I had the opportunity to visit with an old friend. She was proud to show off her nice suburban home, and her backyard which included a swimming pool. The pool was drained and covered as it was Fall, but its proximity to the home's back door had me concerned.
I had just met her little daughter for the first time in years. The child is just a little preschool age girl so I asked my old friend, "Aren't you concerned that your pool is within just a few steps of your back door?"
"No", she said, "my little daughter is quite the little swimmer".
I was shocked at the response, but I kept my silence as I was only visiting for a few minutes. Still I wondered, how it was that this college educated middle aged woman actually believed that her little preschool age daughter was somehow safe from becoming just another drowning statistic.
Each year more than four hundred children die in backyard swimming pool drownings. And behind each story are parents filled with pride over their little tykes swimming prowess. It's insane, and almost all of these children's deaths are entirely avoidable.
Sad But True Personal Story Of A Child's Drowning
Only last summer a couple of business associates, a married couple living in a southern state, had attended a neighborhood pool party. There they mingled, and spoke with other parents. They felt safe knowing that their little children, a preschool aged boy and girl, were "quite the little swimmers", and because there was a lifeguard on hand.
The father only a few feet from the pool was busy talking, while the mother was taking photographs of her children. She left the children so as to take her digital camera away from the pool. She was gone for only a few minutes.
The mother had warned the father, telling him she was putting the camera back in the car, and believed the father understood that he was to watch the children in the pool. He was busy mingling, and thought that the mother was taking the children with her. It was a simple misunderstanding, but it allowed for the tragedy which would unhinge this family's world.
The children were safe, the parents thought, for after all their children were quite the little swimmers. Everyone in their neighborhood had backyard pools. In the South the only way to beat the heat is a backyard swimming pool, and their children had been swimming from the time they could crawl.
Besides the parents thought there were all those other parents around, and to make things even safer there was a lifeguard too.
How could anything go wrong?
In just those minutes that it took for the mother to run her digital camera back to the car, and to return it happened.
When the mother returned she noticed her little son floating face down in the pool. The lifeguard had just thought the boy was playing, but he was not. He was unconscious.
The father jumped in, and brought the boy out of the pool. They performed CPR, and only in the madness of those moments did it cross the mother's mind to ask where her little daughter was.
That is when they realized that the daughter was at the bottom of the pool just a few feet away.
The little girl died, but the boy survived with brain damage.
The mother could not even attend her little girl's funeral, as she was being watched around the clock for fear she would try to commit suicide - she blamed herself.
I had only been talking with the mother the week before. I spent weeks last summer trying to cope with the thought of what had happened to these loving parents, and their little children.
I often reflect upon how unrealistic parents can be when it comes to believing their children are "quite the little swimmers". It only takes a moment for a child to get into life or death situation in a swimming pool, and young children should NEVER be allowed in a swimming pool unmonitored.
Simple Precautions Can Save Children's Lives
I'm hoping that my friend installs a lock on every door which leads into their backyard. This includes any sliding glass doors, and outdoor gates. Including any back exit gates which neighbor children may use to sneak into their backyard.
I'm hoping that inexpensive door alarms be installed on every door or gate leading into their backyard be installed. These are simple, inexpensive, and easy to install precautions which one would have thought would have already been installed in this expensive and modern home, but which I failed to notice upon my visit.
I have now told my old friend this story, and hope she understands how precious her child's life is. I'm hoping that she realize that when there's no gate around a pool that it opens up the potential for grave danger to any child, including their own - even when the pool is empty!
I'm hoping my old friend realizes that the perceptions of their little girl being "quite a little swimmer" is most probably based upon a misplaced sense of pride - a pride which endangers their little daughter's life.
Barack Obama Is Being Set Up To Take A Fall Like A New Millennium Robert F. Kennedy
U.S. Shadow Government Moves To Assassinate Barack Obama!
The 2000 U.S. Coup, which placed the U.S. back onto a never ending wartime footing, and enabled massive tax breaks for the U.S. ruling class continues to play its dastardly game upon the American people.
With lax security being provided to U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama it is obvious that Senator Obama is in grave danger. The Bush Administration seeks to solve the "Obama Problem" by swiping a page from Pakistani dictator Pervez Musharraf's playbook.
Benazir Bhutto's Assassination Arranged By Denying Her Protection
Musharraf successfully terminated Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto's candidacy by denying her proper security which led to her recent assassination.
As in the case of the late Robert F. Kennedy it turns out that Barack Obama is not being provided with competent security. It appears that the Secret Service is breaking every rule in the book to assure that Senator Obama is placed in dire circumstances.
DALLAS -- Security details at Barack Obama's rally Wednesday stopped screening people for weapons at the front gates more than an hour before the Democratic presidential candidate took the stage at Reunion Arena.
The order to put down the metal detectors and stop checking purses and laptop bags came as a surprise to several Dallas police officers who said they believed it was a lapse in security.
Dallas Deputy Police Chief T.W. Lawrence, head of the Police Department's homeland security and special operations divisions, said the order -- apparently made by the U.S. Secret Service -- was meant to speed up the long lines outside and fill the arena's vacant seats before Obama came on.
"Sure," said Lawrence, when asked if he was concerned by the great number of people who had gotten into the building without being checked. But, he added, the turnout of more than 17,000 people seemed to be a "friendly crowd."
The Secret Service did not return a call from the Star-Telegram seeking comment.
Doors opened to the public at 10 a.m., and for the first hour security officers scanned each person who came in and checked their belongings in a process that kept movement of the long lines at a crawl. Then, about 11 a.m., an order came down to allow the people in without being checked.
Several Dallas police officers said it worried them that the arena was packed with people who got in without even a cursory inspection.
They spoke on condition of anonymity because, they said, the order was made by federal officials who were in charge of security at the event.
"How can you not be concerned in this day and age," said one policeman.
The Goal: Assassination Would Cause Disaffection With Political Process
It is simply amazing in the age of alleged U.S. Al-Qaeda sleeper cells that the Secret Service would allow thousands of people who had never been inspected to simply walk into close proximity of the man who will likely be the next U.S. President! All it takes is a grenade or a hand held automatic weapon to change American, and world history, and those in charge of preventing such a disaster are instead enabling potential assassins, and terrorist.
This is an outrage!
This so called oversight by the Secret Service is obviously the result of a plan, which was carried out upon the orders of operatives very highly placed within the U.S. government. It is clear that Senator Barack Obama's life is in grave danger, and that those in charge of protecting him are instead setting him up for an early demise..
It is well past the time for the United States to have lifted its embargo against Cuba.
The small aged Cuban exile community in southern Florida should not hold captive America's foreign policy regarding Cuba.
To those Cuban exiles I say, there will be no reclaiming of confiscated estates, it simply will not happen. You are in your late seventies, and eighties now - it is too late to claim your hotels, and beach front estates.
And to those second and third generation "Cubanos" it is time to call yourselves Americans. You were born in this nation, and you prospered here. Stop calling your fellow Americans "Americans" when you should be calling yourselves Americans. You insult this nation, and future generations of your family by denying your own nationality.
To the second, and third generation of "Cubanos" unwilling to call yourselves Americans, despite having been born in the U.S., and having lived in the U.S. for your entire lives, I will tell you now that you will never inherit the wealth which your grand parents told you was your birthright. You have no claim on properties or wealth awaiting you upon the island of Cuba. It simply won't happen. You will not walk into Cuba and "take over" one day.
Costa Verde Cuba
Fidel Castro is old, and frail, and has stepped down from power in Cuba. Fidel's brother Raul Castro is elderly too, and he will not lead forever. They are no threat to the U.S. It is now time to seek better relations with the government of Cuba so as to foster a better relationship in the post Castro years.
Now is the time to end the American embargo which has punished the people of Cuba, and failed to end the Castro regime.
Americans should be allowed to travel to Cuba, to invest in Cuba, and to trade with Cuba.
Through investment, and trade with Cuba will come increased prosperity for both Cuba, and those who do business there. Trade and investment with the U.S. would promote a positive relationship with the government of Cuba. Trade and investment with Cuba would give the U.S. tremendous influence on this island nation just sixty miles off its shores.
It is unbelievable that a nation as large, powerful, and prosperous as the U.S. is frightened of entering into a closer relationship with Cuba - but it appears most certainly true - that the U.S. is the frightened party. Just what the U.S. is frightened about after the fall of communism is the question.
Americans ask yourselves why you can buy goods in your stores made in Vietnam, as well as invest in and travel to Vietnam, but yet you can not buy goods made in Cuba, invest in Cuba, or travel to Cuba? It is by asking yourselves this question that you will realize that the embargo serves no real function - except to placate a generations of septuagenarian, and octogenarian Cuban exiles living in Southern Florida - and their children and grandchildren who refuse to call themselves Americans - despite having lived their entire lives here.
Let us sell food to Cuba, and let them sell sugar to the U.S. Let them sell exciting vacation packages at beach front resorts to U.S. citizens, and let U.S. companies sell every manner of goods, and services we can to a prosperous Cuba of the future. Let us persuade Cuba that the right path is one toward greater economic and political freedoms for their people - but let us do so as friends, not enemies.
America it is time to end your embargo against Cuba.
It was about 8:30 P.M. Friday night on April 10, 1992, when comedian Sam Kinison was killed in a head on collision with a pickup truck. Kinison had just been married a week before and was travelling from Los Angeles with his newlywed wife, Malika, to a sold out performance in Laughlin, Nevada.
Kinison was completely sober, and drug free at that point in his life, but the teenagers barreling down the wrong side of the highway that night were smashed out of their minds.
Sam had seen the truck coming, and slowed his Trans Am down to just 15 miles per hour, but he wasn't wearing his seat belt. At impact he was thrown into the windshield, and suffered multiple traumatic injuries.
In the first moments after impact Kinison seemed as if he were going to make it, but within minutes he appeared to know he was about to die.
Witnesses stated that Kinison appeared to be holding a conversation in which he stated, "I don't want to die. I don't want to die."
As the conversation continued Sam said, "But why?"
And finally, Kinison stated, "Okay, Okay, Okay".
The last "Okay" was stated in a very gentle and loving manner, as if he were talking with someone he knew, and loved.
Efforts to resuscitate him failed. He was just 38 years old.
The Question Is - Are We Ever Truly Alone?
To whom, or what was Sam Kinison conversing with while he died?
Religious Answers Arrive Quickly - But At What Cost?
For those with traditional religious beliefs the answer might come easy for a religious person could offer the explanation that Sam Kinison was speaking to God, perhaps an angel, or even the Devil, or a demon.
The problem with religious explanations is that they offer an explanation without any means to test those explanations for validity. Such answers beg for more proof, and there never has been any when it comes to claims for the existence of a God, or afterlife. Religion itself all but eliminates the intellectual discourse and the rational quest for verifiable truth about the nature of reality, and human experience. For that reason I must dismiss any religious explanations, despite how warm, and wondrous it makes me feel about life, and death. While I do not reject God, I must not accept another human being's authoritarian religious explanation for anything for it would spell my doom as a creature desirous of rationality, and intellectual integrity. If there is a God I don't see that God as scornful of the scientific method as most fundamentalist believe God must be.
For those less inclined to ascribe, or accept, religious explanations an answer comes with less certainty, so I'll offer several, and in the end I must admit that these explanations are only possibilities with an undetermined level of assigned probability.
Explanation - A Near Death Hallucination?
Victims of brain trauma may be especially vulnerable to neurotransmitter level imbalances, and it would be easy to point to hallucination as the explanation for Mr. Kinison's final conversation. We all hold an inner dialog, even without being aware of that dialog at times. Under extremely stressful situations the conscious mind could rely upon a disassociated stated to filter out perceptions which would cause shock. In fact such a mechanism if it exist could very well be the result of brain design, and evolutionary selection. Those animals capable of maintaining a level of function while in extreme distress, and injury may have one last chance to survive. An elk which continues to kick while within the clutches of a predator may get lucky, and land a severe enough blow to the predator so as to escape what would seem to be an impossible situation. Therefore a flood of speed like neurotransmitters, and pain killing opiates perhaps paired with a hallucination of running might be designed within the very circuitry of the animal brain.
Kinison's "Hallucination" Would Have Been dysfunctional
If Mr. Kinison was only experiencing a hallucination, which allowed him to handle the extreme situation which he found himself in, then why did it take the form of a conversation in which Mr. Kinison was being informed that he was going to die? Such a conversation hallucination would seem only to add to Mr. Kinison's stress at precisely the moment he would need to be calmed. Why didn't the hallucination tell Mr. Kinison that he was going to live? If near death experiences are only hallucinations meant to help people get through a stressful situation it appears to have taken a rather odd form in the case of Mr. Kinison.
Occam's Razor - Are The Simplest Solutions Always The Best?
Despite any preference for a keep it simple Occam's Razor approach, which modern science purports is the best, I suspect that our culture's limited understanding of the workings of the human brain will one day show that the simplest approach isn't always the best when it comes to understanding human mind.
While I will always refrain from endorsing a religious approach to understanding human experience I do believe it is possible that a "religious" explanation has certain advantages under certain circumstances, and this might be one. There may be some wisdom intertwined within religious beliefs which can be dissected scientifically, and which may yield some possible explanations which are more holistic, more quantum in nature than a reductionist approach based upon our current and rather primitive understanding of the human mind.
Explanation - Interface With A Second Sentient Entity
Was it just a part of himself, or was Sam interacting with an another sentient entity?
If Mr. Kinison was conversing with another sentient entity what type of entity could interact with a dying man, seemingly from within his own mind?
MultiVerse Trans Dimensional Consciousness Symbiosis
If the electro chemical computer which underpins human consciousness were in some way connected to another sentience outside the confines of the human body this might explain the death accompanying experience. Some Multiverse theories (i.e., other world theories) state that every possible time line which is possible will exist, and that each time line is yoked to the other through entanglement.
Transdimensional entanglement would have allowed the brain to evolve into a electro chemical quantum computer, capable of "feeling out" every possible result of any calculation at incredible speeds, but due to causality restrictions only the subconscious mind is able to interface directly with the multitude of dimensions. The conscious mind is provided with only a fraction of the final product of any such calculation since the conscious mind is capable of collapsing wave forms.
In alternate timelines Sam Kinison is still alive because he wore his seat belt. Thus it is possible that Sam Kinison as he approached his death in this time line was speaking to his own subconscious in another time line through the process of entanglement. The restriction on passing "information" only applies in cases in which "information" would create a paradox. In dream states, or altered states such as the near death, and death accompanying experience the conscious mind takes a back seat to the subconscious mind. The subconscious watches, but mostly in a passive sense, and therefore can not disturb a timeline through a transtemporal paradox.
The Watchers
Another possibility is that an entity possibly non-biological based upon advanced technology has developed the ability to record human thought from a distance. Possibly opening nano scale wormholes at will in far flung regions of space time. Current theory argues that such a technology may be possible. If it is possible at all and any form of sentient life managed to survive long enough then it is probable that such a connection exist without human detection.
Such a civilization would be able to automate the process of opening nano scale wormholes by yoking particle accelerators to artificially intelligent quantum computers. Entangled particles could be injected through the nano scale wormholes and act as transdimensional sensors. Transdimensional interferometers would be capable of sensing weak electromagnetic fields generated by the brain across vast oceans of space and time.
The same technology could be used to network with other quantum computers in a subspace field - that is to connect to a human mind through a technological form of telepathy. It may be possible to record thoughts, spark memory recalls and record them, and recreate them in the same way the human brain does - download human experience into an remote artificial intelligence matrix - creating an afterlife at the point of death of a human being.
This could account for the thousands of stories which are referred to as near death experiences.
Wrap Up
Just what or whom was Sam Kinison speaking to while he was dying we may never know for sure, or more likely we already know, but the possibilities are much greater than just a hallucination, or even angels. The most important aspect of this event as I see it is that each of us "knows" our own fate. It is how we choose to use that information either consciously, or subconsciously that defines our life.
To all those offended that I chose not to review a religious explanation - ask yourself what then would there have been to review? If magic is involved we have no way of understanding any aspect of an event since magic and religion excludes the possibility of human understanding of the underlying process.
Note also, that for all I know Sam Kinison may be in heaven right now, but whether he is or not I would still be asking how it is that such a heaven could exist, and how it is that a God could accomplish the preservation of individual "souls".
Photo One - Taken From Inside A Warm House Just About 9:00 P.M. Central
I took these photographs on the night of February 20th, 2008 from Jerome, Illinois. This lunar eclipse will be the last one for awhile for those living in the U.S.
Temperature outside is just 12 degrees Fahrenheit - which is bitterly cold for all those on the metric system.
Photo Two - Taken Outside - In Socks and T Shirt In The Bitter Cold
I took these a few minutes ago. The lunar eclipse is ongoing.
This time I'll put on my winter clothes, and some shoes and try to snap a few more photos of the ongoing February 20th, 2008 lunar eclipse. This will be the last lunar eclipse visible to the entire U.S. until 2010. Not sure if that means that it will be the last for North America until then, but still I want to catch some more photos.
I need to use a tripod!
Wish me luck, I'm heading back into the darkness to hunt me some more lunar eclipse photos.
O.K.
I'm back!
Here's one more.
I like this because it shows Saturn as well.
Don't ask me which one is Saturn. I believe it's the "star" on the lower left, but I'm too lazy to look it up.
Well, that's it for lunar eclipse blogging for awhile.
Aegis Missile Defense System Has Grown Increasing Sophisticated
Satellite Shoot Down A Ruse?
This is how I'd do it. Build an expensive spy satellite and build a cheap mock satellite with same exterior dimensions and approximately the same mass. Quietly store the expensive spy satellite for a future launch, without anyone including those who built the device knowing. Then launch the mock satellite in a way in which it will be justifiable to shoot it down with an anti satellite weapon.
Then cook up a story that a race is on to modify an existing anti missile system on the Aegis and the need to shoot down a large dangerous out of control satellite.
U.S.S. Lake Erie Will Attempt To Shoot Down Ailing U.S. Spysat
But why the need for a ruse at all?
Probably international pressure, more specifically from China, to assuage North Korean fears. Perhaps as a face saving measure in light of any deals made regarding North Korea ending its nuclear weapons program. Despite any recent North Korean cooperation they are suspected of constant cheating, and delays, and so the U.S. may have decided to do its own thing - but just covertly enough so as not to push all the parties away from the negotiating table.
The Aegis system is deployed near North Korea, and being able to shoot down a low orbit missile would be an excellent demonstration of U.S. resolve, and abilities.
Then again, I'm just making this whole thing up as I'm going, so perhaps none of it makes much sense. Still it could be true considering the players involved. The critical issue would be whether it works, and if shooting down a satellite is even comparable to shooting down a warhead.
Then again most anti satellite testing has been criticized for being planned in such a way as to not be a realistic assessment of the system's abilities.
Still it will be interesting to see if the Aegis system can be rapidly modified to take down an orbital satellite (low orbit).
(Photo: New York Times) The Double Headed Eagle Flag of Kosovo
What I Believe I Know About Kosovo
The U.S. formal recognized Kosovo as an independent state (February 18th, 2008), and many European nations will soon make their own announcements recognizing Kosovo's statehood. Kosovo's population is almost entire Muslim by religion, and Albanian in ethnicity. It is located in the historic heartland of Serbia, which was itself in more recent times a part of Yugoslavia. This has caused a great deal of enmity between Serbs, and Albanians as the Serbs refuse to recognize that Kosovo is now an independent state.
The Slavic Serbs, and their ethnic cousins the Russians have attempted to block international recognition of Kosovo's independent statehood. For many years the Serb dominated government of cold war state of Yugoslavia suppressed Kosovo independence by discriminating against ethnic Albanians. After the fall of the iron curtain and the break up of Yugoslavia Serbs committed genocide against Albanians, but were stopped when NATO, led by the U.S. commenced a bombing campaign which led to the fall of the Milosovich regime.
My Take On Kosovo Independence
It seems to me that if the Serbs had treated the Albanians in Kosovo properly over the years that perhaps Kosovo would still be part of Serbia.
When it comes to such matters I am no expert, but if you look at the history of the world you'll see that attempts to oppress minorities usually results in terrorism, and eventually separatist movements.
Serbia's claim that the Albanians stole their ancient homeland makes little sense when 95% of the population of Kosovo is Albanian. How this demographic shift took place isn't so much of concern as is the recognition of the end effect. Kosovo is now the newest nation in Europe, and deserves recognition. The U.S. now has a mostly muslim friend in eastern Europe, and this is a good thing sine the U.S. needs all the friends it can get in the Islamic community.
Apelike humans "have faith" that they are able to create a society capable of surviving their baser instincts, but the question is - is that even possible?
Some look at isolated examples of human cruelty and say, it's the exception, most people wouldn't act that way, but others believe human beings are deeply flawed creatures with primitive instincts which lead even the best of people in the best of times to seek to dominate, and destroy others.
NAZI Poster - Germany Had A Solution For Disabled - Sterilize & Euthanize
The thin blue line which separates civilized society from chaos is manned by an army of hard working dedicated professionals who make our streets safe by enforcing our laws, but sometimes even those charged with keeping the law, and maintaining the order reveal their own animal nature.
Good Cops Need More Training And More Pay - Bad Cops Need Firing
Our institutions are after all held together ultimately by force, or the threat of force, and in the end it is who has the bigger guns which determines what is considered acceptable, and what is not. This inescapable conclusion may not make us feel good about ourselves, but it does demand a response. What kind of people do we want making, and enforcing our laws?
I wish this on no one, it can be hell.
